Hello Everyone,
I must beg to differ a little with Tim. Let me just say that each dental school has alotted to them a certain number of positions in each specialty, and the top students of each class at each dental school get the positions. Now lets analyze elite students, they think the same. They all decide to go to Harvard, Columbia and other top rated and ivy schools because they believe that they have more positions available for specialities than another lower rated school. Maybe because of their class size it seems that they are sending more students but the percentage is usually 20% of the class. Now Harvard and the other top schools trick these students with broad wording into thinking that they have an enormous amount of positions available to them because they are who they are. However, I believe there is a standard agmonst the schools probably from the ADA that says that only a certain amount of their students will go to a specialty. So what I would tell a student considering dental schools and strongly desiring a specialty is to weight yourself agmonst your peers at the schools of your choice. Yes, you could go to Harvard or another top rated school and compete with the rest of those blood-thirsty gladiators or you could take a step down to a school where you have a better chance at the specialty of your choice. It is quite possible for a student at Harvard to have a higher GPA and NDB score but not get a specialty while a student in a lower rated school will have a slightly lower GPA and NDB score and get a specialty because his school has positions available. See if the school gives you a scholarship. This usually means that they believe you will get a specialty from their school in four years and represent their school as you try to get jobs. Do not get me wrong! If you do go to a top rated school and get a specialty by being on top of your class you will be very much wanted and probably very well paid. However, if you feel any uneasy feelings at a top rated school about your ranking compared to your peers then don't go there to try to get a specialty. What will happen is that schools like Columbia will tell you since you are #20 in your class of 75 students that you have no chance and will not get a recommendation to a specialty. Stay strong in a top rated school (in the top 20%) and you have a great chance at a specialty. However, be careful in your choice of school.
I would also like to say another thing. I didn't like the way my school's name was insulted when I was at a interview at a top rated school. We were sitting in a circle naming to the host where we came from and, the host would interject about how great that school is and so and so. The host brushed off my school's name. O.k. so my school's name is not so well known but he should not have brush it off (Which I'm not going to mention for my reasons). However, I think a host at a interview should think twice before saying anything about anyone's undergraduate school. It is insulting to here about how great someone else's school is and nothing about yours. It kind of says to me that you believe I made a wrong decision in where I went to college. Well, I wish I could tell that idiot that I should get the applause. I went to a small undergraduate college with very little resources for financial reasons and scored a 96.8% on the DAT's. Yes, the other students at well-known schools scored about the same as me. However, they had more resources available to them and opportunities to spice up their resume than myself. I worked with what I had and got to the same place as they did, an interview at a very competitive school. I'm going to say it is like comparing two drummers. One drummer has a small 5 piece drumset and the other has a hugh 10 piece drumset. Yes, the person with a hugh drumset with sound great because he has more resources, but it is quite possible for anyone to sound great on that drumset. Now the person on the small drumset has limited resources but thinks about all the beautiful musical patterns he can make and succeeds. Here we are again. I may have made excellent music with my small drumset, however the person with the large drumset gets the applause. I could care less about it all now, but I just wanted to point out my anger to an pompous host.
Later
