So I am in a bit of a confusion here.
I was thinking of being a computer scientist, but now I really want to be a doctor (specifically orthopedic surgeon). The problem is I have taken 4 APs (Comp Sci, Econ, Stats, and English) which are mostly math classes. I also take pre-calculus. I have done very well in chemistry (A both semesters) but I got a C- and B- 1st and 2nd semester of Bio freshman year (realized how important school was after so I screwed up). I also hate bio and it might have been because I had a bad teacher but I just don’t like science in general but I still really want to be a doctor. So, my question is, is it bad that i’m not taking any science classes (i’m currently taking physics rn) such as bio or GBBE? I can also retake biology so it will overwrite the grade. I’m just confused on what to do because I am really good at math and I also want to take more AP comp sci classes as well as calc but I have to choose between one or the other (or split them). Also, I am like 99% sure I can get As in those math classes and less confident in the science was (almost 100% I will get a B in AP bio and chem because the teachers are both very bad). Finally, I wanted to mention is it worth it to take the AP exams for math? Will it save me money even im going into medical field. I know this is a lot but if some people could answer this I would really appreciate it as I am not good with this stuff.
GPA: 3.4 (screwed up freshman year 2.5 1st semester but taking as many APs i can get As in to boost it up)
Currently: 3rd year, junior, 11th grade
You are in 11th grade. Please understand that the vast majority of “premed” college freshman NEVER apply to medical school.
My opinion…it’s way too early for you to be so sure that medical school is your thing.
And frankly…you will also need to decide you like sciences to be a medical school student. My opinion.
My advice…finish high school. Then go to college and take courses…see what piques your interest. If it ends up being Medicine…you can take the required courses and go from there.
OK, there’s a lot to unpack in your wall of text. (Hint–if you want people to read & respond to your post–use paragraphs. It’s also helpful if you can list specific questions.)
There’s a saying about med school & medicine as a career–if you think you can be happy doing ANYTHING else beside medicine, do the other thing.
Medicine is a very long haul – you’re looking at spending 4 years in colleges trying to be at/near the top of your college class. (median GPA for accepted med students is 3.7+), while engaging in a variety of expected ECs (clinical volunteering, community service, physicians shadowing, taking on leadership roles in your clubs and activities, doing research, etc) Then should you end up among the fortunately few who earn a med school acceptance, you’ll have another 4 years of med school followed by 3-10 years of additional training (called residency & fellowship)–all of this before you’re allowed to practice medicine independently.
4 years (undergrad) + 4 year (med school) + 4 years (ortho residency) = 12 years
Comp science has a much shorter training path. You can find challenging, well-compensated employment immediately after undergrad.
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if you don’t like bio, then med school is going to be a very, very loooong 4 years. It’s nothing but bio and biochem, plus more bio and more biochem. (There is no math or physics in med school, alas–which made my math major daughters quite sad…they said they really missed doing math. But just isn’t any in med school.) The admission exam for med school tests biology, biochemistry, organic chemistry, inorganic chemistry, psychology, sociology, and ethics with a smattering of statistics and physics questions.
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it is extremely unlikely that you will end up an orthopedic surgeon. If that’s the ONLY area of medicine that appeals to you–find a different career path. 75% of freshmen pre-meds never apply to med school. Of the remaining 25% who do apply, 60% will fail to get a single medical school acceptance.
Orthopedics is among the top 3 most competitive specialties in medicine. Only those with the very highest standardized scores and med school grades are even considered–and only 85% of those top students find a training position.
If you wouldn’t be happy as family medicine/general practice doctor—DON’T GO TO MED SCHOOL.
RE: Not taking AP bio or chem in high school.
Bad, bad idea for a pre-med. Why? Because you will be competing against students in college who have taken both for the elusive As you need to earn GPA that will get you considered by med school admission committee. (Average GPA and sGPA for accepted med students was 3.7+ last year.)
Also if you can't stomach AP bio or AP chem in high school, how in the world are you ever going to get through 4 years of bio-and-chem- intensive coursework required to fulfill med school admission requirements?
Bad teachers---you've used that excuse A LOT in your post. Strong students succeed based upon their effort and aptitude, not because they had a good teacher. You should be able to earn a good grade even if you have a "bad" teacher. (Though I will admit having a teacher who is disorganized and lacking the ability to explain concepts cogently makes earning good grades much harder.) But realize that in college, the responsibility for your success (or failure) rests squarely on your shoulders. No one is going to spoon feed you the material. You will be more or less expected to learn the material on your own. Ditto for med school. Maybe the time to start developing those skills is now.
Taking the AP exam may or may not save you money in the long run.
Some med schools will not accept AP credit to fulfill admission requirements.
The rest require or strongly recommend (which in med school speak = require ) that applicants with AP credit take additional upper level credits in the same field as the credits. (So if you take AP Calc AB and score a 5, then you’d still need to take a full year of additional math credits in college to be competitive applicant.)
So the question boils down to---what do you REALLY want to do?
If you are committed to medicine, you need to take advanced level bio and chem in high school, even if puts a hit on your GPA.
If you want to fluff up your GPA so you can be a more competitive applicant for college, then you ought to take the math classes where you're sure you can earn As.
BTW, med schools don't even look at your high school grades so retaking classes isn't going to help you achieve your goal to be orthopedic surgeon.
I strongly suggest that if think you may want to pursue medicine that you do 2 things:
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shadow some physicians so you can see first hand what their job is like. It’s not glamorous or exciting. It’s repetitive, routine, frustrating and often very stressful.
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volunteer somewhere where you can interact with people who are sick, injured, or mentally or physically disabled. Many hospitals do not allow under-18 year old volunteers, but try nursing homes, summer camps for mentally or physically disabled children, day care centers for the elderly,
If you hate those activities, then you know you’re not cut out for a career as physician.
“I really want to be a doctor”
“I just don’t like science in general”
The science requirements for a premed student are quite tough. I am sympathetic with the notion that you had a bad teacher for freshman year bio, and that might have harmed both your grades in the class and the degree to which you liked the class. As such it might make sense to take another biology class in high school and see if you like it better. However, you are going to need to do very well in a large number of very difficult science classes in university if you want to have any chance at getting into medical school. The path to becoming a doctor is also a very long and difficult and expensive one.
“I am really good at math”
That bodes very well for you doing well in computer science. Both are very logical and somewhat abstract. You might want to also think about some form of engineering or operations research (which is sort of a use of applied math).
“My advice…finish high school. Then go to college and take courses…see what piques your interest.”
Exactly. You are quite young. You have a lot of time to consider multiple possible majors.
Always start with your strengths. When your interests and strengths collide take them apart: what is it, exactly, about being an orthopedic surgeon that appeals to you? Is it physically doing surgery? is it finding ways to fix things? is it the status? the income? etc. Then try to figure out other ways to get the pieces that matter to you. For example, biomedical engineering might be a happy place (btw, it’s still a very competitive field, but within it there are places that are pretty mathy, notably engineering mathematics).
If you don’t like science, you are going to find medicine a very unhappy place- but is it all science you don’t like? My physics collegekid, chose physics b/c she doesn’t like the ‘messiness’ of biology 
And really, this is not a dragon you need to slay today: as others have said, start by getting into college.
Thank you for clearing this up for me. The main reason why I wanted to be an orthopedic surgeon was because I really wanted to get into surgery more and I would really like to help people on that end. Is it only orthopedic surgeons that’s for the best of the best? What about surgeon fields in general? Will it still be as hard? If you really need to be the best of the best to be a surgeon, I don’t think i’m cut out for med school.
All the surgical subspecialties (orthopedics, urology, plastic & reconstructive surgery, cardio-thoracic surgery, neurosurgery, otolaryngology, ophthalmology, even colo-rectal surgery) are extremely competitive–only the best of the best qualify.
General surgery is a medium competitive specialty, but still there are no guarantees that you’ll have the grades and exam scores (or the aptitude & physical skills) to match into it.
Surgical training requires very long hours during residency. 80-100 hours/week is pretty typical.
There are many, many ways to help people and 99.9% don't involve being a doctor or surgeonMedical school is HARD work for just about every student. And it doesn’t matter what specialty you eventually choose. Med school students all take the same courses when in Med school.
If you don’t like sciences…you aren’t going to like medical school.
Maybe you don’t understand this.
In medical school, there are NO elective courses…or choices of courses or sections. The sequence, and course of study are the same for all Med school students at a school. The students don’t get to pick and choose.
EVERYONE takes a very science heavy course load. Everyone.
Oh…and there are a LOT of tests too. Lots of them.
And you can’t spread your coursework over more years, taking a lighter load. That’s not allowed either.
honestly, that’s not the problem. My problem is that I want to go into the medical field to SPECIFICALLY be a surgeon. If I can’t do that then med school is not for me
So…what happens if you go to medical school…and you don’t make the grade for a match to a residency in surgery? You know…it’s a very competitive specialty…and there is NO guarantee that is where you will land after Med school. No guarantee at all.
@WayOutWestMom am I missing the boat on this?
Sorry if I missed this, but what is it about surgery that has you really hooked?
General surgery, especially if one is willing to train at smaller community hospital programs in the South and Midwest, is moderately competitive (meaning there are enough training slots for every person who qualify for & want to study surgery) but requires Step 1 (national standardized exam) scores substantially above the national average. (Mean Step 1 score for general surgery is 236. Minimum passing STEP 1 is 192 and the national average Step 1 scores Is 220. ) This is for allopathic grads only. Osteopathic grads are much less likely to match into surgery than allopathic grads. (For lots of reasons that really aren’t pertinent to this discussion.)
There is absolutely ZERO guarantee that you will have the standardized scores, grades & recs that will allow you to Match into a general surgery residency when you are a MS4.
As I said before, if you are ONLY willing to do surgery, don’t go to med school since there is a fairly substantial chance that you won’t qualify.
If you interested in surgery, there are some other careers that you get into the surgical suite with a shorter training period and less uncertainty
Surgical nurse--RN or BSN required
<a href="https://www.discovernursing.com/specialty/perioperative-surgical-nurse#.W5sFaC2ZOu4">https://www.discovernursing.com/specialty/perioperative-surgical-nurse#.W5sFaC2ZOu4</a>
Physicians assistant -- PAs can specialize just like physicians do. PA is MS level program. PAs can work in any medical fields, but PAs who want to specialize can do a 1 year residency-type training program. There are 5 year direct-entry from high school PA programs. PA school is competitive, but not as competitive as med school.
<a href="https://explorehealthcareers.org/career/medicine/physician-assistant/">https://explorehealthcareers.org/career/medicine/physician-assistant/</a>
<a href="https://www.thepalife.com/direct-entry-and-dual-degree-bsms-physician-assistant-programs/">https://www.thepalife.com/direct-entry-and-dual-degree-bsms-physician-assistant-programs/</a>
Surgical technician--requires EMT certification plus additional training depending upon state certification requirements
<a href="https://explorehealthcareers.org/career/allied-health-professions/surgical-technologist/">https://explorehealthcareers.org/career/allied-health-professions/surgical-technologist/</a>
Stryker medical equipment sales representative. Stryker is the largest manufacturer of orthopedic equipment and devices in the US. Requires a BA/BS in medicine-related field plus 1-2 years of sale experience. Stryker reps often are present in the OR when their devices are being used and advise surgeons on their use. <a href="https://careers.stryker.com/en-US/page/sales-jobs">https://careers.stryker.com/en-US/page/sales-jobs</a>