<p>Hi everyone!</p>
<p>After much deliberation, I chose to transfer to UC Berkeley this upcoming Fall semester. I am a biochem major at my community college and I finished all my pre-med prereq's (math, bio, chem, ochem, physics) there. </p>
<p>I am accepted into the College of Letters and Science and when I was applying I intended to major in MCB: Biochem. I am aware of the grade-deflation in MCB and in Berkeley in general, but recently I was interested in switching to a double major of Integrative Biology and Mathematics.</p>
<p>I was wondering,</p>
<ol>
<li><p>is it possible to do a double major in math if I only applied for Biochem? I haven't finished all the math courses; I only did up to calculus, but I haven't taken differential equations and linear algebra.</p></li>
<li><p>if anyone has double majored, how rigorous is it to succeed and get a good grade?</p></li>
</ol>
<p>Thanks and good luck to everyone in their midterms/finals/summer breaks!</p>
<p>Congrats on getting accepted to Cal.</p>
<p>Hate to burst your bubble but Cal’s Math department is no joke and probably has almost the same grade deflation than microbio. Upper division math can be very abstract.</p>
<p>If you are pre-med then do an easy major in the humanities like a foreign language; those classes have the lowest grade deflation and usually no curves. </p>
<p>Math at Berkeley has the lowest average GPA, I don’t know why you want to do it (you didn’t say why), especially if you are premed. </p>
<p>Thanks for your input everyone! @CSB111 I was actually interested in studying multiple fields of study besides only biology. Math is really a subject that I like because of the critical thinking that it teaches you but if it has an even lower GPA average than MCB, then I probably would not take it haha</p>
<p>Have you taken the equivalents of Math 53, 54, and 55? You need to take these to declare the math major.</p>
<p>Note that there is no requirement to major in biology to do pre-med, although many medical schools do not like to see all of your BCPM* courses from community college, so you may want to take some upper division BCPM courses after transfer.</p>
<p>*BCPM = biology, chemistry, physics, math</p>
<p>@ucbalumnus ok i haven’t taken 54 and 55. I hope I can take them before I declare or concurrently, but I guess that is a question for the math department?</p>
<p>And that is a great point actually. considering that I took all my BCPM courses at community college, I am almost obliged to become a bio major so I can take upper div BCPM to prove to med schools that I can handle those upper divs. then again berkeley MCB is notorious for grade deflation. I guess I am answering my own question. should really focus on getting good grades within my major so my GPA trends upward before I graduate. this premed track is quite a numbers game haha</p>
<p><a href=“http://math.berkeley.edu/programs/undergraduate/majoring-mathematics”>Majoring in Mathematics | Department of Mathematics at University of California Berkeley; says that you need to have completed all three of 53, 54, and 55, or have completed two of them and be enrolled in the third. Minimum grade is a C in each, but the department recommends that only students with at least a B- in each declare the major (of course, grades that low will be very damaging to your medical school admission chances).</p>
<p>This means that if you want to major in math, you need to take 54 (or H54) and 55 in your first semester and declare in your second semester.</p>
<p>You do not have to declare MCB or IB in order to take a few upper division MCB or IB courses. Remember also that math courses count as BCPM courses.</p>