<p>I hear a lot about medical schools not only wanting to see good GPA, but also the rigor of college. What kind and how many classes do you take for it to be considered rigorous? Like right now i'm taking chemistry, calculus, biology, and english. That's only 4 classes! Many people take 5 classes! Of course their classes don't have 2 three hour labs and includes most impossible-to-fail core courses like art. Also how would medical schools look upon this if I decided to take some core courses like history and art during the summer so I have more time to focus on my pre-med classes in the fall?
Oh and another thing, I know many medical schools don't take AP credit, but do they take community college credit for pre-med requirements. And do they take AP credits for non-premed core courses e.g. behavioral sciences?</p>
<p>Thanks</p>
<p>Rigor varies from school to school, but it's bad if you're below normal according to whatever metric your school and AMCAS use to measure it. Mine did not include lab hours and such, so we just had to suck it up and deal. We're often advised that we should spend at least a couple semesters higher than normal.</p>
<p>Medical schools don't care about you taking non-premed courses, so they wouldn't care whether you use AP; i.e. if you don't have to take it, it doesn't matter whether they accept AP credits. </p>
<p><a href="http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/showthread.php?t=219345%5B/url%5D">http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/showthread.php?t=219345</a></p>
<p>Usually it's hours taken that is the best determinant of "rigor" however, I think that of all the things to worry about in med school admissions, rigor should be the least of your worries...or at least very near the bottom.</p>
<p>Should you be taking 12 hours every semester? probably not, but if you are on a pace to graduate in 4 years or even 4.5, you should be more than okay...</p>
<p>so it's better if I just take my core classes and my sciences together in the fall rather than spread the courses out over the summer and only take, say, two courses during the fall?</p>
<p>when you say two courses are you saying two pre-med requirements or just two courses period?</p>
<p>Being anything less than a full time student will likely raise red flags unless it's obvious that you are doing so b/c you're working to pay for school and aren't just sandbagging to focus on your studies (financial/family obligations are not held against you if you present with an "atypical" application/transcript)</p>