Physics trouble

[Illyaria]

Hey guys!

 

I've never had trouble at school. I'm usually really good at making positive grades. I have a GPA of 3.7 which could have been better but I went through a depression last semester and didn't try as hard in my classes as I should have. I'm starting to get really discouraged. My physics teacher is not helping. He claims that if I can't pass his class, I should forget about med school in general but I had my heart set on being a PA.

 

My lab grades are really good. As and Bs. My quiz grades are As. However, the quizzes are only 5%, labs 25% and tests are 70%. My test grades are god awful. The first test our teacher said that out of his 6 years teaching physics, they have never been so bad. The highest grade was a C. I still had time to bring up my (now) F grade because of the test. My next test went up 20 points but still wasn't great. My grade was 2 points from a D. I really hoped I could get a C overall. I studied like crazy. We don't have physics tutors here. Just took my test and I know I failed it. I wanted to cry. Nothing I studied was on the test except one problem. ONE! He didn't even put questions up there he said to review! One of the questions was something we never even went into detail about!

 

The PA school I'm looking at doesn't require physics but I wanted to apply to more than one school. It was a OR choice. So, am I getting my hopes up about being a PA or is it still possible? Failing physics is going to put me back a whole year graduating. I'm so discouraged now.

[GreyhoundGirl]

Don't panic. I know you said you talked to the professor, but maybe try talking to him again and explain that you're really doing everything you can and you need some more help. Professors are paid to have office hours and help students, so if you aren't getting that you should speak to the department head or dean. Also, if it was a matter of having to re-take the class or even do another semester of school, I would hire a tutor out of pocket. It will be worth it in the long run. 

[rev ronin]

I'm guessing this is a university, not a community college?  If you need to, consider retaking the class in a non-university environment if you need good teachers who aren't necessary researchers and a supportive learning environment with lower ratios.

 

My experience with PA school is that the difficulty was not bad professors and "gotcha" tests, but the sheer volume of important material to cover.  Don't think that failing or doing poorly at one physics class makes you unsuited for PA school, especially if this is an outlier and you're rocking all your other science classes.

[Glorious_Ignoramus]

General physics is tough; unless you absolutely require it for a school that you absolutely must apply to, then I would avoid the classes which will end up lowering your grades.

 

I erroneously chose the calc path (vs stats) as a pre-health student and that landed me in hot water with a fast paced, very intense calc course for which I took a gpa hit.  I never completely recovered and had to take quite a few units to get my gpa back up.  To boot, I didn't realize that stats as a pa school req is nearly ubiquitous.

 

Otherwise: tutors!