<p>I read on Brown’s [pre-med</a> advising page](<a href=“http://www.brown.edu/Administration/Dean_of_the_College/hco/freshman_and_sophomores/courses.php]pre-med”>http://www.brown.edu/Administration/Dean_of_the_College/hco/freshman_and_sophomores/courses.php) that “Between one and two semesters of college-level Mathematics” is usually required. What does that mean, exactly? How many semesters does a 5 on AP calc BC satisfy, if any? I guess I’m wondering how much math I will be taking at Brown, and if I should/will take a math course my first semester.</p>
<p>Do pre-med students usually take more than the required 1-2 semesters?</p>
<p>a 5 on the BC is enough</p>
<p>How much math does a chem major need? The site said “2Math.” Does calc BC satisfy any of that?</p>
<p>Chem is tricky. It’s changed a bit. But my honest recommendation is through Linear Algebra-- which is BC + MA18 and MA52 at Brown.</p>
<p>Thanks. Does it matter when I take the math courses? Should I get started as soon as possible? (It’s already been a year since I did calc, so I’ve already forgotten everything.)</p>
<p>I would probably just take linear algebra (if you have BC and can get away with it) if you’re not as comfortable with calc as you used to be… MA18 hasn’t really been that useful though it is quite easy…</p>
<p>I’d say take it before PChem. You will use lots of calc in PChem, so you should refamiliarize yourself before then.</p>
<p>back to the first question: the pre-med advisor talks about this question a lot. there are 129 allopathic med schools in the US, puerto rico, and canada. of those, 17 require at least a semester of calc and 35 require “college mathematics.” Only a few schools require 2 semesters of calc. Of course, some of the best med schools (Harvard, JHU) fall into these categories. Calc counts for college mathematics, but statistics generally does as well. This is complicated by the fact that some schools allow Calc BC scores to count. </p>
<p>That’s a really long response for a simple solution that virtually everyone does: no matter your HS background, take 1 semester of calc and 1 semester of statistics, and you’ll be fine.</p>