<p>OP you do know that pre-med is usually (not always) just 8courses or so? Not much to it really. You can major in Philosophy, English, Spanish whatever. I'm sure there are Comp Sci pre-meds. Maybe not that many, but some.</p>
<p>If Mercer is really what you want and you think there is any chance that with intervention it will happen---send in the $$ to hold your space. It will buy time and help you calm down until it can be figured out. Money well lost if need be. But you are feeling cornered right now.</p>
<p>Premed is an intention, not a major. You have to major in something, pick computer science and prioritize those classes your first semester. This will give you some time to acclimatize your parents to the realities. Do not panic regarding the medicine aspect of their wishes- they do not get to choose your courses, in fact, they legally will not have the rights they probably think they have. Do investigate the computer science requirements for Emory and its reputation compared to the other two schools, neither of which has an outside of region reputation like Emory does. Never get poor grades to avoid being elegible for medical school admissions, you don't want to sabotage your other opportunities. An easy way to avoid medical school (as a physician I don't recommend it to many) is to not take the required courses, if that doesn't work you can take the MCAT casually and show your disinterest in an interview, but by then you should have worked things out with your parents. Academically, for your future in comp sci, it may be better to just attend the school your parents chose for now. Remember, no college will let your parents make your decisions for you, such as picking your courses. Once you are in college you can use their resources to handle your parents if your HS guidance counselor can't. Good luck, relax and enjoy being a college freshman wherever you end up.</p>
<p>Don't let your parents decide for you.</p>
<p>Play hard ball. Tell them that you're not going to college unless it's with the understanding that you will be majoring in CS, not medicine. Now, if they can't afford Mercer and can afford Emory, that's another story. Otherwise, tell them that they can either help you in paying for your college education or kick you out of the house.</p>
<p>If they kick you out, so be it. Don't go somewhere you don't want to go and study something you don't want to study. You will regret it every day for the rest of your life.</p>
<p>Do CS if that's what you want to do. ABSOLUTELY DO CS IF THAT IS WHAT YOU WANT TO DO. There is and should be absolutely no question whatsoever on this. Your parents should have 0, absolutely NO say in your major, especially if it's something like CS were the jobs are good (or at least not bad.) If medicine doesn't interest you at all don't pursue it at all.</p>
<p>You said your parents want you to take on debt. Does this mean they wouldn't be paying for your college? If so, you've got just about every card in your hand. They give you a house right now, and if push came to shove they probably wouldn't kick you out. Go. Where. You. Want. This is real life and if your parents are being irrational it's because they're human, they're people, they're imperfect and they're wrong. If your parents would be paying for your college then are you willing to give that up for Mercer? I did (although not for Mercer, for a different college) and I have not regretted it a moment in my life. I would be living a life of total regret had I gone where my parents wanted me to, because it just wasn't right and I knew it wasn't right. You'll take on debt you wouldn't have otherwise, but it's the price you pay to determine your own destiny. </p>
<p>Please, please, please listen to me when I tell you, anyone telling you to factor in your parents advice is wrong (IN THIS CASE. Parents can give good advice. Her's are giving her destructive advice and it should be disregarded.). You will be miserable if every day when something happens you think "I'm only here because of my parents, if only I was at Mercer..." Your parents will get over it or not, and if not then they're not worth a whole lot as parents.</p>
<p>My goodness please listen to me. I know too many people who were like you and made the wrong choice.</p>
<p>chuy is absolutely, 100% right in this. Take on debt. Apply for scholarship. You can easily demonstrate financial need if your parents aren't helping to pay, and you will easily qualify for tons of money. Fill out one of the forms, and since you wouldn't be a dependent, your income would be next to nothing (maybe nothing). You can't do better than that. If your grades are good, you can get a scholarship.</p>
<p>Get part time jobs, be a part time student. Take out loans, and take 6 years to graduate from your undergraduate program. It's not that big of a deal. There are ways to get what you want. DO NOT LET YOUR PARENTS DECIDE FOR YOU WHAT IS BEST. YOU ARE AN ADULT.</p>
<p>I dont understand why you guys are telling mika to go tell someone. Just man up and tell them no. And its not easy taking out loans, working, while going to school. </p>
<p>Mika I was in a similar situation couple of years ago. They wanted me, and still do, to take premed. So I started as a Premed+health science related major and I switched out second semester. Now I am majoring in MIS along with premedical studies. You can major in anything and still do med school as long as you fit the required courses, which is only like 8-10 semesters worth of courses. Anyways, I digress. </p>
<p>I would tell them that you dont think that they love you or that youre scared of cutting people up, etc... I just told them to bugga off. They said okay.</p>
<p>
[quote]
You can easily demonstrate financial need if your parents aren't helping to pay, and you will easily qualify for tons of money. Fill out one of the forms, and since you wouldn't be a dependent, your income would be next to nothing (maybe nothing). You can't do better than that. If your grades are good, you can get a scholarship.
[/quote]
If only this were true. It's not. It's very, very difficult. Your parents hold the power cards. You can't make them pay for a college they don't want to pay for. On the other hand, they can't make you major in something you don't want to major in. I'd start by showing your parents that prospects for comp sci majors are excellent. I don't know what median starting salaries are coming out of Mercer are, but at Carnegie Mellon they were almost $72,000 and at RPI they were about $60,000. Not bad, and that's with just a BA. If you can't persuade your parents to let you go to Mercer, Plan B is to go to Oxford/Emory. I agree with others Emory has a great reputation outside the south. I'd be very surprised if their comp sci offerings weren't good enough, even if they aren't as good as Mercer's. You can take the pre-med courses or not depending on how much you want to placate your parents. It's easy not to get into med school - no need to do badly in the pre-med courses, there are lots of other ways to sabatoge an application. (It may be an urban legend, but I've heard that Harvard periodically gets essays saying "My parents are making me apply, please don't accept me.")</p>
<p>I'm off to a doctor's appointment, and all I can think of is this: if you don't want to be a doctor, please don't. Signed, a future patient of yours or someone else!</p>
<p>OP, you came to the PARENTS forum for a reason. Please listen to the wise and thoughtful advice given here by the adults, and not irresponsible juvenile student advice like posts # 24 & 26.</p>
<p>Oh, and not getting into med school does not require failing/doing badly in any classes - just ask last year's premeds...</p>
<ol>
<li><p>This is going to sound a little harsh: How can you expect to be treated like an adult -- i.e., have your views and choices respected -- when you don't act like an adult? Until you are willing to have an honest, rational talk with your parents about this, you simply don't have any status to complain about anything. Your parents obviously think they have to make decisions for you because you are not capable of doing it for yourself, and you have done nothing to prove them wrong.</p></li>
<li><p>This is also going to sound harsh: In all likelihood, your parents are going to win this particular fight. I say that based on having witnessed a number of such situations over the years (one of which actually also involved going to Emory). The CC mantra that the student should choose is a cultural preference, not a reflection of legal or economic reality. The legal and economic reality is that the parents can choose not to pay for any college they don't want to pay for, and the student's choice is either to finance the college of his or her choice without parental help -- something that is quite difficult if your parents COULD pay something significant -- or not to go to college at all. You can threaten that, of course, but you may not want to go through with it if they call your bluff.</p></li>
<li><p>Oxford/Emory is not like going to the fifth circle of Hell. I know you prefer Mercer and have your heart set on it, but rationally you have to know that you can be happy at Oxford. Not only is Oxford vs. Mercer a fight that you are likely to lose, but it's a fight that isn't really worth winning. You will be you at either place, and that is going to determine 90% of what you get out of either one. (Plus what interesteddad said about Emory. I'm not certain that you have really done your homework on this.)</p></li>
<li><p>Concentrate on the fight that IS important, IS worth winning, and that you CAN win: You don't want to be a doctor, you don't want to go to medical school, you don't want to be a pre-med in college. That may be what your parents want for you, but it isn't you. You have perfectly practical interests; they have no rational ground for making you study things that are irrelevant to your plans. But you have to let them in on the secret, and go through the (maybe long, maybe emotional) process of getting them used to the idea. And the way to start that is to take responsibility for your life and to start being honest -- respectful, too, but honest -- with them and with everyone else.</p></li>
</ol>
<p>My best friend in high school faced a very similar situation. Her parents wanted one thing, she wanted something vastly different. They were Chinese, and my friend was brought up NOT to challenge her parents. She was reasonable, rational, and honest. My parents and my minister went over to talk to her parents on several different occasions. They wouldn't budge a centimeter.</p>
<p>I'll never forget the advice my sympathetic dad ultimately gave my friend: You can win this battle, but you will lose the war. Don't do it.</p>
<p>Finally, my friend wisely decided she wanted to go to college, any college, more than she wanted to be homeless and estranged from her family. They did love her very much, and wanted what they thought was the best for her.
She offered a compromise to them: She would go where they wanted, and give it a heartfelt try. If at the end of two years she felt the same way, she could transfer. They agreed to it. </p>
<p>Contemplate proposing a similar compromise if honesty, information and reasoning falls on deaf ears. Talk to your GC, too. Maybe he or she has had students in similar situations, or knows someone else you could contact who might help, before you capitulate. But in the end, if they are immovable, go to Oxford/Emory, DO WELL in your classes, and take it from there.</p>
<p>My heart goes out to you. I know this is not easy. Please try to remember your parents do love you, even if they are misguided in this one thing. You can send me a private message if you like.</p>
<p>I want to reinforce a point made previously:</p>
<p>Premed is not a major.</p>
<p>You can play this game and win. You can take the relatively few courses required of med school applicants (many of which will be very useful to you in the future as a medical consumer and as someone who will be inhabiting the type of body whose systems and functions you will be studying).</p>
<p>Take those courses. Even take the MCAT if that will enable you to keep peace and stay on track. Then don't go to med school. Take your newly minted degree, get a job in the field of your choice, and sail into your own life.</p>
<p>You mention loans. Will the financial burden you have to shoulder for undergrad be less at the school you prefer? If so, that is something that requires further consideration.</p>
<p>I would like to reiterate the part about the loans. Who is taking them out? You? Your parents? Have you (or they) run the calculators at FinAid</a>! Financial Aid, College Scholarships and Student Loans to see just how long it will take you to pay off the loans for an undergraduate degree and for medical school? Do they know how little money you will be making in medicine for a very, very, very long time? Elsewhere at cc (maybe it was in the Financial Aid forum) I read a message about how one working physician was still paying off his student loans when his child was in med school!</p>
<p>If Oxford/Emory and Mercer are both only possible with loans that you have to sign for, you can refuse to sign for them. You can go to the community college. You can work your way through school. You can transfer into a public university in your home state and get a good education. It would not be easy, but it is something that people do every single year in this country.</p>
<p>Way back in the last century, a friend of mine had parents who refused to pay for her education if she did not study what they wanted her to. She dropped out after a semester because her grades were so bad in that field. She worked at a fast-food restaurant for about a semester, and then joined the US Army. The army trained her, and provided multiple opportunities for career development. She retired as an officer. She earned a Ph.D. and became a world expert in her field. She found an option that worked for her. You have options too. They may not be pretty ones, but they do exist.</p>
<p>Talk to your guidance counselor.</p>
<p>We all wish you, and your family all the best. Please let us know how things work out.</p>
<p>Leaving aside questions of right or wrong, which I think are irrelevant to the OP's issue (unless WE can talk to his parents.</p>
<p>First, we should be clear what is at stake here. The question is, what are your parents willing to pay for? It is ultimately their money. If they simply will not pay for any school except Emory-Oxford, then you have two choices: you can either go to Emory-Oxford, or you can get a job and start saving your money with the hope of going to Community College and getting on with your life that way. It is not my life, but, given those choices, I would go to Emory-Oxford.</p>
<p>After you get to Emory-Oxford (and, hopefully, later at Emory Atlanta), your parents may insist that you take certain courses. Again, it is their money. If they are adamant, I would take the courses (as well as other things of my own choosing) and do as well as I could. I would even apply to medical school, if that is what they want. But once you have your degree, THEY CANNOT MAKE YOU GO, EVEN IF YOU ARE ACCEPTED. Once you have your degree, you will be in a much better position to support yourself.</p>
<p>Bottom line, do what you need to do to get where you want to go, even if means going to a school that is not your first choice. In addition, hard as it may be, count your blessings. Remember, there are many students in this world whose parents cannot or will not pay for ANY college.</p>
<p>mathmom: as a participant in the academic process, I think I know what I'm talking about.</p>
<p>If the young lady cancels her health insurance, fixes her bank account(s), and moves out of the house, then she is no longer a dependent, and it is her annual income (not her parents') that will be given on the FAFSA. Making <em>~$0</em> annually for a <em>young lady</em> who wants to study <em>computer science</em>? I would be surprised if they didn't buy her a car.</p>
<p>And where exactly you'd recommend she moves out to live with $0 income and no health insurance?</p>
<p>csprof2000: If she does all that, what if her parents are still claiming her as a dependent on their income tax? Would her parents then be falsifying their return?</p>
<p>
[quote]
If the young lady cancels her health insurance, fixes her bank account(s), and moves out of the house, then she is no longer a dependent, and it is her annual income (not her parents') that will be given on the FAFSA. Making <em>~$0</em> annually for a <em>young lady</em> who wants to study <em>computer science</em>? I would be surprised if they didn't buy her a car.
[/quote]
</p>
<p>Absolutely untrue. i work in a college, helping students fill out their FAFSA. I have been to training in the FA field and work with FA professionals. A student is not independent as far as FA is concerned unless they are 24 or older, or married, or a parent, or a ward of the state while a minor, or an orphan, or a vet, or have a bachelors already. The system is very clear about that. Moving out, not being on family's tax return, getting off their insurance, all of that is irrelevant. If it were that simple, everyone would do it. please do not spread misleading advice.
<a href="http://www.studentaid.ed.gov/students/attachments/siteresources/66.pdf%5B/url%5D">http://www.studentaid.ed.gov/students/attachments/siteresources/66.pdf</a></p>
<p>Thank you Garland. Well and succinctly stated.</p>
<p>We'd all do well to remember that assumptions are not facts and to have the discipline to separate and identify the two accordingly.</p>