I want to be a journalism major (as a backup & bc I’m interested in it), while doing pre-med. However, it seems as if most pre-meds are science majors and I’m scared it’ll look bad to med schools. Also, I’m worried I’d be more prepared for the MCAT if I was a bio major (rather then a journalism major).
So do you know of people that were non science majors in pre-med. And where they successful in being able to get into med school?
Bump
A lot of pre-med students choose non-science majors. It seems logical that in order to get a well-rounded education that a doctor needs, having a humanities major and taking sciences classes for pre-med requirements could actually be a good idea. You’d learn to think critically (sounds corny, but it’s important) and write well, especially with a journalism major.
Also, biology is only one of the four parts of the MCAT- no major is going to prepare you for the MCAT, especially because the material is covered in the classes all pre-meds take, regardless of their majors.
[Disclaimer: I’m a high school senior planning on majoring in linguistics and going pre-med]
Thanks!! Anyone else?
The only thing a non-science major needs to be careful about is doing especially well in their science pre-reqs. Since a non-science major takes substantially fewer BCPM classes than a science major does, those science pre-reqs have a proportionally larger impact on their sGPA. (And your sGPA is just as important, if not MORE important, than your overall GPA.)
“I want to be a journalism major (as a backup & bc I’m interested in it), while doing pre-med. However, it seems as if most pre-meds are science majors and I’m scared it’ll look bad to med schools.”
Med schools do not care what major is. Med schools care about GPAs, MCAT, ECs, LORs, and PS. Bio happens to be most common major, in part, because it kills two birds with one stone (satisfies most premed prereqs and major reqs at same time) whereas with journalism major, you’re somehow going to have to squeeze premed reqs in somewhere.
“So do you know of people that were non science majors in pre-med. And where they successful in being able to get into med school?”
S’s classmates included psych, fine arts, and business majors. I’m 200% if others who post regularly respond, you’ll be amazed at how many med students had non bio backgrounds
“Also, I’m worried I’d be more prepared for the MCAT if I was a bio major (rather then a journalism major).”
Although premed courses provide background, you’re going to probably have to take a MCAT prep course (e,g, Princeton Review, Kaplan, etc) when time comes