Meet JHU_Mandy - Cary, NC, Public Health (Natural Sciences) Major

Hi! My name is Mandy and I'm a junior this year (which is hard to believe) and I'm majoring in public health, on the natural sciences track. I'm planning to go to law school after graduating, though it's been a bit of a winding road to get to that decision! Just to prove it, these are the classes I've taken in my time at Hopkins:

freshman year:
-intro organic chem 1 + 2, intro organic lab
-intro physics 1 + lab
-expository writing
-bioethics
-personality theory
-freshman seminar: on the road
-cognitive neuroscience

sophomore year:
-physics 2 + lab
-calc 2
-anthropology of mental illness
-business law 1
-fundamentals of health policy and management
-international human rights law in us courts
-law, psychology and public policy
-intro to moral philosophy
-philosophical implications of clinical neuroscience

currently, junior year:
-biostatistics for public health
-environment and your health
-politics and policy design
-politics of health policy
-constitutional law

I've been an undeclared neuroscience major, a chemistry major, then a public health major. I've been pre-med, pre-med and pre-law, and now just pre-law. Like I said, it's been a long road. So if you have any questions about any of my classes or any of the advising tracks--ask away!

One thing that has been pretty constant over the semesters is my location--I've lived in three buildings that are all right next to each other on Charles Street. First was a single (within a three-person suite) in Wolman Hall, freshman year, followed by a four-person suite in Charles Commons sophomore year. And now, I'm living in The Charles, an apartment building situated between the two dorms. Pretty convenient, huh? Aside from my life plans and goals, I'd say I'm a bit of a creature of habit.

Outside of classes, I'm mostly involved with admissions, through Hopkins Interactive and now a job within the office. I'm also on the Academic Ethics Board and am the Presiding Official this year. I'm in a couple of other clubs that I recently signed up for, but I'm not hugely involved yet, so I'll leave those out for now. Aside from clubs and such, I love to bake and cook, and having my own apartment with a nice kitchen has been delightful. I'm also a huge college basketball fan and I'm a hardcore Orioles fan and football is growing on me, so we'll see.

And finally, I should tell you why/how I ended up at this place I've come to love more than I even imagined. Well, I applied ED because I had fallen in love with it well before I even saw the campus. When I did get to come visit, there was no further question--I couldn't possibly go anywhere else. I just saw myself here and could imagine walking the paths, etc., as silly as it sounds. But I came with a very narrow-minded view and I'll share it only because I've learned so much since then: I was originally sold on Hopkins because of the whole pre-med thing. (sigh/moan/groan). Yes, it is an amazing place to be if you're hoping to go to med school. But guess what? That's not all. Like I said, I had a few identity crises and got REALLY LUCKY that Hopkins has a WHOLE LOT MORE than just an incredible pre-med program. I rapidly discovered the vast benefits of a well-rounded education, pre-med or not. You can come here and study whatever you want, take classes in tons of amazing departments and there's truly no excuse not to have a broad, expansive education. Thankfully, and without even knowing it beforehand, I ended up at a place that has top-quality programs in each and every one of its departments, making it perfectly okay to change course if that's where circumstances lead (and I'm learning that it happens way more often than people would think). It's a beautiful thing to change your mind--and to be able to.

Be sure to check out my blog if you'd like to see what I'm doing with my life. And as always, feel free to ask me anything. hopkins.typepad.com/mandy

hello, again! Here's a little archive of some past questions I've gotten, with my responses. Hopefully this will help someone, and if you have any questions about anything you see, or something else, ask away!

Great questions. Let me actually address your second one first. If you're intending to follow the pre-med track, any natural sciences major would allow you to meet the requirements. In fact, you can major in anything you want, just as long as you take the classes required for med school. Here's a list of what most medical schools want you to have taken as an undergraduate.


1 yr. of general chemistry with associated labs
1 yr. of organic chemistry with one associated lab
1 yr. of biological science coursework with associated labs
1 yr. of general physics with associated labs
1 yr. of English (composition and/or literature)
1 yr. of mathematics (calculus and/or statistics)
1 sem. of biochemistry (required by 30+ schools) with associated labs
Up to 24 credits in social sciences and humanities

from the office of pre-professional advising, here: http://web.jhu.edu/prepro/health/overview.html

Let me also direct you to this other message thread where there's more discussion on the pre-med track. http://z14.invisionfree.com/Hopkins_Forums...p?showtopic=244


As for the neuroscience question: Unfortunately, there aren't really many neuroscience classes offered for Freshmen. There is a class called Physiological Psychology, which is an introductory-level course on relating brain structure to function, basically. This is NOT a pre-requisite for other later neuro classes, so I actually did not take it. In the spring, the freshman class is called Cognitive Neuroscience, which IS a pre-requisite for later classes, so if you intend to major in neuroscience, you really should take this class in the spring.

Freshman year is a great time to take classes that are of personal interest to you, since there aren't too many requirements that you have to get in. This is from the office of academic advising, it's a great place for an overview of the Neuroscience major, and you can check out other majors as well. It has links to the department's website as well. http://www.jhu.edu/~advising/majors_neuroscience.htm

So for you, personally, it all depends on what you're interested in. There is a writing requirement (12 credits total), so I took an Expository Writing class first semester. As far as the Calculus goes, I'm pretty sure they offer Calc II in the fall, so you could take that if you wanted. Biology with lab is another good one to take, especially if you don't have to take Chemistry and lab at the same time. One thing I'll have to say--if you got AP credit for Chemistry, I would NOT recommend taking Organic Chemistry freshman year. I took it this year, but only because I took Chem I and II at a state university during the summer. Organic Chem is extraordinarily hard, not just content-wise, but also because it requires taking a different approach to it, one I was not ready for. Many freshmen who take it end up very stressed...heck, many sophomores and upperclassmen who take it end up stressed! It's hard..I'd suggest waiting until after you've figured out what works for you in university-level classes and once you've established a good learning technique.

And about the credit limits: For freshmen in the School of Arts and Sciences, the limit is 16, but I think 17.5 is allowed IF you take a foreign language. I think that's right...hm..It's only for the engineering students that the freshman limit is 18.

Just making sure you know this--"premed" isn't a major, it's just a sort of track for advising purposes. If you're interested in IR, you can major in that and still be on the premed track, you just have to take some classes that would be outside of the IR major but are required for med school. There are also a lot of students who double major in IR and Public Health to pursue international health issues. I think it's a pretty cool (and very practical) combination.

I know what you mean with the last part of high school. Getting accepted on Dec. 15 makes it a bit rough to stay motivated and focused for another several months. The best thing I can tell you is to just stay on top of your studies...if for no other reason just to be absolutely sure you maintain the standards you've set for yourself. Give yourself the satisfaction of completing high school all the way through with your strongest efforts and performance. Does that make sense? I just mean you've worked so hard up until now, don't let yourself slack off--but definitely don't be afraid to take the time to pursue other interests. Have fun! Enjoy the comforts of home and high school and knowing everyone. You'll be glad you did it, I promise.


Also, one thing Admissions_Daniel reminded me of was that you don't have to come in to your freshman year with a definite major. Academic advising is a great resource for helping students pursue their interests but still end up graduating with some kind of degree. Also, just make sure to stay open-minded. I came in dead-set on Neuroscience and now I'm strongly considering Chemistry.

1. I couldn't even imagine what was waiting ahead of me when I was a senior in high school. I knew college would be a completely different world, not only because of the course work but also because of being away from home and having to keep myself motivated since Mom and Dad aren't here to ask me if I've done all my homework. Now don't let that scare you. When you come, there are going to be about 1200 other students in the EXACT same situation you are in. All of the excitement during orientation will certainly help put you at ease in some respects.

In order to do well...hm, this is kinda tough, as I'm still figuring that one out for myself Seriously though, the best thing I can tell you is that you have to be open-minded and understand that you may need to 'learn how to learn.' Your high school study habits may or may not work for you in college and you'll just have to experiment a bit to figure out how to best use your time. In college, you'll have a lot more free time and it's easy to let it slip away from you, so just try to figure out how you can make the most of your time. What's worked for me is (on Sundays) to write out every specific thing I want to do for each day of the week. It's not set in stone, but it gives me an idea of what I need to get done to stay on track.

There is an infinite number of resources if you need help! All professors have office hours, during which you can pop in and ask a question, and I'd say pretty much all of them would be happy to make an appointment with you if you can't go during their office hours. Also, bigger classes have a teaching assistant or several (also known as a TA). They also have office hours if you'd rather approach them than the professor. In addition, for the large science classes, the pre-health honor society hosts free tutoring sessions. For Organic Chem, they host one a couple of weeks before each exam, though they might host more for different classes. Also, Academic Advising offers tutors. If you have a group of 2-4, it costs $30/semester. There's also a ton of those study-type books that you can buy or use in the library (i.e. Schaum's outlines, the .."for dummies" series, etc.)

Another thing to keep in mind is that we have an excellent health center and counseling center. If you are having a difficult time, the counseling center is free and completely confidential. They could even just help you learn how to deal with stress and that sort of thing. They're great, don't be afraid to use them as well.

2. The library is open quite late. A-level is open until 12 am, and then the other levels are open until 3 am. Next school year, when Gilman has closed (it used to have a 24-hour reading room), M level of the library--which is the main floor--will be open 24/7. And YES, you can get a security escort. They'll tell you all about that service and others like it during orientation. They REALLY encourage you to use that service and are more than happy to escort students. It's a very safe campus, but they do everything in the world to keep it that way.

3. You have to wait a certain waiting period before you can get a new roommate, I believe it's 6 weeks. During that time though, you can have meetings with your RA (resident advisor) who can help you and your roommate resolve any conflicts you have. The reason for the waiting period is so that you can try to resolve it on your own instead of just instantly moving out. I know someone who switched roommates between the first and second semesters and it worked out just fine for everyone.

Pre-med is not a major at Hopkins, it is an "advising track." If you want to go to med school, you can major in ANYTHING you want, but there's a few advisors who you can see during your time at Hopkins to make sure you're on the right track and meeting all the requirements. While you can major in anything, there are some courses you do need to take in order to get in to medical school, which are:

1 yr. of general chemistry with associated labs
1 yr. of organic chemistry with one associated lab
1 yr. of biological science coursework with associated labs
1 yr. of general physics with associated labs
1 yr. of English (composition and/or literature)
1 yr. of mathematics (calculus and/or statistics)
1 sem. of biochemistry (required by 30+ schools) with associated labs
Up to 24 credits in social sciences and humanities

from the office of pre-professional advising, here: http://web.jhu.edu/prepro/health/overview.html

Let me also direct you to this other message thread where there's more discussion on the pre-med track. http://z14.invisionfree.com/Hopkins_Forums...p?showtopic=244

You can also take a look at the Pre-professional advising website (the first one linked to above), just to get an idea of what it's all about.

Also, if you're interested, here's a list of all the majors at Johns Hopkins: http://apply.jhu.edu/academics/majors.html

The average courseload for Arts and Sciences students is 15 credits per semester, which is usually about 5 classes. (I say 15 credits "usually" amounts to 5 classes because some science classes are 4 credits, some labs are 2, some labs are 1, it really varies...but many of the social science and humanities courses are 3 credits each). For Engineering students, the credit average is 16-18 credits, and I'm not exactly sure how this translates (into a number of classes), because I think the courses over in those departments are generally for more credits. I'd imagine it's just about 5-6 classes though.

There is a credit limit for students, though you can get permission to go over it. For Arts and Sciences freshmen, you can only take 16.5 credits (without getting special permission), and freshmen engineers can take up to 18.5 credits. Arts and Sciences upperclassmen can take up to 18.5 credits, and Engineering upperclassmen can take up to 19.5 credits. (this is all from the Academic Handbook), http://www.advising.jhu.edu/images/handboo..._Manual_08.pdf


This post has been edited by JHU_Mandy on Sep 24 2009, 10:27 AM