<p>I want to be on a premed track/ major and i want to minor journalism. Would harvard be a good fit in this regard?</p>
<p>I just finished my junior year of high school and I’m highly interested in Harvard and have done a lot of research on the school so I think I can answer this question. I don’t think Harvard actually has a journalism major (correct me if I’m wrong) so you can major in English which a lot of journalists do. As an English major you can still take medical school required classes and still get into medical school with that English degree. Once again I’m still a high school student so anyone feel free to correct me if I’m wrong.</p>
<p>Neither “premed” nor “journalism” is an actual concentration, or even track, at Harvard. “Premed” merely means that you intend to satisfy the requirements for applying to medical school, which generally means four years’ worth of into lab science courses, some math, and some extracurricular activity that shows you are serious about health care, science, or both. You can do that and concentrate in anything, although it’s easiest to do it if you are concentrating in something where all those courses are required, which means some version of biology or chemistry, and that’s what a majority (but far from all) pre-meds do.</p>
<p>As for journalism, Harvard is a great place for journalism, not because it has great courses on journalism, but because it has a serious student newspaper, lots of other student publications, a culture of huge interest in journalism, plus an awesome alumni network throughout the world of mainstream and alternative media. As far as I know, students interested in journalism are probably more likely to major in government or history than English literature – anything that provides substantive background on a field that interests them, and that involves primary-source research experience. The students most involved in the Crimson probably concentrate in whatever-interferes-least-with-the-Crimson; I think they sometimes anchor the curve for the rest of their classmates while they spend 80 hours a week working on their paper. It may be tough to combine that with pre-medism.</p>
<p>You don’t have to work on the Crimson to have a career in journalism, though. One of my favorite relatives/somewhat recent Harvard grads recently got a great job with a major daily newspaper; he didn’t start doing journalism until after he graduated. He was bumming around Europe after college and started writing articles on spec to prolong his travels and to give his tourism some focus. That’s something to watch out for with Harvard students – they are sometimes so ridiculously talented that completely nutty career paths work out fine.</p>