ill be following the pre-med program and major in biochemistry and planning to graduate in 4 years.
minimum hours at my college are 12, but how many hours should I take if I will be working a part-time job?
Thank you!
Does your college publish four year academic plans by major?
I’m guessing 12 credits per semester would not be enough to graduate in 4 years.
How many hours/week will you be working?
Taking fewer than 12 credit hours will bump you down to part-time status which will impact your financial aid and may disqualify you from living in the dorms.
Do you have AP/IB scores that have given you advanced standing or credit for required coursework?
If you look on the Biochemistry department page at your college, there will list of required course along with a suggested schedule you’ll need to take to graduate in 4 years. Start there and then make a spreadsheet setting up a tentative schedule that will include all major coursework, co-reqs for your major, GE requirements and pre-med requirement not included in your major.
You will probably want to start out your first semester by taking a slightly lower course load to give yourself time to adjust to the college workload. Be sure to talk to your advisor when you get to college for orientation.
D1 & D2 usually took 16-18 credits/semester. YMMV. (They both had jobs during the semester too.)
Minimum credits for graduation is usually 120 to 128 at schools using semesters and having 12 credits as the minimum full time load.
But 12 per semester will require 10+ semesters instead of 8. So you need to average 15 or 16 per semester to finish in 8 semesters.
Yes sophomore orientation is next month I think @bodangles
ill go with 16 I think @WayOutWestMom
https://fulbright.uark.edu/advising-center/_resources/pdf/2016newcore/chembs-bios-2016.pdf this is the catalog for biochem
may I ask if working affected their grades somehow? @WayOutWestMom
So it says 120 credits to graduate. Therefore, you need to complete 15 credits per semester on average.
If you will be going into your frosh year at Arkansas, your first semester as a biochemistry major may look something like this:
MATH 2554 Calculus I (or a higher or lower math course based on placement testing or AP score)
CHEM 1213/1211L Chemistry for Majors I
BIOL 1543/1541L Principles of Biology
UNIV 1001 required for frosh
non-science general education course
Not really. D1’s weakest trimesters were due to adjusting to college and family/personal issues. (Her dad & grandfather both had received terminal cancer diagnoses. Not a good year for any of us.) She wasn’t working at the time. D2 always blamed her weakest semesters not on the fact she was working, but because she was taking 23-24 credits and spread herself too thin academically.
S didn’t work first year at our suggestion. (I’m sure he had no problems agreeing). His GPAs were below 3.2 at end of first year. He worked PT last 3 years before he applied (10 hours week). I think working played an enormous part in him getting into med school, if anything it sharpened his time management skills. He typically took 15/16 units per term, except 12 (all UD bio course) during term he took MCAT. As a premed taking 15/16 units per semester, you should be able to handle a PT job (10 hours a week) without breaking a sweat. I don’t say that because I think a premed is necessarily some kind of superman/superwoman, it’s just that you have way more free time than you think.
Take about 14 credits first semester then move to 15-16.
If you work, limit that to about 6-8 hours first semester. Increase that to 10-12 max after that.
Remember that for med school, slow and steady wins the race.
It depends on what kind of part-time job. If it is on-campus work-study job, you typically can study when things are slow, or even skip work for midterm/final. If it is off-campus job, you don’t have that luxury and it can impact your grades if not handled properly.