<p>At my school (University of Pittsburgh), organic chemistry is considered a weeding out course. Until I took it I had a 4.00 but I got a B in orgo 1 (A in the lab) and I'm looking at a low A, or high B for Orgo 2 this semester. </p>
<p>But I don't know what weeding out really means? Does not getting an A mean you are being weeded out? Like you need an A to show you can handle medical school?</p>
<p>Or is failing mean you are weeded out?</p>
<p>No one has ever explained the concept to me.</p>
<p>i guess the concept of a weed out course is a combination of the following</p>
<p>the course is extremely difficult to do well in and obviously you need to do well to be a successful pre-med
the course makes people want to not be doctors anymore since they would rather not continue on the path with the other pre-med classes after experiencing this one</p>
<p>Although to be honest I find it a little hard to believe you don’t know and I think you are just humble bragging (for example you could have asked this without saying you’re getting an A in the class)</p>
<p>Honestly, I had my advising meeting the other day and she asked what I was getting in orgo because it was a “weeding” out course. When I told her I might get a B she said I should work a little harder because it would be a lot better if I got an A. That’s when I started wondering if getting a B wasn’t good enough. No lie.</p>
<p>At a large competitive public school, DD saw classmates get C- and be unable to move on to the next course, and sometimes get dropped from their science major. It is a weeder in that it likely has a large class of smart kids with an intense curve, if most of the students were straight As in HS AP classes, all of a sudden you will see people with Fs, Ds, Cs who have never seen one before.</p>
<p>This was especially brutal in quarter systems where the students needed three classes for the year of coursework. They had less time to recover from a bad time and three chances to get a bad grade.</p>
<p>At D’s UG it was the very first Bio class that was known as weed out. Yes, your very first semester at college. I believe it is the best way, the earlier the better. Good number of Honors kids have switched from pre-med after this class. most of them did not fail, they simply realized that any studies related to this class is NOT for them. This way, they did not loose the whole year or even couple. We had known abou the class way before D. started, buzz was going thru the Honors dorm. However, some others have pursued pre-med after receiving a C in this class and eventually have applied to Med. School. In addition to weeding out, the class also taught everybody to make a huge adjustment to your study habit even if you were valedictorian from the private prep. HS</p>
<p>Weeder classes also often have a strict limit on the number of As per class. (10%, 15%, 20% for example.)</p>
<p>At D2’s university, in weeder classes only 15% of all students got A’s, 15% got Bs, 50% got Cs and the rest got Ds or Fs. Grading was on curve so your success depended on being better than the person sitting next to you.</p>
<p>With 4 semesters of intense weeding going on in the chem sequence, the pre meds dropped like flies…</p>
<p>There used to be joke passed around the dorms at her school: during freshman orientation, everyone is a pre-med. [Then they take gen chem.] By winter breaks, everyone’s a a econ major. [Then they take Calc 2.] By summer, everyone’s a sociology/anthropology/business/your choice here major…</p>