You Don't Need a Science Major to Become a Doctor
Scott Giberson '20 arrived at TCU from Austin sure of one thing: he wanted to be a doctor. First-year chemistry changed that.
“I was in my chemistry class and thought, you know, I don't actually like this very much,” he recalls. So he quit pre-med. “I had a bit of a quarter-life crisis.”
For two years he explored instead of committing. He chose psychology because it genuinely interested him (“learn more about people, why they do what they do”) and minored in Spanish to connect with his multi-ethnic heritage. He had no idea both would end up shaping the physician he'd become.
The Conversation That Changed Everything
By junior year, Scott figured the door to medicine had closed. On a hunch, he asked a roommate to help him get a meeting with Dr. Laura Luque, the biology professor from his intro course. He didn't expect her to remember him. He laid it all out anyway: the crisis, the years of wandering, his fear that it was too late.
He expected her to agree. Instead:
“I hear what you're saying, but I think you can do it, and I think you should do it.”
“That completely changed my trajectory for my life,” he says.
Reflecting years later, Dr. Luque says she was moved that it stuck.
“I firmly believe that every student is capable of achieving great things. Sometimes, all they need is for someone to believe in them and to say so at the right moment.”
That fall, he started taking the first-year biology and chemistry classes he'd skipped, this time on his own terms. What he didn’t do was abandon the two majors that had pulled him off the pre-med track in the first place.
Putting Psychology and Spanish to Work
As it turned out, the “detour” majors weren’t a detour at all. Both became daily tools. Psychology shapes how he reads patients and families, not just symptoms. Spanish, sharpened by a semester studying abroad in Chile (also his first time ever leaving the country), let him talk directly with Spanish-speaking patients instead of through an interpreter.
He remembers a career-day visit to an elementary school where he realized half the class spoke mostly Spanish, so he switched languages on the spot. “Seeing their faces light up was just so fun. One of the most unexpected, joyful moments that's come out of me learning Spanish.”
"Do a lot without burning out."
That instinct to follow genuine interest didn't stop at his academics. It's the same thread running through everything he did outside class: Frog Camp facilitator, tour guide, Chancellor's Host, Student Foundation, campus ministry. His secret wasn't time management; it was following what energizes you.
“Do what you like and do what you're passionate about, and don't do anything to check a box. That's the biggest key I have for people going into college.”
When pre-med students show him their impress-the-committee checklists, he pushes back: “I always ask them, what are you actually passionate about? Those are the things you should pursue.”
Is TCU only for Christians?
Campus ministry was one of the most grounding parts of Scott’s TCU experience, and it points to a question a lot of prospective families quietly ask: does the 'Christian' in Texas Christian University mean you have to be one to belong here?
Scott, a person of faith himself, answers plainly.
“TCU truly is a place for everyone,” he says. “A lot of people think you have to practice a certain faith to come here. That's certainly not true.”
For him, his church's college ministry mattered less as a statement of belief than as a source of community and mentorship, especially since he didn't join Greek life. It was where he met people he never would have crossed paths with otherwise, and where he found older mentors who lived in Fort Worth and could speak into his life beyond the campus bubble. “When I was thinking about wanting to be married one day, I could actually talk to a married person,” he says, “which was a crazy concept as a college student.”
But what surprised him most was how much TCU widened his view of faith rather than narrowing it. It was here that he attended his first synagogue service and learned what a Jewish service looks like.
“That was a wonderful experience, and I learned so much,” he says. “Anyone is welcome here, regardless of your faith or lack of faith. This is a place where you can step outside the comfort zone you grew up in and learn more about people who are different than you.”
Why It Worked
Community, mentorship, an unconventional path, a professor who believed in him. None of it happens by accident, and Scott credits TCU's size and spirit for making room for all of it. Smaller classes meant professors who knew his name (he still has some of their cell numbers), and a culture where an unusual path felt possible. That's how a psychology major ended up with a combined MD/MBA, sparked by a Neeley hackathon his senior year.
“TCU really punches above its weight. It's not a large university, but all my friends are at the top companies and schools in the country. That's hard to nail down on a website, but once you're here, you feel it.”
He's honest that it wasn't always easy. There were moments of doubt, wondering if he'd chosen right. “Looking back, it was an amazing four years, but it was also challenging at times.” Knowing that going in, he says, is exactly what makes it worth it.
From quitting pre-med as a first-year to matching into pediatrics at one of the country's top children's hospitals, Northwestern/Lurie Children's Hospital of Chicago, his story proves there's more than one road into medicine, and sometimes the most winding one leads exactly where you're meant to be.
Explore Your Own Path at TCU