<p>Does this look bad to colleges for a pre-med? What if you had honors of both and had AP Bio and AP Calc AB and BC?</p>
<p>First off, keep in mind there is no pre-med major. So you are not applying anywhere as a “pre-med”. Pre-med is an interest; it means nothing more than while in college you plan on taking the 10 or so classes required to apply to med school. </p>
<p>Maybe there’s a box on the college app you can check off that indicates this interest; all this is for is to allow them to send you info on what a wonderful job their pre-med advising office will do for you, perhaps to have said office contact you once you are enrolled. </p>
<p>Colleges could care less, in terms of admission, whether you checked the pre-med box. </p>
<p>And you might want to spend a few minutes looking at the admission criteria of the colleges you plan on applying to. At many universities they don’t take even your major into account (depending on what college you are applying to at the U). For example the UC system in CA does not take major into account for anyone applying to the College of Letters and Science.</p>
<p>Thanks. How do I go about finding this info? I will probably apply to University of Miami, Tufts, NYU, University of Florida, and a few other schools. Also, will I have a hard time in college without taking AP Chemistry and AP Physics? Should I try to learn the material myself in advance?</p>
<p>College chemistry and physics courses may specify *high school<a href=“not%20necessarily%20AP”>/i</a> chemistry and physics courses as prerequisites.</p>
<p>My D. is almost in her third year of Med. School. She did not have AP Chem. or AP Physics because her private prep. HS did not believe much in naming classes “AP”. She ended up being hired to be an SI for Gen. Chem. prof. and was told numerous times that she has brought grades up for many students. She was explaining Chem. to many who have had AP Chem. in HS.<br>
HS AP mean nothing. Med. Scholl wil look only at your college GPA.</p>
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<p>The vast majority of A’s in college science courses will be earned by those who had an AP/IB course in HS. Thus, you would be starting out behind. Could you catch up? Sure. Will you? No one knows.</p>
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<p>Admission criteria for colleges (and data about the stats of incoming classes) can be found at NCES.</p>
<p>Use the College Navigator to select any particular college by name, then look under the Admissions tab for what’s required when applying.</p>
<p>You will also see the stats of last year’s admitted class.</p>
<p>You can also look at the Common Data Set published by specific school. (Google school name + common data set) CDS will rank the importance of various factors that admissions office consider im applicants.</p>
<p>Will this ruin my chances of getting into a good school? I feel like if I say I want to be a Bio major or do pre-med and haven’t had AP Chem it could look bad/be a detriment. I was thinking of taking a introduction to chem class at a community college the summer before college starts and take a look at AP Chem books…</p>
<p>The pre reqs for med school are 1) superior GPA at an accredited college 2) certain pre-req courses 3) high MCAT score.</p>
<p>AP Chem is not directly related a single one of those.</p>
<p>If your reason for not taking AP Chem is because the class would be too difficult for you then it will definitely hurt your chances of admission to a university that looks for the most rigorous coursework. However, if this is the reason you are not taking it, then I would encourage you to reconsider the pre-med route.</p>
<p>If your reason for not taking AP Chem is because your school doesn’t offer it, or you had an unavoidable scheduling conflict, or a similar valid issue, then it will likely not impact your chances at all.</p>
<p>^ much better answer than mine! Listen to rlmdad, sarain.</p>
<p>I would not worry about it at all. Many students go to schools that do not even offer AP Chem. It just means you have to take intro chem when you get to college. Now… that can be a bear (take it from someone who had trouble with that class many years ago). But not taking AP Chem in general is NOT going to impact your long term chances to get into med school as long as you do when in chem when you get to college.</p>
<p>I mean there’s a few reasons I’m not taking it. First of all, I didn’t take it this year because for Honors Chemistry my teacher barely taught me and the AP Chemistry teacher is different and expects a lot of out of you. I didn’t want to get a C or anything. Now I regret it because I took Honors Chemistry in 10th grade a year ago and don’t remember much. I thought it would be fine without AP Chemistry because I was willing to study it the summer before college. Now my dad asked me about it and he told me that once colleges see I’m applying as a pre-med or Bio major without AP Chem, they will automatically reject me. I don’t know if its true but he seems adamant about it :l</p>
<p>The thing is, he JUST told me today and I have 3 days of school left and there’s no more time to get it changed with my counselor. I wish I would’ve known earlier :(</p>
<p>bump just wanted more opinions</p>
<p>Your dad is incorrect. Most colleges don’t even consider what you state as your potential major. American students are apt to change – so they know it’s not any sort of predictive tool.</p>
<p>The only way I could see it hurting your chances is if you’re taking an easier science class in lieu of it. Although if you had applied as a prospective chemistry major and decided not to take AP chem then that might be a reason to raise one’s eyebrows. You’re ‘interested’ in bio and are ‘planning’ on being pre-med. Colleges realize that you’re predicting the path you’d be likely to take and won’t hold it against you if you didn’t have a high school schedule that fit a certain mold.</p>
<p>I also took Honors chemistry in 10th grade, as do many people, and took AP Chem in 12th grade. I do not remember a single thing from Honors chem that I needed to have knowledge of to do well in AP Chem. If you’re interested in being pre-med or being successful in college in general, you shouldn’t shirk off difficult classes because it “expects a lot of you”. Studying over the summer would also not be necessary, since there are many students that never take AP chem and are completely fine taking chem in college. </p>
<p>A couple days ago you asked about your schedule, and I said twice that you should consider taking AP Chem instead of AP env sci or Honors Anatomy and Physiology. While it wouldn’t be harmful to not take AP chem, I think you should reconsider your options if you’re genuinely interested in the class. Your chances shouldn’t be hurt regardless, however it can only help to have some AP chem foundation if you plan on taking chem in college. There are always ways to get your schedule changed, especially this early before next year.</p>
<p>Regardless, you certainly won’t be rejected over it. Don’t stress too much.</p>
<p>What the others said!</p>
<p>Your application to any college will be evaluated against others in their application pool; one of the important measurements is the rigor of the curriculum you have undertaken in comparison to the context of your high school, and in comparison to all the other applicants in their pool. So, look around you, and honestly assess how you stack up compared to those around you.</p>
<p>Whether you took AP This or That won’t be important to med school admissions committees when you get around to applying. What will be important to them is that you took the courses required for admission, and how you performed in those courses.</p>
<p>What you do need to realize is that most of the students taking the required courses for med school application WILL have taken those classes at the AP level while in high school, and that you will be competing against these students for the top grades in these classes so you will be a strong applicant to med school.</p>
<p>Begin with the context of your high school. If your high school offers both an honors and an AP class in chemistry, for example, is it understood that the AP class is more rigorous and taken by the strongest students? So, if you taken the honors class instead of the AP class, how will you do next year taking the college class alongside the student who took the AP class? You might do fine; again, you might struggle to keep up with her.</p>
<p>Obviously you don’t want to take a crazy number of AP classes in high school because of the workload; and some high schools limit the number of APs you can take at any one time. But pick and choose your APs wisely so as to best prepare yourself for the premed competition you will face in college.</p>
<p>Now my dad asked me about it and he told me that once colleges see I’m applying as a pre-med or Bio major without AP Chem, they will automatically reject me</p>
<p>Uh, no. First of all, no schools do not reject you if you don’t have AP Chem. colleges know that they’re are all kinds of reasons that people don’t take a certain AP class - doesn’t fit in their schedule, school doesn’t offer it, conflicts with another req’d class, etc…</p>
<p>Secondly, you don’t have to apply as “premed” (that’s not a major at 99% of schools). And you don’t have to be a bio major either. But even if you were, not taking AP Chem won’t matter for admission.</p>
<p>Lastly, I don’t know what kind of undergrad you think you need to attend to get into med school, but any good school (good state school, good private) is good enough.</p>
<p>Where does your dad expect you to apply? </p>
<p>BTW…a “poor grade” in APChem at midterm will look worse to colleges than no APChem class at all.</p>
<p>You’re going to get the SAME answers as BEFORE and on your new thread in another forum on CC. Your dad is wrong.</p>
<p>I will probably apply to University of Miami, Tufts, NYU, University of Florida, and a few other schools. Also, will I have a hard time in college without taking AP Chemistry and AP Physics? Should I try to learn the material myself in advance?</p>
<p>I doubt any of these schools will care. Where else will you be applying? What are your stats?</p>