Scared for college rigor?

bernie12
Sun, 08 Jun 2014 14:34:21 +0000

@6ofhearts‌ : It’s competitive, but there is plenty of grade inflation and learning resources past the introductory courses/pre-health core to help students succeed (or at least make them appear as if they succeed) at these sorts of schools. I wouldn’t really be afraid. Just go do your best. These places have high med. school placement and the science curriculum is problem stronger which means you’ll learn how to think about science better at schools like those 2. Medical schools don’t really care about what you learn so much as the grades you make in classes, but the MCAT certainly cares, and most of all, so should you. Don’t go to any school and just have “pre-med syndrome” the whole time where literally everything you do and every course you choose has medical school admissions influencing you. Get your money’s worth and come out stronger than what you are now based on you HS background. This isn’t easy (balancing the need to get a high GPA and actually attempting to challenge yourself and learn), but is totally worth it if you are actually willing to do the work or think hard without viewing it as the “teachers making it so hard for us to be a doctor”. They aren’t, they are just trying to develop students’ minds and toughen them up along the way. Also, don’t underestimate some state schools. Sometimes there can be much less room for error because they won’t curve more difficult science courses as generously. Rice and Duke will typically curve pre-health science cores to B- or B just all the other reputable southern universities, whereas some state school instructors will surprise, make the course harder than what you may have gotten at the private school and then set the curve at C or C+. Even a student far above average incoming stats. wise may have a hard time getting an A because clearly difficult college courses are not like high school and usually are not giving completely objective exams (multiple choice, matching, fill in blank, pointed short answer), so your SAT will not really end up mattering (SAT problems are readily predictable. In difficult college courses, they are trying throw “curveball” or very challenging applied problems where deep learning is needed as opposed to the methods more commonly used to study in HS or for the standardized admissions tests).

As for those 2 schools (I checked their courses out using coursehero or stumbled upon course websites online) I would more or less watch out for the physics and math courses. Biology is fine at both (though intro. biology at Duke is annoying because with some it’s multiple choice, and not the easy multiple choice. Not much room for error there and no partial credit available. Advanced courses are like most top schools…where you still have a decent chunk of faculty teaching pure lecture style and designing HS like exams that focus on lower cognitive skills and then you have some that are definitely focusing on problem solving and building analytical ability. You should take a mixture. If you have done well in HS, you may have to adapt to the latter courses, but they will help train your mind for MCAT passages and then you can use the other classes to GPA pad if possible). Gen. chem at both is pretty standard (harder at places like WashU and Dartmouth). OChem at both is somewhat challenging but places such as Harvard, Chicago, Northwestern, WashU, Emory, Princeton, Stanford, Caltech, and MIT are much harder as (probably because of who they have teaching. Also, many of these schools give intensive evening exams whereas most Rice and Duke instructors are clearly designing shorter, less thorough in-class exams) those schools are much more about the tedious and curveball prompts on assessments. Advanced courses beyond that are anyone’s guess. But this is what I can gauge about the pre-health core at both. Outside of physical science and math, they appear as doable if not more doable than other top schools. They are challenging but not overwhelming, which is honestly good for you. If you do what you’re supposed to do, you’ll learn a lot and be competitive for med. school. These schools are clearly among the pre-med friendly whereas some (namely HYCPCtM) of the schools listed above are more “science/pre-grad” friendly and science courses across the board are almost unusually challenging (the only protective factor you have at those places is the inflation because the content will really really make even a solid student sweat at many of these places and on top of that, P, M and C have not that much inflation) and there usually are not “easy” instructors to run to if you feel uncomfortable about a certain course. If you’re worried about stuff like that. Those 2 schools put you in a better position than many others.