I am going to be starting my nursing pre-reqs in the next year and I was wondering if there is any advantage to taking the science major versions of Biology and Chemistry instead of the typical intro versions needed for nursing? Does anyone know how much harder they are? I know after being a nurse for several years I will want to go back and get an advanced degree and possibly take some upper level nutrition classes that require Organic Chem and the regular science major Chem is a pre-req for Organic. I would appreciate any advice or comments. Thanks.

When I took Molecular Bio at my school it was STRONGLY advised that you only take it if you are a science/med major. Otherwise you can take " Into to Life Bio" or something else. Well I got an A but my professor was a &*^&%&^% . LOL! As for hard...no I didn't find the MATERIAL hard..just her tests.

I'm taking an intro to Chemistry class right now. There's no way in the world I could understand the more advanced Chemistry classes. What does your school require for your degree? We can't pick and choose...we have to take A&P I and II, Intro to Chem, and Organic & Biochemistry. Good luck!

I'm still pre-nursing but I did take General Chemistry (1A) instead of the Intro to Chem (6A). I won't lie, it was much much harder and I know this because now I'm taking the intro general chemistry to get an A is the class because in general chemistry I ended up with a C+.

Granted that I'm not very good with chemistry anyways, but that 1A Chem class was hard. You learned everything you learned in 6A except you build on all of the concepts/equations/etc... to a more advanced level. I remember having to substitution problems having to use X and Y to find the number of moles of a compound.

In my intro 6A the thermochemistry and electromagnetic radiation chapters are so easy. We only had 2 or 3 simple problems for thermo using q=MCT equation whereas in 1A is was using that equation twice as one longer equation and sometimes you had to use X's or Y's for substitution. And for electromagnetic radiation in 6A we went through 1 or 2 equations and in 1A we had something like 7 different equations and they wern't all so easy.

Part of the problem was the way our professor worded the problems on the tests which made the class even harder but if you spend a lot of time studying it's possible to get an A. But strangely enough both 6A and 1A are counted as 5 unit classes.

Oh ya, and the chem labs were twice a week instead of once a week in 6A. Plus the labs were much harder.

I will be starting my pre-reqs this summer and I am taking 'Intro to chemistry' (its a 5 week course) so I know I will have work 3x as hard to learn the material. In the Fall I will be taking Gen. Biology. I am taking Intro to chem to prep me for Gen. Biol. When I tranfer to U of M I will have to take Prinples chemistry 1 for the BSN program.

Good luck to you

I have taken the first term of a 3-term sequence of chemistry for science majors. I've also taken 3 terms of chemistry for allied health students. The chem for science majors is just more... "science-y" for lack of a better word. We covered topics that dealt with astronomy and physics. A lot of focus on energy levels and different laws (Coloumb's Law and Beer's Law).

Edited to add: Since you think you might want to take coursework later on that needs it as a prerequisite, you might as well take it now. BTW, the course I took was not that difficult so long as I studied.

I have 20 hours in the more advanced chem. course work - it was for another degree that I decided not to pursue.

It was fine (A's, one B) and actually has made the nursing coursework easier (nutrition, pharm., patho) as so much of what I had is being "reviewed" in these courses.

If you have the interest, I would not let an advisor discourage you from taking the more "advanced" course.

SJ

One possible issue is that some schools only accept science courses that are so old. I've seen some limit to five years. So say you go to get your Masters in 6 years, they may not accept those classes and you may end up retaking them anyway- so your intro class may have come in handy.

I am going to be starting my nursing pre-reqs in the next year and I was wondering if there is any advantage to taking the science major versions of Biology and Chemistry instead of the typical intro versions needed for nursing? Does anyone know how much harder they are? I know after being a nurse for several years I will want to go back and get an advanced degree and possibly take some upper level nutrition classes that require Organic Chem and the regular science major Chem is a pre-req for Organic. I would appreciate any advice or comments. Thanks.