When people find out my undergraduate degree is in Biology, they immediately assume I’m going into medical school after graduation.
To be specific, I’m a third-year undergraduate majoring in Systematics and Ecology (SEC). Most people who’ve asked me what my Biology major is don’t know that it exists. Others who already know that keep on forgetting what it’s called.
The LaSallian previously covered both the opportunities our program offers and the struggles of students in niche programs like ours. Those two previous stories clearly justify the risks and concerns we face as SEC students. Those risks and concerns are ones we consider cautious opportunities.
In 2018, the Biology program diversified into three tracks. Since then, more students choose to major in the other two: Molecular Biology & Biotechnology and Medical Biology. Meanwhile, Our frosh block in the SEC program alone consisted of only nine students.
Most Biology courses in the University also treat us as potential medical students. When SEC students take subjects with the rest of the Biology majors, we’re forced to conform to the expectations for the rest of the batch. Moreover, professors teach concepts in a way that “will be useful for med school.” Hence, it’s evident that the lack of awareness of the program’s existence trickles down even to them. Some even admitted they’ve only heard of the program through us because we enrolled in their classes.
I’ve witnessed this treatment as well with enlistment. In the wake of the Archer’s Hub fiasco, I went to campus to have my enlistment concerns resolved. Some courses ended up being unavailable to us despite our having completed the prerequisites for them. After a two-hour wait in line to meet the College’s Academic Programming Officer, it turned out the only problem was because they seemed to have forgotten to make the courses available for us SEC students.
On the other hand, I admit that career opportunities for SEC graduates seem bleak. It’s challenging to find job openings that align with our interests. For instance, searching for job offers online requires more specific keywords or filters to find something that aligns with our program.
Campus career fairs have also seemed uninteresting to SEC students, as no company partners seem to cater to our interests or the practical courses we’ve honed. If there was any job offer related to biology at all, it was likely to be medical or microbiological.
It is because of these concerns that I understand why some peers and family members question whether we really don’t want a medical career. Medical programs, of course, are already some of the most established ones in the country, because their careers are already in high demand and command competitive salaries outside the country.
The opportunity to live out a worthwhile advocacy as a potential career, however, is what keeps us going. We’ve treated our SEC-exclusive courses as happy hours amid the other challenging Biology courses infamously labelled as part of the “four horsemen of Biology.” The way our professors have lectured us on terrestrial and marine ecology has helped us deepen our understanding and appreciation of the many interactions between biota and the environment that shape our planet.
Furthermore, the Philippines is one of the best places for a career like the ones SEC students like me are pursuing. Taking termly field trips to the University’s Marine Station has exposed us to mangroves, corals, and seagrass ecosystems close to the heart of the world’s marine biodiversity—one that is so rich that even overseas postgraduate programs would send us back here to maximize our research prospects.
If humanity needs its doctors to diagnose and tend to its ailments, the planet needs its ecologists as well to safeguard it from further damage. Our program primes us for opportunities to do just that.
Biology mustn’t automatically be a medical thing. While the possibilities in the medical field seem promising, the opportunities offered by the blue and green shine just as bright. The world may tend to forget that we exist, but through us—and the ones who mentor us—the world may keep on existing.
Editor’s Note: Elijah Salazar was a third-year undergraduate student majoring in Systematics and Ecology when this column was written in August. He is currently in his fourth year.