<p>So I have fortunately been accepted to both UCLA (as a Biochem Major) and UC Berkeley (Bioengineering). Unfortunately, I have been oscillating between the two due to questions of whether I should choose a tradition PreMed Major as Biochem at UCLA or an engineering degree that may allow me a “plan B” if things, for what ever reason doesn’t work out with my going to medical school. My ultimate goal at the moment is to get into Medical school and become a surgeon. My favorite subjects have been in Math and Science. </p>
<p>Facts and Rumors that I have heard:</p>
<li><p>Berkeley has a very prestigious engineering school.</p></li>
<li><p>UCLA is has a prestigious Premed Program.</p></li>
<li><p>an engineering major will set me a part from the other bio sci majors applying to med school (assuming my gpa and mcat scores are competitive).</p></li>
<li><p>I do very much prefer the campus at UCLA over that of CAL, but do not mind going to berkeley, in that respect.</p></li>
</ol>
<p>Feel free to ask me any question that may better help you in answering mine!</p>
<p>if you go to cal as a bioeng + premed, id put your chances of getting into med school at around 10%. seriously. engineering is already hard. PLUS Cal…seriously a bad combo</p>
<p>biochem is not a traditional premed major (it’s mostly chemistry with some biology on the side), it’s considered a physical science (that also has many medical school requirements included as major courses)</p>
<p>and while being an engineering major will set you apart from many other premeds, you have a significantly lower chance of having a competitive gpa with other premed students that chose an easier path. If you are up for the challenge, though, go for it.</p>
<p>Bruinboy’s claims are inaccurate.
BioE upper division courses at Cal are easy A’s. Most of them have mean GPAs of 3.5. Once you get past the lower division courses, BioE is smooth sailing.</p>
<p>Also Biochem is not a non-traditional premed route (at least at Cal). There are tons of premed Molecular and Cell Biology: Biochemistry and Molecular Biology emphases students.</p>
<p>From what I have read on these UCLA forums is that UCLA premeds crowd your physiology major. At Cal it is actually opposite; most premeds at Cal crowd the MCB major and overlook the physiology/human biology emphases located in our Integrative Biology major.</p>
<p>i guess what i’m trying to say is, engineers have a much higher chance of getting a lower gpa (too low to apply for MD programs) than non-engineers.</p>
<p>Other than an advance math sequence and the more complicated physics series, they have all the same lower divs. A large number of BioE majors are premed. Plus if you do fail to get into medical school, a bioE degree is much more applicable in the job market than other biology majors.</p>
<p>below 3.5 and it’s probably going to be very hard</p>
<p>anon5524485: that may be how it is at Cal. At UCLA, physical sciences and biological sciences are split for both physics, chem (gen chem and ochem), and math. the physical sciences sequences are rumored to be harder and much more of a gpa deflator. engineers MUST take the physical science sequences.</p>
<p>aside from just chances of getting in, why on earth would you want to do engineering if you want to do healthcare type work? even as a back-up? may be it’s just me, but i can’t see how you can be happy as an engineer or a doctor. the work is just completely different.</p>
<p>bioengineering is very different from other engineering fields.</p>
<p>Call me a cynic, but the truth is that most premeds (I am not aiming this statement at anyone in particular) are not doing it because they want to help people or because they are interest in medicine, but they are doing it for the money. Bioengineering tends to pay better than most other biology majors (but then again biology majors do not pay that well anyways).</p>
<p>I am a biochem major at UCLA - and I did not find the upper division courses to be very difficult to get high grades in. The worst were the lower division organic chemistry and life science series (seriously competitive) - which I took with many engineers.</p>
<p>I think engineering, especially at a more prestigious engineering school, is generally harder to get a 3.5+ GPA in - which is pretty important for good med schools. I also agree that the two disciplines, bioengineering & biochem, are VERY different. I feel that biochem at UCLA tends to involve more memorizing and is more anally technical (typically wet lab) than engineering, which I gather involves a lot more math+programming optimization and data processing (dry lab). I’m also not quite sure what bioengineering is however, compared to chemical engineering with a biomedical focus…</p>