<p>I know that it isn't the best idea to take summer courses at an "easier" university, but what if I take physics and math during the summer at my regular institution? I assumed this would be fine, but I have recently heard that admissions committees might look down on me for doing this.</p>
<p>If you are going to take anything in the summer take something to fulfill a core requirement not a pre-med requirement.</p>
<p>What do you guys think about taking summer pre-med courses at your home university (top 20 school) during the summer? Particularly taking introductory bio and lab over the summer? Thanks.</p>
<p>"If you are going to take anything in the summer take something to fulfill a core requirement not a pre-med requirement."</p>
<p>It's not the best to do it. But it is ok, if you have to. </p>
<p>Reasons are:
1) it's definitely noticed if you take it an "easier" college (i.e. princeton students taking orgo at the community college)
2) premed courses are often on a curve, and the group of students is often of lower caliber over the summer
3) many summer courses are condensed
4) summer classes are often not taught by regular faculty, but adjunct lecturers, so if you decide to get a letter of rec then that will be reflected in it.</p>
<p>By the same token, though. Doing it only makes admissions look more carefully at your curriculum, it's just looked at with the above things in mind. It doesn't really hurt you.</p>
<p>I know that it wouldn't be as good an idea to take pre-req courses over the summer, but do Medical schools care how many non-pre-req courses you take over the summer?</p>
<p>How about taking English courses over the summer? It would be fulfilling both the English requirement for medical schools and a writing requirement for my college.</p>
<p>I took General Chemistry II and Biology II over the summer at my home institution and recieved A’s in both. I then went on to Organic Chemistry and Genetics during Fall term and received A’s in both, so I couldn’t imagine them thinking any less of my two summer courses when I have A’s in subsequent higher level courses. As long you can pull off an A in the next class (if there is one), you would probably be fine. But, if you can at all avoid taking pre-med courses over the summer, I would advise doing that.</p>
<p>There have been people who took physics at a community college, still did well on the MCAT and got into a good med school. I don’t see how taking either math or physics at a local 4-year school would make any difference. Both of those subjects are more or less the same everywhere.</p>
<p>make up for it with a kickass MCAT score…it will put any doubts to rest</p>
<p>You’ve had several people who are either in med school (bluedevilmike) or are parents of someone in med school (me) advise against it. We’ve been through the process and are not speculating on the outcomes and have no agenda other than to share what we know has already worked.</p>
<p>Med school applications result in such a low percentage of interviews offered and an even lower percentage of acceptances. Why take a chance on having ANYTHING in the application that could count against you if it came down to accepting you or another person? You will NEVER know why you didn’t get an interview; it doesn’t make sense to knowingly do something to weaken your profile and chances.</p>
<p>Also, and not trying to fuel flames here,but since this is a totally anonymous site, who’s to know how many bad pieces of advice are being given out as part of an agenda to potentially hurt others and reduce competition? Think about it…med school is known to attract some very cut throat individuals.</p>
<p>BTW: There are plenty of people with “kickass MCATs” that don’t get into med school. It takes a very complete and balanced application to make the final cut.</p>
<p>for what it’s worth, my pre-med advising office says that it isn’t recommended, but that if you do you should take no more than one (total, ever). I, for example, took a summer pre-med requirement at my home school (top 20 U) while doing emt training</p>
<p>This makes me kind of upset. If you take a summer course at your home university, you’ll get the same caliber class. It will be condensed, but you cover all the content. If anything, this is harder. I’ve talked to my pre-med advisor and he says that becuase of the timing of classes and goals for graduation, taking summer pre-meds won’t negatively affect an app. Classes are a small piece of the application puzzle. </p>
<p>Summer courses are a necessity. Discrimination because of them would be quite questionable.</p>
<p>They want to see you take orgo and such classes as part of a full courseload. It is much easier to take a single class over the summer rather than 5 courses over a semester. That’s why summer classes are suspicious. Secondly, the people who take summer courses at my school are typically the weaker students (students who either were taking light loads during the school year or had to drop a class during the school year) so your competition isn’t quite as good (meaning your A is summer orgo is easier to achieve than an A in regular orgo). Thirdly, you’re right: summer classes condensed. When you learn a vast amount of material in a very short time, you have to wonder how much of that you’ll actually retain for med school.</p>
<p>And also, a summer that you’re taking classes is a summer when you’re doing something else full time. Taking a class is certainly better than sitting beside a pool all summer, but a lot of people against whom you’ll be competing when you’re applying will have had a full-time volunteer position or a full-time research position over their summers.</p>
<p>Re #13: Summer classes are not a necessity. This is obvious: if they were a necessity, everybody would do them, and nobody would be at a disadvantage.</p>
<p>Classes are not the same caliber over the summer; they draw very different professors and very different student pools. Most importantly, as GV does a very good job of explaining in post #15, summer classes come at the expense of other valuable opportunities.</p>
<p>Classes are a small part of the application puzzle. Taking summer courses is therefore only a minor setback (although the cost in EC’s can be very severe). But it’s a bad idea nonetheless.</p>
<p>Sorry to bring up an old thread…</p>
<p>But someone mentioned earlier taking an English course during the summer…Would this really count negatively for admissions? Or would a couple of 5 class semesters be better?</p>
<p>I’m trying to squeeze in a study abroad during junior year and am finding it difficult to fit all the premed and concentration requirements into three years…</p>
<p>Thanks! :D</p>
<p>–It would be a mild negative.
–5-class semesters are a good thing in and of themselves, actually – provided you do well in them, of course. If it allows you to study abroad, that’s an additional benefit.</p>
<p>Are summer classes really that time-consuming? Are they Mon-Fri and for how long? </p>
<p>I was thinking of taking a Spanish course during my next summer, but I don’t want my volunteer experiences to suffer as a result. Is it possible to do both?</p>
<p>You will still have a vast amount of time to do ECs relative to a normal school semester. Go for it.</p>
<p>mihan- it would be an extremely mild negative, especially if you did at least one in the normal year. I wouldn’t sweat it for a minute. The big problem is people trying to do a large number of pre-reqs in the summer, and honestly I would suggest that english is a less important pre-reqs than the sciences to many schools, unless you do poorly.</p>