Hi, first post!!
I am a current senior in high school applying for college in CA, but I am a bit conflicted as to what major I should choose when applying to schools such as UCB and Stanford. I realize that both majors can be very competitive, but the real problem I am finding is in the potential careers I can pursue with these majors. Ideally, I would like to pursue a career in the medical field, but my father, an engineer, believes I have a better chance at finding a well-paying job with an engineering degree. I have read that most if not all engineering degrees require a high level of understanding in math and physics. I took AP Chem, AP Bio, and AP Calc AB, receiving 4’s on all exams. Any advice is appreciated!!(-:
Engineering will kill your gpa,if you’re planning on going to med school
I agree with your father. It will be easier to find a well-paying job with an engineering degree.
If your thinking of medical school go with biochemistry, since med school is primarily based on that subject. Biomedical Engineering is a GPA killer, but if that is your passion go for it.
Believe it or not, medical schools actually teach enough biochemistry. Some of the most successful and happy physicians I know have “other” undergraduate degrees.
For Berkeley specifically, bioengineering appears to be one of the most competitive majors in frosh admission, while molecular and cell biology (which includes biochemistry) is in the less competitive College of Letters and Science.
Recent graduate surveys by major from Berkeley are at the “What can I do with a major in … ?” links at https://career.berkeley.edu/Survey/Survey . Bioengineering tends to do better than molecular and cell biology, but it does seem that 2014 bioengineering graduates did significantly better than in the past (when bioengineering graduates historically did worse than most other engineering graduates).
No specific major is required to do pre-med, although engineering majors other than bioengineering may be more difficult to fit the pre-med courses into than many other majors.
Be aware that only about half of pre-meds who apply to MD medical schools in the US get admitted to any. Of course, many intended pre-meds drop the idea after not getting a high enough college GPA or MCAT score. Since many pre-meds are some kind of biology major, the ones who did not get into medical school flood the biology job market.
You might want to do more research. Stanford apparently doesn’t have a biochem program, but a biology degree with a biochem/biophys focus. I doubt it would be much easier than a bioE curriculum. A quick look at their curriculum charts shows that all of the core bioE and bio courses (except “ethics in bioE” and 2 programming classes) overlap, and some of their electives do as well - so your first ~2 years would be close to identical in either major.
In general, it depends on what you’re good at. If you graduate from an elite school, your job prospects from bioE/biochem/bio/chem/chemE will be fairly similar and differentiated mostly by your internship experiences. At most universities your first 2 years will be close to identical, so expect your sophomore GPA to be similar in either bio or bioE. After that, you have electives - some people find engineering electives easier because they are applied, whereas others prefer bio and biochem because they are mostly theory.