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By Zachary Grimmet

The adage “this is what college is all about” has inspired many unconventional decisions made in an attempt to explore atypical interests, academic or otherwise (frequently otherwise). For the pre-medical student (for better or worse), this applies less to all-night parties and more to discovering fields you might not have previously considered for serious study.

Pre-medical coursework includes similar basic requirements at each university but still allows for substantial flexibility, contrary to popular opinions about the stereotypically rigid premed schedule. During four years of undergrad, basic requirements for medical school account for less than half of the coursework that students will take, allowing ample opportunity for following academic passions or curiosities. Requirements vary mildly between institutions but generally consist of one year of Biology, General Chemistry, Organic Chemistry, Physics, and English, and typically a semester of Biochemistry. Even with the requisite lab addendums, there is plenty of available time for exploration.

However, how to go about such career exploration can be a nerve-wracking experience for the pre-med student. The notion that every choice – which classes to take, which MCAT resources to use, or which hospital to volunteer at  – is critical for med school competitiveness leads to considerable anxiety for every pre-med. But it needn’t! These choices represent the most exciting opportunities for pre-medical students, who commonly choose rigid, STEM-heavy schedules with little opportunity for exploring diverse fields of potential interest.

Advantages of following your passion in a non-traditional field

If your interest in a non-STEM field is strong enough, I highly recommend following through and majoring in music, computer science, economics, etc. – whatever the case may be. If you are motivated, med school requirements can be accomplished along the way while completing a non-STEM major. The difficulty will lie in smartly scheduling the most challenging scientific coursework, such as organic chemistry and biochemistry, so that proper attention is paid to these rigorous courses.

However, you will reap significant rewards by working in a field you truly love. Your motivation to study will be much greater, and your drive and productivity much more formidable, if you genuinely love what you do. Most importantly, you will simply be happier – do not make the mistake of wholly sacrificing your happiness for medicine, particularly this early in the process. It is a long road, and a significant portion of your life will be spent gaining entrance to the medical ranks. Be sure to enjoy the journey, or you risk looking back with regrets that were far from inevitable.

Second, maintaining interests outside of medicine will be essential for your mental health and academic success before, during, and after medical school. Remember that you are preparing to not just get In, but get through medical school, residency and fellowship, and to do so, non-medical interests will be a crucial release valve for the significant pressures of this profession. These interests can be extracurricular, social, or academic – as long as they exist and help remind you to focus on more than medicine.

Lastly, unique non-traditional courses of study will yield surprising dividends in terms of your competitiveness as a medical school applicant. This is especially true during the interview process. Great as your grades may be, stellar as your MCAT score might look, and impressive though your hospital experience might be, admissions committees will see many, many similarly extraordinary resumes. The fight to stand out is an important one and is worth some dedicated time during your undergraduate years.

The best, most straightforward, and frankly the most honest way to add the ‘flair’ that makes your application stand out is to pursue your genuine passions and express your enthusiasm throughout your application. An applicant who branched out and pursued a music major, succeeded in computer science coursework, learned Arabic, or completed a major/minor in art history will be more compelling and unique than a similarly stellar applicant without such unique experiences. This reality holds true not only for admission to medical school, but also for competitiveness for residency, fellowship, and attending positions.

Advantages of traditional pre-medical majors

Traditional pre-medical majors include molecular and cell biology, physiology, chemistry, physics, and even – for the numerically inclined – mathematics. A natural advantage of these majors for those applying to medical school is the strong scientific preparation for basic science coursework in the preclinical years.

Additionally, if you anticipate you may be interested in a career in biomedical research, these majors are almost a ‘must’ to properly prepare you for the rigors of scientific research. This is particularly true if you desire to become a physician-scientist or run a laboratory of any kind during your career. If you fall into this ambitious camp, it will be hugely helpful to pursue a STEM major and complete elective coursework (bacteriology, neuroscience, biomechanics, etc.) that can help you to 1. identify specific, sub-specialty areas of potential research interest, and 2. connect you to professors that run laboratories you might want to join.

It should be noted that some traditional coursework prepares you very well for medical school even if it’s not a prerequisite, and should be considered regardless of interest. General anatomy and physiology classes, particularly those with a lab portion that gives you access to and experience with cadaver dissection, can be quite helpful in preparing you for pre-clinical medical school coursework.

Lastly, STEM majors have more opportunities to take electives that may allow them to identify early areas of clinical interest (immunology coursework can spark clinical interest in infectious disease or allergy, for example, whereas anatomy and physiology coursework may help you discover a passion for surgery, radiology, or pathology). Elective coursework, even at the undergraduate level, is becoming incredibly multidisciplined – even including fields as unique as neuroimmune pharmacology, among many others. If your interests remain unchanged, it is possible that such early coursework can give you a head start on becoming a competitive applicant to such fields. However, in the author’s opinion, this is a minor consideration. Interests change so frequently (with 55-80% of medical students changing their specialty decision from matriculation to time of residency application) that this potential advantage is substantially blunted in the grand scheme of things.

The bottom line: what’s best for you?

Choosing a major as a pre-medical student can be a difficult and consequential decision. Naturally, many hopeful physicians already possess considerable enthusiasm for STEM fields, and for these students, major selection won’t be a question. They can – and should! – follow their passions in traditional fields like molecular biology, chemistry, or physics. For many who live and breathe chemistry, a major in music or art history, for example, would be laughably unsuitable.

However, medicine is not a one-size-fits-all profession. Physicians are an incredibly diverse bunch. Many pathologists feel more aligned with Ph.D. scientists than they do with family medicine physicians or orthopedic surgeons, and we should remember that diversity of interest, background, and experience will always be incredibly important for the medical community. A sizable proportion of pre-medical students exhibit considerable interest in an adjacent or even completely unrelated field. For these students, I would argue that choosing to major or minor in your unique field of interest will yield valuable dividends in the short and long term.

There is significant pressure to major in a STEM field as a premed, but resisting this pressure can ironically make you a more distinguished applicant, particularly at the interview stage. Per the AAMC, applicants majoring in the biological sciences are accepted 41.5% of the time, whereas social science majors are accepted 41.4% of the time and humanities majors are accepted at a rate of 47.9%. These “non-traditional” fields do not, therefore, inherently give the applicant a disadvantage, contrary to stigma that non-STEM pre-medical students may experience. Something needs to make admissions committees pull your application from a stack of similar applications, and a unique passion that you’ve followed through on and that shines through your personal statement and interview is a great strategy to accomplish this.

Even if you don’t major in an unconventional field, consider taking significant non-STEM elective coursework throughout college in an area of genuine interest and plan how you will emphasize these studies to admissions committees. This will help to diversify your application and separate you from other applicants. The most successful applicants typically explore compelling non-STEM interests and weave a story around these passions and their motivation to become a physician, so that their application reads as a seamless narrative. This approach is extremely attractive to medical school admissions committees looking for applicants that ‘pop’ off the page. Most importantly, however, the act of exploring other fields will allow an applicant to discover bona fide interests, inside or outside of medicine, and become a happier, more fulfilled, and motivated young professional as a result. This is, after all, what college is all about.