<p>I am thinking of completing my prerequisites for pharmacy school and work my way to get a bs computer science degree as a backup (economy is pretty bad out there and I want to make sure I can have the best odds of finding a job regardless of being accepted into pharmacy school. It seems like engineering bs degrees has a better chance than any science and math bs degrees after graduating from college).</p>
<p>fyi: Some courses do overlap with pre-pharmacy (calculus and physics) and I am about to finish all prerequisites after my sophomore year is over. </p>
<p>Have you heard anyone doing this? Is this even possible to do?</p>
<p>Thanks.</p>
<p>Isn’t prepharm all about maintaining a really high GPA? Then doing CS for pre-pharm would be a pretty bad idea unless you’re really good at CS. You would probably ruin your chances at pharmacy if you did CS.</p>
<p>Should be possible, but you’ll need to be good in order to keep your GPA up.</p>
<p>Example requirements: [Prerequisites</a> - Pharm.D. Professional Program - University of Minnesota](<a href=“http://www.pharmacy.umn.edu/pharmd/admissions/Prerequisites/index.htm]Prerequisites”>http://www.pharmacy.umn.edu/pharmd/admissions/Prerequisites/index.htm)</p>
<p>The basic science, math, and general ed requirements overlap with CSci. In addition, you need to take microbiology, advanced bio, anatomy, physiology, and organic chem I+II+lab.</p>
<p>I don’t think it hurts to go in with this as a goal. Take the basic sciences plus intro CSci courses freshman year. If you don’t think you can handle both, pick one then.</p>
<p>check the requirements at your school for CS degree and see if there is enough elective space to complete pre-pharm requirements. If you have some AP/IB credit you may have room or you may have to add on some summer work. Totally depends on school.</p>
<p>Pharm competition at good schools at least is insane. At Purdue I recall a number like 700 students in pre-Pharm and under 200 in the actual program, very cutthroat. </p>
<p>The overlap is not as much bizzare as you think; my wife worked for over a decade in pharmaceutical manufacturing and it was not unusual to see PharmD’s work in Pharm related IT areas like packaging, quality assurance, and the like. A couple of the smart ones I got to meet in company parties and such actually had undergrad engineering degrees and went on to be PharmD’s specializing in pharma manufacturing.</p>
<p>I will check with my advisor but I am pretty sure I have enough space for both (I took many APs in high school and received credit for almost all of them). </p>
<p>CS (this and BME are the only engineering majors offered at my university) is something to fall back on if my initial plan (getting into pharmacy school) didn’t work out (it’s just way too competitive like turbo said); I never heard anyone doing this so that’s why i thought it may be out of the ordinary. BME, math, chemistry, and biology are very popular majors for people who are interested in applying to medical school, pharmacy, etc. I am afraid there are not enough jobs in this economy for people with bachelor’s degree in those fields. </p>
<p>Do you think getting a BS in computer science will give me a better chance of landing a job after graduation? or should I pursue deeper and apply for grad school?</p>
<p>Thanks for all the input.</p>