Category Archives: University Tips and Tricks

Most students at UBC commute to and from campus instead of residing on campus, often due to monetary issues or difficulties with finding a space on campus. You’ve probably heard that research shows that longer commutes to school correlate with poorer performance. However, it often just isn’t possible to shorten your commute. So instead, here’s some tips on your commuting options!

Biking

Biking is one of the cheaper options that can also keep you active daily. By biking, you can often get as far east as Cambie Street within 45 minutes.  There is about 50 – 75 metres of elevation gain as you approach the university, and the city can also be quite hilly. Many students also use biking as a “last mile” transportation option: many people bike to a convenient bus stop, use the bus bike racks, and then continue biking once they reach their stop at UBC. You can also ride to an available bike parkade and then take transit to school. However, biking can also be quite miserable in the wintertime, due to the near-constant rain. It also gets dark as early as 4 pm in the wintertime, and some people may not be comfortable with biking in the dark. As well, even with locks, bike theft is a known problem on campus. Despite this, biking is still a very valid option for many students. You can use Google Maps to find your way around, as it also has bike paths built in.

Driving

If you live in the suburbs, such as Richmond, Surrey, Coquitlam, commute times by transit can reach between one to two hours for a one-way trip. This can be shortened to between thirty minutes to an hour if you have a valid driver’s license or you carpool with a friend. This is one of the more expensive options, as you need to maintain your vehicle, pay for gas, and pay for parking at UBC. Parking passes at UBC range from $370/term ($690/2 terms) for parking at one parkade to $430/term ($800/2 terms) for parking at five parkades, where you need to specify which parkade(s) (out of six) you would like to be able to park in. There is also free parking along Marine Drive, which tends to fill up very quick and is often not a viable option. You could also drive to a Park and Ride (whose rates range from being free to up to $3.75 a day depending on the lot) and take transit to UBC. These Park and Ride lots are in the suburbs, such as at Bridgeport, Coquitlam Central, Park Royal, and Scott Road. Google Maps or a built-in GPS tend to be some of the better options for finding away around while driving.

Transiting

Vancouver’s transit system is often considered one of the best in Canada.  If you are eligible (which most students are), you may use the U-Pass which you must renew every month. This is paid for by your student fees for $43.35/month. If you commute during peak hours, you often won’t be able to sit, so some students arrange their classes so they can commute when it’s less busy. The most popular buses include the 49 (49th Avenue to Metrotown Station), R4 (41st Avenue express to Joyce Station), 25 (King Edward Avenue to Brentwood Station), 99 (Broadway express to Commercial-Broadway), and 84 (4th Avenue express to VCC-Clark Station). These connect to the Expo, Millennium, and Canada Line Skytrain Lines, which further connect into the suburbs. You can use the Translink Trip Planner and apps such as Transit or Radar to plan your trips and see where the next buses are. One of the downsides is that the transit system can be very unreliable when it snows, and there are sometimes hiccups due to accidents and mechanical issues. Transiting can also take up to 2 hours each way, depending on how far away you live. However, you can also use your transit time to settle down, catch up on readings or homework, or sleep.

Conclusion

There are multiple ways of getting around depending on your needs and current resources, and there isn’t one “best” way of commuting, as everyone’s situation is different. Take a look at your options, and learn more about your commute before you start in September!

With attendance at Zoom university being at an all time high, the team at The Undergraduate Scientist would like to share some tips of how they’ve been adapting to the online term. These tips range from study advice to self-care.

1. structure your day

Many students have complained about the lack of structure to their day due to most courses being asynchronous and recorded. This leads to a loss of motivation and a sense of aimlessness. We encourage students to attend live lectures, or to schedule set times where the students plan on watching the recordings. The goal is to simulate what it would be like if classes were in person, and hopefully having allocated times as to when you’re going to engage with classroom material will give you a sense of direction for the day.

An advantage of online classes is the flexibility, however this does not mean you should only be watching lectures when you feel like it. Often times, one ends up playing catchup on lectures a few days out from an examination, which is not only very stressful but also ineffective.

2. Find a hobby that doesn’t use a screen

I remember at the end of the term, my eyes became so tired and I couldn’t focus on the words displayed on my computer. Remember to take breaks and rest your eyes. Try to schedule 2-3 hours away from the screen each day. Find a social-distancing friendly hobby so you won’t be tempted to check social media on these breaks. For me this is golf, but some suggestions for other hobbies can be jogging, skateboarding, cycling, walking your dog, etc.

3. invest in a secondary monitor

You can get these for as low as $40 dollars for used models or $300 for high-quality ones. This makes computer work much easier as there is more space to work, as opposed to squinting at my laptop all day. You can also put reference material on this screen, which minimizes clicking through tabs to find things, only to be lost as to where your original tab was located.

4. don’t overload yourself

It’s tempting to take on more jobs or extracurriculars, because there is now more available time. This is especially true for commuter students who might gain 10 more hours a week, since now they don’t need to travel back and forth from UBC. This being the case for me, I decided to take on more than usual this school term, resulting in burnout in the middle of the term. You can definitely add one more commitment than usual, but I recommend allocating most of the extra time as breaks. Trust me, your eyes and your back will thank you.

5. Stay in touch with family and friends

A big drawback of virtual learning is that people feel out of touch with their peers, leading to a dwindling sense of community. Quarantine and social distancing accentuates loneliness, even when we don’t actively realize this. Make sure to call or contact your family members and friends regularly not only to check up on them, but to alleviate loneliness. Always make time to attend to the relationships in your life, because these relationships are much more valuable than school.

Hope this was helpful!

Having all taken the MCAT, our team has found that many of the courses we took were a big help in prepping for this exam. Here we will talk about the must-take courses if you’re thinking about tackling the MCAT.

Chemical and Physical Foundations of Biological Systems: Having solid fundamentals in general chemistry, organic chemistry, and physical chemistry is essential to doing well on this section. For example, I studied for the MCAT before taking any organic chemistry courses and found it near impossible to understand. We have highlighted the strongly recommended courses! Those that are not highlighted are courses we found useful, but are relatively easy to self-teach for MCAT purposes.

– CHEM 121 (Introduction to General Chemistry)
– CHEM 123 (Introduction to Physical and Organic Chemistry)
– CHEM 203 or CHEM 233 (Organic Chemistry I)
– CHEM 213 (Organic Chemistry II)
– CHEM 205 (Physical Chemistry)
– CHEM 211 (Analytical Chemistry)
– CHEM 245/235 (Synthetic Chemistry Labs)
– PHYS 100 (Kinematics, Force, and Energy)
– PHYS 117 (Dynamics and Waves) or PHYS 101 (Fluids, Energy, and Waves)
– PHYS 118 (Physics of Electricity and Magnetism)

Critical Analysis and Reasoning Skills: Probably no courses at UBC will prepare you for CARS. The only way to do well is to practice, practice, and practice! If we did have to recommend courses they would be the following:

– ENGL 110
– Upper-level literature courses

Biochemical Foundations of Living Systems: Having a solid cell-biology background is essential to doing well on this section. Exposure to introductory-level biochemistry is highly recommend to familiarize yourself with the logic behind certain reactions. We have highlighted the strongly recommended courses! Those that are not highlighted are courses we found useful, but are relatively easy to self-teach for MCAT purposes. The third year biochemistry courses can be quite difficult, and so depending on whether or not they’re required for your program and your confidence in the subject, it may be worth it to self-study the topics instead of taking them!

– BIOL 112 (Introduction to Cell Biology)
– BIOL 234 (Introduction to Genetics)
– BIOL 260 (Introduction to Animal and Plant Physiology) or CAPS 301 (Human Physiology)
– BIOL 200 (Cell Biology)
– BIOL 201 or BIOC 202 or BIOC 203 (Introduction to Biochemistry)
– BIOC 302 or BIOC 303 (Biochemistry)

Psychological, Social, and Biological Foundations of Behaviour: All the topics can be easily self-taught. Some of the team did not take any psychology or sociology courses and still scored in the 97th percentile on this section. This being said, some of us spent the longest studying for this section, so taking relevant courses should help!

– PSYC 101 (Introduction to Biological and Cognitive Psychology)
– PSYC 102 (Developmental, Social, Personality, and Clinical Psychology)
– SOCI 101 (Social Interaction and Culture)
– SOCI 102 (Inequality and Social Change)

We hope this article was useful! Check out our course review page for more details on these courses.

Throughout your university years, you will undoubtedly be required to consult research articles for a paper. Although it’s tempting to just find an article that says what you need and throw in a citation, there are many situations where taking a more in-depth analysis of the paper will help your paper (and your GPA!).

SEARCHING FOR PAPERS

It can be difficult to find papers that match exactly what you’re looking for. Places to start include Google Scholar, UBC Library, or even the citations listed on Wikipedia or in other papers. As a student, you will have access to many journals through UBC Library, so this is often your best bet! Choose your keywords carefully, unless you know the exact paper or author you are looking for. On Google Scholar, you can use operators such as AND,  OR, “” , and – to refine your search. This can make finding appropriate papers a lot faster and easier!

Once you find an article you really like, take note of the authors. Often the authors have done previous work on the topic, allowing you to focus in on related articles. Getting to know the key experts on your topic is essential to writing a great paper, as this gives your paper more credibility.

If you’re struggling to find relevant articles, consider looking at literature reviews. They might contain pertinent information, which you can then track down the source of this information, hopefully leading to a relevant article. Reading literature reviews also familiarizes you with the stakeholders and experts on your topic!

ANALYZING THE PAPER

Now that you’ve found an appropriate source that says what you need, you should also analyze it! Does it come from a reputable journal? How was the study conducted? How was the data collected and analyzed? Does the data support the authors’ conclusions?

This step is time-consuming, and often it will be impractical to you as a student to thoroughly analyze every paper you cite in your assignments. Things to look out for that will also affect how you talk about the paper include:
– inclusion/exclusion criteria
– sample size (Is the sample size large enough for statistical analyses?)
– blinding and controls (Is this a double-blinded randomized trial? If not, how are they controlling for extraneous factors and biases?)
– type of study (e.g. retrospective, experimental) (Is the author correct in inferring correlation = causation?)
– duration of study
– variables measured
– implications of the data

READING THE PAPER

Always start by reading the Abstract! This gives you a summary of the paper’s research question and findings, which saves you a lot of time in determining whether the paper is relevant. It’s okay to skip most of the Introduction if you’re familiar with the background knowledge of your topic; however, make sure to identify the knowledge gap, research question, and what they propose to do in order to answer this question.

I would then advise to skip to the Discussion to quickly find out if their efforts were fruitful, and the implications of their results. You can then go back to the Results section to determine whether you agree with their conclusions. Often times, there are specific details in the Results section that aren’t mentioned in the Discussion.

Reading the Materials and Methods section is often optional and depends on your needs. If you’re writing a paper about the latest scientific findings on your topic, you can probably just skim the section. This extends to literature reviews as well. However if you’re designing your own experiment, it’s often worthwhile to see how experts in the field approach similar experimental design.

We hope you found this article helpful! Happy lit. searching 🙂

Many science students want to pursue medicine in the future, however the process can be daunting. One of the biggest roadblocks is the infamous 7.5 hour MCAT. Here, I’ll explain what exactly is the MCAT, as well as my journey to scoring in the 99th percentile.

what is the MCAT?

The MCAT is a 7.5 hour exam that covers a broad range of topics. These include the Sciences and the Social Sciences. There subjects are grouped into four sections: Chemistry/Physics (59 questions), Critical Analysis and Reasoning (53 questions), Biology/Biochemistry (59 questions), and Psychology/Sociology (59 questions). All the questions are multiple choice, and there are broadly two question types.

The first type is concept questions, which solely test your content knowledge. Theoretically, if you did a perfect review of all the concepts covered by the MCAT, these should be “free” points. The second type is research-based questions. You are required to read a research passage adapted from the primary literature and answer questions about the passage. Some research-based questions can be answered by solely looking at the passage itself, but some are reliant on content knowledge.

The Critical Analysis and Reasoning section (CARS) is different from the other three. The good news is that it is all passage based questions that do not rely on any background knowledge. The bad news is that the passages are incredibly dense and cover an impossibly broad range of topics from history to art to music.

Credits: AAMC

test-taking conditions

I took my exam at the Bentall Centre in Downtown Vancouver. You check-in upon arrival and they give you a locker and key to store your things. They take a picture of you and do a fingerprint scan (which they use to confirm your identity every-time you leave or enter the testing room). They also put your phone in a sealed bag, which you can store in your locker; however, the bag must not be torn open. They stagger the exam start times, so not everyone begins at the same time, thus you don’t have to worry about washroom lineups during the scheduled breaks.

When entering the testing area, they will ask you to pat yourself down. They will also provide you with ear plugs and noise-cancelling headphones. In terms of scrap paper, they give you many erasable note pages, which I found to be more than enough (you can ask for a clean one after every break as well).

In terms of environment, the temperature was comfortable (I just wore a T-shirt). Both the break area and testing area are monitored with video cameras; however, you are allowed to talk to other test-takers during your breaks (just not about the exams).

My study Guide: Content review

I began studying late June and aimed to take the exam on September 7, giving me roughly 2 months. For the first month, I would do content review. For content review, you want to spend more time on what you don’t know. Since I am majoring in Chemical Biology, my general/organic chemistry knowledge was more in-depth than what is needed for the MCAT. I had also taken some introductory physics courses so my main focus was on the physiology aspect of Biology, Biochemistry, and Psychology/Sociology.

I used the Princeton Review books, and I read 1-2 chapters a day (however, I read the entire chemistry books in one sitting). By focusing on a small amount of chapters, I could focus on memorizing all the details instead of unnecessarily cramming the information by reading an insane amount of chapters.

Along with reading, I would also do two other things during content review. Thrice a week I would write out all the biochemistry pathways and amino acids. There are around 6-7 pathways to remember and it is important to memorize these as they are “high yield” (likely to show up). I would also do 2-3 Jack Westin passages a day to practice my reading comprehension for CARS. I probably ended up studying 6-7 hours a day (although it should’ve been 4-5 hours, but I’m guilty of procrastinating).

my study Guide: practice problems

The AAMC prep bundle is your friend! Definitely buy this resource! This is really the only purchase you need to make in terms of paid practice material. Third party practice material (Kaplan exams, TPR exams, etc) are unnecessarily complex, and their practice exams score very harshly to scare you into buying one of their prep courses (which can cost upwards of 1000$). Some free resources I used were the 100 free questions from UWorld and the free Khan Academy passages.

For the first days I aimed to do 60 practice questions a day. I later began doing 120 questions a day, which is equivalent to half a MCAT, therefore ramping up my test-taking stamina. I would mix and match questions from different section banks (eg. 30 questions CARS, 30 questions Chemistry, 30 questions Biology, 30 questions Physics), so I wouldn’t be too bored from doing 120 questions of the same subject.

I took my first full-length exam in the middle of week 2 of practice problems and scored a 515. This gave me an indicator on which subjects I needed to work on (in my case CARS and Psychology/Sociology). Thus I dedicated 2 days to rereading my Psychology/Sociology books and grinded out more CARS passages on Khan Academy and Jack Westin, before going back to my regular schedule of 120 questions a day.

I scored a 518 on the next two full-lengths. However, my CARS scores were abysmal and were hovering around a 124-126 (44-67 percentile). By this time school had started, so I really had to be selective on what I was going to study. I had 3 days left. I decided that I was going to spend these next 3 days solely on CARS, and I redid most of the AAMC CARS questions.

My actual score was a 523. With my CARS section being in the 95th percentile (129)! Even though it was still my lowest section score, I was very proud of myself for improving so much. Every minute of the past two months suddenly seemed very worth it when I got my score back!

my test expenses

The MCAT isn’t cheap, but I think I spent less than your average applicant. I bought the Princeton Review set for 80 CDN (used). There are also ways to get review books for free if you’re very google-savvy ;). I spent around ~350 USD booking my exam, and ~300 USD  (which I split with a friend) on the AAMC practice bundle (all including tax). Apart from these, I didn’t spend any extra money on third-party materials or any prep courses (the costs would be ridiculous). Remember, the more time you invest in studying, the more money you will save, as another retake would cost you ~350 USD more.

I hope you guys found this useful!

Transitioning from high school to university can be very tough. There are many things we wish we knew when we started our undergraduate journey. But worry not, we have put together a list of things we wish we knew in first year.

I wish I knew #1…

Having an idea what major you want to do in second year is important, even if you don’t declare majors in first year. This is because many second year majors have different prerequisites. If you know what majors you’re interested in, you could potentially skip some boring general first year science courses.

I wish I knew #2…

This is mostly for commuter students. Try to plan so that you do not have to go to school on some days. This saves a few trips back and forth. Even with online schooling, we recommend having days without scheduled classes so you can have a small break. Continue reading →

With online classes becoming the new norm, it is essential to adapt to this new learning environment. How does one stay focused when Facebook is now literally a click away? We have come up with a list of tips that help keep you focused on your online lectures and screen casts.

Tip #1

Close bookmarks to any social media sites. This makes accessing them less tempting because they won’t be in sight.

Tip #2

Keep your phone out of reach. It’s very easy to pick up your phone and start texting and browsing social media when your phone is right next to you. Make it a hassle for yourself to get your phone by keeping it far away. Continue reading →

Whether you’re a fresh first year or a seasoned fourth year, a good study routine is essential to doing well in school. Here are some tips, that I personally follow!

Taking notes in class

Many people tend to use a notepad/notebook to lectures fore notetaking; however, I discourage you from doing this. This is an inefficient form of note-taking, because people tend to copy down what’s shown on the slides instead of paying attention to the lecturer! Instead, I encourage you to bring a device, where you can annotate the (usually posted) pre-lecture slides. By doing this, you can write down things that the lecturer mentions, which are NOT on the slides and be more engaged.

In this regard, I personally used an iPad and apple pencil. It keeps my backpack light and all my notes in one place. I strongly recommend investing in one, or a similar note-taking device. Continue reading →