Bioengineering and Pre-Med

I am currently pursuing a Bachelor of Science in Engineering (B.S.E.) degree from the University of Pennsylvania, which means I am a traditional engineering student, as opposed to the Bachelor of Applied Science, where there is leeway for pre-med students like me to take fewer engineering courses and have more elective options. That does not stop me from taking the prerequisites for medical school; I just have to be more careful with how far I stray from the engineering curriculum.

There were a few things I considered before coming to Penn, mainly because it is such a pre-professional school. Over half of my bioengineering classmates will end up in consulting, and it is hard to stay on my pre-med path while everyone else is polishing their resumes for career fairs and attending case interviews. However, leveraging these unique opportunities is how I differentiate myself from other premeds; embracing this fact has resulted in the opportunities I have taken on/plan to take on during my time at Penn.

This semester, I have begun maintaining this website as a personal project to enhance my web development skills and have collaborated with my peers on labs that explore various disciplines of bioengineering at an introductory level through activities such as CAD modeling and circuit design with pulse oximeters.

In the near future, one unique thing I plan to do is add elective coursework that highlights my favorite aspects of creation. I will be taking classes for two minors: Engineering Entrepreneurship and Design.

For the Engineering Entrepreneurship minor, I will be taking many courses that align with the pre-professional culture at Penn:

• Applied Medical Innovation I and II, a class that serves as an idea incubator and provides me with the opportunity to pitch a prototype at the end of my senior year
• Management and Economics of Pharmaceutical and Biotech Industries, a class that focuses on case studies and discussions of the lifecycle of a pharmaceutical and biotechnology product
• Venture Capital and Entrepreneurial Management, a class that invites speakers to foster case discussions on venture capital management issues in the context of a high-growth potential start-up company

For the Design minor, I will be taking many courses that allow me to express my creativity in digital design, specifically on the web:

• Art of the web: Interactive Concepts for Art & Design, a class that assigns projects to students to master the organization and design of websites, content navigation, basic UX design, and information architecture
• User Experience (UX) and User Interface (UI) Design, a class that studies existing products, understanding the user research, visual interface designs, and principles of human-centered design within the design process
• MATTERS: Art + Design Material Ecologies, a class that funds field trips to local sites of material extraction, production, and disposal, with each student preparing a final ethics project on a single material to guide future creative work

Even within the classes that are required for my major, there are so many ways that engineering can intersect with medicine:

Required Classes (Pre-Med Related):

• Biological Data Science I - Fundamentals of Biostatistics
• Principles of Human Physiology
• Engineering Ethics

BE Intro Courses:

• Bioengineering
• Scientific Computing
• Biomechanics
• Biotransport Processes

BE Courses:

• Biomaterials
• Bioengineering Laboratory Principles
• Bioengineering Signals and Systems
• Cellular Engineering
• Bioengineering Modeling
• Bioengineering Modeling, Analysis and Design Laboratory I & II

Senior Design Project:

This class offers students the opportunity to apply theoretical ideas and tools learned from other courses to a project that addresses a real-world problem relevant to their career goals.

Penn provides numerous opportunities for me to create something that is my own, applying my medical knowledge to entrepreneurial ventures. Overall, my time at Penn Engineering will have a lasting impact on my life, regardless of how medically involved I become in my career.