Decisions Decisions

[Guest BiggyG]

I'm currently a fourth year Engineering Physics student at McMaster university and am working on a 16 month internship at the London Regional Cancer Center. Enrolling in engineering, I never really considered going into medicine, but after working at the Cancer Center I have had a change in attitude. My dilemma is this:

 

My engineering course requirements have prohibited me from taking a lot of the required courses for most medical schools (in Ontario anyways). I probably could make up for this in my final year of my engineering undergrad degree, but doing so would sort of comprise my degree in that I could be taking much more advanced engineering courses (my technical electives).

 

This problem also continues onto the MCAT issue in that I have a first year chemistry class under my belt, but other than that no biology, no physiology, etc ... Plenty and plenty of physics though.

 

I can apply for McMaster Med-School so that I don't have to worry about Pre-Reqs or the MCAT, but I feel as this might severely limit my chances because my average isn't the greatest at around 78%-79% and my volunteer experiences are limited.

 

What do you think the best course of action would be? I feel as if I will apply for McMaster Medical school either way, but assuming I won't get in should I try and take an extra year to take some chem and bio classes along with an english or two to satisfy some of the prereqs and gain experience for the MCAT or should I try to find a job with my engineering degree and apply again after a year of working or should I try and start a M.Sc or M.Eng and try to re-apply after a year of graduate work?

 

Any advice offered would be greatly appreciated, let me know what you think or if anyone has been in a similar situation.

[Guest turtle]

I don't know that I'm at all qualified to give you advice, but here it is anyway if you want it

 

 

My suggestion would be to finish your engineering degree then take an extra year to do the prereq's and write the MCAT. This will have the benefit of allowing you to complete your current degree with all the advanced courses...a good thing both because that is what you obviously went to school for and in case you ever want to work in engineering again. Also, by doing the extra year with all the prerequisite courses, many more doors will be open to you in terms of the number of med schools you can apply to...and you may also be able to bring your GPA up some.

 

Grad school is great, but won't do anything about the prereq situation, and it wouldn't help you at McMaster until after it is complete since McMaster doesn't consider your graduate degree in their application process unless it is conferred before the application deadline.

 

As the saying goes, 'just my 2 cents'...

 

*turtle*

[Guest BiggyG]

Thanks for the response, what you said makes perfect sense. One question though would be, how would an extra year affect my GPA? I wouldn't be in any program per say, just taking some courses. What if I did them at a different university? I'm a little unclear as to how this all works in terms of my overall GPA.

[Guest turtle]

as i understand it, every year of full-time undergraduate studies is included in your GPA, regardless of whether it is part of your regular program. People will often take an extra year of courses in order to do this, and it's ok if it's at a different university, but it would have to be a full course load. If all you want is to take the prerequisites, but you don't care about improving your GPA, you can just do the courses part time...they will still be counted as fulfilling the course requirements, but will not get counted in your GPA calculations. This is because most schools only include full-time semesters (and not summer courses either) in GPA calculations.

 

make sense?

 

*turtle*

[Guest seedstrike]

I don't really know how taking that fifth year would work at most universities. Queen's website states that applicants are required to have 3 full time years in any program + a full year in bio, humanities, and phys sci. I am sure you can take the requirements you are missing in your fifth year but I don't know if Queen's would use that extra year to calculate your cumulative GPA.

 

The only university that I can remember right now that specifically mentions the "special" fifth year is Western. Here's the blurb from their official website:

 

"Applicants who have earned a degree from a recognized university, may elect to continue in full time undergraduate studies, (a so-called special year) so that their academic standing may be improved for application to medical school. Only the first special year taken by the applicant will be considered for determination of GPA. Special years will only be considered if they contain five full or equivalent courses (30 credit hours) with a minimum of four full or equivalent courses at the honors level (which at Western are numbered 200 or higher). Honors level courses at Western numbered 200 are equivalent to third year courses at all other universities. First year courses are not acceptable in the ‘special year'."

 

It's not very detailed and my advice (though quite generic) would be to get in touch with the admin people at the different universities you are interested in for more help.

[Guest aneliz]

The blurb from the UWO website is correct...however, if you have your degree, and you have 2 full time years that are about 3.65ish or better...you should already be okay. All you will have to do is the pre-reqs for UWO...and Western really doesn't care if you do them from a different school, by distance ed, as a part-time student, etc. So, you could finish your degree, apply and then start doing any missing pre-reqs...you would need to have them all finished by Aug 2005 for entry in fall 2005.

 

Good luck!

[Guest MikeD]

I'm in engineering at Waterloo, and am in almost the same situation right now...maybe just a little farther along though. Here was/is my plan:

 

If your program is anything like mine, you were given about 1 or 2 chances to take anything outside of engineering until fourth year, where then the table becomes pretty open (well...not really. We're still excpected to take 6 technical electives...except we finally had a choice). After looking at all of the requirements for most of the med schools in Canada, I figured my best bet was to delay graduation by a year. I'm in my fifth year now, and have a nice mix of engineering/science/art, just like my fourth year. I definitely suggest eventually getting all the med school pre-reqs in you can, so you don't close any doors. I also suggest mixing them into your undergrad degree...staying away from any "post-grad" undergraduate years purely for pre-reqs, unless your GPA is already good enough. I think this helps in a couple of ways.

 

From what I can tell most schools don't care if your degree took 5 or 6 or 7 years. A lot of schools though won't count the grades you get in that "post-grad" year if you did one, and the ones that do have some rigid guidelines on the courses you can take (ie. no first year courses). By postponing graduation for a year you can count the pre-req marks, which I found to be better than my other grades, plus you still have the option of a sixth "special year" for Western, if you still don't have 2 years above the GPA cutoffs. Another thing to note: two "good years" is in general better better for the GPA than 3 OK years, so work your courses wisely.

 

If you're like me, you need as much GPA help as possible, so you need these extra courses counted. I could rant forever about the demoralizing use of marks in my program, and probably a lot of other programs I'm sure. People with mid to 90 high school averages are brought down to the 60-70 range, cutting down a lot of dreams for a career outside of engineering.

 

The typical response to the "What premed program should I take?" highschooler question is "One that you like". I think that's only the part truth. If I had a time machine to go back...I'd rethink this and balance what I thought was interesting with something that would give me an easier shot at medicine, which is what I've always wanted. My class alone has several top ten Descartes Math, Sir Isaac Newton Physics, and ACN Programming finishers who are consistently getting 60-70's, which gives you no hope of having a competitive GPA.

 

Sorry for the rant, but anyways, just try to fairly work the system to give yourself the best shot possible.