PLME Chances and Neuroscience Major Questions (long-ish read)

Colleges and Universities A-Z Brown University
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<p>For my inaugural post on this board, I guess it’s appropriate to ask about one of the first schools I was interested in when I started searching for colleges a couple years back. </p>

<p>I’ve been looking for solid BS/MD programs and view the PLME offered by Brown as one of the best opportunities available to me, but I’m also considering a regular undergraduate program followed by MCATs and… ah, you guys seem to know the drill by now so I won’t bore you.</p>

<p>I’ll ask the “easy” question first. I’ve become really interested in neuroscience recently and so the schools that I am considering all either have a Neuroscience or Neurobiology Major, or offer a concentration in Neuroscience/Neurobiolgy under the Biology major. Other BS/MD schools I’m applying to are Drexel and Rochester (I was originally going to apply to Boston U. but I saw that they required Chemistry SAT2). Have any of you had experience with the Neuroscience Major at Brown, and would you recommend it to somebody ultimately aiming to get his MD? Is the program taught well, and are the research opportunities interesting?</p>

<p>The second question is about my chances with the PLME. I guess I should give my “statistics”…</p>

<p>GPA: unweighted: 4.0 / weighted 4.76</p>

<p>SATI: 2350 (800 Math, 790 Critical Reading, 760 Writing) - First time, I’m not taking it again either… (does it matter to universities that I took this as a sophomore and not a junior?)</p>

<p>SATII: 740 Biology-M and 750 Literature. Taking Math2 in October</p>

<p>AP: Calc BC, Biology, English Language&Comp, World History, NSL (National/State/Local Gov’t), Statistics all 5. Taking AP Literature&Comp and AP Chemistry as a senior. I MIGHT self study for AP Psych (do you recommend?)</p>

<p>Race: Indian
Sex: Male</p>

<p>Classes Taken that may be of significance
H. Anatomy and Physiology
Biotechnology (Montgomery County refuses to offer this for Honors credit even though it’s quite difficult, even for an honors level class. High workload)
AP Calc BC, Stat, Lang, World, NSL, Biology, (Chemistry and Lit senior year)
C++
Spanish up to level 3H (Could have easily continued but decided to take Biotech)</p>

<p>Senior Schedule:
Piano (Fine Arts credit)
AP Literature
AP Chemistry
Internship</p>

<p>Unlike many students doing AP Calc BC as juniors, I’ve decided not to take MVC in high school (school doesn’t offer, and I’d rather do the internship)</p>

<p>The internship in question is the HHMI NIH Internship, which is a full-year research internship at the National Institutes of Health. I’m in a PET Radiopharmaceuticals Lab synthesizing new molecular precursors that will be radioactively tagged (adjacent lab, I can’t do it without at least a Masters in Chemistry) and used for clinical trials to diagnose alzhiemers. It’s a lot of organic chemistry! (5 days a week for about 20 hours during school year, and 40 hours a week this summer for 3 months)</p>

<p>Other EC:
Debate and Forensics team Captain, made county Finals in both. (going on 4 years)
It’s Academic Team Vice President (same)
President of Environmental Club (2 years)
NHS Secretary
Key Club (going on 4 years)
SADD (going on 2 years)
Literary Magazine (the one year we had it)
Young Republicans (just started last year)
Science Club (2 years)</p>

<p>Activities / Awards:
National Merit Semifinalist (might be a finalist, who knows?)
Bausch and Lomb Honorary Science Award - University of Rochester
1 Week Biomedical Science program at University of MD - College Park sponsored by HHMI (howard hughes medical institute)
2 Day symposium on evolution - sponsored by HHMI (gosh they really like me!)
~ 400 service hours</p>

<p>yeah, sorry for the awfully long read… downtime in the lab so I got caught up in it.</p>

<p>So realistically, do I have any shot of getting into PLME? (Honestly, I have no clue, I come here and see people with sports, loads of community involvement, and perfect “stats” and even with them it’s unsure)</p>

<p>Obviously you guys cant give me a figure I can actually rely on/place a bet on, but any opinions would be REALLY appreciated.</p>

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<p>Of course you have a very good chance. You have amazing test scores, grades, and research experience/internships. However, indians make up some of the most competitive applicants, but you do seem to be BS/MD material. There are lots of other BS/MD programs out there and you should apply to them as well as PLME.</p>

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<p>I wont comment on chances because I hate those threads. I will comment on neuro-- the concept of teach neuroscience as a separate concentration for undergraduates STARTED at Brown. Much like many intro physics courses are based on MITs curriculum, many of the country's undergraduate neuro is based upon Brown's.</p>

<p>I'd say that combined with the fact that BN0001 is the most taken clsas at Brown adds up to something that is general a positive thing for our neuro.</p>

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<p>Thanks. I'm also looking at REMS (URochester's BS/MD) and Drexel (extreme safety I guess). Does PennState still have one? I'm ineligible for BU's due to my lack of a SAT2 Chemistry score (why they don't accept Chemistry or Biology as a requirement boggles my mind... maybe it's just because people tend to score higher on the Biology one)</p>

<p>I've been looking at other BS/MD, Northwestern's doesn't appeal to me ... maybe I could look into it a bit more. Got other suggestions?</p>

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<p>YAY! Thanks for commenting on the Neuro bit melody! That's really good to hear, and is exactly what I was hoping to hear. Any other comments?
I might not be able to reply because I have to do some stuff in the lab right now...</p>

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<p>
[quote]
Thanks. I'm also looking at REMS (URochester's BS/MD) and Drexel (extreme safety I guess). Does PennState still have one? I'm ineligible for BU's due to my lack of a SAT2 Chemistry score (why they don't accept Chemistry or Biology as a requirement boggles my mind... maybe it's just because people tend to score higher on the Biology one)</p>

<p>I've been looking at other BS/MD, Northwestern's doesn't appeal to me ... maybe I could look into it a bit more. Got other suggestions?

[/quote]
</p>

<p>Yeah, Penn State still has their program.
We have a whole forum based on these programs here:</p>

<p><a href="http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/forumdisplay.php?f=476%5B/url%5D"&gt;http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/forumdisplay.php?f=476&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p>

<p>and a good list of BS/MD programs here, though it may be slightly outdated:</p>

<p><a href="http://www.medicalhelpnet.com/content/view/28/46/%5B/url%5D"&gt;http://www.medicalhelpnet.com/content/view/28/46/&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p>

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<p>I've seen that before, it was useful at first... thanks for the forum link.</p>

<p>Anybody else have opinions of my chances/the neuro program?</p>

<p>Thanks in advance!</p>

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<p>Self-studying for psych is definitely possible. I took a one-semester psych class which was a total joke, but I did my reading, barely studied (maybe a couple hours total during the week before the exam), and got a 5. Our class used the book "Psychology" by Meyers -- it was great. Invest in the book and do some of the practice tests on the CD... you should be fine.</p>

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<p>You belong to the Young Republicans and you want to go to Brown?!</p>

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<p>Haha... I'm really more of a moderate now. Social liberal, foreign policy conservative. I've got a crazy conservative friend who wanted to start up the club, we were a bit late in starting it but we're original members.</p>

<p>Plus, my liberalism helps temper the radical conservativism in the club and keep them from looking like immature fools.</p>

<p>It's a good laugh :P</p>

<p>Yes, I want to go to Brown :)</p>

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<p>I can kind of speak to the neuro question-</p>

<p>I'm a rising senior and I've been interested in neuroscience for a few years now. I am doing my own cellular neuroscience project at my high school. I'm naturally very interested in colleges with good neuroscience.</p>

<p>And from my research of Brown, it probably has the strongest neuro program of any of the major universities I've looked at (I looked at some LACs too, I like the LAC environment). The other ones I've looked at extensively have been Wash U (great) Northwestern, MIT, UPenn, Dartmouth and Carnegie Mellon. And Brown competes with all of them, it's great, from what I've looked at so far.</p>

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<p>Thanks! I dont think that MIT and Carnegie are the right environment for me. I'm still not sure about applying to WashU, I know it's a great school... I just don't know if it's for me. If I can make time, I might visit, but it's not too close to home.</p>

<p>I was kind of looking at Dartmouth too... not seriously though.</p>

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<p>Any other opinions?</p>

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<p>got life?</p>

<p>lol, you got great chances</p>

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<p>fengshuibundi, I think you have a great chance at PLME. If you are interested in Bs/Md programs, the Rice/Baylor program is also great.</p>

<p>How did you get an internship with NNMI NHI? I thought that was only available for students in medical school?</p>

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<p>Hey, </p>

<p>I think your chances look great: </p>

<p>A few things: </p>

<p>-I think Brown will think it's cool that you took the internship instead of taking MVC. They like independent doers/thinkers. NIH is also very impressive on its own merits!!!!</p>

<p>-Retake that SAT!! It's just one saturday of your life and dang a perfect score doesn't hurt anybody!</p>

<p>-The neuroscience at Brown is fantastic, arguably the best in the country. Other rival programs tend to be at large schools, like UCLA, where you just can't get the individual attention. So, aside from the caliber of Brown's neuroscience program on its own merits, I would say it's better than many simply because of the personal attention and opportunities you can get. </p>

<p>-- Brown neuroscience has some of the top and most groundbreaking research in the country -- like implants in the brain that allow chimps to play video games with THEIR MINDS. They are also the ONLY US institution that has a graduate partnership with NIH</p>

<p>-- The curriculum is VERY flexible, so it can be anything you want it to be (e.g. neuropsychology, biological basis of behavior, neuroanatomy, etc). You take 3 core neuroscience classes, which are mostly neurobiology, and then 6 electives that can be in ANY (applicable) discipline (from anatomy all the way to philosophy). </p>

<p>-- It's one of the most popular majors on campus and widely considered to be one of the best</p>

<p>-- One of the intro class teachers wrote the book! </p>

<p>On PLME</p>

<p>PLME is great, but Brown's med school isn's the most prestigious (please correct me if I'm wrong -- I'm not an expert on this). However, if your focus is on neurology, it could be a great place considering the strength of neuroscience at Brown. And the benefits of not having to apply to med school speak for themselves...</p>

<p>And brown is simply awesome and I know I wouldn't mind spending 8 years there :)</p>

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<p>Bah, I'm also going to be applying to Brown's PLME...also interested in neuroscience; perhaps our paths will cross one day. Your scores destroy mine :).</p>

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<p>xwang90: HHMI NIH internship? My school district has a program that works with the HHMI and sends 22 students to do the internship every year (Montgomery County, MD).</p>

<p>ClaySoul: retake the sat? I can't because I have to take some SAT2s in october... and a 2350 isn't THAT horrible ;) Also, I visited Brown on Thursday and I absolutely LOVED it... it even smelled perfect! The open curriculum is something I can't wait to take advantage of!</p>

<p>njh219: That's awesome! Have fun working on your applications</p>

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<p>retaking the SAT definitely isn't necessary, just if you have time and the inclination :)</p>

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<p>Inclination? Maybe.
Time? Nope.</p>

<p>SAT2 MathII and Chemistry in October... I better start studying for the Chemistry one!</p>