<p>In my four years of high school, I've never taken a single biology course. I didn't really think much of it as I'm not planning on majoring in anything related to bio and when I asked my counselor about it once, she said it really didn't matter at all. However, I am planning on applying to Cornell's Engineering school for computer science (which has nothing to do with biology!) and I found on their website that engineering applicants are required to have taken a biology course -
<a href="http://admissions.cornell.edu/pdf/freshman-requirements-chart">http://admissions.cornell.edu/pdf/freshman-requirements-chart</a></p>
<p>How worried should I be? I could try to get into a bio class at a local community college second semester but is that too late/will it even count? Is it actually required or is it a strong recommendation? If its the latter, how much will it hurt me in admissions since I've never taken the class? And will I have this issue with other schools I'm applying to for engineering?</p>
<p>The main reason I never took it was because I moved after my freshman year and at my old school bio is a junior class whereas at my new school it's a freshman class...</p>
<p>Tell Cornell when you apply why you don’t have Bio on your transcripts. I think they have a place where you can add comments in their app. I really don’t think it’s that big of a deal if you’re going into Engineering, especially after hearing your reason (changing schools). You could have your counselor add that in her/his rec for you as well.</p>
<p>I would do it at a community college or over the summer. It is a requirement, according to your chart. You may be able to either get it waived or take it at Cornell (or other University), but the most straightforward is to do it before you arrive on campus.</p>
<p>I would have your counselor write about it in her LOR. She could detail the current scheduling restrictions and how those combined with those of your former school made it a challenge to even fit biology in. </p>
<p>Why don’t you instead apply to computer science within Cornell’s College of Arts and Sciences? CAS requires 3 years of science but doesn’t specify biology. The computer science curriculum will be the same; the only difference will be the college’s individual distribution requirements.</p>
To anyone in the future who’s in a similar situation - i ended up emailing admissions and they told me that they added bio as a “requirement” on the chart due to the increased proportion of high-schoolers taking the class but it’s not very emphasized in admissions for non-bio related majors. Actually, I just recently got a likely letter for comp sci in the school of engineering!
I think it because engineering schools think that you will be taking science all four years…a typical sequence is Bio, Chem, Physics and then AP one of those.