<p>so im guessing if i can get an easy 5 on the AP 112 would be pretty straightforward?</p>
<p>i honestly do not know how canadian schools compare with american schools and how american school's calculus curriculum compares with cornell's haha..</p>
<p>I got a 5 on AP calc AB and found 112 difficult, even though in AP calc we covered many of 112's topics (solids of revolution, differential equations, to name a couple). May be a different case if you take calc BC in high school, and I'm not a natural at math; it doesn't come easily to me, and it's true that some people do find 112 relatively easy.
Anyway, the point is that for premed you'll want to take a math class, and if you've done calc in high school and did well you probably want to start with 112. I wouldn't start off with a 200-level like multivariable, though, because what you're really trying to do for pre-med math is get a good grade.</p>
<p>wait let's think for a minute; how many kids start pre-med and end up not making it at Cornell</p>
<p>A ton, I hear.</p>
<p>1000 take general chem, bio, physics (typical premed courses), 250 remain as premeds after 4 years.. and 200 make it. GL to us lol, bright future ahead :P</p>
<p>i dont get why so few people remain as pre-meds. im looking at the median grade range for cornell and they dont seem that bad at all. if the median grade for most of the weeder courses is a B, then how could people in pre-med (assuming they are mark grubber extraordinaires) not get over 3.5 gpa?</p>
<p>You just said it yourself. The median grade is a B (which is a 3.0). You really need a 3.4+ to be competitive. Thus, most people do not get good enough grades. Keep in mind, not everyone drops because of grades. Some people realize they don't want to go to school for 8 years, they don't want to have no lives for 8 years, they don't want to come out of school $200,000 in debt and spend half of their lifetimes paying it off, they don't want to have to work 80+ hours in residency making almost less than minimum wage on a per hour basis, and then have to work 50+ hours even after they become doctors. They don't want to spend half of their professional lives fighting off lawsuits. They want to be able to see their kids on the weekdays. They want to be able to marry before age 30. They want to be available enough to form relationships with the opposite sex. They don't want to be stuck in gross smelly formaldehyde-filled anatomy labs at 2:00 in the morning. They don't want a life in which they have more textbooks than friends. You sure the ones who stay in premed are the smart ones?</p>
<p>sweat -_-|| and you still want to be a doctor to save people's lives? Altruism lol.. hm just one thing you mentioned sounded a bit suprising to me, that a $200,000 debt takes half of doctors' lifetime to pay it off. But dont average surgents make aronud 250k-200k Per year?</p>
<p>Some things to consider:</p>
<ol>
<li><p>How many people become surgeons, dermatologists, etc.? The most number of residency spots available is still in primary care.</p></li>
<li><p>Don't forget interest. By the time you pay off your loans, you will have paid more in interest than the original loan amount.</p></li>
<li><p>It heavily depends on your ability to save. If you can't wait to drive that BMW or buy that house in the Bay Area, you're going to be in debt for a long long long time.</p></li>
<li><p>Can't forget about those undergrad loans as well ;)</p></li>
</ol>
<p>I think we're getting off topic here. Everyone knows being a doctor is not a walk in the park and only the people who truly want to become doctors end up doing it for a living. Some people do it for the bling later on in life. Some people want to join doctors without borders and save lives. Some people want the job security. And still others can't find a job being a clinical psychologist because out medical insurance system is lacking in coverage of that area so instead of pursuing that dream and getting hopelessly crushed by the harsh reality of starving psychologists they decide to become psychiatrists instead.</p>
<p>anyway, I did see that the median grade for the hon chem course is higher. whats the reason for this? anyone know?</p>
<p>Because the people in honors gen chem are chemistry geniuses.</p>
<p>My HCEC interviewer and I had a lengthy discussion about how I got owned in Chem 216. She said that one of her advisees begged for mercy after Chem 215...and Chem 215 is definitely the easier semester in the Chem 215-216 sequence.</p>
<p>norcalguy is right. The bell-curve is made so that approximately 17% of all students in BioG 101 and Chem 207 receive any form of "A" (A+, A, A-). In chem and the lecture-based bio, this means that a max. of 200 kids out of 1000 will receive any form of "A." In BioG 105/6, only around 30 students recieve any form of "A" (the class is made up of 150).</p>
<p>When you have the best and the brightest in these classes, there's natural competition. I feel that if you can make it through Cornell's premed classes while maintaining at least a 3.5 (so a B+/A- avg), you will get into medical school. Don't be cocky; the cockiest ones are weeded out first. Don't be scared of the courses, either. Forget you're premed, forget the pressure, and just try your hardest. My advice is be modest, help others in your hall/section (great way to see if you actually know the material, and you'll meet people!), always go to office hours for everything (even things you think you understand...), and do all of the assigned practice problems.</p>
<p>As a sidenote, there is a 00 course for Bio 105/6, but it doesn't really cater to the course. The lecturer is interesting and brings up plenty of out-of-context examples, but there is no correlation in attending the 00 and a better grade (I'm doing better this semester, despite not being enrolled). The whole autotutorial class is like a 00 course. Go in and get help from TAs whenever you're confused. DEFINITELY go to 00 hours for math112, however. The professor is so nice! I used to go to the sessions early and get help on homework (later in the semester, the problem sets get ridiculously impossible).</p>
<p>Don't take 215-216. If you're a non-chem major that sequence is just needlessly hard. If you're pre-med, you're looking to get good grades. This isn't like undergrad admissions, where admissions people will look at your transcript and think, Gee, so-and-so took honors chem instead of regular, that's pretty impressive. Med school wants you to have a high GPA. Also, don't take Bio105-106 unless you're REALLY self-motivated and organized! And by really I mean really really. Also, try to get a 112 prof who speaks English. That always helps.</p>
<p>when med schools recalculate GPA, how do they round A-'s? Do A-'s round to A's like A+'s do?</p>
<p>No. A-'s are still A-'s (ie they count for 3.7 grade points). The only things that "round" are A+'s.</p>
<p>O_OOOOOO</p>
<p>i thought A- count for 4.0 hahahahaha. oh god a canadian is finally exposed to the american style of grading >_></p>
<p>so i heard that A+ = 4.33 and A = 4?</p>
<p>This looks hard indeed..</p>
<p>Also do you know if grad and dental schools round off A+ too? And would you suggest me to cram biology over the summer and get placed out of the Bio Intro courses? Since Bio 200 courses have higher class median and my class schedule is pretty tight for the four years, having to fit pre-med into engineering curriculum.</p>
<p>I don't know how grad and dental schools deal with A+'s. Frankly, it's not very fair to students at schools that don't give A+'s for A+'s to count as 4.3 instead of 4.0. That's the logic behind converting them to A's. </p>
<p>I'm of the opinion that you should be chillaxing in the summer before college to avoid burnout later on. I guess if you feel that you'll have trouble squeezing all of the classes in...don't expect upper level bio courses to be any easier than intro bio though. As explained on another thread, median grades aren't everything. In upper level bio courses, you compete with people like me. In Bio 101, you compete with some pimple-faced freshman (no offense) living w/o mommy and daddy for the first time.</p>
<p>whats the dental and pharmacy school competition compared to medical school competition? obviously its roughly the same classes, but in terms of the # of people in each?</p>
<p>I just want to point out that Bio105-106 is not really an honors class of bio101/102. Even if you're stellar at bio, you'll only succeed in the autotutorial (105-106) if you have good time management skills and are not a procrastinator. It's an alternative to going to lecture 3x/week and having 3 big exams, instead you just teach yourself(no lectures) and get tested on each section.</p>