Dartmouth is FAR from a crappy program. It used to be. But most of the staff are new and are there because they want to teach and mentor young residents. Unfortunately, they have not gotten a great crop so far, although there are some good residents there (from what I have heard). Some of the staff are really great though - I think you will be able to judge for yourself.
The newer staff have trained at great programs (MGH, MSKCC, Penn, among others) and, as I said, do not have platinum rods up their butts like many attendings at famous institutions.
Honestly I came very close to ranking Dartmouth #1. I love the location - very peaceful, and in the mountains (NH is my favorite place on earth). Problem was it is almost too isolated. Again, if I had my own family to cart around I would have probably loved it more (like with Iowa). I got the impression that a motivated resident would have a lot of success - the attendings are interested in mentoring and helping you out. It is, however, a somewhat small program. It's a big hospital but not THAT big. So the volume is less. The hospital is newer, though, but the path department is somewhat squeezed for space. I believe they are expanding to take care of this though. Dartmouth-Hitchcock used to be closely associated with Lahey Clinic (just south in central-eastern Mass) but now they are more independent and have probably lost some business. It's tough to be a major hospital in New England when you are just 2 hours from Boston. I did tell the PD at my exit interview that I really was impressed by the program and was strongly considering it (which was true) and he said "We hope we see you and would love for you to come here, stranger things have happened!" (I think he thought I was leading them on or something).
Vermont used to be one of the more malignant programs, with very long hours and aggressive attendings. But it has mellowed. You still work hard, apparently, on surg path and some CP rotations. But there are some new attendings (and a new PD who I don't know) who are more teaching oriented and friendly. The director of AP (or surg path), Dr Cooper is a fantastic guy, wonderful pathologist, but somehow I get the sense he may be drawn away by a bigger name program. Burlington is a decent city, fairly expensive I believe, isolated (about 4 hrs from boston), and it somewhat of a socialist paradise (lots of public transportation, recycling, eco-friendly foods and stores. The facilities there are somewhat older, although I believe the new construction there will include new path facilities. Thus, you would come out of VT well trained and many recommend it as a great place for training for almost any type of resident (researchers, private practitioners, etc). So yes, rigorous. They expect their residents to do well. They also do believe that their program offers most everything, and they are probably right. The volume, again, is not as high as other places, but it's enough. I think one of their residents is coming out here for a hemepath fellowship in the next couple of years.
U Minnesota I don't know much about except that it used to be perhaps one of the best path departments in the world before the institution somewhat imploded with financial difficulties. Rosai was there at the time. I have only indirectly heard things about it, and these things seem promising. So I would recommend visiting. Minneapolis is fairly nice - traffic is becoming a bear if you have to commute in on I-35 or 52 or 494 (I went to college in Minnesota).
What all these places share is the winter! Great stuff.
