Rising Freshman in High School, looking to get into BS/MD, graduating early? --> Need advice

Pre-Med & Medical School Multiple Degree Programs
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Hello CCers

I’m a freshman in high school right now. I have a lot of questions about BS/MD, and how to ensure that I have a “good” chance of getting into the higher ones like Brown, maybe Rice/Baylor (but one can only dream, am I right?).

Classes taken this year:
Chemistry Honors
Biology Honors
Precal Honors
World History AP
Spanish 2 Honors
English 1 Honors
Band (most definitely dropping after this year, it just takes up way too much time with marching band season)

Self study: AP US History

Predicted schedule:

Sophomore:
AP Calculus BC
AP Chemistry
AP Biology
AP Physics 1
English 2 Honors
Spanish 3 Honors
Independent Study Math (Art of Problem Solving (discreet mathematics))

Self study: AP Computer Science A (looks interesting, I have many good friends who will help me, and I definitely won’t take the exam if I don’t feel confident by January), AP US government and AP Environmental Science (probably won’t take these unless I’m looking for a national AP scholar by sophomore year, does that mean much?)

Junior:
Independent Study Multivariable Calculus (MIT Open courseware, online university, or something of that nature)
Independent Study Organic Chemistry
AP Physics 2
AP English Language
AP Spanish 4 Language
AP European History
AP Statistics (really don’t want to take this class, I’ve heard a lot of bad things about the teacher)

Senior Year (this is where I run into problems):
Independent Study Mathematics (unless the calculus teacher at my school retires, she is already around 70 years old)
Independent Study Biochemistry
Independent Study Physics C AP (since this course is not offered at my school, I don’t even know if this will be allowed by the administration)
AP English Literature
AP Spanish 5 Literature

…and I’m out of classes…my school doesn’t offer anything else other than AP Macro (so strange that they don’t offer AP Micro to complement it), and that’s just a semester class so…

I’m in the following clubs:
Mu Alpha Theta
UIL Competitive Mathematics Team
Science Club (Olympiad and UIL)
Band (which like I mentioned up there^, I am dropping)
Competitive Chess Club (USCF rating: 1523)
HOSA (health science club)

Clubs which I will join in the future:
National Honor Society (Spanish)
National Honor Society (Science)
National Honor Society (that’s way down the line though, senior year only)

Volunteering:
Have been volunteering at a program that delivers pet food for seniors since 7th grade
Have been accepted into a hospital volunteering program for this summer, will continue to look for more opportunities
Miscellaneous school volunteering

Other ECs:
Classical Piano for around 11 years, although I’m not a prodigy or anything
Oboe playing (I’m pretty decent, I’m the only freshman in the top band at my school and I played with a youth symphony for a year, but I’m dropping band and this will ultimately mean I’ll drop the instrument since I my parents can’t afford buying/renting one)

Research:
Shadowed a nano-technologist last summer, thought it was pretty interesting and I’m planning to actually start a research project under his guidance

Shadowing:
Other than the nano-technologist, nothing yet, plan to shadowing doctors this summer

If you’ve actually read through all of that, thank you so much^^^

I am thinking about graduating early. Other CCers have strongly advised against it but I never explained to them the situation I am in. My precal teacher/future calculus teacher is the sponsor of the math club at our school. I spend most of my after-school time in math club and science club practicing for competitions. My life pretty much revolves around that. My only friends in school are in math club and science club. I am the only freshman. One of my best friends is the only sophomore in this club and the rest are seniors and juniors.

I think that our sponsor will retire after next year (when I am a freshman) or the year after that (when I am junior). Also, new zoning changes in our school district ensure that the feeder junior high that gave our high school previous math and science students will now be zoned to a new high school. What I am trying to say is, I am the last of my high school’s era for competitive math and science. It is very, very obvious that no one in our school is interested in the math and science clubs and that it will eventually die out due to lack of interest. And when our sponsor retires, no one will be willing to take up the club anyways, and that would be the end of my high school’s math club.

Also, there is the issue with classes. If I stay senior year, it would be pretty much a blow off year. Like I said before, I am bound to “run out” of classes to take. I have already mapped it out and have determined that graduating early won’t alter my course load that much (it wouldn’t make it that much harder). I would just have to self study for the AP English Language test next year and take AP English Literature my junior year instead of my senior year.

But there is the case with developing ECs. One more year would give me time to prepare for the chemistry, biology, physics and mathematics olympiads (I missed the second level for biology by 5 questions, chemistry by 11 questions (local exam had 75 questions, cut off was 52), and AIME by one question). My goal is to ultimately to make 3 of these olympiads at least once (USAM(J)O, USNCO, USPHO, USABO), and make honors for 2 of them. Graduating early would give me significantly less time to do this. Also there’s less time for shadowing/volunteering (although I can make that up this summer and the next one), as well as research.

I think there is enough time to develop my shadowing/volunteering hours as well as research, but I know that graduating early would ultimately mean that my goals for the olympiads above will become far-fetched unless I really, really try this summer. But is it really worth it? Staying one more year just for a shot at 4 olympiads which are not even guaranteed to give results after hard work? Staying one more year without any friends and without any club to associate myself with? I know that BS/MD programs are tight on ECs and significantly less time to develop them would hurt my chances. Maybe BS/MD is just not right for me in this situation?

Essentially what it comes down to is:

Graduate early: Graduate with my sophomore friends and be part of that “final league” of math club/science club students, but have significantly less time to develop ECs

Graduate normally: Have more time for ECs but have a very gloomy senior year

Thank you so so much for reading this. I’m really tied and any advice would help.

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@Shreyas0718,

Will answer your detailed question, but quick question that I have, as I seem to see this more often on CC these days – how are students taking AP Calculus as high school sophomores, which requires completion of Algebra I, Geometry, Algebra II, and Pre-calculus? I realize students can take some courses in middle school – i.e. first year of Foreign Language or 1 to 2 years of Math (Pre-AP Algebra I, Geometry) before starting high school, but even at the earliest I’ve seen AP Calculus taken by juniors.

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@Roentgen Thank you so much for reading. Most usually take Algebra 1 as sixth graders (they take tests called “Credit By Exams” which allows them skip middle school math. I took exams for 7th grade and 8th grade math in sixth grade so I could take Algebra 1 in 7th grade. My middle school offered a geometry class taught by the head algebra 1 teacher, so I took geometry in 8th grade. I took another credit by exam for algebra 2 after hearing how my high school’s precal/calculus BC teacher was retiring soon and that’s how I’m in precal right now.

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Have you considered not graduating at all? You could simply apply a year early to the colleges you want. (I know some universities don’t allow it, like Stanford)As a freshman, I was considering this opinion until I had schedule conflicts with AP physics 1 and AP Bio, but it still seems viable for you, I would look into it.

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@PercyFowl I didn’t realize that you could do that until yesterday when someone messaged me, but thanks for reading and replying anyways! I’ll look into it.

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@titan456

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@shreyas0718,

Ok, so first off, I wanted to say it’s great that you’re looking into these type of programs early. There are also Bachelor/DDS, Bachelor/PharmD programs as well, so realize in terms of combined programs in healthcare after high school, it’s not just limited to medical school.

You should be taking the cores every year in grades 9-12 – English/Language Arts, Science, Math, and Social Studies. With respect to your high school schedule, you will not gain anything in terms of the Bachelor/MD program process when it comes to self-studying for an AP course. I’m assuming your schedule is the typical 7 period a day schedule in which the fall semester runs from August to December and spring semester runs from January to May. Your math should end at AP Calculus BC. You won’t gain anything more in terms of admissions by doing AP Statistics or Multivariable Calculus. It’s not even close to necessary to take every AP course offered at your school.

I would say taking AP Chemistry, AP Biology, AP Physics 1 all in one year and as a sophomore will be way too much. It’s too much material and you don’t gain anything extra even if you were to take it and gets “As” in all of them. Spread them out: AP Chemistry in 10th, AP Biology in 11th, and AP Physics 1 in 12th grade (or take AP Physics 1 in 11th along with AP Bio, and then take AP Physics 2 in 12th). Take AP US History in 11th grade along with the rest of your classmates. You can also take something like AP Psychology, since Introductory Psychology is now part of the premed requirements.

Leave your summers fully open in which to do healthcare volunteering, shadowing physicians or in a hospital, scribing, medical/scientific research at a university or medical school, etc. to expand your CV. As you progress in high school, you can start applying for club/organization officer positions.

That being said all of this is pretty moot, as your number one priority should be maintaining good grades, high class rank, and good standardized test scores: ACT/SAT and specific SAT subject exams for the specific Bachelor/MD programs that require it. These will be looked at first in terms of the filtering process for these type of programs, especially at the very competitive ones.