Health Studies or Biomedical Science at Waterloo

[fefe]

Hey guys!

I'm in my last year of high school and i'm stuck choosing between biomedical science or health studies. If any of you have had experience in these programs, please tell me about it!

 

I think i like waterloo, but if you have any other suggestions, i'd love to hear it:)

 

and if you've already graduated from these programs, what career options are there?!

 

Thanks everybody!

[charmer08]

Health studies and biomed are completely different programs. Make sure you look at the courses you'll have to take for each program. Biomed is pure science whereas health studies requires you to take ethics, sociology, psychology and some pure science courses... Only first year level pure science courses are required so in upper years, its basically all health courses.

 

If you are a "science" person, go for biomed.

[fefe]

thank you for your reply! =D

i am a "science" person, but i also like health studies because they have the co-op option.

at first i wanted to take biomed because i was thinking about becoming an optometrist, but since they only accept 90/300 people, i think my chances are prettty slim...so now thats why i'm also looking towards health studies.

if i take biomedical sciences, what kind of career paths would i have?

[rmorelan]

thank you for your reply! =D

i am a "science" person, but i also like health studies because they have the co-op option.

at first i wanted to take biomed because i was thinking about becoming an optometrist, but since they only accept 90/300 people, i think my chances are prettty slim...so now thats why i'm also looking towards health studies.

if i take biomedical sciences, what kind of career paths would i have?

 

side note - you can also take honour science, follow the same biomedical program course path and eventually transfer into biomed.

[charmer08]

thank you for your reply! =D

i am a "science" person, but i also like health studies because they have the co-op option.

at first i wanted to take biomed because i was thinking about becoming an optometrist, but since they only accept 90/300 people, i think my chances are prettty slim...so now thats why i'm also looking towards health studies.

if i take biomedical sciences, what kind of career paths would i have?

 

Career paths include academic or industrial research, teaching, professional schools, technician, genetic counselor, nutritionist etc etc... you should be able to find the career options on their website.

[rmorelan]

Good question at this point I guess would be what you want your back up plan to be? I would hate to think you were stuck passively taking what happened to be left to you

[blind_synergy]

I'm at Waterloo, doing their co-op program (computer science with the bioinformatics option). If you choose to do the co-op program, your ECs will suffer. Chances are, if you're like me, you'll be moving around a lot on your workterms to new cities and such; you won't have time to establish a permanent presence in any activity and you can pretty much rule any CIS sports out (would you, if you were a coach, be happy if one of your athletes moved to Cupertino half-way through the season?). FYI: The way the co-op program works for most students is that you attend a term of school and then do a term of co-op and repeat six more times.

 

On the other hand, I'm getting really valuable experience in the professional environment. You can really get to know your employers to the point where you stop thinking of them as your bosses and more so as colleagues and friends. You won't be short of any LoRs. Also, at least in CS, some of the jobs I'm interviewing for this term are paying in the realm of $20-$30 per hour in addition to covering housing costs if you have to move (Apple and Qualcomm, specifically). You can make enough money to pay for tuition and then some. Be warned, though: research and university jobs tend to have awful pay and not much room for advancement.

[rmorelan]

I'm at Waterloo, doing their co-op program (computer science with the bioinformatics option). If you choose to do the co-op program, your ECs will suffer. Chances are, if you're like me, you'll be moving around a lot on your workterms to new cities and such; you won't have time to establish a permanent presence in any activity and you can pretty much rule any CIS sports out (would you, if you were a coach, be happy if one of your athletes moved to Cupertino half-way through the season?). FYI: The way the co-op program works for most students is that you attend a term of school and then do a term of co-op and repeat six more times.

 

On the other hand, I'm getting really valuable experience in the professional environment. You can really get to know your employers to the point where you stop thinking of them as your bosses and more so as colleagues and friends. You won't be short of any LoRs. Also, at least in CS, some of the jobs I'm interviewing for this term are paying in the realm of $20-$30 per hour in addition to covering housing costs if you have to move (Apple and Qualcomm, specifically). You can make enough money to pay for tuition and then some. Be warned, though: research and university jobs tend to have awful pay and not much room for advancement.

 

Jobs in that category also are pretty good ECs as well I think - people interviewing me certainly spent some time exploring that despite the other more traditional EC stuff that I did

[blind_synergy]

Jobs in that category also are pretty good ECs as well I think - people interviewing me certainly spent some time exploring that despite the other more traditional EC stuff that I did

 

That's good to hear. I'm having some trouble with scholarship apps that differentiate between the two; I just don't have many traditional EC's to list (had plenty in HS, basically none right now).

 

I'm guessing you did some lab work? I'm finding it difficult to force myself to move into that area, given what some of these private companies are offering in terms of cash, future employment, and one-on-one mentoring. Qualcomm just the other night rented a section of McGinnis and put down two grand for free beer and food (you could order whatever you wanted) for all of their interviewees. I don't see any government or univeristy jobs making this kind of effort.

[fefe]

side note - you can also take honour science, follow the same biomedical program course path and eventually transfer into biomed.

 

wow you can do that? =O COOL!

thats actually a really good idea, thanks!

[fefe]

I'm at Waterloo, doing their co-op program (computer science with the bioinformatics option). If you choose to do the co-op program, your ECs will suffer. Chances are, if you're like me, you'll be moving around a lot on your workterms to new cities and such; you won't have time to establish a permanent presence in any activity and you can pretty much rule any CIS sports out (would you, if you were a coach, be happy if one of your athletes moved to Cupertino half-way through the season?). FYI: The way the co-op program works for most students is that you attend a term of school and then do a term of co-op and repeat six more times.

 

On the other hand, I'm getting really valuable experience in the professional environment. You can really get to know your employers to the point where you stop thinking of them as your bosses and more so as colleagues and friends. You won't be short of any LoRs. Also, at least in CS, some of the jobs I'm interviewing for this term are paying in the realm of $20-$30 per hour in addition to covering housing costs if you have to move (Apple and Qualcomm, specifically). You can make enough money to pay for tuition and then some. Be warned, though: research and university jobs tend to have awful pay and not much room for advancement.

 

thanks for the advice! just a little confused...what does EC mean? sorry i'm newb:o and btw what happens if you're in the co-op program, but don't get accepted to any jobs? and do you get jobs offered from people around the world?

[MaeFleur]

i was thinking about becoming an optometrist, but since they only accept 90/300 people, i think my chances are prettty slim...

 

90/300 isn't too bad. Since you are posting on a premed forum I'll assume you're interested in medical school which generally has much slimmer chances. Don't discount optometry only because you think your chances are slim. If you want it, work for it and you'll be there in no time!

 

Good luck choosing what to take in undergrad!

[blind_synergy]

thanks for the advice! just a little confused...what does EC mean? sorry i'm newb:o and btw what happens if you're in the co-op program, but don't get accepted to any jobs? and do you get jobs offered from people around the world?

 

ECs = Extracurriculars. Between you and me, I don't think you'd have much trouble in either program. I've gotten 90s in almost every bio/chem course I've taken at Loo with minimal effort (first term chem and bio I skipped class and only studied before the midterms and finals; not recommended, the catching up was brutal and stressful); it's the math and computer science courses that kill, just with sheer workload (i.e. one long assignment per week per course). Physics also.

 

Anyways, you might find it difficult to get a job first or second term co-op. That's cool, no worries. It's common and UW only starts bugging you if you're still batting zero after three or four study terms. All you need to do to get them off your back is to prove you've made an effort applying and searching. You need to work five co-op terms to graduate with "co-op" written on your degree. Good marks and a well-written resume will get you interviews. Job offers are far and few between, though. You get 4th year ass-hats that apply to low-level positions and are generally way more qualified than you. They get the offers but chances are they won't accept. Don't fret if you only get 'ranked'. You could be the greatest interviewee in the world and still get slotted down because other guy has 4+ years of C++ experience.

 

This term, I've interviewed for a bunch of positions in Canada (mostly Toronto; one in Waterloo), three in the States, and one in Hong Kong. The ones in the States seem to pay disproportionately high (Qualcomm offered $950 per week plus they pay for housing; I'll find out about Apple tommorow). Not sure how the pay outside of CS and engineering is, though. Next Friday they'll post the rankings; you generally interview for a bunch of jobs and then, at a certain date, they release the rankings.

[erinrin]

Hi,

 

I am a second year student and I want to transfer into Biomedical sciences. But I think I need to take 4 lecture courses plus lab so I would like to ask people who are in sciences and have completed at least first year, what are the labs like compared to lectures, in terms of difficulty?

 

Thanks

[Orcamute]

Great question,

 

I was debating whether I should do Bio-Med or Health sciences when I was in highschool too. I went towards Health Sciences because I was mostly interested in Anatomy and how the infrastructure of Health was created and how it has evolved (I thought that would be great knowledge to have as an MD too).

 

However, I always considered myself as a Science guy and I didn't want to give up a Science degree for the Health Sciences (which you have to give up the .Sc after the degree in the majority of them aka H.S degree). So..I looked into different degree's and I found one at Carleton that was a B.Sc (Bio) BUT it had a w/specialization in Health Sciences program (which was in Honours). I was thrilled and without a doubt I went with that.

 

I also applied to the McMasters Health Science program (which I was accepted) but I decided to go with Carleton even though it was more expensive. There are a few other B.Sc programs that also offer the specialization in Health Scienes like Wilfrid Laurier (which is also a good program and is also reknown for having a wild party life).

 

The way I see it, Bio-Med is especially great if you are doing Research. Health Sciences is great if you want to be a practicing Medical Doctor and/or are looking for a Health Related career (although you can definitely get one with Bio-Med too).

 

Cheers and good luck.

[rmorelan]

I took biomedical science at waterloo - I enjoyed that program. Liked the fact the labs were separate courses.

 

Not a lot of flexibility with it with all the requirements at times.

[NutritionRunner]

I'm not how strict the program requirements are at Waterloo, or if students outside of a given program can take some of the courses offered by that program, but you can always explore different subjects through your electives.

 

For example, this summer, at Guelph, I took a public health course that explored the social determinants of health. I learned a lot about the various factors, outside of biology/physiology, that affect health. So you don't necessarily have to be studying health sciences to take those kinds of courses. (I've also taken courses in sociology, psychology, couple and family relationships, etc. as part of my program. Plenty of students in bio-medical science, at least at Guelph, take some of those courses as electives as well.)

 

It really depends on where your strengths and interests lie. It's also okay not to know exactly what you want to study at this point - I've seen a lot of students either change their major or transfer programs/universities after first year, when they've had exposure to a bunch of different courses and decide what really captures their interest. For example, there are always a few people who transfer into my program (Applied Human Nutrition) after they've had exposure to some nutrition courses and realize that if you want to become a registered dietitian you need to attend a Dietitians of Canada accredited program.

[GPCRs@work]

I went to waterloo for biochem (non co-op stream). a lot of my friends did biomed and really liked it. it's more or less just biology. I would recommend that you look into minors early on if you're interested in that kind of stuff, since you'll have the electives to do them.