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What should I choose bio or math

I like bio but its a lil hard for me but still its alltheory so its like a story type to me but maths im good at it and i like it too its easy for me too but in previous 2 years I have been getting good grades in bio more than maths ahhhhhh idk what im gonna do in future I like bio too maths too ! And we dont have any option to choose both so yeah i have to choose one !

Reply 1

MindMax2000

Universities Forum Helper

Original post by Analebanic1

Is this for A Levels or GCSE (or even the international versions)? What do you intend to do at uni and what do you want to do as a career?
Note: both maths and bio are required subjects for a number of degrees, so you might need to think this through as often you can't usually switch from a life science to a quantiative degree.

There are certain disciplines at degree level (at least in the UK) that encompasses both maths and bio:

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Bioengineering (note, this is more engineering than biology)

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Bioinformatics (the quantitative kind e.g. health informatics)

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Mathematical biology (https://www.st-andrews.ac.uk/subjects/mathematics/mathematical-biology-msc, https://www.exeter.ac.uk/undergraduate/courses/mathematics/mathsmsci-biology/, https://www.dundee.ac.uk/undergraduate/mathematical-biology-bsc, https://www.york.ac.uk/study/undergraduate/courses-2023/bsc-mathematical-bioscience/, https://www.keele.ac.uk/study/undergraduate2023/undergraduatecourses/biologyandmathematics/, https://www.nottingham.ac.uk/naturalsciences/study-with-us/what-you-study/pathways/bpm.aspx, https://www.hw.ac.uk/uk/study/postgraduate/mathematical-biology-ecology-and-medicine.htm)

You can often do a Natural Science degree that's half maths and half biology, but you would need to research which unis and courses that allow this.

Reply 2

Okayn

I’m assuming you are going into A-Levels.

I did both of those subjects in A-Level.
Biology has a lot of content and so you’ll have to do lots of memorizing. There are lots of large 6 mark questions each based on some sort of process.
Biology marks schemes from experience, can be awkward at times - you feel like you’ve got the answer but there’s marks schemes that are very specific.
In AQA Biology - there’s an essay you have to write in paper 3 so consider that too.

Maths (single) in A-Level is generally split into 3 parts. Pure, Statistics and Mechanics. Mechanics is something normally new to GCSE students - it’s similar to physics pretty much. You’ll learn about things like pulleys, objects on slopes, friction, rods and etc. There’s questions normally based around kinematics and suvat, or using newtons laws or calculating moments. In statistics you will normally have to learn multiple hypothesis tests. They are pretty basic normally because they follow the same/similar methods each time but some of the later content in year 2 can be confusing. There’s also a small amount related to the large data set and methods of collecting data but most of that part is just memorizing.

Pure was my favorite part of A-Level Maths - you’ll learn about differentiation, integration, arithmetic/geometric sequences among other sequences, vectors, using binomial expansions to expand things, a variety of trig identities including cot sec and Cosec, there’s modelling questions with all of these topics, there’s also a bit of proof that you need to be comfortable with, there’s also logs and exponentials and coordinate geometry. Don’t get intimidated by all these words - they’ll make sense in time.

Please note that topics can vary between exam boards but those are generally what A-Level maths consist of.

For me - I found Maths to be more fun just because there’s either a right or wrong answer and because it was my favorite at GCSE. In Biology you need to try and pick the right way to say things to get the marks and memorizing can get tiring . Both in my opinion are still very interesting subjects which can open up a multitude of different degree options. You should consider the type of career you want in the future too.

Goodluck