<li><p>What do you think is the best field of grad school to attempt at Columbia (law school, med school, business school)? Which does Columbia have the best success rate in? (For example, Columbia students may have better rates of acceptances at the top law schools rather than the med schools.)</p></li>
<li><p>Where can I find information about the stats of people accepted into grad schools and where they got into?</p></li>
<li><p>Is it common and okay to be completely undecided? It appears that once you enter college as a freshman you’re forced to take certain courses based on your desired major/concentration. Premeds are required to take Chem and Calc. It appears your path has been decided even before you start college.
Is it common for people to turn completely 180 and decide they want to go to law school 3 years down the line? And is this harmful to their applications?</p></li>
<li><p>What are the advantages to taking an accelerated course if you can get better grades in the lower-level course?</p></li>
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<li>Why don't you go to grad school (or not) in a field you want to work in? Are you that indifferent about being a doctor versus being a lawyer that you're going to choose one career path over another based on the fact that one might be slightly easier? You can't go to b-school right away, so that's out of the question.</li>
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<p>If you do well at Columbia and do well on the standardized tests (LSAT, MCAT, GMAT, GRE, etc.), you'll be able to get into a good grad program. Columbia's not going to be any better or worse at placing its students in grad school than its peer schools. It's likely much harder to get into a top medical school than a top law school, no matter where you go.</p>
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<li><p>USNews grad school rankings.</p></li>
<li><p>It's 100% OK to be undecided, and relatively common. Yes, medical school requires a number of courses, but you're not requred to even major in a science. Law and business schools don't require anything in particular, so you could major in whatever you want. There's nothing "harmful."</p></li>
<li><p>Why said you can get better grades in the lower-level course? That's a bad assumption. Are we talking about Acc Physics or Intensive/Organic Chem?</p></li>
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<li>Yes- accelerated chem vs. general chem. I would assume that the more apt students take the accelerated path and the kids in general chem are less good at chemistry. So with a curve, you would do better in the easier course. Am I right?</li>
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<p>Those are bad assumptions.</p>
<p>First, "a curve" doesn't mean that every class has the same curve. It's totally set by the professor. I don't know who is teaching regular and intensive this year and whether one class will have an easier curve. I took intensive organic, and the professor seemed to be very generous with the curve probably because the class was filled with many of "the cream of the crop"-type students.</p>
<p>Second, there are plenty of "apt students" who take the regular gen chem class, for whatever reason. Some take it because they think it's going to be an easy A (sort of like what you're thinking). Some just don't want to be bothered with taking an annoying chemistry test during orientation week when everyone else is out getting hammered. Some want to take a 2-semester class (to fill science requirements in CC, for example) rather than a 1-semester class.</p>
<p>Thank you Columbia2002</p>