Some questions on the Music and Science courses (1 Viewer)

[187]

Hey, I'm currently in Year 11 but I'm highly unsure about what course/University to choose. What's so awesome about UNSW is that it's the only place I've found so far to offer a combined Music and Medicine degree. However, I'm not sure about the Music side of it. Er, Arts/Medicine DOES mean I can study Music for the Arts part, right?

Link: http://www.handbook.unsw.edu.au/undergraduate/programs/2006/3841.html

(Er, by the way, what's the difference between a course and a program?)

I'd really love to study Music Composition, but UNSW only seems to offer a single, generic sort of Music course: http://www.handbook.unsw.edu.au/undergraduate/programs/2006/3425.html

What exactly is involved? If it's mainly musicianship and musicology, then sorry, but it's not for me.

Okay, for the Science bit, what exactly does that involve? Basically you can choose a subgenre (e.g., Physics, Chemistry) for your entire Science degree? What kind of jobs can you expect as a result? People have been telling me that Science is the worse Medical-ish degree there is, and that employment and job opportunities absolutely suck. I've also heard that you need to study Science before you can do Medicine, so I'm quite confused. Can anyone provide any information at all, regarding anything about the Music, Medicine, Medical Science and Science/Science Advanced degrees? Basic overviews would be awesome. Thanks a lot!

 

[sikeveo]

for the latter part of your question, put usyd gmp in google.

 

[Survivor39]

If you are asking about BA/MBBS, then the medicine part is Medicine. It's NOT a B Science. You graduate to become a doctor.

 

[187]

Sorry, let me clarify that. Basically what I'm asking is:
- what exactly does a Science course involve and what is the employment like?
- for a Science course, can I choose any sub-branch of Science that I'd like to study or is it all biomedical?
- does UNSW offer a Music Composition course, or only a general Musicology-style learning system?
- Arts/Medicine means I can do Music/Medicine, right?

 

[Raginsheep]

Science course involves "science-iy" stuff i.e, physics, maths, chem, bio... What will happen normally is that in 1st year, you will take a fairly general selection of subjects that come under the science program (to clarify your ealier question, a program is basically your degree). In later years, you can choose to specialise in a specific area of science such as physics (known as majoring in), etc by taking specific subjects which correspond to that major.

Science is not a medical-ish degree although you can make it one by doing lots of biology, body chemistry subjects. However, doing science does not necessaryly mean that you want to get into med at a later stage.

As for science being needed for med, there are currently two options to get into med in Australia.
1. To get into undergrad med, such as at UNSW, you sit a test known as UMAT in addition to your UAI. The UMAT test is based on "general ability" stuff (or so I've heard since I didn't sit it) rather than being knowledge based.
2. Or, you can try for post-grad med at Usyd which involves completing an undergrad degree first and then sitting the GAMSTAT. This test does test knowledge, including science and thus you some knowledge, although I'm not sure exactally how much and what level is needed.
There's no requirement for you to do a science degree before post-grad med but it probably will help. You could do an degree in Music first if you really wanted to.

As for employment opportunities, I'm not to sure but opportunities will probably be better overseas than here in AUstralia. Alot of people with science degrees may choose to go outside the traditional workplace of a lab and move into industries such as finance.

 

[187]

Thanks, Raginsheep! By the way, you made me think when you said: "You could do an degree in Music first if you really wanted to." Is it uncommon or a bad idea to do one degree (Music is 4 years) first, and then a second degree (Science would be about 3-4years, I would imagine)? I don't particularly like the idea of being 4 years older than everyone else, so do you have any userful advice?

 

[Survivor39]

Some people do two degrees, one after the others. There's nothing wrong with it.

 

[Raginsheep]

Also alot of "older" people (ie not 17/18 in 1st year) attend uni as well, some for the first time. It might not be the same but for my degree, I'll be doing a 1st year subject in 3rd year uni so theres not this "age" thing which might be prominient in primary and secondary school.

Note though: the government will only fund your uni degrees for so long. After a specific time, you'll be on your own.

 

[Rach_10]

I looked into doing Music/Med myself being totally torn between the two, although I was interested in performance not composition. The uni of melbourne has a Medicine/Diploma of music course which takes 7 years.

From what I understand the BA MBBS at UNSW is musicology based with group performance, not sure about composition. I'm looking at doing it - I'm first yr med this yr but we start Arts courses in 2nd yr