[QUOTE=Spoons]
I can only speak from my experience here, and as always, YMMV. But thinking back to my own undergrad days, this was a common misperception.
It’s true that engineering and science students always seemed to be busy with labs and reports and problem sets and similar things. But at our school, at any rate, none of these things counted for much of the student’s overall grade. Oh they did count, but the sheer volume of them meant that none of them could count for much. If you completely blew a few, your final grade wasn’t much affected. Compared to this, the English, history, and poli sci students seemed to have it soft: turn in an research essay by the end of the year and write an exam. There were some differences–maybe there would be two papers and an exam, or maybe a midterm test. But pretty easy right?
Not quite. Assuming we’re working on the “essay and exam” model, consider the following:
– You have two, and only two, opportunities to earn a grade. Blow either one, and you’re probably getting an F in the course. So you’d better do each right the first time–there are no makeups, no doing better on the next assignment. Very similar to law school.
– Essays tend to be due by the end of term, just before finals. If all your courses require an essay and exam, then you can’t leave things to the last minute. If you’re going to prepare well for finals, you have to have those essays out of the way with enough time to prepare. So time management, organization, and prioritization become vital skills acquired (usually) the hard way. Again, skills that are vital at law school.
Now, do this well enough and consistently enough through your undergrad to get the GPA necessary to enter law school.
English, history, and poli sci may seem soft to an outsider, and indeed, if all you want to do is coast through and barely pass, you can get through these with minimal effort. But doing well (well enough to earn the necessary high GPA for law school admission) in these subjects is indeed challenging; and the way they are structured and graded is very similar to the law school experience. Again, just my view and YMMV, but I hope you can see what I’m getting at.
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See, the thing is, I’ve done both (poli sci/german undergrad and then premed postbac), and found the latter drastically more difficult. Now granted, the undergrad was at a state school and the postbac at a prestigious science oriented private research institution; furthermore, I’m much more humanities inclined than scientifically inclined, which may have made the undergrad easier. However, the sheer difficulty of engineering and some science classes can be hard to accurately convey . . . in the humanities, rarely is there a problem with grasping a basic concept, usually the challenge is in finding a new angle on an issue and presenting it coherently and convincingly.
However, in the sciences, 1) there is one right answer, which can be both gratifying and frustrating, and 2) simply understanding the concepts can be the main challenge. I think in general the GPAs are lower in the sciences for a reason . . . again, YMMV, and this is turning into a hijack, so I’ll stop.
Gestalt
I was motivated to the point of unhealthy obsession. My classmates called me “grade junkie.”