Which SUNY med school? (UB vs. Stony Brook vs. Upstate)

WayOutWestMom
Sun, 28 Apr 2013 11:07:59 +0000

D1 (now 3rd year in clinicals) told her younger sister to look for these in a med school:

P/F grading during the first 2 years
no mandatory attendance at lectures w/ powerpoints/recordings of lectures posted to class website
6-8 (or more) weeks off to study for STEP1

(She made other suggestions too. She liked early clinical and PBL, but realizes that not everyone does.)

You will probably need a car for MS3-4 even at Upstate since you likely don’t want to be walking back and forth between the hospital and your apartment at 3am or midnight when you get off shift. And here at least, for some rotations, MS3-4s have to report at 6am for pre-rounds everyday. Do you really want to be walking to the hospital in the winter pre-dawn?

If you are sent to remote sites for clinicals, you will get living expense reimbursement from the school. The school will also help you find housing. The moving around can be inconvenient, but it does give you a broader view of how medicine is practiced in different locations.

I would suggest you ignore match list results for now.

Match lists aren’t a particularly useful indicator for program success. In part because they change each year depending on the interests of the graduating students. Also you, as yet, don’t know which programs are top matches in the field and which aren’t. There are some residencies at unlikely places that are top ranked.

Also match lists are strongly influenced by the mission of the school. Some schools produce a lot of primary care docs because they select students likely to go into primary care.

If you have the chance, go to Second Look Day at each of the schools and chat with both current students and your potential classmates. You’re going to be spending the next 4 very intense years of your life with these people. You need to be comfortable with the school’s atmosphere and the people at the school.