Health Sciences (Bachelor of Science): International Year One (Cornerstone Entry)

If you see yourself improving community health or working in a lab, a careful first step makes all the difference. Cornerstone Entry to FIC’s Health Sciences (BSc) stream of International Year One opens with a support term and then a full science year, taught on the Burnaby campus where Simon Fraser University is based. The programme is planned over four terms.

You begin with CNST101, CNSU101 and CNQS101, the three non-credit Cornerstone courses covering academic skills, university life and quantitative foundations. The health sciences year follows, with BISC101 General Biology, CHEM121 General Chemistry and Laboratory I, HSCI160 Global Perspectives on Health, MATH151 Calculus I and STAT203 Introduction to Statistics for the Social Sciences, plus a writing course and four electives. Cornerstone also teaches the note-taking and exam habits that heavy science courses reward.

The courses are designed by SFU and taught by instructors it approves. A 2.50 cumulative GPA over ten courses and 30 units, with every grade at C- or above, guarantees your transfer to second year in SFU’s Faculty of Health Sciences BSc, where you choose the Life Sciences or the Public Health and Data concentration. SFU also runs a co-op programme for Health Sciences students.

Graduates move into roles such as medical laboratory technician, public health inspector, health educator, research assistant, environmental health officer and biomedical equipment technician. Cornerstone Entry is meant for science-minded students whose English sits under the Integrated threshold and who want a term of preparation before biology, chemistry and calculus. Biology 12 at C grade or better is expected for this stream.