Not a "Science Person"

[nicola.kirwan]

Nontraditional on a couple of fronts, just dipping my toe into the water of seriously considering a career shift. But despite the persistence and depth of my interest in medicine and medical research (over the past, say, 5 years), I've only recently started giving it serious thought, mostly because I've never considered myself a "science person" whatever that is supposed to mean, and I always thought medical school was for those types of people.

I never hated math nor science, and I typically got good grades, but neither ever came as easily and effortlessly to me as humanities subjects. So I followed my natural strengths. Parts of biology were really interesting to me--genetics and cellular function--others bored me to tears (taxonomy, ugh). At the time I wished we had the opportunity to study biochemistry, as that seemed like it would be really interesting and is something that I've poked around in on my own in the past few years.

I have persistent interest and strong curiosity about medical issues and questions. I find myself reading medical research papers and thinking about questions I would ask. The problem-solving component of diagnosis and research is what I find compelling. My standardized test scores were strong. I also like people and work well with them. Are interest, interpersonal skills, and academic capability enough? Or is there some personality trait of being a "science person" that you should also have? I think I probably would feel a bit intimidated around students who were super premed/biochem/physics, etc. and always thought along those lines.

Purely from an academic perspective, I believe I could prepare and discipline myself to do well in a post-bacc and then medical school. But for some reason I'm skeptical of my "type of person" looking at medicine.

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[trev5150]

I didn't consider myself a science person until I became one. I started out as a music major back in 1992. Then I got into all the amazing stuff in science.

A "science person" is above all else curious. There is no super this or that. That's perception. Those people have affinities for something and that's what you notice first. You don't really need to worry about competing with them at all, just the set of criteria you need to suitcase to get into medical school. Instead of feeling intimidated, make up your mind to get tight with those people and study with them. Benefit from their existence. Then do that with everything.

 

[Oso]

Just another n=1 here, but I absolutely hated anything math and science through high school. Took the easiest classes and did well enough (B's) to still have a decent GPA. Definitely preferred english and history.

Got to college, became interested in medicine, took some science classes and decided that with hard work I could do it, now I'm about to graduate from medical school in a few months. I remember comparing myself to all these people who knew they wanted to be a doctor since they were 6 years old and 'loved' anything biology and science related .. whatever.

I think the most important thing, like trev-dawg said above me, is to be curious and interested in learning more + hard work. Good luck.

 

[Matthew9Thirtyfive]

Sounds like you don’t hate science, you just don’t like certain aspects. Many people who go to med school are like that. I’m not a big chemistry fan, though I’ve come to enjoy parts of it. That doesn’t make me less of a science person—same goes for you.

 

[Goro]

Nontraditional on a couple of fronts, just dipping my toe into the water of seriously considering a career shift. But despite the persistence and depth of my interest in medicine and medical research (over the past, say, 5 years), I've only recently started giving it serious thought, mostly because I've never considered myself a "science person" whatever that is supposed to mean, and I always thought medical school was for those types of people.

I never hated math nor science, and I typically got good grades, but neither ever came as easily and effortlessly to me as humanities subjects. So I followed my natural strengths. Parts of biology were really interesting to me--genetics and cellular function--others bored me to tears (taxonomy, ugh). At the time I wished we had the opportunity to study biochemistry, as that seemed like it would be really interesting and is something that I've poked around in on my own in the past few years.

I have persistent interest and strong curiosity about medical issues and questions. I find myself reading medical research papers and thinking about questions I would ask. The problem-solving component of diagnosis and research is what I find compelling. My standardized test scores were strong. I also like people and work well with them. Are interest, interpersonal skills, and academic capability enough? Or is there some personality trait of being a "science person" that you should also have? I think I probably would feel a bit intimidated around students who were super premed/biochem/physics, etc. and always thought along those lines.

Purely from an academic perspective, I believe I could prepare and discipline myself to do well in a post-bacc and then medical school. But for some reason I'm skeptical of my "type of person" looking at medicine.

The Music and English majors we admit tend to be really good medical students.

You don't have to be a "science person", but you do have to understand Science. But keep in mind that Medicine is both brute memory and the ability to apply.

Oddly enough, I've found that engineers tend to struggle in med school.

 

[trev5150]

Oddly enough, I've found that engineers tend to struggle in med school.

In my experience in the aviation world, engineers don't handle unknowns very well. It's difficult to get them to factor in things like weather limitations, regulatory considerations of every stripe - anything they can't crunch numbers on. In science (and in my of course limited experience, medicine) many times the answer is "...it's always the case, except when it isn't". They don't like urgency either, I've found. They really hate it when they're told all the things they didn't think of - especially from non-engineer muggles.

Engineers are important and necessary, but they can be remarkably inflexible.

 

[Lawpy]

Nontraditional on a couple of fronts, just dipping my toe into the water of seriously considering a career shift. But despite the persistence and depth of my interest in medicine and medical research (over the past, say, 5 years), I've only recently started giving it serious thought, mostly because I've never considered myself a "science person" whatever that is supposed to mean, and I always thought medical school was for those types of people.

I never hated math nor science, and I typically got good grades, but neither ever came as easily and effortlessly to me as humanities subjects. So I followed my natural strengths. Parts of biology were really interesting to me--genetics and cellular function--others bored me to tears (taxonomy, ugh). At the time I wished we had the opportunity to study biochemistry, as that seemed like it would be really interesting and is something that I've poked around in on my own in the past few years.

I have persistent interest and strong curiosity about medical issues and questions. I find myself reading medical research papers and thinking about questions I would ask. The problem-solving component of diagnosis and research is what I find compelling. My standardized test scores were strong. I also like people and work well with them. Are interest, interpersonal skills, and academic capability enough? Or is there some personality trait of being a "science person" that you should also have? I think I probably would feel a bit intimidated around students who were super premed/biochem/physics, etc. and always thought along those lines.

Purely from an academic perspective, I believe I could prepare and discipline myself to do well in a post-bacc and then medical school. But for some reason I'm skeptical of my "type of person" looking at medicine.

Majoring in humanities is definitely a good thing since medicine is as much an art as it's science. And the science of medicine is based very heavily on cell biology, genetics and biochemistry, which are the subjects that you enjoy. So you'll do fine in med school, and if anything, your humanities background and experiences are what will make you unique and interesting to adcoms.

 

[Cheenghee Koh]

That is me! I majored in community counseling and humanistic psychology in undergrads. Yes, I went to a department of psychology. But I took many classes in humanities (e.g. gender and sexuality studies/philosophy). I read critical theories/feminist/queer theories/culture studies.... At that moment, I hated everything that had anything to do with numbers, because I believed they are part of the power complex that exerts control on individuals, in particular minorities. I never expected that one day, 20 years later, I would receive advanced training in statistics, completed all my science pre-reqs with straight As, and got fine MCAT scores on science sections (> 90%) (I even self-taught biochemistry). (If you ask me whether I still believe that those things with numbers are part of the power complex? Yes, I still do. But now armed with the same tricks, I can easily fight back ) So, what I want to say is, don't underestimate your potential. If you can handle well humanities, it is likely that you will find the required science courses manageable if you are using your reasoning skills developed from your training in humanities.

 

[Detective SnowBucket]

Not in the same boat as a non-trad but both of my parents have liberal studies degrees so that was really what I had been raised around. Directly because of this I had the same strengths and weaknesses academically as both my parents (killer at language, history, English etc, but not so great at math...actually kinda bad) but anyways, I took limited science classes in high school and it wasn't until I was in ug that I really found that I ******* love organic/biochem. I still hate non-cell/molecular based bio though, like evolution or ecology. You are just like every other prospective med student and there's nothing to worry about.

 

[Mt Kilimanjaro]

Read “Peak” by Ericcson.

I think he occasionally overstates his case, but not by much. The key difference between “science people” and others is that the former group — “biology pre-meds” in this case — have spent more time in focused practice. Studying PowerPoint slides and taking multiple choice tests over them is a very specific skill set and if you have not practiced it extensively like most people in medical school have you will probably not be as good at it as they will. However, that doesn’t mean you can’t be successful and also become a “science person” with sufficient practice.

 

[mk04447]

I took astronomy the first time through and we drew stars, poorly I might add. I ended up with a master's in bio before the job was done. Do you want to be a doc?

 

[nicola.kirwan]

Thanks to everyone for their replies and encouraging tone. This thread exceeded my expectations.

I took astronomy the first time through and we drew stars, poorly I might add. I ended up with a master's in bio before the job was done. Do you want to be a doc?

I hope to figure that out soon.

As it turns out, the two science courses I did take in undergrad were astronomy courses--solar system/planetary geology and cosmology/the universe. We photographed stars and galaxies (our otherwise small, little-known and unendowed school had a planeterium, world-class telescope and observatory). Those two classes were my among my absolute favorites. The professor was particularly good, but still it was fascinating stuff. He was also tough and said we had to "know everything" for the test. The first time around I didn't take that seriously and received a grade reflecting it. The second time I made sure I knew everything and got every test point, including the bonus ones. If that type of comprehensive memorization is what is required, I get it.

 

[siliso]

Medicine is a human services field though based on science. If you have the capacity to learn and apply say biochemistry, the fact that you don’t have a passion for it in and of itself isn’t a problem. If you wouldn’t like to learn and apply biochemistry or pathophysiology to taking care of people then you probably don’t want to be a doctor. If you would, then maybe you do.

I never took a science class outside the one “physics for poets” with lab that was required for my liberal arts degree, until I decided to go back for prereqs.