The best premed course in the Philippines (from the perspective of a UP student)

I was reading the different posts in Narinig ko sa UP (Overheard at UP) when an incoming senior high school student (don't ask how she got there, haha, but her name is Hannah Abigail Agustin) asked "What was the best premed to get into the UP College of Medicine?" From that question, I answered the clearest answer which gave her exactly what she wanted. UP Diliman's BS Psychology program. Statistically speaking, they encompass the largest chunk of qualifiers into the College of Medicine, thus making it the BS UP Med Premed course of choice, excluding Intarmed. Furthermore, being at the College of Social Sciences and Philosophy (the past AS and thus the "center" of UPD according to some pundits), they get to be at the heart of all things UP Diliman, guaranteeing them an awesome college life AND sufficiently high grades necessary for qualification in the college.

That would sufficiently answer her question (though honestly I didn't want to go into full details myself in the thread, since I'm a BS Biology major myself, and I might give the impression that I'm labeling BS Psych majors as an "easy" course for getting into UPCM, so I just said "UP Diliman Psych"). Of course, the whole thread caught on quickly, as you know how open minded and "opinionated" UP students are. And honestly, poor child, if I were there I wouldn't know who to listen to. It's not like we all have labels of credibility there. Though frankly, some of the answers there are extremely far fetched. BS Mathematics? BA Social Studies (Area Studies)? Sure, there are cases when one or two people from certain obscure courses get through. But let's be realistic here mates. We want the safest premed when we choose a degree. Something that more or less gives us a direct path to it. Thus, here is a rough criteria for choosing degree programs ideal for pre-medicine:

(1) It prepares you for medicine, providing a background on the sciences that are usually taught in medical schools, such as, but not limited to, the following: Anatomy, Physiology, Biochemistry, Microbiology.
(2) It allows you to get sufficiently HIGH grades for entry into the best medical schools. (You'll need at least cum laude for UP College of Medicine).
(3) It prepares you for the National Medical Admission Test, or NMAT. (90 is the minimum for UP CM. Most applicants have 99 or 99+)
(4) It provides you with a sufficient fallback if ever you fail to pursue medicine for some reason unbeknownst to me at this present time. (You can't just sulk if you don't go to med.)
(5) It interests you. (unless you just want to sleep in your classes all day)

Background and Grades, the premed uncertainty principle

Honestly, for most people (even UP students) no one course suits all of that criteria, with #1 and #2 being extremely difficult to reconcile (The health sciences courses, ideally the courses that prepare you the most for medicine, are notoriously difficult. To put it into perspective, UP Diliman, the flagship campus, had 15 Summa Cum Laudes. Meanwhile, UP Manila, the health sciences campus, only had 2, Paco and Bea, BS Biochemistry and Biology, respectively). I suppose if I were to break up the courses, I'd say there were three kinds of courses. Note: some courses don't fall into these criteria and thus will not be mentioned here. This is pretty much based on the popular premeds of choice.

A.) An "easy" course (I'm using the term lightly since no course is truly easy) that prepares you least for medicine. - I would put BS Psychology, Anthropology, Education here, since you can get a really high GWA with relatively less effort. I would also include courses like Area Studies, Behavioral Sciences and Development Studies (offered in UP Manila) since there is always at least one person from these courses that slips past. Employment is variable, depending on your specialization really, but it's usually corporate.

B.) An intermediate course which gives you a rough idea of what to study during medicine while having the right difficulty to ensure that you can still get high grades as long as you put your back into it. - I would put my own degree, BS Biology, here, since the course is challenging (Curse you Math 17) but many of those in the batch still proceeded to graduate with honors (with one summa). I would include BS Public Health and BS Medical Technology in this too since they also have relatively more Latin honor graduates than other courses in the health sciences. I'd also put BS Biochemistry and Chemistry here too, since they still garner plenty of cum laudes, though their course is honestly also quite difficult (though they don't have duty, so I wouldn't class it under the next criteria). These are usually the pure science courses, which usually require masters for decent employment opportunities.

C.) A hard course (health course usually) that can completely prepare you for the lifestyle (yes it's a lifestyle) of the health sciences and professions though usually has a toll on one's grades since the subjects are both physically (duty) and mentally (hard) taxing, and there are some rumors about profs deliberately lowering grades (curving down? is there such a word? haha) to discourage their graduates from going to medicine. - BS Nursing is the epitome of this. Graduates have pretty much already worked with doctors at this point, and some of them even chastise interns. Basically anything in the health sciences falls under this. Nursing. Pharmacy. Physical Therapy. I suppose Public Health would fall under this as well, but I separated them since they usually do well enough to proceed with medicine anyway, while people who usually pursue the other courses here usually just stick with their chosen career. BS Molecular Bio and Biotech also falls in here, since I've heard they have a high mortality rate. The ADVANTAGE of these courses however is that you have a definite fall back if you don't proceed to medicine (providing you past your licensure exams mehehe).

The NMAT

What about the NMAT? Honestly, the NMAT is a really easy exam. If you've taken the UPCAT, it's exactly the same, taken four years later. Thus, you would have grown more intellectually, and thus the exam gets easy. I included it in the criteria since I've noticed that some courses do better in the NMAT than others (I think BS Biology excels the most, with only their Social Sciences pulling them down, but other degree like PH, Bio/Chem, and anything science related also garner high scores). Generally, a BS degree should give you all the necessary information you will need to ace the NMAT. It's just a matter of preparing for the exam, and just using your wits (half of it is an IQ test, so I'm sure you'll know how you'll do there). There are plenty of review centers as well, but honestly the best thing to do is just listen in class when the pertinent NMAT subjects are taught to you :)

Fallbacks

As for fall backs. Well, honestly, the best courses for falling back on are the ones with a firm industry. I would say the health sciences are the most secure in terms of job security among the other courses I've mentioned above. The sciences (both pure and social) would usually entail two tracks of careers, academe/research, and industry/corporate. Unfortunately, some degrees lack the latter, such as my own BS Biology degree, making job finding rather difficult if you fail to pursue medicine or other graduate degrees. I'm lucky I found a job at the Mind Museum hahaha. If you have the money to pursue medicine though, this shouldn't be a factor. You should take the last factor into consideration, which is interest in your chosen premed, just in case you start to realize that med isn't really for you after all.

Interest

Interest. Interest. Interest. Basically, you need interest in the course for two reasons. One, you're going to be willing to study the degree and all its components despite having no intention of pursuing it as a career in the future. Two, you wouldn't mind pursuing it if you decide you don't want medicine anymore. Put it into perspective. Your real preparation for your intended career doesn't begin until you're around 20-22. You're just preparing for your preparation during your undergraduate degree. You better fricking like it. So, you choose a course that really intrigues you. I chose BS Biology in 2008 since I loved Biology in high school and since I honestly didn't mind pursuing a research and or academic career if I didn't pursue medicine. Oddly enough that's what happened, but I have no regrets whatsoever, since my job in the Mind Museum looks extremely promising and very rewarding.

So, I can't decide your premed for you. But I can give you a rough guideline on how to choose the ideal premed for you. :) I hope anyone who reads this learns from it :)

Things to remember when applying for the College of Medicine in UP.

The thread in question was written due to one's certain interest in UP's College of Medicine. Thus, here are some pointers that you must take into consideration if you ever plan to pursue this.

1. UP tries to democratize admissions. - What does this mean? It just means that it tries to get as many people from as different backgrounds as possible. Thus they put a quota on the number of Bio students, and try to get in some students from different backgrounds, such as Computer Science, Dev Stud, Fine Arts, etc. Of course, grades and NMAT are the absolute criteria with these courses as well, so if you decide on pursuing these courses, do your best.
2. It's harder for girls to get in. - WHAT!?! That's sexist! Here me out. Girls usually have higher grades than boys. Unfortunately (or fortunately for boys), UP sets a 50-50 cap on the student population. Thus, girls compete among themselves, while guys do the same. As girls have higher grades, that means that the minimum grade to be in a secure spot is higher for them than for boys, making the competition a lot tougher. As for why there's a quote in the first place, no one but the insiders know. Perhaps it's to stop a male drought? Perhaps it's because women tend to get pregnant and stop studying? I don't know.
3. There are 160 slots total. - 40 are automatically allocated to the Intarmed, leaving 120 slots, 60 for each sex. 10 of those in a batch would be MD/PHD students who opted for the 8 year program :)
4. BS Psych usually gets the most applicants - They usually garner around 30 slots per batch. BS Bio UPD gets around 20, while Bio UPM gets around 15 into the college.
5. Some have it lucky. - There are certain slots allocated to the children of UP doctors. They're affectionately called "anak ng diyos". Just keep this in mind.
6. UP has RSA (Return Service Agreement) - You need to serve the Philippines for 2-3 years, within 5 years, before you go and do whatever you want in your life. Haha. Think of it like this. UP is subsidized by the government, so you're technically a government investment. They need to maximize their cash, so you can't blame them for doing this.
7. There are also allocated slots of people from the provinces. - UP Med has something called the Regionalization program, where they get one person from each region to study in the college, and send them back to the provinces to do their return service. If you're from the province, you're lucky. :)
8. Study study study. - Grades are more or less 80% of the criteria used for selecting whether you get into UP. You're gonna need at least a cum laude to get in, and if you're from a school other than UP, you better be a magna or summa. :)
9. Your CV doesn't mean anything. - Unlike ASMPH, which asks you to submit a CV, and UST which requires certification from your different organizations, UP doesn't ask for that. There are only three things they look at, your grades, your NMAT, and your interview. I suppose what you did on your CV will help you on the interview, but aside from that, just study if you really want to get into UP.
10. UP isn't the only med school - There are many others, so if ever you don't get in, there are plenty other ways to serve the people. Patients won't care where you graduated from. And honestly, if you want to get into UP solely because it's UP, then honestly you're not the kind of student that deserves to get into UP. :)

Hope it all helps :)

Recent developments

Yesterday started out really horribly. I woke up at 7:30 am, 30 minutes pass the start of my economic botany class. I hurriedly prepared, hoping to just make it to the lecture and attendance call, and upon arriving I see them all answering test papers. Shit. I quickly get my own answer sheet and there and then realized that I was going to flunk that quiz so fricking bad. *sigh* Well, I hope I can make up on it in future quizzes, I got a good score on my first quiz considering I barely studied for it, though this quiz is definitely going to fuck up my chances for the highest possible marks.

Aside from that, my day wasn't too bad. It was long, granted, a lot of things happened yesterday than expected. Frustratingly I did miss out on a lot of things since a lot of it was held at the exact same time (4-6). HS+PM meeting, UPOE GA, BIGKIS-UPM GA, BSS Med Orientation Seminar. Eventually I opted to go to the latter, cause admittedly, that is the most important event involving my life and my future. Everything else is just strictly for socio civic interest, which in all honesty isn't as big of a part of my life as it used to be. The seminar went well, but since it started late and was slightly disorganized it ended up finishing around 8-8:30. Despite that, I learned so much regarding the different med school applications, particular the UP College of Medicine and Ateneo School of Medicine and Public Health.

Upon my contemplation last Thursday night, I opted to just apply for three medical schools, namely, UPCM, ASMPH and UERMMMCI. The first I chose for obvious reasons, it's the best, it's the cheapest, and it has the environment that I have grown to love since I came to Manila in 2009. This is still ideally my first med school of choice, and I'd do ANYTHING to get in. As a safety net, I applied for the other two. ASMPH I applied for for three reasons. The first is its similarity to the University of the Philippines. They have the same lecturers, they also share the same curriculum (OSI-Organ System Integration), and most of the students in "the ateneo" come from UP, so it shouldn't be much of a shock. The second reason I picked it is due to their financial aid program, which is based on need as well as academics. I'm hoping to god my financial status, which used to allow me to obtain 70% subsidy in UP, would be enough to allow me to get 100% of in ASMPH. Med school is hella expensive, and a mere 70% would be insufficient to help us get through med school. x_x I'm hoping my decent NMAT score (99 without studying! boo yah!) would help me scrap through though, as I've heard rumours that there are 3,800 applicants this year vying for a slot among the 160 to be offered in ASMPH. Last choice is UERM. Originally I was rather skeptical about this school, preferring to opt for St Lukes College of Medicine. However, visiting there made me feel extremely at home. The people were nice, and the biology alumni were extremely numerous. PLUS THE CHICKS HAHAHA. I heard there are partial scholarships, plus scholarships for those who are in financial difficulty, but I'll found out more about those once I've done my interview.

 I'll talk about the last two med schools in Manila that I considered but eventually opted not to proceed to due to a talk with Masaki regarding these things. The first would be St Lukes College of Medicine. A lot of people were really encouraged to apply to this school when they attended the open house last October. After all, the facilities are extremely top notch, the passing rate has been consistently high and most importantly, the scholarships are extremely generous. After going there, even I was starting to see myself as a Lukan (though I really despise that term). However, not to bash St Lukes, as I'll always consider it a great medical school, but I started to hear a lot of rumours about it. First, I heard that there's extreme selectivity regarding those who take the board exam, i.e., that not all are allowed to take the board. Troublesome. Second. I heard that the scholarships are extremely difficult to maintain, with no mercy with regards to financial status and other factors that may prevent you from continuing med and/or maintaining a scholarship. Third. The curriculum, though novel, doesn't seem to shine through for me, as it just seems to be a traditional curriculum with a few "integration concepts". I'm not to keen on trad myself to be honest, preferring the OSI curriculum as well as a PBL based approach. Which brings me to the next med school, PLM-CM. According to Von, it feels right at home being there. However, I'm actually bothered about that. Right at home was homey, but it was also shit. Facilities were bad and lacking, and I heard even more so at PLM-CM. Plus, the tuition fee is way out of my league. 66, 000? Ain't nobody in my family got cash for that! Granted, it was my own stupid fault for not getting all the paper work sorted out when I could have done it ages ago, such as getting my cedula and voters ID sorted out. Oh well. I guess PLM would have been a good choice for me to be honest, but I passed up on that, with regret, admittedly, but it's alright. I can always apply the year after if I don't proceed to medicine, which is one of my options. Mom wants me to try out for AUF-SOM, but I don't want to go back to Pampanga. I can get a FULL scholarship there with my awesome NMAT (lol) but it just doesn't sit well with me. It's either Manila for Med or not at all.

I'll continue my tirades another time.