My college course... (A 3rd-level student's insight)

Course:
Bio and Chem sciences in UCC

Points:
350 - down from 365 in previous years. [

Number of students:
300!!

Hours:
2 or 3 lectures a day, 3 toutrails a week 2 two hour labs aweek, its grand
Course Content:
just 4 subjects all year which can get abit bouring
Summary:
basicly is fair easyer than i thought it would be, i got 450 points did lower maths and chem was my only science subject and im doin grand with very little work. the tests are hard alright but if u just tip away and do abit of work each day u should pass

I'm currently in 2nd Year, this is true as far as I can tell, but the finer points of the course are constantly changing. I've tried to get the most relevant things in without going overboard, but give me a shout if you want to know more.

Points:
740 - combination of HPAT and LC results. System is little complicated, but explained well in this document: www2.cao.ie/downloads/documents/2010UGMedEntry.pdf

Number of students:
160

Hours:
quite variable, starts off about 20 (10 hrs lectures, 10 hrs labs and tutorials) in first year, then increases up gradually. Placements can be very long days, often starting as early as 7.

Course Content:
Not going to dwell on the subjects much as this has been dealt with in previous posts. Some key things of note I think though are that you are being taught clinical skills in hospitals from the start of 2nd year, which is a recent addition; it used to be that alot of the basic clinical stuff (IV insertion, suturing, etc) was taught in the first couple of weeks as an intern.
Significant hospital placements start in 3rd year, and you are pretty much never on campus anymore; you get your lectures in hospitals. The first 2 years are mostly on campus though.
They've also just introduced a research project this year for 2nd years which is a significant commitment; 12 Monday afternoons and 2 solid weeks. This is good exposure to research and may get you published; very important later on when going for jobs.

Workload:
There's no doubt that there is a lot of work to be done but the advantage is that you can more or less do it at your own pace. There are very few assignments, and they're mostly rather small, the real work comes in studying lectures. The field of Medicine has amassed an awful lot of knowledge over the years, so there is a lot to take in. Material is jammed into a single lecture that could be spread out over a few; however, the stuff isn't difficult, you just have to be sharp to keep up and take the time later to learn it all off. This usually isn't a problem for the kind of people getting Medicine though, but you will still have to commit a couple of hours to learn off each lecture. That's where the real time consuming part of Med school is.

Social Life:
Despite what most think, is rather good. The demographic in this course is quite unlike any other in that you will get about 20-30 North Americans (mostly Canadians), and about the same again of Malaysians/Muslims in addition to the Irish. These however, integrate surprisingly well, so is not a problem. As the HPAT has only just been introduced for this year's first years, there are a lot of marginally older people too, the likes who are a few years out of a physio course, or transferred from a Med-related science course, etc. This should take a few years to balance out, then it should be mostly LC students again in the Irish representative sample.
There are always people who will go out on to their weekly club, but the real fun lies on the trips and outside term; this is when Meds really let their hair down, and have got a reputation for it! You can expect anything from Meds on tour! But these are usually preceded by exam periods of complete social reclusion for up to 4 weeks at a stretch. Due to the highly demanding nature of the course, and the fact that the yearly timetable is very different to most other courses, you tend to socialize more with your classmates than other courses would, but with such a large class, you're bound to find a good core group of consistent friends to hang out with.

Job Outlook:
Pretty much recession-proof and transferable to anywhere in the world. You are pretty much guaranteed a job, but the higher ones are very competitive and the road is long. You are an eternal student and most career paths don't lend themselves very well to a good family life, or at least that's my impression, see here for more details: http://www.boards.ie/vbulletin/showthread.php?t=2055781254
The ones that do (GP) are very competitive to get on a training scheme.

Summary:
The course is highly stimulating and very dynamic. You get great satisfaction, but is also very time consuming. "Hands-on" training begins very early on, and is a great break from lectures. Social life is great, but on a different schedule to most other courses. Employability is not a problem, you will always find a job.

Personal take:
The two best things I like about my course are:
-people: My classmates and I get on very well as we all have similar mindsets. Also, the people contact in hospitals; this is great, but don't do Medicine if you don't like talking with people, that's what you do most of the time, not medical procedures.
-science: This is a highly intellectually stimulating profession, where you constantly build your knowledge. Most other science based courses, unless you go into teaching or research, there is little application for what you've learnt. Medicine is great that way in that you know you will use what you learn in your job.

I've just finished first year so I can't offer much on the psychology side of it yet other than to say that my friends in first psych through arts really enjoyed the course so far and I know myself that the few lectures I sat in on were really interesting.
In first year...............
....................... you study all science along with every other first year doing science so you're in big classes and you have lots of oppurtunities to make new friends. You are also given a first year psych timetable and invited to sit in on as many lectures as you like and you are invited to meetings with the heads of the dept. and the other people in your course(which isn't many) and are given the option of one to one meetings with the dept. heads to make sure that you're settling in to college and that you don't feel like you're not a psychology student. It can be hard to remember that you're actually studying psychology sometimes when you're buried under a particularily horrible maths assignment..
.........................The science in first year is managable but I've been warned that unless you have an interest in the modules you will carry on to second year, they can get considerably harder, particularily chemistry.
........................Don't let the fact that you have to do maths in first year put you off this course as maynooth has an awesome maths support center where maths tutors(and the odd lecturer) volunteer their time to help any students that show up with whatever they're struggling with.. I know more than one person that would've failed without this help.
........................... In second year you go into the same psychology classes as the first year arts students and you continue on with two of your four science modules from first year(if you want to carry computer sci on then you have to keep up maths as well). Being a year wiser than your psych classmates should definently help.
............................ Come third and fourth year you only study psychology but the background in science that you gain from first and second year should help you if you go on for certain areas of post grad study.
............................Additional points.....
The data analysis module in first year maths is basically the same as the statistics module in first psychology so if you're weak at maths this could be a help to you when it comes to the stats side of psych experiments.. if you're good at maths then it means your workload will be that bit easier in second year :_)

Hope this helps and pm me if you wanna know anything else. :_) Plus I should add that maynooth is a great college.... with loads of college clubs and societies, good academic staff and a really nice atmosphere about the place in general!