Hey everyone, I just had a question about Honours Biology. I've been debating what stream to go into in the next year, and I was considering Mol Bio and Genetics or Biochem...but I hear that choosing biology may give me more freedom to choose electives. If I do end up choosing honours biology, do I have to choose one of the four specializations? Also, I hear that orgo 1 and 2 are not required, and instead we take 2E03. Will this affect my ability to get into pharmacy school or med school?

Originally Posted by Angoose

Hey everyone, I just had a question about Honours Biology. I've been debating what stream to go into in the next year, and I was considering Mol Bio and Genetics or Biochem...but I hear that choosing biology may give me more freedom to choose electives. If I do end up choosing honours biology, do I have to choose one of the four specializations? Also, I hear that orgo 1 and 2 are not required, and instead we take 2E03. Will this affect my ability to get into pharmacy school or med school?

orgo 1 and 2 are not required, but you can take them you have to take orgo 2OA3 or Orgo 2E03 both work, and don't base your whole life/choices/program on med/pharmacy school .. choose a program that you will like. Its best to read the undergrad calender than ask these questions here. Every information about this program/courses required etc are in undergrad calendar

Since Chem 2E03 doesn't have a lab component, it generally does not meet any professsional schools' requirements as an orgo course.

No, you don't have to pick a specialization in Honours Bio.

I'm not entirely sure what courses are required for bio...but if you stay in core biochem (ie, don't specialize), then you will have a TON of electives in third year. Like, an insane amount. Check the undergrad calendar. Although, sometimes electives are overrated, and much more trouble than they're worth.

i think you should make a table of all the courses you have to take for the programs you are considering to applying to. see which courses interest you and pick your program based on that.
see which courses are mandatory in 2nd, 3rd, 4th year for each of the programs. does the program require a thesis? see which courses you did really well in, in first year, and maybe pick your program based on that. for example, if your highest marks were in bio and math, you could consider applying to the bio/math program (also for this program you don't have to take upper year chemistry courses). and even if you don't have the required first year courses to get into a certain program, you might get a conditional acceptance as long as you complete the courses by the end of second year. for example, if you wanted to apply to life science 2, but you didn't do psych 1xx3 yet, you could take it in summer school.

Originally Posted by Angoose

Hey everyone, I just had a question about Honours Biology. I've been debating what stream to go into in the next year, and I was considering Mol Bio and Genetics or Biochem...but I hear that choosing biology may give me more freedom to choose electives. If I do end up choosing honours biology, do I have to choose one of the four specializations? Also, I hear that orgo 1 and 2 are not required, and instead we take 2E03. Will this affect my ability to get into pharmacy school or med school?

You cannot get into pharmacy school without organic chemistry. You need both the 1st and 2nd organic chem for UofT and Waterloo (which would be the 2 most reasonable schools b/c going out of province is difficult).

Originally Posted by SciMania

You cannot get into pharmacy school without organic chemistry. You need both the 1st and 2nd organic chem for UofT and Waterloo (which would be the 2 most reasonable schools b/c going out of province is difficult).

Thanks for the info. I just wanted to pick a stream that gave me a little more freedom to choose electives, and maybe with a slightly lighter workload haha.

Originally Posted by Angoose

Thanks for the info. I just wanted to pick a stream that gave me a little more freedom to choose electives, and maybe with a slightly lighter workload haha.

I have to say that if your goal is pharm/med or any other professional school...go with core honours biology w/o the specialization UNLESS you are highly interested in one particular stream/program.

Unfortunately, it's really all about the marks and professional programs are hard to get into without good marks, so going into a difficult stream won't help you.

Also, if pharmacy is something you're serious about you can apply after 2nd year (provided you finish all the pre-reqs)...which eliminates the need to really pick a program.

Also don't take shortcuts (i.e. taking Chem 2E03, because if you end up applying to med schools outside of Canada, for example in the Caribbean or the states, they will need 2OA3/2OB3 - so its best to get them done with in second year). You don't want to be stuck taking these in 3rd/4th year because some professional schools look really hard on those 2 last years (for ex. OT/PT look at your last 2 years only), so do yourself a favour and take them early on

Originally Posted by SciMania

I have to say that if your goal is pharm/med or any other professional school...go with core honours biology w/o the specialization UNLESS you are highly interested in one particular stream/program.

Unfortunately, it's really all about the marks and professional programs are hard to get into without good marks, so going into a difficult stream won't help you.

Also, if pharmacy is something you're serious about you can apply after 2nd year (provided you finish all the pre-reqs)...which eliminates the need to really pick a program.

Also don't take shortcuts (i.e. taking Chem 2E03, because if you end up applying to med schools outside of Canada, for example in the Caribbean or the states, they will need 2OA3/2OB3 - so its best to get them done with in second year). You don't want to be stuck taking these in 3rd/4th year because some professional schools look really hard on those 2 last years (for ex. OT/PT look at your last 2 years only), so do yourself a favour and take them early on

Man, now I'm really nervous about orgo haha. I won't be taking it in the summer, but I hear the two orgos destroy everyone :(.

Originally Posted by Angoose

Man, now I'm really nervous about orgo haha. I won't be taking it in the summer, but I hear the two orgos destroy everyone :(.

why won't you be taking them in the summer? if i had the choice, i definitely would've done so.

Originally Posted by Angoose

Man, now I'm really nervous about orgo haha. I won't be taking it in the summer, but I hear the two orgos destroy everyone :(.

Lol nah, they aren't that bad.

I was pretty bad at organic chemistry in first year - it just mostly memorizing functional groups and a few reactions and because I didn't get the underlying principles (they don't really teach them in first year) I didn't do very well on that midterm.

Second year organic chem gets a lot better IMO, and this is coming from someone who a) sucked at chem in the past and b) sucked at organic chem even by my own chemistry standards.

After first year, I contemplated the same thing (I was trying to get into vet school, so I needed like an 11-ish average), and I ended up going with Honours Biology (Core) instead of specializing (I was deciding between Physiology - do they still have that? lol - and Genetics). There is no required thesis, and there was a lot of freedom to take what I wanted. I still took 2OA3 anyway, since I thought it would be helpful to prepare for the MCAT, and so in case I had to apply internationally (Ontario residents are only allowed to apply to OVC, you can't apply to any other province's vet school, so if you don't get in Ontario you have to apply out of Canada), I'd still have that organic chem prerequisite covered. The Honours Bio program involved almost all the prerequisite courses I needed to apply, gave you first dibs for other bio courses on the course list that were interesting, and gave me enough flexibility to take other electives required as prerequisites for vet school, and other interesting electives to boost average, lol.

Anyway at the end of the day, if the courses required in the specialization are ones you would be taking anyway, which you find INTERESTING, then go for it. Personally, I found that when taking "easy" electives, there was no point if you didn't give a shit about the topic anyway, you aren't going to study for something you dislike no matter how "easy" it is. I often found that I did better on the required bio or biochem courses than the easy elective, since I tried harder when I assumed the material would be more difficult.

The best thing to do is just to look at all the schools you might be applying to in 3 or 4 years, and make a list of all the prerequisite courses you'll need and any restrictions they have on when you can take them (ex. OVC didn't count summer school courses, you had to have a full courseload or they wouldn't count the course, etc.). Then check the course calendar and make sure the specialization (or non-specialization) will allow you to do all of that, and make sure the course list is one that you are cool with. I'm sure you've already been doing that but yeah just 100% make sure since I know some people who didn't check and now they are in trouble since they're in 4th year and didn't take english 1A03 or something yet, but the school won't count the course if they take it now since it's a first year course .. etc.

Good luck!

Originally Posted by Alchemist11

Lol nah, they aren't that bad.

I was pretty bad at organic chemistry in first year - it just mostly memorizing functional groups and a few reactions and because I didn't get the underlying principles (they don't really teach them in first year) I didn't do very well on that midterm.

Second year organic chem gets a lot better IMO, and this is coming from someone who a) sucked at chem in the past and b) sucked at organic chem even by my own chemistry standards.

Which underlying principles are they? I'm curious, and I want to know, so I don't fall into the trap.

Originally Posted by justinsftw

Which underlying principles are they? I'm curious, and I want to know, so I don't fall into the trap.

Lol, well let's see...

Basically what happens is, they show you the mechanism for a reaction, and then sort of leave it at that but don't explain it.

They also don't spend a lot of time talking about certain reactions (e.g., Grignard + CO2 making a carboxylic acid) but it's on the synthesis chart so people just 'memorize' it.

But honestly it's not hard at all to look at the mechanisms and try to figure them out for a bit.
You can probably just google something like "alkene to alcohol" or something and sites like chemguide.co.uk will have mechanisms and explanations for how you do that.

I'm not saying you should fully understand the mechanisms for every reaction in first year, but if you've seen and reconstructed the mechanism knowing the reaction itself becomes much easier.

Originally Posted by justinsftw

Which underlying principles are they? I'm curious, and I want to know, so I don't fall into the trap.

There are too many examples and I wouldn't really call it a trap. If you're interested in orgo, then instead of blindly memorizing the reactions chart, you could perhaps do some web surfing and investigate why those reactions work. While this would solidify your understanding, it might be a lot of extra work/confusion since they don't really test you on anything beyond the basics.

Originally Posted by ladyh

After first year, I contemplated the same thing (I was trying to get into vet school, so I needed like an 11-ish average), and I ended up going with Honours Biology (Core) instead of specializing (I was deciding between Physiology - do they still have that? lol - and Genetics). There is no required thesis, and there was a lot of freedom to take what I wanted. I still took 2OA3 anyway, since I thought it would be helpful to prepare for the MCAT, and so in case I had to apply internationally (Ontario residents are only allowed to apply to OVC, you can't apply to any other province's vet school, so if you don't get in Ontario you have to apply out of Canada), I'd still have that organic chem prerequisite covered. The Honours Bio program involved almost all the prerequisite courses I needed to apply, gave you first dibs for other bio courses on the course list that were interesting, and gave me enough flexibility to take other electives required as prerequisites for vet school, and other interesting electives to boost average, lol.

Anyway at the end of the day, if the courses required in the specialization are ones you would be taking anyway, which you find INTERESTING, then go for it. Personally, I found that when taking "easy" electives, there was no point if you didn't give a shit about the topic anyway, you aren't going to study for something you dislike no matter how "easy" it is. I often found that I did better on the required bio or biochem courses than the easy elective, since I tried harder when I assumed the material would be more difficult.

The best thing to do is just to look at all the schools you might be applying to in 3 or 4 years, and make a list of all the prerequisite courses you'll need and any restrictions they have on when you can take them (ex. OVC didn't count summer school courses, you had to have a full courseload or they wouldn't count the course, etc.). Then check the course calendar and make sure the specialization (or non-specialization) will allow you to do all of that, and make sure the course list is one that you are cool with. I'm sure you've already been doing that but yeah just 100% make sure since I know some people who didn't check and now they are in trouble since they're in 4th year and didn't take english 1A03 or something yet, but the school won't count the course if they take it now since it's a first year course .. etc.

Good luck!

Wow, this is really helpful advice. Yeah I think I might consider doing bio. However, I hope I don't have to do physics too much in that. I'm in 1l03 right now and I'm struggling with it since my tutorials are Monday, where there's always a quiz, but the prof doesn't really teach (And we're behind) plus the textbook doesn't help. Has anyone taken the course and made some decent notes? hahah