Hello everyone,
I will be attending JHU this upcoming fall as a junior transfer. I’ve been looking at some older posts as well as videos, vlogs, and comments about the experience at JHU. I will be majoring in Psychological and Brain Sciences. What has been your experience at JHU? How demanding are the classes? What should I expect?
THANK YOU!
I just graduated last year. I personally enjoyed Hopkins. The environment was very in sync my personality; I personally like being busy and was eager to rise to the challenge of the Hopkins rigor that I heard about. However, I didn’t have problems making friends and finding time for leisure activities. I also enjoyed the fact that Hopkins’ is close to several elementary, middle, and high schools since I did education-centered volunteering back in high school.
Expect to see many highly accomplished and ambitious students at Hopkins. I used to have a bad habit of comparing myself to others, and I used to be pre-med (so everyone around me was like that), so that put a lot of unnecessary pressure on me to measure up. But there are also a surprising number of people who are amazingly laid-back and down-to-earth. Many people at Hopkins feel that they’ve formed a strong sense of camaraderie around the shared struggle of keeping up with Hopkins classes and all their extracurricular commitments.
How demanding the classes will be really varies. I’ve never had courses where I thought the workload was unmanageable. Although I’ve been extremely busy some weeks when assignment due dates and exams were scheduled around the same time. I have taken several classes where the subject matter was just completely over my head (though I think that is specific to my major, Applied Mathematics, because the upper-level classes were graduate-level at the time).
However, getting a good GPA is definitely possible, and professors can be very generous with their grading. Even in classes where I thought I understood very little, I’ve never gotten lower than a B. However, doing well requires the ability to adapt quickly to professors’ teaching styles and understand how their exams are structured. And you have to be willing to put in the time to keep up with the classes (whether that means doing problem sets, doing textbook readings, or reviewing lecture notes regularly).
I was undecided, then Behavioral Biology and pre-med, then Applied Mathematics and Statistics, so I took classes from a wide variety of disciplines. The few Psychology classes I took (Foundations of Brain Behavior and Cognition and Abnormal Psychology) were pretty straightforward for me, but those were lower-level courses, so that might not be a good indicator of how the major will be. Though I will say that generally, upper-level courses are a lot more interesting than lower-level ones. Also, since Hopkins has several brain science majors, there is a great variety of courses to choose from.
In terms of student satisfaction, expect mixed results. Some students really love Hopkins, like me. Most I’ve talked to have a love-hate relationship with it. Generally, they like the people but hate that it’s hard to have a school-life balance.
@OnMyWay2013 Hello! I read your comment before coming to Hopkins and now again as I finish my first semester here. Thank you so very much for your advice.
So far I have been doing well in my classes. I am currently taking Statistical Analysis (Dr. Athreya), Organic Chemistry (Dr. Falzone), Sensation and Perception (Dr. Fischer), and Neuroethology which is a new class this semester (Dr. Melville). I had to drop from Statistical Analysis because I strongly disliked the way Dr. Athreya structured the class. It is unfortunate because I like her teaching style and the material is not too complex.
Other than that, I have found extremely difficult to make friends at Hopkins. It’s hard to not find someone who’s constantly complaining about their classes and stressed about med school. I am trying to reach out to other motivated people and perhaps create a community that will help me academically and personally.
My major now is Neuroscience and Psychology.
Please let me know of other tips that come to you.
@DrRich Good to hear from you! Sorry to hear that you’re struggling to make friends. It’s very hard when you’re in majors that are very popular with pre-meds because you end up always being surrounded by them. And upperclassmen premeds can be particularly neurotic, haha. Most of my friends were either people I met during freshman orientation, people in my freshman dorm, classmates in my Applied Math classes (where there are few pre-meds), and people I met through clubs.
I know the first three aren’t so doable given that you’re a transfer student, upperclassman, and pre-med in a science major. But if you have the time, I highly recommend joining at least one club purely for your own leisure. For that purpose, try and stay away from honor societies, academic clubs, or pre-med related clubs (although PILOT tutoring / group problem-solving sessions can be pretty fun and laid-back depending on the group). If you plan on taking some of the short one- to three-week Intersession courses right before the Spring semester starts, that can also be a good way to meet people in a less intense environment.
I was involved with Hopkins Christian Fellowship, Gospel Choir, the JHU Cubing Association, and the Johns Hopkins Entertainers Club (the ones that spin fire). I also went to some meetings for the Hopkins Dialectic, which holds a lot of philosophical and religion-related discussions, and Organización Latina Estudiantil (OLE) even though I’m not Latino. Even if you just join a club sport or something and meet for an hour once a week, clubs in which everyone is being intentional about not focusing on school or med school plans are generally more uplifting. I’m sure that if you went to a space like that and got to talking with some people, and expressed to them what you expressed to me, you’d find many people who would be interested in being a part of a more supportive community as well.
@OnMyWay2013 Thank you so very much for your helpful feedback! I will most definitely get involved in more non-academic organizations. I strive to be like those accomplished and high achieving students. Of course, never comparing myself to anyone.
I hope you’re doing great in your new endeavors.