Need some direction, help!

[A-Ron21]

Hi everyone. I'm usually a lurker on this forum but I decided to make a thread to ask for some help.

 

I'm a senior biology/chemistry student at a state university in Pennsylvania. I am geared generally toward human physiology/medical science. I will be graduating next fall, and I need to make the stressful decision of choosing a graduate school.

 

Here is my problem in a nutshell: I don't know what I want to do.

I am confident that I would be successful in a medical program. I get good grades and I am fairly sure that I would be successful as a doctor of some sort. I am being pressured (not strongly, but some) by my professors to enroll in a medical program.

 

I've sorted it to two main problems:

 

1) I really do not know what I want to do with my degree. I have always had a fascination with how things work. However (again), in high school I was never good enough in mathematics and so the option of me enrolling in a physics or engineering program for undergrad was out of the question. I have definitely improved in my mathematical ability since then. I also have had an interest in infectious diseases and have looked up a couple schools for that.

 

2) Cosmology, astronomy, and engineering were always my first and main interest. The first books I read were on cosmology and astronomy. I've always wanted to enroll in the space program at NASA. I've always wanted to be a pilot. I highly enjoy building things and taking them apart and learning how they work. This is clearly an engineering-type interest.

 

So here is my focus: I would like to pursue my dream of working with NASA or astronauts (or being one) first and foremost, but I am not sure how to go about doing this because my undergraduate degree is in biology and chemistry. I've been searching on the Peterson's website and have found several schools that offer programs in Biophysics and Bioengineering, which are the closest I could come to melding the two fields.

 

I've considered doing a master's program in something related to biology or phsyics, and then possibly going a non-academic route (ie. aviation school or the navy) in order to make this happen. However I have no idea how to start that.

 

The other option is go to a medical school, and then after I graduate try to do some sort of work with NASA and human physiology in space (basically).

 

-----

 

Anyways, if you actually made it through reading all this, I highly appreciate it, and would definitely appreciate any advice that the members of this board can give me.