<p>I heard that doing a liberal major can help you get into med school. Is that true? Would you be prepared for the mcats and med school in general if you majored in the humanities? Hopefully someone who has gotten into med school with a liberal major will reply.</p>
<p>ive been told by a good friend of mine who graduated from brandeis as an econ major who also was in pre-med and is actually taking his MCATs tomorrow that you will be prepared for the MCATs by taking the necessary pre-med courses and studying ur butt off. If u want take summer classes in the advanced courses to help prepare more.</p>
<p>As far is it being able to help you. My cousin whos a vascular surgeon and on admissions at Mt Sinai told me that med schools are looking for more "well rounded" individuals and are straying from those students that just take science courses and major in bio or chem. So i guess under certain situations it can help to have a liberal major. You just need to do well in every class you take, have amazing EC's and do well on the MCAT.</p>
<p>But ya ive been told they are looking for students with well rounded educational backgrounds now. You just gotta excel everywhere in college. </p>
<p>If you want to major in the humanities...then by all means do so. You will do better in class with a major u actually enjoy and ur GPA will show that. Its not uncommon anymore for a pre-med to major in sumthing other then science so def go for it!</p>
<p>I agree. More than half of medical school applicants are biology majors, with another quarter from the physical sciences. Although it may not be a guaranteed ticket, you will stand out in the admissions process. I was a mathematics major and did very well on the MCAT even though there was no math on it aside from simple algebra. As long as you take the prereqs, you will do fine on the MCAT and in medical school.</p>
<p>where did u go for undergrad jack?</p>
<p>Any words of wisdom for us?</p>
<p>I did my undergrad at Loyola University Chicago.</p>
<p>A few words of wisdom that I do not find floating around too frequently about the MCAT:</p>
<ol>
<li><p>Really invest some quality time in your science classes freshman and sophomore year. This means understanding, not memorizing. When the time comes to study for the MCAT, you will retain a lot of the information. Unlike my friends, I found I didn't have to spend my entire junior year catching up and relearning stuff that most people blew off (very hard and time consuming). </p></li>
<li><p>Read highly-regarded, hard-to-digest literature throughout your first three years. Your verbal score will improve greatly (The Chicago Tribune was my personal favorite).</p></li>
</ol>
<p>jack, do you feel that undergrad is really not as important for pre-med as people make it out to be. I mean im looking at Manhattan College, but if i do well will it really make a difference?</p>
<p>Doogie:</p>
<p>If you're talking about specific institutions, you're entering a "gray area", especially when it revolves around GPA. That's the beauty of the MCAT, because whether you're from an Ivy League Institution or "Western (Insert State Here) University", the higher MCAT will always be favored. As long as you keep your GPA high, do well on the MCAT, and remain solid with EC's, you will have an excellent chance of getting into a good medical school from Manahattan College.</p>
<p>At Morehouse College, the Chairman of the biology department encourages students to major in biology b/c our biology department is specifically tailored to get students into medical school. I'm a pre-medical student, yet I'm an econ/math major. From what he told me, you need to have good "knowledge base" to understand/retain the vast concepts in biology. At Morehouse, it is rare to perform well enough on the MCAT's to get into medical school if you're not a biology major. He encourages students to take at least Cell Biology, Molecular Genetics, and Physiology. If time permits, biochemistry is another great class. </p>
<p>Last summer, I took Calculus II at a local college before my senior year of HS. I met a young woman is currently a 1st year in medical school. She said that the "year" of organic chemistry isn't really test; biochemistry really helped to link biology and chemistry together for the MCAT's.</p>