Change of heart: Help with my route to med school?

Pre-Med & Medical School Pre-Med Topics
1

<p>Hello everyone!
Throughout my life, I have been inclined to follow my parent's footsteps and follow the path of business. However, it is not until now that I have discovered what I really want to do, which is to help the lives of other people. After finally realizing the "what", I must now find the "how". As of right now, I have finished my first year of college with a GPA of 3.77. However, most of my classes were business-related. I figured that since it it would take me an extra year to switch from business to a science related major, I should just major in something I am really interested in and take a post-bac after I get my bachelors. I am considering in switching from business to philosophy because I am really interested in this field of study (I can also graduate in 4 years because I have junior credits already). All in all, I am wondering if this is a solid plan for my quest into medical school. I understand that I must maintain my GPA and become involved as much as possible.</p>

<p>Here are some of my additional credentials (for a lack of a better term :P):
Philanthropy Chair of my Fraternity
Weekly volunteer at a hospital
Weekly volunteer at an elementary school
Member of Green Club
Member of my school's honors program
Working 2 jobs while being a full time student
(I might be missing some since it is 4:41 AM but I am also trying to get more involved when school starts)</p>

<p>THANK YOU SERIOUSLY FOR ALL RESPONSES/ADVICE. THIS IS MY DREAM AND I WOULD WANT TO KNOW HOW TO GET THERE IN THIS TOPSY-TURVY WORLD! :P</p>

2

<p>You want a BA in Philosophy or are you going premed? Or both?
Your post is unclear.</p>

3

<p>Philosophy and being pre-med is fine. You can even keep your businees major if you want. Major is not important. Any will do.<br>
You need to take all pre-reqs, have GPA as close to 4.0 as possible (including ALL classes, music, art, paper making, whatever…), prep. for MCAT, get decent score and all the while continue with all medically related ECs as well as others in area of your personal interests (if any) and do not forget to enjoy the 4 most important years of your life.</p>

4

<p>Have you taken any science classes? Gen Chem? Gen Bio?</p>

<p>Your post is unclear. Switching to philosophy is fine – and might even help with the mcat VR – but how does that jive with a 5th and a ‘science’ major?</p>

<p>What year are you in?</p>

<p>btw: didn’t you post two months ago that you were thinking about Engineering? What happened since May to change your mind?</p>

<p>fwiw: how representative of your abilities is your SAT score of 1650? What was the math subscore? I only ask because solid math skills are required for engineering and chem. (Organic will be extremely difficult w/o visual-spatial reasoning skills.)</p>

5

<p>Sorry for being unclear but this post primarily deals with 2 issues.

  1. Switching from Finance to a BA that I am interested in (either Anthropology or Philosophy)</p>

<p>2) If this plan that I mapped would be a way to getting in medical school.</p>

<p>This upcoming semester will be the start of my sophomore year in college. I graduated high school in 2011.</p>

<p>Btw, besides volunteering at the hospital, is there any way I could get more medically related ECs?</p>

6

<p>1) No med school will care.</p>

<p>2) Can you graduate in four years AND complete the premed prereqs? If so, plan on graduating, studying for the mcat, and applying a year later.</p>

<p>3) You could use some ‘sciency’ ECs, such as lab work and/or research, and you can’t get those until you complete some science courses. </p>

<p>Check back next year after you ace Gen Chem & Bio.</p>

7

<p>I’m interested in this statement:</p>

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</p>

<p>Wouldn’t taking post-bac classes after your bachelor’s take…at least a year anyway? So would you really be saving any time with this route, if the rationale is that you didn’t want to spend a year switching from business to science?</p>

<p>Virtually every profession out there “helps people”–personally, through services, through products, etc. Medicine is pretty grueling, so you should be sure of your commitment to it before you embark on this insane journey. I personally wouldn’t consider weekly volunteering at a hospital to be a compelling enough reason to pursue medicine. If I were in your shoes, I’d want to seriously take some intro and upper level science courses to figure out if I’m cut out for the academic side of medicine.</p>

8

<p>@kristin5792 True. But after my some family issues regarding their health, I have found a passion to dedicate my life to enhancing the physical well-being/health in people. Additionally, I personally have overcome many health problems (which is a near miracle) and I really want to share my experience and implement it into the medical field. I know it may be “grueling” but I have a knack of always getting through things if I put my mind/heart into it. </p>

<p>And with regards to the post-bacc path, I feel like I could score better on the MCAT if I take the science courses right before the test. Additionally, I am in no rush, thus I would like to enjoy my undergraduate experience, taking courses I am interested in (not saying that I am not interested in science courses but I want a well-rounded education between the sciences and liberal arts) and getting involved around campus.</p>