Sketchiest/ Worst DO schools...Which Schools are For-profit?

[rubisco88]

Which DO schools are for-profit? In your opinion which DO schools are the worst? Which DO schools are the newest?

In general, it seems like people dislike Rocky Vista, the Touro schools, and LECOM.

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[cliffhuxtableDO]

RVU is the only school that is for-profit.

To find the newest schools look in the CIB.

There's no need to discuss the "worst" schools. That will not end well. Each school has ups and down, good and bad.

 

[JaggerPlate]

I'm opening one up in my garage - for-profit, I'm the only professor, we learn "lightening bone setting," for most of the time, clinical rotations are completed on your own time, I don't take personal checks, and I do not answer questions about where the cadavers come from.

... shadiest

 

[Atom bum]

What's wrong with new schools? It's not like they are helping students cheat on exams. I realize they are not as established as older schools but I don't think that makes them "shady".

 

[Hottpants89]

Which DO schools are for-profit? In your opinion which DO schools are the worst? Which DO schools are the newest?

In general, it seems like people dislike Rocky Vista, the Touro schools, and LECOM.

People base the opinions on those schools you listed almost completely on what they hear from others. Listening to people's opinions on here can just make things more complicated for you. Through the application process and dealing with specific schools I found less than half the information I read here to be accurate. That is just my experience though.

You should apply wherever you are interested, go to your interviews, and make your own opinions. I ended up liking some more than I thought I would and others less. I ruled a few schools out based only on the weather in the areas they are located. One school I applied to initially took two months to return an email with a simple question and didn't answer their phone when I called repeatedly over the course of that time. Things like this will give you a good or bad impression of schools and it would be unfortunate to go to a school that you don't like as much because of other people's opinions, which are only based on others opinions still. Just decide what you want in a school and go for that instead of doing what people on here think you should do.

Also, the AACOMAS information booklet is free through their site and has the years that each school was founded listed.

 

[Easy C]

I'm opening one up in my garage - for-profit, I'm the only professor, we learn "lightening bone setting," for most of the time, clinical rotations are completed on your own time, I don't take personal checks, and I do not answer questions about where the cadavers come from.

... shadiest

Sign me up. Some of the greatest tech companies started in a garage! So why wouldn't a garage based Med School be any different.

Will your Mom bring cookies and lemonade in during those long study hours?

 

[Doctor4Life1769]

All of them are for profit, even if not stated as such.

You'll learn. Oh yes, you WILL learn.

 

[JaggerPlate]

Sign me up. Some of the greatest tech companies started in a garage! So why wouldn't a garage based Med School be any different.

Will your Mom bring cookies and lemonade in during those long study hours?

For an additional fee ... yes.

 

[JeetKuneDo]

I'm opening one up in my garage - for-profit, I'm the only professor, we learn "lightening bone setting," for most of the time, clinical rotations are completed on your own time, I don't take personal checks, and I do not answer questions about where the cadavers come from.

... shadiest

Are you opening up a branch campus of Stewart University?

 

[judasreznor]

For an additional fee ... yes.

How will you help me prepare for the COM(P)LEX? Will I be able to match into that Neurosurgery residency I've always dreamed of after I learn to set bones in your "lightening" quick style?

 

[vandyam]

Not trying to bring people out swinging or anything, but what is wrong with LECOM? I've never heard anything on here negative about them, but if there are "down falls" I'd love to hear them, as LECOM-B is my first choice - I want to be well informed. Their avg mcat is b/t 28-29 and COMLEX has a 100% pass rate - admissions are harder than ever - so I assumed they were very sought after. Are there negatives I'm missing? (Besides not being able to eat/drink in classrooms/uniforms for OMM?)

 

[DuxburyPembroke]

What's wrong with new schools? It's not like they are helping students cheat on exams. I realize they are not as established as older schools but I don't think that makes them "shady".

The new new schools with provisional accreditation do have less options for student loans. All new schools have the capacity for shadiness - especially new branch or satellite campuses, I think. The agency that accredits osteopathic medical schools, COCA, has very few standards, and almost none (it seems) that a school is forced to meet in its first few years. I attend a satellite campus of an established school, and it is going to take years yet to approach the level of the parent school, even though everything is, they continue to insist, just the same. New new schools may be great, who knows?

@Hottpants: SDN is not exactly the truthiest place on the net, but this is one of the only places where the truth about some schools will be told. Admissions will tell you outright lies, period. You can not trust anything an admissions officer says to be true, and AACOMAS data may be self-reported by the schools.

@vandyam: I've heard good things about Bradenton from Bradenton students, so I think that's probably a fine choice - certainly the best of the LECOMs (for now, although I heard a rumor that Dr. Krueger is retiring?). The 100% board pass rate may be inflated - I know that at LECOM Seton Hill, all students who have failed any class in second year or are under a 3.0 GPA (this is more than 2/3 of the student body, even though our grades usually get a little curve to keep most of us good) have to take a series of exams and pass all of them in order to be allowed to take the boards. Everyone who fails one of these tests or has less than a 2.5 GPA has to give up an elective to take LECOM's summer board prep course, at the end of which, again, you have to pass a mock COMLEX in order to be allowed to take the real thing. It's not a bad system - in fact, it's a good system for catching all of the students who have gotten through two years without learning the minimum of basic science expected of a third-year before they mess up their careers by going into boards thinking they are prepared. But it does mean that those reported pass rates are highly misleading.

 

[nicknickp3]

I'm opening one up in my garage - for-profit, I'm the only professor, we learn "lightening bone setting," for most of the time, clinical rotations are completed on your own time, I don't take personal checks, and I do not answer questions about where the cadavers come from.

... shadiest

Average accepted MCAT and GPA please.

 

[mafunk]

I'm opening one up in my garage - for-profit, I'm the only professor, we learn "lightening bone setting," for most of the time, clinical rotations are completed on your own time, I don't take personal checks, and I do not answer questions about where the cadavers come from.

... shadiest

 

[JaggerPlate]

Are you opening up a branch campus of Stewart University?

On paper ... no. In theory - absolutely (the 'chancellor' will be involved and we will still be #1 in US medical education)

How will you help me prepare for the COM(P)LEX? Will I be able to match into that Neurosurgery residency I've always dreamed of after I learn to set bones in your "lightening" quick style?

We have a complex COMLEX review program ... it mainly involves hacking various other COM student's qbanks.

Neurosurgery will not be a problem.

Average accepted MCAT and GPA please.

MCAT is not required ... I'll look at ACT scores, but my main qualifier is one of those at home art tests that design schools send you. You know, the one where they mail you a picture of a pirate or turtle with a blank box next to it, then you draw your version of the picture in the box and mail it back.

I carefully review these, as I feel they represent the best correlation with COMPLEX and lightening bone setting competence.

 

[87DO15]

Awesome.

 

[racerwad]

The new new schools with provisional accreditation do have less options for student loans.

I think RVU and its provisional status is the only institution where students don't have access to the full spectrum of graduate school loans. All of the other institutions have full access to federal loans because of their not-for-profit status.

 

[Bacchus]

I think RVU and its provisional status is the only institution where students don't have access to the full spectrum of graduate school loans. All of the other institutions have full access to federal loans because of their not-for-profit status.

I don't think that's the reasoning. Any new school affiliated with a school (undergrad) is entitled to federal loan funding.

 

[racerwad]

I don't think that's the reasoning. Any new school affiliated with a school (undergrad) is entitled to federal loan funding.

Possibly. I know that PNWU is not associated with any undergrad institution and are provisionally accredited but their students have access to all normal pathways to profound indebtedness.

I admit I did not pay ultra close attention throughout the interview day but paying for school was something I listened to with both ears. I do know that PNWU is accredited by both COCA and the regional accrediting body in the PNW. Maybe this is how they do it?

 

[DocEspana]

Possibly. I know that PNWU is not associated with any undergrad institution and are provisionally accredited but their students have access to all normal pathways to profound indebtedness.

I admit I did not pay ultra close attention throughout the interview day but paying for school was something I listened to with both ears. I do know that PNWU is accredited by both COCA and the regional accrediting body in the PNW. Maybe this is how they do it?

I love when I have to start sentences this way... "My understanding is" that once you have any accreditation (state or COCA) you can get federal loans. The states tend to give it immediately upon opening, and COCA clearly waits til the first graduating class. No one talks about the state accreditation because its somewhat of a rubber stamp that the school is indeed located in state and is a medical school.

As for why RVU doesn't have access... does anyone know if colorado did not rubber stamp them (assuming my understanding is correct)?

 

[DocEspana]

Also on the Touros.... I believe you confused "sketchiest" with "jewiest". Unless this is the merchant of venice. Then elizabethan era etiquette would lead you to assume they are the same.

 

[racerwad]

I don't think that's the reasoning. Any new school affiliated with a school (undergrad) is entitled to federal loan funding.

I love when I have to start sentences this way... "My understanding is" that once you have any accreditation (state or COCA) you can get federal loans. The states tend to give it immediately upon opening, and COCA clearly waits til the first graduating class. No one talks about the state accreditation because its somewhat of a rubber stamp that the school is indeed located in state and is a medical school.

This is my understanding PNWU got accredited regionally and is provisionally accredited by COCA. The regional higher institution accreditation allows them to give federal student loans.

I'm willing to sit correct on this. I just wanted to clarify that just because a school is provisionally accredited does not mean that they can't give federal loans.

 

[UBCvan]

My understanding is that you guys are all correct!

 

[drctother]

Not trying to bring people out swinging or anything, but what is wrong with LECOM? I've never heard anything on here negative about them, but if there are "down falls" I'd love to hear them, as LECOM-B is my first choice - I want to be well informed. Their avg mcat is b/t 28-29 and COMLEX has a 100% pass rate - admissions are harder than ever - so I assumed they were very sought after. Are there negatives I'm missing? (Besides not being able to eat/drink in classrooms/uniforms for OMM?)

Nothing wrong with LECOM-B as a first choice school, just know that the "100% pass rate" has been discussed in other threads before and people shared their theories on whether or not this 100% rate is actually true (most people seeming to think its not true). Also, admissions are harder than ever at most schools as there was more applicants overall this year, its not just LECOM.....

The school is fine though, I dont consider it a "top school" personally but its definitely NOT a "bad" school either, in my opinion

 

[UBCvan]

Nothing wrong with LECOM-B as a first choice school, just know that the "100% pass rate" has been discussed in other threads before and people shared their theories on whether or not this 100% rate is actually true (most people seeming to think its not true). Also, admissions are harder than ever at most schools as there was more applicants overall this year, its not just LECOM.....

The school is fine though, I dont consider it a "top school" personally but its definitely NOT a "bad" school either, in my opinion

hey dude
I just realized my friend is a friend of yours at UBC LOOL
how weird is that??

 

[Prncssbuttercup]

All of them are for profit, even if not stated as such.

You'll learn. Oh yes, you WILL learn.

ALL schools are out to make money. My state schools are always out to find new donors, etc... why, to bring in money! For profit/non-profit is a tax status it means nothing about what you do with your money. Just because a school is 'NPO' doesn't mean they have to put extra money back into the school. They can increase salaries, give out bonuses, send people on trips, etc... it does NOT mean they have to put it toward curriculum or anything 'student' related... They can put it in savings, whatever they want... but so many of you are SOOO hung up on NPO vs FP that you think it's different... it's really not that different except if I donate something to RVU, it's not a tax write off... if I donate the same thing to PCOM, it is a tax write off...

Jagger, maybe you should see if you can get some NPs to come to the garage med school

 

[randomusername]

ALL schools are out to make money.

QFT. There are several "non-profit" schools with tuition significantly more expensive than RVU's and I doubt all of that extra money goes into betterment of the education.

 

[DocEspana]

ALL schools are out to make money. My state schools are always out to find new donors, etc... why, to bring in money! For profit/non-profit is a tax status it means nothing about what you do with your money. Just because a school is 'NPO' doesn't mean they have to put extra money back into the school. They can increase salaries, give out bonuses, send people on trips, etc... it does NOT mean they have to put it toward curriculum or anything 'student' related... They can put it in savings, whatever they want... but so many of you are SOOO hung up on NPO vs FP that you think it's different... it's really not that different except if I donate something to RVU, it's not a tax write off... if I donate the same thing to PCOM, it is a tax write off...

Jagger, maybe you should see if you can get some NPs to come to the garage med school

Well it can't go into savings. Or certain executive salaries. The rest of it is all true though.

 

[judasreznor]

We have a complex COMLEX review program ... it mainly involves hacking various other COM student's qbanks.

Neurosurgery will not be a problem.

Dude, I'm going to back out on those two acceptances I got and go straight to your school. I don't even care about the tuition. I'm going to be Neurosurgeon.

 

[Prncssbuttercup]

Well it can't go into savings. Or certain executive salaries. The rest of it is all true though.

They can keep a portion of it (for sure, min) in savings. My NPO that I volunteered for and was on the BOD for routinely had 10k$ in savings every year that we said was "for emergencies" and it was never a problem. We did fund-raising, and added more money every year but still maintained NPO status... Clearly that is a small organization, but I would think similar principles apply... They have to be able to maintain an account for funding for the future....

 

[KTownGT]

Worst schools: The ones that rejected your ass.
Best schools: ones that gave interviews and/or acceptances.

 

[DocEspana]

They can keep a portion of it (for sure, min) in savings. My NPO that I volunteered for and was on the BOD for routinely had 10k$ in savings every year that we said was "for emergencies" and it was never a problem. We did fund-raising, and added more money every year but still maintained NPO status... Clearly that is a small organization, but I would think similar principles apply... They have to be able to maintain an account for funding for the future....

Well I should clarify, NPO means you have to use a certain percentage for the school. The savings does not count. But since you can do whatever you want with the other, smaller, percentage of capital inflow that percentage was prob the savings account. I'm clearly no expert on tax status, haha, but Im pretty sure that the money has to be spent on the school, not just reserved in the schools rainy day fund.

Most medical organizations are NPO from schools to hospitals to a handful of offices with multiple partners. I have to assume its more cost effective when the required re-investment of capital is so high, you'd rather be forced to put more capital than you normally would back into the organization and keep the remaining percent duty free than pay the massive taxes on the capital you would incur if you were for profit.

Clearly what I'm talking about is *not* funny, so I suggest we stop talking about it and begin auditing Jagger's garage school.

 

[NurWollen]

Sign me up. Some of the greatest tech companies started in a garage! So why wouldn't a garage based Med School be any different.

Will your Mom bring cookies and lemonade in during those long study hours?

Not to mention some of the greatest bands....

 

[DocEspana]

Sign me up. Some of the greatest tech companies started in a garage!

Not to mention some of the greatest bands....

Not to mention pretty much all of the greatest cars...

 

[ahyes]

How is RVU not the worst school just because it is for-profit. You know what other US schools are for-profit? University of Phoenix and Capella University. Capella offers online PsyD degrees and with the way RVU is portraying the DO profession, it may not be long until someone tries to create an online DO degree too.

 

[MLT2MT2DO]

If you stick around SDN long enough you'll hear something negative about every single school. There are just negative Nancy's in the world and if there is something negative to say (which there is about every school) they will say it, while omitting the positives which may or may not outweigh those negatives.

I have only been around SDN ~3years and I can give you a negative about every single school. Since you won't be attending class via SDN I'd suggest checking out the schools in real life.

The general rule I've heard and accepted though is if you don't have a really strong tie to a new school (especially if they haven't graduated a class) it is better to avoid them. All new schools/campuses have growing pains.

 

[DocEspana]

If you stick around SDN long enough you'll hear something negative about every single school. There are just negative Nancy's in the world and if there is something negative to say (which there is about every school) they will say it, while omitting the positives which may or may not outweigh those negatives.

I have only been around SDN ~3years and I can give you a negative about every single school. Since you won't be attending class via SDN I'd suggest checking out the schools in real life.

The general rule I've heard and accepted though is if you don't have a really strong tie to a new school (especially if they haven't graduated a class) it is better to avoid them. All new schools/campuses have growing pains.

Like hell I'm not

 

[Slack3r]

I thought ATSU-SOMA kinda sucked pretty bad...

...but seriously, it did.

 

[JW08]

How is RVU not the worst school just because it is for-profit. You know what other US schools are for-profit? University of Phoenix and Capella University. Capella offers online PsyD degrees and with the way RVU is portraying the DO profession, it may not be long until someone tries to create an online DO degree too.

What are we rating schools on? their education or organization structure?
As far as education, RVU is not sparing any cost, and they got more money then state schools (especially with govt. cutting funds).

Question. Do all med schools provide GTA/MUTA?

 

[MLT2MT2DO]

What are we rating schools on? their education or organization structure?
As far as education, RVU is not sparing any cost, and they got more money then state schools (especially with govt. cutting funds).

Question. Do all med schools provide GTA/MUTA?

Don't be ridiculous we don't rate schools here on SDN by shallow things like education or organization structure.

We get down to the heart of the problem and deal with serious things that will forever affect who you are as a doctor.

Such as:

SDN reputation
Whether you have to dress professional
Whether one can or cannot have drinks in the classroom
Has a student in the schools history ever matched at ACGME derm/ophth/plastics
And of course how much the dean makes

 

[HockeyDr09]

Don't be ridiculous we don't rate schools here on SDN by shallow things like education or organization structure.

We get down to the heart of the problem and deal with serious things that will forever affect who you are as a doctor.

Such as:

SDN reputation
Whether you have to dress professional
Whether one can or cannot have drinks in the classroom
Has a student in the schools history ever matched at ACGME derm/ophth/plastics
And of course how much the dean makes

What other criteria could you possibily rate a school based on?

 

[87DO15]

What other criteria could you possibily rate a school based on?

Don't be silly. We also judge them based on the awesomeness of the school name.

 

[DocEspana]

Don't be silly. We also judge them based on the awesomeness of the school name.

Rocky Vista University < Nova < Mt. Dew Presents: The LECOM Dew Tour X-TREME OMM!!!

 

[Torr]

What other criteria could you possibily rate a school based on?

School mascot.

 

[HockeyDr09]

School mascot.

Anyone want to take on the LECOM Monsters

Side note to Torr: I see you still only rocking one dancing monkey

 

[DocEspana]

Anyone want to take on the LECOM Monsters

Side note to Torr: I see you still only rocking one dancing monkey

wow... i had no idea this actually existed when I mentioned the Mt. Dew Presents LECOM Dew Tour X-TREME OMM! That is exactly the mascot I would imagine for it.

 

[87DO15]

wow... i had no idea this actually existed when I mentioned the Mt. Dew Presents LECOM Dew Tour X-TREME OMM! That is exactly the mascot I would imagine for it.

Gah, that's just embarrassing.

(Not that you imagined that mascot, embarrassing that it actually exists)

 

[oar2386]

Your forgetting THE most important factor:
how hot the chicks are

 

[HockeyDr09]

wow... i had no idea this actually existed when I mentioned the Mt. Dew Presents LECOM Dew Tour X-TREME OMM! That is exactly the mascot I would imagine for it.

Gah, that's just embarrassing.

(Not that you imagined that mascot, embarrassing that it actually exists)

I guess you guys aren't hockey fans.

Lecom doesn't have a mascot (that I'm aware of).

The Monsters are an AHL hockey team out of Ohio.

 

[aspiringOSTEO]

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