As a chemistry peer tutor for my past two years in university, I have had the opportunity to not only meet and mentor some really interesting students, but I have also been able to hear about how the first year science classes have been going on a regular basis. For one of this semester’s first year chemistry classes, the average on the first test was ~30% – I heard similar numbers for last year’s class.

Although I can’t remember if the class average for my first university chemistry test was that low, the average was supposedly a failing grade. So you can imagine what the impact of those types of results is like, especially considering that for many first year science students, this is the very first university test that they take. It can be quite the confidence crusher to go from a 90+ chemistry mark in high school to a failing grade on your very first university test.

I can still remember my own first university chemistry test, so much so that I could probably regurgitate the gist of the six problems we were asked to solve. I remember them pretty clearly because I recall reflecting about that test, and particularly, how and why it was different from my high school tests.

There were subtle differences – like the fact that lectures actually mattered (however, this tends to be more true for some university courses and less true for others). Two of the questions on my chemistry test were based on information taught in lecture but not available in the textbook. In my high school, there was never information or concepts taught only in class but not available in the textbook (you’ll find that professors have much more flexibility in terms of what they can choose to teach in university). However, this on its own is not that big of a deal – just go to class more if you didn’t the first time around. Another difference you will find is that there is significantly more material to cover in university than in high school, but I will address that topic in a future part of this series.

Yet there was one question in particular on the test that many students got wrong, which made me realize what the difference between high school and university science was; it’s a difference I have continued to notice in many of my university science courses. All our professor did was take a certain problem type but turn it backwards; that is, he took a problem type he went over in lecture and simply asked us to solve it in reverse. It was kind of like being taught how to determine the force due to gravity on an object in class, and now being given the force due to gravity and asked to find the mass of the original object on the test. Obviously the question was a bit longer than that, but the general idea was the same.

University: Learning How to Think

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When it comes to the transition from high school to university, an oft-quoted line is that “student averages tend to drop about 10-15%”. Looking at the basic numbers, this initially seems to be a pretty fair statement. For example, at York University, you need at least a mid to high 70s average to receive admission to one of its science programs, such as Biology (e.g. 77+ or so).

Considering several factors, such as the fact that fewer students probably got a 90+ average than the number of students who achieved a 77-89 average, it is probably safe to assume that if we computed the average of the final high school grades for a first year York science class, the number would be around 85. And I would imagine that most first year university science classes are made of students with similar high school marks.

Looking at the first year university science courses I have taken so far, the class averages have generally been around the ~65 mark, so it seems that on average, student marks do drop about 15%, and possibly more in some cases.

However, keep in mind this doesn’t mean that all students tend to drop 10-15% in their course marks; it just means that on average, students seem to achieve lower marks than they did in high school. Initially this seems to make sense: if a university class still needs to maintain a class average of 65, then obviously an entering class with high school averages of 85 should see a drop. As a matter of fact, however, the issue is much deeper and complex than this.

Consider the fact that there are actually some students who do better in university science than in high school. There are also some students, unfortunately, who do worse. And there are students who do about the same.

Moreover, there isn’t an obvious correlation between high school marks and university marks. For example, I know a student with a 95 high school average who now maintains a mid-80’s average in university, and can’t seem to break the 90 barrier. On the other hand, I know another student with a 95 high school average who completed first year university science with an even higher average. Myself, I had about a 94 final high school average and my first year university average was somewhere close to that.

NOTE: Universities generally use a GPA system which does not involve the averaging of numerical grades – rather, each numerical grade for a course is first converted to a value on the GPA scale, and these GPA values are then averaged. I’m just trying to make a point with my previous few statements.

Clearly, at least for science programs, the transition between years within high school (where students maintain the same type of marks) is very different from the transition from high school to university.

The Simple Reason: Marks, Difficulty, and General Academic Program Delivery Vary from School to School

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On Tuesday I took my first test for my Molecular Biology course. It was a pretty interesting format. There were 20 multiple choice questions, each with five choices (A to E). All of the questions were “Which of the following statements is correct” or “Which of the following statements is incorrect“, with only one correct answer for each question.

The neat thing about this test was that Choice E was always “None of the above“. Now, last week, the professor told us that he was going to reduce the number of answer choices to 5 – which initially sounded great, because he used to have 8 or something in past years. However, giving us 5 choices with the last one always being “None of the above” actually makes the test more difficult.

Why Does this Make the Test More Difficult?

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A few days ago, I had my first peer tutoring session of the year. Last year I tutored chemistry to first year students, but this year, I am now also tutoring first year biology and mathematics. I love teaching and helping students succeed in general (this blog itself should make that obvious!), and I am really hoping teaching plays some role in my career.

The very first student I tutored this year needed some help with chemistry. She was very enthusiastic, and was obviously keen on learning, which I like a lot. However, I quickly noticed the reason why she was having trouble with the chemistry problems; it was the same thing I have seen many times in numerous students who were not prepared for the jump to university.

I remember one question she asked me in particular. It was a chemistry problem that provided a chemical equation, as well as the mass of one of the reactants (I’m not going to go into too much detail for those of you who have not taken chemistry, because there’s a more important point I want to get across). We read the question together, and then afterwards, she immediately started converting the mass of the reactants to its amount in moles. However, after reading the question again, I realized that the calculation she was doing was pointless; the calculation she was doing was irrelevant to the answer. But she was doing the calculation anyways because she was on autopilot.

What is Autopilot?

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There are lots of things to consider when choosing university courses in general. As a student applying to a professional school, however, your strategy for choosing course electives should be much different than say a student who hopes to work right after finishing his undergraduate degree.

Let me preface the article by first saying that there will be students who disagree with my viewpoint on the issue of course selection. I’m going to share with you my opinion on course selection, under the assumption that you are serious about maximize your chances for getting into medical school. If you aren’t, that’s fine, and you may very well disagree with some of my suggestions.

You have to take prerequisite courses for some medical schools

Like with your compulsory courses, some medical schools have prerequisite courses that you must take by the time of your admission to their school. For example, the University of Toronto’s medical school requires: “One of Humanities/Social Sciences/Languages; two Life Sciences”.

It is important that you find out what these prerequisite courses are, and make sure you complete them by the end of your application year.

Fortunately, there aren’t too many prerequisite courses in general. Most of them are usually part of the basic science undergraduate program, and tend to overlap with prerequisites of other medical schools. There are also some schools (e.g. McMaster and Western) that do not have any prerequisite courses.

But assuming you are applying to a reasonable number of medical schools, I advise you to fulfill all of the prerequisites.

Let’s face it, your marks matter

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Getting high grades is a game

I have done extremely well academically in school my entire life, and I have done pretty well during my past two years of undergraduate biology. I also probably work less and study less than almost anyone, including students whose grades are as high as mine. The reason I have been so successful is because I understand that getting grades in school is essentially a “game”. The students who understand the rules of this “game” the best are the ones who get the highest grades.

Unfortunately, it would be impossible for me to explain all aspects of getting grades as a “game” in just one post. Instead, let’s focus this article on one key concept I always use when approaching my university courses, and one that I feel many students unfortunately neglect.

All professors test differently, therefore you should prepare differently

When I look around, I often see students approaching all of their courses in the same way. They take the same type and amount of notes in all their classes, and provide the classes with the same intensity of attention.

Yet if you saw me in class and watched how I paid attention, took notes, etc., you’d quickly notice that I approach all of my lectures very differently. I probably typed more notes than anybody in my biochemistry course last year, whereas I skipped a ton of my organic chemistry classes or barely even listened while I was there. Yet in the end, I aced both courses.

So why are my in-class habits remarkably varied? My habits are varied because the way the important (i.e. testable) information in my classes are delivered also vary. One of the most important attributes of a strong student is the ability to recognize what’s going to be on the test, and where to find that information.

Lecture-based vs. Text-book-based courses

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