<p>Ok, so just to begin- I LOVE to learn. I would give up almost anything to be in the classroom and learning! I have close to a full tuition scholarship at my college which I want to utilize to the fullest degree!</p>
<p>I'm a Sophomore almost done with the Biology requirments(Typical premed but I LOVE Biology). Since I have a scholarship which is paying for my schooling and I love learning, I would rather stay in school than graduate early. To be honest, I'm not too worried about hurting my GPA. However, I'm stuck in a dilemma because I don't know what to do.</p>
<p>My options are:</p>
<p>1.) Double major-Biology and Psychology
2.)Major in Biology with Minors in History(Concentration in Middle Eastern/Islamic Studies) and Psychology</p>
<p>I know, I know, I should choose what my heart wants to do but I would like to do both. Each option has its benefits but there isn't a particular option that I want more than the other. In this case, do I pick the double major simply to show more dedication? However, I have seen a lot of premed bios and I've realized a lot of premeds have also gone this route so would I really stand out? What could I do with a double major outside of medicine right after undergrad? I'm genuinely interested in history, have been, and will always be, yet I have always feared a college course would be me sitting listening to a teacher blabber for hours on end.</p>
<p>My ultimate goal is to go to medical school. My main weakness is poor/few extracurriculars which I'm trying to supplement by a more colorful academic record.</p>
<p>Double major, double minors or any combination thereof will do nothing to improve your chances at getting accepted into med school. It won’t make you stand out from the pack. Simply put–med schools don’t care about your major. Or your minor. </p>
<p>OTOH, having few and weak ECs will have a definite negative impact of your admission chances.</p>
<p>Supplementing weak or non-existent ECs with more academics really won’t help you at all.</p>
<p>~~~</p>
<p>P.S. if you really want to pick up a second major to improve your employability outside of medicine–mathematics or statistics. Neither psych nor history will improve your employment prospects.</p>
<p>Part of the amen chorus: forget about the double-anything, get working on the ECs now. Your academic record will not make up for the lack of ECs, shadowing, etc. And you don’t mention your GPA; if it’s solid, you still need to do well on your MCAT. So forget the double-stuff-won’t help your med school apps-study hard for the MCAT and get started-today-on significant ECs.</p>
<p>From what I read, the best thing to do is to maintain a stellar GPA, esp in the sciences, and make sure you do the extracurriculars expected of a pre-med. If a medical school accepts you, they want to make sure you will become a doctor. So they want someone who has volunteered in medical settings, especially those that expose you to patients so you know what you are getting into. THey may want some diversity in their classes, so IF you have the first two covered, then exploring a non sciency major certainly wouldn’t hurt.</p>
<p>Lol, well what I meant to say was that I DO have extracurriculars but nothing that a typical Bio major wouldn’t have(eg: research, volunteering, clinical exposure). I am working on getting something more meaningful though. I thought <em>maybe</em> an interesting academic minor or major might separate me from the rest of the Bio majors. It wouldn’t hurt me bc I already have the full tuition scholarship at my school AND I love to learn!!</p>
<p>I keep on reading posts on CC and SDN that say that there is fierce competition among Bio majors when it comes to admissions because there is just too many of them! Two of my professors have also told me that if I’m serious about medical school- I should pursue something outside of Biology. One has even urged me to go into Bioinformatics–you know just to seem more interesting to admissions.</p>
<p>Seriously, your major won’t make any difference to adcomms. Yes, alot of bio majors apply to med school. (In part because there is lovely overlap between biology degree requirements and med school admission requirements. Also because people who want to be docs are often passionately interested in the biological sciences.) But alot of bio majors get accepted.</p>
<p>An unusual major or minor might be one of several talking points during interviews should you get that far in the process, but a unusual major by itself won’t get you and interview.</p>
<p>IOW, an adcomm member isn’t going to read your app and say–Hey a biostats major! We haven’t interview one of those yet this year. What the heck–let invite him. I’m tired of talking with bio majors.</p>
<p>I suggest you go do first hand research by looking at the data at AAMC about the percentages of various major accepted into med school. </p>
<p>There is fierce competition among all majors. Bioinformatics might be good if you like it not because it would help with admissions but because it is becoming more and more prominent in biomedical research.</p>