<p>Hey guys,</p>
<p>I am a rising high school senior who is planning on pursuing engineering regardless of where I go for undergrad; however, my ultimate goal is to attend med school. So my question to everyone out there is: What area of engineering should I select, if it even matters, to still remain competitive and on tract for med school. I was planning on choosing chemical engineering initially, so all comments are welcome.</p>
<p>Engineering is a bit of a double-edged sword to use for med school. On the one hand, you will have a pretty strong “safety” if you fail to get in. On the other hand, your GPA will likely suffer from an engineering program (unless you’re extremely talented and motivated, which is unlikely if you’re not staying in the field).
There’s a few good ones, but first you have to be honest with yourself: are you good enough to get into med school?</p>
<p>Yes. Straight A’s all throughout high school, 5’s on the AP Micro, Macro, English Lan/Comp, and Physics B tests last year as a junior, and I’m taking AP Calc BC, AP Physics C, AP Chem, AP English Lit/Comp, Hrs Organic Chem, and Hrs Anatomy and Physiology next year. I am motivated, hard working, and confident in my academic abilities.</p>
<p>And I didn’t just learn the material in each of my courses to barely squeak past with a 5 on my AP tests; I truly internalized and understood all of the topics covered.</p>
<p>I would say biomedical engineering would be kinda suiteable for med school, they don’t focus on the samething but they have some stuff in common</p>
<p>From what I hear, BME classes are typically curved higher (average of about 3.3 rather than 2.9-3.1 in other majors - again, just from what I’ve heard) where I go because they want their students to be able to be competitive for Med school. Probably still harder than other paths to Med school but easier than ChemE or other engineering fields if you’re trying for Med school. </p>
<p>That said, you’re probably best off doing whatever you’re most interested in. If you find ChemE more interesting than BME you should probably do that. And again, this leniency for BMEs is something that’s at my school, not necessarily your school.</p>
<p>So if I choose ChemE, would I have to take extra bio/other per-med courses to prep for med school? (ChemE is the field that most intrigues me at this point in time)</p>
<p>^Yes. Also, BME’s typically have to take additional courses as well.</p>
<p>With my school, the ChemE’s have to take an additional bio class to be premed (not sure if they /have/ to take Orgo 2, but it counts towards the major if you choose to).</p>
<p>BME’s at my school do not have to take Orgo. Additionally, a lot of med schools suggest biochem - neither ChemE or BME requires it at my school, so it would have to be an “extra” class.</p>
<p>If you’re more interested in ChemE, definitely go ChemE. It won’t be the thing that potentially stops you from getting into med school.</p>
<p>I have a friend who is a BME who wants to go to medical school. She has taken summer school for organic chemistry, and she has to take biology classes with labs in addition to the curriculum because they aren’t already integrated. My school tries to market biological engineering as pre med engineers. They have to take all pre med requirements as part of their standard plan of study. </p>
<p>And all you’d have to add at my school for ChemE to be pre med would be additional bio classes.</p>
<p>BME is the traditional engineering route to med school, though it does kinda suck if you fail to get into med school. You learn a lot, but nothing in any real depth.</p>
<p>Chemical engineering and BME are the most popular and by far the easiest. Most med schools require 2 semesters of biology (BME) and organic chemistry I & II (ChE), so choosing any other major would require considerable credits outside of your major. You can also sometimes count some biochemistry/pre-med courses towards electives for ChE and BME majors. That’s not to say you can’t choose a different major (I met an applied physics major at Cornell who’s going to Penn’s medical school), but it may require you to overload your schedule for a couple semesters.</p>
<p>You may want to ask yourself what you want to do with an MD, however. Med schools sometimes like to limit their acceptances to those they expect to become practicing physicians. If this is you intent, you may want to consider a biology/chemistry major. You really won’t use many of the engineering concepts you learned in undergrad, so your time could be better spent raising your GPA, doing research, volunteering (insert other considerations important to med school applications). If you want to medical research, an MD may not be the best choice. Some medical researchers have MD’s, but more have PhD’s, and a PhD will track you towards a research focus, whereas at medical school it may be difficult to find time for such experience in between classes, residencies and the like.</p>
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Eh, I’d qualify this statement.
BME/ChemE are the closest to Med in terms of pre-med classes, but that’s just about it. ChE especially is not really an “easy” path to med school because the major itself is pretty hard and tedious. Really, med school admission is based on 3 things:
<p>In terms of safety, ChemE is probably the best, but I wouldn’t recommend ChemE for med school because your GPA will suffer. If you’re dead set on med school and will be able to be competitive, do a liberal science and forget engineering.</p>
<p>I meant the easiest engineering major to do pre-med with. Of course biology is by far the most popular pre-med major. I would agree that if you’re certain you want to go to med school, an engineering major isn’t the best.</p>
<p>Biomedical engineering and chemical engineering do usually have the greatest overlap with pre-med courses, if that is what you mean (although there can be variation by school). But their schedules are often very crowded, so fitting in one missing pre-med course as an elective may displace a desired other elective.</p>
<p>Of course, not-very-related majors that do not have heavy requirements or time consuming lab or project courses may have plenty of breadth and free elective space to fit the pre-med courses in. Examples may include math, statistics, some humanities, some social studies.</p>
<p>One thing to watch though is for most med schools if you use AP credit you have to take a higher level class. Like if you use your AP credit to get out of chem 101 you will have to take a higher level class to “make up” that credit for med school.</p>
<p>I’m only using my AP credit to place out of first semester physics and calculus. Will I still be ok for medical school apps? I’m taking intro level chemistry and biology (biomedical engineering major here).</p>
<p>Most med schools like to see 2 semesters of physics with labs taken at a university. And many schools like to see at least 2 semesters of math. That can be stats or calc.</p>
<p>But like admission for undergrad different schools require different things. If you have an idea of what schools you may want to apply to look and see what they require.</p>
<p>Do you know if it’s common or at least not rare for medical school applicants to take lower level classes later in college when it turns out their AP credit won’t be accepted?</p>
<p>I don’t know how common that is or how well it works because most med schools like u to take more advanced classes if you use APs</p>