Be Gentle DD Dropped Organic Chem

[Anonymous]

My DD has had a rough first year of college. Large state University and she got a C in General Chem and recently withdrew from Organic. First semester GPA hovered about a 3.0. This semester without Chem should be better but only because Chem was dropped. Maybe 3.5 ish. Plan is for her to retake over the summer. She’s so frustrated with Chem though and is dropping out of Biology major and is thinking of something else. Her talents have always been in the humanities. SAT score was 780 verbal 620 math.

She’s lost a lot of confidence struggling in math. Please help.

[Anonymous]

OP again- I meant Chem not math above.

[Anonymous]

I think that if she is struggling intensely with chemistry she is not going to enjoy the course load for her chosen major. Is there a reason biology is what she wants to major in? Truthfully, it doesn’t seem to be a strength of hers with what you’ve posted.

[Anonymous]

Not trying to be snarky, but why would a strong humanities kid be taking organic chemistry, or majoring in biology? That just sounds like a recipe for disaster. Maybe this can be a window to discovering that a different major is a better fit? I barely eked out a C in freshman calculus second semester and it was a wake-up call that I was meant to be an English major, not an engineer.

[Anonymous]

I'm also confused about the Biology major. Was she trying for pre-med? Organic Chemistry is well-known as a class that breaks plenty of good students. It's a weed out.

[Anonymous]

she had general chem and o chem both in her first year? ugh. also, these are big weeding out courses in big U's.
signed, chemical engineer who barely passed o chem.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Not trying to be snarky, but why would a strong humanities kid be taking organic chemistry, or majoring in biology? That just sounds like a recipe for disaster. Maybe this can be a window to discovering that a different major is a better fit? I barely eked out a C in freshman calculus second semester and it was a wake-up call that I was meant to be an English major, not an engineer.

+1

[Anonymous]

Are you me? My humanities DD in her freshman year also struggled with chem. She is pre-health (not pre-med) which is why she took it. Didn’t take AP chem and her honors chem was interrupted by the pandemic.

Somehow she squeaked out a B in chem lecture and a B+ last semester and this semester assuming the curve is the same she should do the same. She is seriously reconsidering the pre-health because she is absolutely dreading organic chem. Right now she’s not going to take it until junior year, taking bio next year and her major courses (anthropology with a focus on bio ethics).

I am encouraging her to shadow this summer ALOT because she needs to not go down this GPA killing path until she is convinced she is going pre-health. She is also considering law school so again need to not further kill the gpa.

All this to say OP, I hear you and feel your pain on behalf of your DD.

[Anonymous]

-^sorry meant B+ In lab

[Anonymous]

Yeah, moral of the story is you can't just go picking your kid's major because you like the sound of it at cocktail parties.

[Anonymous]

I hope she changes to a major that is a better fit for her talents and interests. Life is too short to spend it trying to fit a square peg into a round hole.

And there's no reason for her to spend the summer retaking the class. Instead, she should find an internship or job (or class) related to something she's interested in.

[Anonymous]

OP- I was a biology major who struggled with organic chem, as well. I got A’s in all of my other major classes, so totally disagree with PPs who say she should change her major because of this. What is she interested in? Some biology fields don’t really use organic that much. The summer school approach is a good one- I did that and found it much easier to do well when that was the only thing I needed to focus on. Good luck!

[Anonymous]

For those that say why Biology it’s because that’s what SHE chose. I was not a STEM major and didn’t realize how weedy Biology was in terms of tough math and sciences.

She’s definitely dropping Bio but has no idea where to go. She works so hard so this is Devastating for her.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:For those that say why Biology it’s because that’s what SHE chose. I was not a STEM major and didn’t realize how weedy Biology was in terms of tough math and sciences.

She’s definitely dropping Bio but has no idea where to go. She works so hard so this is Devastating for her.

to her guidance counselor, if they have those at Big U.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:For those that say why Biology it’s because that’s what SHE chose. I was not a STEM major and didn’t realize how weedy Biology was in terms of tough math and sciences.

She’s definitely dropping Bio but has no idea where to go. She works so hard so this is Devastating for her.

Don't kids usually have the mom's brains? Maybe she should be considering something else.