<p>I am considering Wash U for college. I want to go in pre med or major in bio. I have heard that it is super competitive and almost impossible to get a good gpa. I need at least a 3.5 gpa to go into med school. Is Wash U that hard in pre med or did I hear wrong? Also, how does it compare to top ivy league schools like Princeton, Harvard, and Yale?</p>
<p>Haha, lets be real. It’s not an Ivy, how could it be difficult?</p>
<p>Ivies arent that good. They are just all around good in all departments. Never number 1 in a select area.</p>
<p>O’RLY? Because I’m pretty sure Penn’s school of nursing is the best school of nursing in the country</p>
<p>Lol nursing</p>
<p>If it’s too difficult, then what would an Ivy be? Impossible? Now before you people jump on me like rabid animals, DISCLAIMER: it was a joke! </p>
<p>Princeton’s got grade deflation. It’s probably tougher to maintain a high grade at Princeton, especially for engineering and the natural sciences. All the other Ivies have grade inflation though.</p>
<p>WashU>>>JHU for pre med. You don’t want some punk ruining your lab to get ahead.</p>
<p>Hahaha if you’re premed you’re gonna have a great time at Washu. Right.</p>
<p>Brando: sarcasm?</p>
<p>Trolls aplenty, huh. WashU premed is rigorous, but not impossible.</p>
<p>Yes, let’s be real: Brown and Yale with their 3.5-3.6 average graduating GPAs are extremely difficult. Can’t imagine any non-Ivies being more difficult to maintain a good GPA at than those two (MIT and Caltech must be comparable walks in the park because they are not Ivies).</p>
<p>Oh, and the Princeton grading distribution hasn’t really affected the sciences and engineering. Those depts. already graded like that before the policy. Mainly the humanities and social sciences were effected. That only means, that at Princeton, you can’t use those to guarantee a boost in cumulative GPA. With that said, if Princeton has science classes that gave 35% A/A-, that sounds awesome. I wish I had science courses like that. 10-25% (getting a B+ means you’re in the top quarter of a gen. class for example. Let’s not talk about orgo. where some profs. are giving a soft majority of C grades) is the norm, especially for pre-med weedouts. Bet WashU is similar. Tough, but doable.</p>
<p>im not a pre-med major at washu but i can debunk the myth of being super competitive. my floor had a lot of pre-meds and gen-chemers. right before a lab was due, they would all gather together and go over it as well as sometimes do group study sessions. if that doesn’t show how supportive washu students are of each other i don’t know what does. i can’t speak for their grades but considering i didn’t hear too many complaints and only know a few people who dropped chem/pre-med (none from my floor), i can’t imagine being any more difficult than that at a comparable school</p>
<p>I don’t see the point of posting paragraphs to fight the trolls. Let thence say whatever asinine thing they want.</p>
<p>WUSTL Biology Major here.</p>
<p>I think the answer that best sums it up was said by Atemporal.</p>
<p>“WashU premed is rigorous, but not impossible.”</p>
<p>While there are those with natural talent or those who have a good background in the sciences from high school who do well, there is an amazing abundance of resources to help you do well if you didn’t come from a high school which prepared you as well. The thing is, only a very small portion of the pre-meds take advantage of all of these resources (all of which are FREE) If you’re ready to use all these resources, I think it’d be very easy to get a 3.5+ here (and even 3.8+, i know a decent number of people with these stats)</p>
<p>I won’t comment on comparing the premed program with other universities because hey, who really knows unless they’ve attended both? and if so, their perspective would be tainted because they’ve already taken the course.</p>
<p>CHEMISTRY (General and Organic)</p>
<p>For freshman general chemistry, there is the Peer Led Team Learning Program (PLTL) which puts you in a weekly problem solving group of about 6-8 students which simulates exam and quiz questions for the week. In addition, there is academic mentoring offered by Cornerstone (cornerstone.wustl.edu for more info if you’re interested) which can set you up with group or one-on-one tutoring with someone who has gotten an A in the course (This goes for almost every single class). In every residential college (dormitories that are organized by one sophomore and one freshman dorm [usually]) there are residential peer mentors who serve as in-residence tutors for Chemistry, Physics, and Mathematics.</p>
<p>For my year in organic chemistry, the Chemistry department also created POGIL (process oriented guided inquiry learning for those of you who are interested) which was a similar extra study session you could go to in which they prepared exam like questions and gave you extra preparation for the test. These were extremely well-organized and basically offered free by the TAs. </p>
<p>IMPORTANT: The Chemistry Department recently moved to PRESET cutoffs for exams instead of curves, removing any competition you had with you peers. Even before this, however, there was never a competitive atmosphere at WUSTL and there is almost certainly none nowadays. </p>
<p>I also believe WASHU has some of the best professors in the nation who are not only very intelligent but VERY interested in you learning the material. Prof. Loomis (who teaches General Chemistry I) won the students’ choice for best professor a year ago and Prof. Frey (who also teaches General Chemistry I) is the director of the Teaching Center and was promoted to Professor of the Practice for her teaching.</p>
<p>BIOLOGY</p>
<p>I think introductory biology is one of the more difficult sequences at WUSTL. The biology department does put out weekly problem sets which you must do in order to do well on the exams but resources for these classes are somewhat less available save for the Academic mentoring offered by Cornerstone. Usually, RPMs in other subjects (who are also premed) will be able to help somewhat. </p>
<p>I think the first two biology courses (Principles of Biology I, Principles of Biology II) is where the decision whether to continue with premed is made. I think where most students falter with biology is that they don’t put in the effort to really KNOW the material (too used to multiple choice tests in high school where the answer was somewhat obvious). There is a difference between RECOGNIZING the information and being able to RECALL and SYNTHESIZE information you have learned on the test. If you’re willing to put in the effort into figuring out how to study best for each course and be flexible in how you study, you’ll be ready for WASHU.</p>
<p>Thankfully, the upper level courses in biology are more lenient grade-wise and have better grade distributions.</p>
<p>One of the redeeming qualities about the biology department (and chemistry) is the MANY opportunities to teach (tutor, teaching assistant, problem solving group leader, help desk) which I don’t think is nearly as available at other universities.</p>
<p>PHYSICS</p>
<p>I believe physics is one of the best taught courses at Washington University. For those of you who are unfamiliar, the course now assigns homework assignments due at the beginning of each lecture which forces you to keep up with the material. In the end, almost everyone is prepared for the test. With a preset curve set from the grades when they previously taught the course, student grade distributions have gone heavily towards A’s while preparing students well. </p>
<p>OTHER REASONS TO CHOOSE WashU for Premed</p>
<p>I think WashU offers one of the best preparations for applying to medical school. When I last checked, the average MCAT score for applicants from WUSTL was roughly 32, well above the national average of applicants of 29. I think something that attests to this preparation was that for my first practice test, without any preparation, I scored a 35. </p>
<p>I believe the advising at WashU is also unparalleled. I have an extremely competent 4 year advisor, an amazing major advisor ensuring that my academic plan is solid, and the ability to access an advisor every day of the workweek to talk about my plan through “Dean of the Day”(which has come in handy alot). </p>
<p>Specifically for pre-med, WashU Cornerstone offers an amazing MCAT course taught by WUSTL MED MD/PhDs which is not only taught well but skips alot of the stuff that is way too simple (i.e. the trigonometry that courses like the Princeton Review insist on going over). Along with this, WashU offers personal statement workshops, countless programs to get you ready for the AMCAS application and your first years such as “Junior Jumpstart” and “Career Camp”. The Career Center offers basically unlimited opportunities to conduct mock interviews to prepare you for your medical school interviews. Also, WashU’s prehealth committee is extremely helpful, assisting you by evaluating your writing on practice secondary application questions, your personal statement, resume, and Work and activities list which will be on your primary medical school application making the process alot less stressful. In addition, they are extremely efficient and will not delay your application like some college’s premedical committees. </p>
<p>Research opportunities here are unmatched as well. I have never heard of a person who wanted to conduct research and didn’t get it. WashU also offers several fellowships to conduct research which usually offers a $4000 stipend for 10 weeks of research in the summer. These programs are called “SURF” and “C-SURE” (for biology research only, there are others for other fields). WashU also recently joined the Amgen Scholars Program with other top research universities in the nation and offers a $4000 stipend, food allowance, free housing and activities paid for, along with a trip to the Amgen national symposium. </p>
<p>I could go on and on (I apologize for misspellings and grammatical errors, I’m typing this fast). If you have any questions about anything specific, I’d be happy to answer on this thread (I check up on this forum only occasionally though). </p>
<p>WashU premed has opened up so many windows for me and I have never regretted my decision to come to WashU for premed. OP, I hope this helps and I wish you luck in your application process.</p>