Cost of School vs. Quality of Applicants

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ucbsowarrior

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The cost per year at ucbso used to be significantly less than the current fees of approx. $15,326. Back in the days the cost of the program was only about $4,000-$5,000 per year. The increase in fees were added in an accellerated manner after 1999. As a result the number of applicants applying and the quality of applicants appying to ucbso for the following years after this transistion dropped significantly. Only until now do the stats profile of the appicants seem to have resumed to normal, but the number of applicants is still significantly below those numbers offered prior to 1999-2000.

What do the current crop of OD candidates believe is the reasoning for the drop in the number of applicants??? The price??? i.e., the price disparity btw other schools becomes progressively less as the years pass on.

Thanks in advance for any input from all members of this forum.

ucbsowarrior 👍
 
ucbsowarrior said:
The cost per year at ucbso used to be significantly less than the current fees of approx. $15,326. Back in the days the cost of the program was only about $4,000-$5,000 per year. The increase in fees were added in an accellerated manner after 1999. As a result the number of applicants applying and the quality of applicants appying to ucbso for the following years after this transistion dropped significantly. Only until now do the stats profile of the appicants seem to have resumed to normal, but the number of applicants is still significantly below those numbers offered prior to 1999-2000.

What do the current crop of OD candidates believe is the reasoning for the drop in the number of applicants??? The price??? i.e., the price disparity btw other schools becomes progressively less as the years pass on.

Thanks in advance for any input from all members of this forum.

ucbsowarrior 👍
Click to expand...

Price does have a lot to do with it. In the end, everyone who goes though an optometry program will be an OD. Why would you spend 5,000 more on tuition per year and a lot more on housing if you could go somewhere else for less money? If you’re going to be about 90,000 in debt anyway do you really want to push it an extra 20,000? I don’t.

Also, I not great with economical things, but I've heard anytime the ecomony is doing bad that there are less and less people who can afford to go to medical school or optometry school - thus lowering the applicant pool.

What exactly do you mean by "the quality of applicants applying"? Did the old applicant’s have GPA's of 3.9? It looked like Berkley had some of the highest numbers of all the schools.
 
Kristene9 said:
Price does have a lot to do with it. In the end, everyone who goes though an optometry program will be an OD. Why would you spend 5,000 more on tuition per year and a lot more on housing if you could go somewhere else for less money? If you’re going to be about 90,000 in debt anyway do you really want to push it an extra 20,000? I don’t.

Also, I not great with economical things, but I've heard anytime the ecomony is doing bad that there are less and less people who can afford to go to medical school or optometry school - thus lowering the applicant pool.

What exactly do you mean by "the quality of applicants applying"? Did the old applicant’s have GPA's of 3.9? It looked like Berkley had some of the highest numbers of all the schools.
Click to expand...
The applicant to positions offered ratio dropped dramatically over the past 10 years and when the pool drops,...there is ultimately less selectivity.

When the economy does poorly, usually there is an increase in those entering grad programs, b/c the prospects of finding 'idea' employment post-undgrad is not as promising.

ucbso had an edge over the rest of the schools in terms of drawing more applicants, b/c it was one of the lowest cost schools in the nation for the last half century. The edge was not unto itself due to ucbso, but the price point in addition to other factors of the school (good research dept., world reknow faculty, sf bay area rocks!, cal bear spirit...etc...). I believe that berkeley has lost some of the 'specialness' it had back in the 60's and 70's.........People's Park just isn't the same anymore =)

ucbsowarrior
 
Is Cal still ranked high in board passing rates? When I looked at schools back in the mid 90's, Cal's numbers were very impressive. That and the fact that the graduate tax had not yet been added, made the school very attractive. When I graduated from Cal in 1997, the board scores were still tops, but I thought I had read somewhere that the numbers are not what they used to be. I don't know how true that is, but if so it is possible that applicants look to that as one way to choose a school. At least I did.
 
Succinctly, my top 5 reasons for diminished applicant pool at UCBSO:
1. Cost v. other opt schools
2. Pre-requisites v. other opt schools
3. Who cares about prestige v. opt schools?
4. Why wait for Interview Day? SUNY starts accepting in October, and they're nice!
5. Money is worse v. other health professions

Extended version:
My opinion is that cost is the primary reason why the applicant pool has diminished at UCBSO (although I still felt on interview day that I was in the company of some of the most impressive 20-somethings I had haver met). Although I'm a CA resident, the overall cost of attending either UCBSO, SCCO or SUNY would not have been very different for me, I think just a few thousand dollars for the entire 4 years. So, for those who aren't partial to the bay area (and who aren't "old" like me), is that little bit of money worth it when you could be going to school in Manhattan?

Another consideration for me in choosing schools was the number of unfinished pre-requisites I had. I ended up not applying to some schools (e.g., Pacific) because I didn't have a lot of their pre-requisites. In my case, the only pre-req I took solely for Cal was Anatomy. I know for some other students this is not the case.

Also, if a student's only goal after graduation is private practice, then "prestige" means very little. In my opinion, it's hard to even talk about the prestige of one school over another when there are only 17 programs from which to choose. If SUNY or SCCO or another school is going to interview you and offer a slot before the Fall semester ends, why wait for Berkeley to give you an answer sometime in March? Are your patients really going to switch to another provider if you didn't go to Cal? There are plenty of SCCO grads practicing in the bay area without this problem. Actually, I'm pretty sure the general populus is ignorant/apathetic toward any differences between US optometry schools.

And there is a certain warmth and personal attention toward applicants that other schools are very good at cultivating, for which UCBSO just doesn't have the manpower to provide. At my interviews at both SCCO and SUNY, a detailed financial aid presentation was given and I had the opportunity to speak one-on-one with someone whose only concern was financial aid for optometry students. For Cal, I had to kinda just guess what my total annual expenses would be, based on the $15k+ number given in the packet and the grad student estimate from the UCB FAO webpage.

My final thought is that some students are turning to other more lucrative health professions. Just mentioning my plans for optometry school was enough to elicit a recommendation to go into pharmacy or dentistry instead, because the money was better. It was hard for people to understand that I wanted to go to optometry school because I actually WANTED TO BE AN OPTOMETRIST and wasn't just looking for a security blanket. I've had optometrists themselves tell me that this is the wrong profession for people whose primary criterion is high pay.

The funny thing is that I was really down on UCBSO before interview day, maybe because I was prepping to say "I didn't want to go there anyway" if I wasn't accepted. But once I was sitting in that room with all the other candidates and then talking with all the current students and realizing what an awesome opportunity it is to be on that campus, I just felt in my gut that I really HAD to go there. If I had never applied or interviewed at Berkeley, I'm sure I would have never thought twice about it. After interview day, I knew I would never be happy going anywhere else.
 
polkadot said:
If SUNY or SCCO or another school is going to interview you and offer a slot before the Fall semester ends, why wait for Berkeley to give you an answer sometime in March?
Click to expand...


Is this true for all cases? Even if one sends out the application early, for example in September? What, if any, are the advantages for applying early if you don't get a decision by March?
 
Rosanna said:
http://forums.studentdoctor.net/showpost.php?p=2224619&postcount=12

I believe there is a diagram showing the most recent board rates in the student lounge that wasn't sent via e-mail to students. I'll make a copy and post it tomorrow for those interested.

- Rosanna
Click to expand...
As stated above, as the applicant to positions ratio decrease....there is less selectivity. Now if the sample of applicants is still large, there is very little effect on the whole system. Back in the mid to late 90's there were over 400 applicants applying for about 60 spots. After the turn of the century, there was one year where the applicant pool dropped down to 180 applicants....currently sits at 225 for the year of 04'. In addition, the admissions commitee realised that maybe they should start doing some interviews....as they could not properly get a feeler / vibe of the candidate from some essay, ref letters and a bunch of stats....I believe that the interviews were required to fine tune the precision and accuracy of their selection process...as they didn't have the previous abundance of cream-of-the-crop applicants.

The best analogy would be to pick from a basket of good oranges vs. a basket of good, avg. and poor oranges. In the first basket you just close your eyes and randomly pick some oranges. In the second example you have to carefully pick the good ones.....thus, you are essentially fine tuning your selection process.

Another point to make out is that I believe that ucbso in the past did not have the proper admissions commitee manpower to carry out the interviews in the past...I'm glad to see that they've relized the importance of the interviews and revamped their admissions process. (side note: during the first day at school one of my classmates asked the academic dean why there are no interviews for berkeley...he provided his stance...basically stating that they are some bias factors that corrupt the interview process...and I guess he must believe in this, given that the process has gone unchaged for decades. Why the change in the process all of a sudden???)

In terms of the board scores, the ucb advantage evident. However, the ucbso students are not gaining on the advantage, as the other schools are performing poorer than the prev. years (this could be due to students applying to more lucrative fields)....the main advanage is seen in the early years (part 1), the gain in part 2 and 3 is not as large. My theory for this is as follows: ucbso students usually possess a higher aptitude in the basic sciences (higher oat scores, gpa, etc...i.e,. tested in part 1), but their clinical skills are only marginally higher than the other schools. What this means is that most schools do a decent job of preparing students for the clinical arena. Does anyone else have any logical deduction(s) as to why the % advantage is not maintained thru out the yrs?

This ucbso advantage is flawed in the sense that it pools all the other schools together and compares this average to itself. If you picked suny and compared it to the avg of all the other schools combined....suny may also have an advantage! Does PUERTO RICO help the ucbso advantage??? So this advantage thing-ma-jig cannot be used to properly assess school-to-school advantages....b/c a micro-to-macro comparison is a biased aid for comparison's sake. Don't get me wrong...I'm no ucbso hater...I had a blast there!..but want the picture to be painted in a clear manner.

If anyone could provide any insight or rebuttals, it would be most appreciated =)

ucbsowarrior
 
caltrinity said:
Is this true for all cases? Even if one sends out the application early, for example in September? What, if any, are the advantages for applying early if you don't get a decision by March?
Click to expand...

I believe UCB is one of the few optometry schools that doesn't have rolling admissions. Once the app. deadline comes, they look at everyone's application at the same time. This past year's deadline was Dec. 15th. Then the interview date for everyone was Feb. 20. Since they are looking over and interviewing so many people at once, it takes them quite a bit of time to respond, such as sending out interview letters and letters of acceptance. For example, I didn't get my letter until April 16. I'm sure some of the other schools would be much quicker as responding.

At most of the other optometry schools, they're only dealing with a couple of applicants at a time and they start interviewing a lot earlier. So it can be really difficult for some students to have to wait until April to find out if they got into Berkeley when they could already be set October.

However, if you're in the top 10% of the applicant pool at UCB, then you would find out sooner, perhaps a month or so?? Not too sure on that. Plus, you don't have to fly in for an interivew because they do it over the phone!

Ning-Ju
 
hey; just a couple of my thoughts....
1- i really have to agree with polkadots assessment of things; I really did not get a very positive vibe of UCB prior to interviews... I understand if they are a state school and have no money or if they have no manpower; but to me that really does not excuse the way I perceived they treat applicants; I applied to 5 opt schools from neco, and pco to ucb and scco and every other school but ucb had a toll free number to call; they encourage people to call and talk to them. second; i sent several emails and never once received a personal answer; i had got a couple different emails; one was some one elses status of what they were missing in their application, one was a group annoucement that i got an interview... etc.
also the fact that the interview date is soo late really negatively impacted them to me. by the time i had recieved notice i would get an interview i had already been accepted to three other schools and needed to send in deposits. because of this i did not go interview there; and perhaps if i had i would have been blown away like polkadot; but ir eally do not regret my decision. In the end; i do not believe the general population cares what school their opto graduated from; and i think that it is all going to depend on my own abilities to succeed rather than any specific school.
2-in regards to why the differences between ucb and other schools decrease after part 1; i would say it is because of the strong emphasis on numbers and increased amounts of prereqs that ucb requres. since they have such high average gpa and oat scores of students; these people are clearly equipped to do well on part 1. pretty much everyone going into opto has taken some levels of bio, chem, micro, ochem etc but i would guess that most have done very little in clinical aspects. thus, the playing field is essentially leveled when it comes to part 2 and 3 because everyone starts at about the same proficiency of zero. the higher gpa/oat will help out the first year but after that it is essentially new material to everyone.
 
ucbsowarrior said:
In terms of the board scores, the ucb advantage evident. However, the ucbso students are not gaining on the advantage, as the other schools are performing poorer than the prev. years (this could be due to students applying to more lucrative fields)....the main advanage is seen in the early years (part 1), the gain in part 2 and 3 is not as large. My theory for this is as follows: ucbso students usually possess a higher aptitude in the basic sciences (higher oat scores, gpa, etc...i.e,. tested in part 1), but their clinical skills are only marginally higher than the other schools. What this means is that most schools do a decent job of preparing students for the clinical arena. Does anyone else have any logical deduction(s) as to why the % advantage is not maintained thru out the yrs?

This ucbso advantage is flawed in the sense that it pools all the other schools together and compares this average to itself. If you picked suny and compared it to the avg of all the other schools combined....suny may also have an advantage! Does PUERTO RICO help the ucbso advantage??? So this advantage thing-ma-jig cannot be used to properly assess school-to-school advantages....b/c a micro-to-macro comparison is a biased aid for comparison's sake. Don't get me wrong...I'm no ucbso hater...I had a blast there!..but want the picture to be painted in a clear manner.
ucbsowarrior
Click to expand...

"In terms of the board scores, the ucb advantage evident."
~Yes ucbso is above average on all Boards. Doesn't mean that ucbso is an "advantageous" school though. If you start with the highest test scores, GPA, etc. you would expect those students to pass the Boards. What would be strong evidence for an "advantage" is if the school admitted average applicants and then had top board scores anyway.

"the main advanage is seen in the early years (part 1), the gain in part 2 and 3 is not as large. My theory for this is as follows: ucbso students usually possess a higher aptitude in the basic sciences (higher oat scores, gpa, etc...i.e,. tested in part 1), but their clinical skills are only marginally higher than the other schools."
~ucbso students are also probably also just better at taking standardized tests, based on their high OATs (I know they have to know the material as well, just on the whole many of them probably are good test takers too!)

"Does anyone else have any logical deduction(s) as to why the % advantage is not maintained thru out the yrs?"
~Since the current gap is 20% for part I, and the national average on part II is around 90%, it is impossible for there to be a 20% gap!

"So this advantage thing-ma-jig cannot be used to properly assess school-to-school advantages....b/c a micro-to-macro comparison is a biased aid for comparison's sake."

~Took the words right out of my mouth.

Not hatin' on ucbso either, I just think that this "ucbso advantage" is an intellectually dishonest use of statistics. All that it shows is that the students at ucbso are above the national average, but since they come in that way, they had better be that way when they leave! Doesn't really show that the education is any better than anywhere else.

"I'm no ucbso hater...I had a blast there!..but want the picture to be painted in a clear manner."

~That's good, it would be disturbing if you were hating on your alma matter! Thanks for pointing out the problems with the statistics for head to head comparisons as well.

Just my $.02
 
Ning said:


I believe UCB is one of the few optometry schools that doesn't have rolling admissions. Once the app. deadline comes, they look at everyone's application at the same time. This past year's deadline was Dec. 15th. Then the interview date for everyone was Feb. 20. Since they are looking over and interviewing so many people at once, it takes them quite a bit of time to respond, such as sending out interview letters and letters of acceptance. For example, I didn't get my letter until April 16. I'm sure some of the other schools would be much quicker as responding.

At most of the other optometry schools, they're only dealing with a couple of applicants at a time and they start interviewing a lot earlier. So it can be really difficult for some students to have to wait until April to find out if they got into Berkeley when they could already be set October.

However, if you're in the top 10% of the applicant pool at UCB, then you would find out sooner, perhaps a month or so?? Not too sure on that. Plus, you don't have to fly in for an interivew because they do it over the phone!

Ning-Ju
Click to expand...

Does anyone on the forum have any logical deductions as to why the dates are set as mentioned by Ning?

Give your toughts and I shall share mine. There are reasons for most things.
 
Badger150 said:
"In terms of the board scores, the ucb advantage evident."
~Yes ucbso is above average on all Boards. Doesn't mean that ucbso is an "advantageous" school though. If you start with the highest test scores, GPA, etc. you would expect those students to pass the Boards. What would be strong evidence for an "advantage" is if the school admitted average applicants and then had top board scores anyway.

"the main advanage is seen in the early years (part 1), the gain in part 2 and 3 is not as large. My theory for this is as follows: ucbso students usually possess a higher aptitude in the basic sciences (higher oat scores, gpa, etc...i.e,. tested in part 1), but their clinical skills are only marginally higher than the other schools."
~ucbso students are also probably also just better at taking standardized tests, based on their high OATs (I know they have to know the material as well, just on the whole many of them probably are good test takers too!)

"Does anyone else have any logical deduction(s) as to why the % advantage is not maintained thru out the yrs?"
~Since the current gap is 20% for part I, and the national average on part II is around 90%, it is impossible for there to be a 20% gap!

"So this advantage thing-ma-jig cannot be used to properly assess school-to-school advantages....b/c a micro-to-macro comparison is a biased aid for comparison's sake."

~Took the words right out of my mouth.

Not hatin' on ucbso either, I just think that this "ucbso advantage" is an intellectually dishonest use of statistics. All that it shows is that the students at ucbso are above the national average, but since they come in that way, they had better be that way when they leave! Doesn't really show that the education is any better than anywhere else.

"I'm no ucbso hater...I had a blast there!..but want the picture to be painted in a clear manner."

~That's good, it would be disturbing if you were hating on your alma matter! Thanks for pointing out the problems with the statistics for head to head comparisons as well.

Just my $.02
Click to expand...
Dude,
you ain't telling them anything I haven't said. You're just rewording my toughts.
ucbsowarrior
 
cunikki said:
hey; just a couple of my thoughts....
1- i really have to agree with polkadots assessment of things; I really did not get a very positive vibe of UCB prior to interviews... I understand if they are a state school and have no money or if they have no manpower; but to me that really does not excuse the way I perceived they treat applicants; I applied to 5 opt schools from neco, and pco to ucb and scco and every other school but ucb had a toll free number to call; they encourage people to call and talk to them. second; i sent several emails and never once received a personal answer; i had got a couple different emails; one was some one elses status of what they were missing in their application, one was a group annoucement that i got an interview... etc.
also the fact that the interview date is soo late really negatively impacted them to me. by the time i had recieved notice i would get an interview i had already been accepted to three other schools and needed to send in deposits. because of this i did not go interview there; and perhaps if i had i would have been blown away like polkadot; but ir eally do not regret my decision. In the end; i do not believe the general population cares what school their opto graduated from; and i think that it is all going to depend on my own abilities to succeed rather than any specific school.
2-in regards to why the differences between ucb and other schools decrease after part 1; i would say it is because of the strong emphasis on numbers and increased amounts of prereqs that ucb requres. since they have such high average gpa and oat scores of students; these people are clearly equipped to do well on part 1. pretty much everyone going into opto has taken some levels of bio, chem, micro, ochem etc but i would guess that most have done very little in clinical aspects. thus, the playing field is essentially leveled when it comes to part 2 and 3 because everyone starts at about the same proficiency of zero. the higher gpa/oat will help out the first year but after that it is essentially new material to everyone.
Click to expand...
Can anyone also provide rebuttals to the above?

I will share my views in a few days.

ucbsowarrior
 
ucbsowarrior said:
Dude,
you ain't telling them anything I haven't said. You're just rewording my toughts.
ucbsowarrior
Click to expand...

"In terms of the board scores, the ucb advantage evident."~Your words not mine. And I proceeded to disagree with the premise that ucbso has any sort of advantage for boards. You did as well, but when you say there is and then you say there isn't an advantage, it gets a little confusing.

"Does anyone else have any logical deduction(s) as to why the % advantage is not maintained thru out the yrs?"~You
"~Since the current gap is 20% for part I, and the national average on part II is around 90%, it is impossible for there to be a 20% gap!"~me

So I did say at least one thing that you did not.

Tough not for me to say what you were thinking when you make both the arguement for the "ucbso advantage" and the counter-arguement about it's statistical dishonesty.

The point of my post was to
A. Express my agreement with the part of your post that questions the validity of the comparisons between individual schools using ucbso boards vs. national averages.
B. Counter your contention that their is a ucbso advantage.
C. Answer your question on why the gap between the ucbso pass rate on part I and the national average is greater than on subsequent board exams.(the statistical impossibility of it no matter how well ucbso students do on later parts!)

Sorry if this quote/response style seems like an attack on you, I was just trying to make it clear what I agreed with you about and what we didn't agree about.
 
Badger150 said:
"In terms of the board scores, the ucb advantage evident."~Your words not mine. And I proceeded to disagree with the premise that ucbso has any sort of advantage for boards. You did as well, but when you say there is and then you say there isn't an advantage, it gets a little confusing.

"Does anyone else have any logical deduction(s) as to why the % advantage is not maintained thru out the yrs?"~You
"~Since the current gap is 20% for part I, and the national average on part II is around 90%, it is impossible for there to be a 20% gap!"~me

So I did say at least one thing that you did not.

Tough not for me to say what you were thinking when you make both the arguement for the "ucbso advantage" and the counter-arguement about it's statistical dishonesty.

The point of my post was to
A. Express my agreement with the part of your post that questions the validity of the comparisons between individual schools using ucbso boards vs. national averages.
B. Counter your contention that their is a ucbso advantage.
C. Answer your question on why the gap between the ucbso pass rate on part I and the national average is greater than on subsequent board exams.(the statistical impossibility of it no matter how well ucbso students do on later parts!)

Sorry if this quote/response style seems like an attack on you, I was just trying to make it clear what I agreed with you about and what we didn't agree about.
Click to expand...
No problems...I'm apologize to the forum if my thoughts seem convoluted....I was always poor in expressing my toughts =)...But to Badger150, there's no need to apologize to me, I'm always open to all types of comments as this one fuction of the forum(s).

ucbsowarrior
 
caltrinity said:
Is this true for all cases? Even if one sends out the application early, for example in September? What, if any, are the advantages for applying early if you don't get a decision by March?
Click to expand...

SUNY interviewed me without OAT scores back (and offered me an interview within a week after I submitted my app in Sept); I had an acceptance letter a week after the interview, contingent upon an OAT score of 320.
SCCO won't interview without OAT, but I received my interview invitation in early December, right after scores came out. My acceptance letter was here in my hot little hand the Wednesday after my Sat interview.
I also was invited to interview at ICO without OAT scores but ended up declining the interview.
 
ucbsowarrior said:
In terms of the board scores, the ucb advantage evident. However, the ucbso students are not gaining on the advantage, as the other schools are performing poorer than the prev. years (this could be due to students applying to more lucrative fields)....the main advanage is seen in the early years (part 1), the gain in part 2 and 3 is not as large. My theory for this is as follows: ucbso students usually possess a higher aptitude in the basic sciences (higher oat scores, gpa, etc...i.e,. tested in part 1), but their clinical skills are only marginally higher than the other schools. What this means is that most schools do a decent job of preparing students for the clinical arena. Does anyone else have any logical deduction(s) as to why the % advantage is not maintained thru out the yrs?

This ucbso advantage is flawed in the sense that it pools all the other schools together and compares this average to itself. If you picked suny and compared it to the avg of all the other schools combined....suny may also have an advantage! Does PUERTO RICO help the ucbso advantage??? So this advantage thing-ma-jig cannot be used to properly assess school-to-school advantages....b/c a micro-to-macro comparison is a biased aid for comparison's sake... .
Click to expand...

My theory is that UCBSO loses its "advantage" in the clinical portions because they recruit a different kind of student. I would say the other programs have a majority of students who are really passionate about optometry. What percentage of UCBSO students only applied there? If you REALLY want to be an OD, aren't you going to apply to at least a few schools? I applied to 5 and was afraid I should have applied to more. UCB recruits people who are really good at didactic learning, hence great GPA/OAT/Part I scores. If other schools have less book-smart students that are really excited about getting into the clinic, then those students are going to be better clinicians.

My last OD was a recent UCBSO grad who I thought was a terrible OD. Why? He had terrible "bedside manner". His answers to my q's about my eyesight were vague, and he didn't do a very good job of convincing me that the "freckle" he found on the back of my eye (as he drew a big black spot on my chart) was "nothing to be worried about". Don't get me wrong, I've witnessed other UCBSO grad who were just fantastic with their patients, but I think that has a lot to do with personality developed before school, something that appears to be less important for Cal than for other programs.

Lastly, I would agree that the stats are flawed and are not necessarily valid assessment of quality of education nor of students. For instance, Puerto Rico has gotten a lot of "going there as a last resort" comments in this forum. But they cater to a different student population, one that is primarily Spanish-speaking. Is the OAT offered in Spanish to them? Of course their entrance stats will look lower! A lot of their students probably completed undergrad here stateside, once again faced with a significant language barrier. If someone like me, a non-Spanish speaker, went to Puerto Rico, I would surely struggle if not drop out altogether.

Feedback is welcomed and appreciated.

-p.dot
 
I really agree with p.dot! 🙂 i mean; in the end i really believe its going to be what you put into it. All schools teach a little different; but you are going to put the effort in and study and whatever else; you could pass the boards at any school you attend. When it comes down to it, statistics are just numbers... why should you really care if your school has a 70 percent pass rate vs some other school with a 90? kids who went there obviously got the preparation they needed and learned materials to pass ... so if you want to try hard then you can pass too.
In the end, all the talk about this school is better, or i am worried about going to x school cause i cant get into a different one but i wont pass the boards just seems pointless to me. even if you get into ucbso does not guarantee you will pass the boards on the first try; even if its got a 97% pass rate, that still means that 2 kids didnt pass it; so you could just as easily be one of those 2 kids if you arent gonna try hard or whatever. it just seems to me that blanket statements like 'berkeley has the smartest od students, or they have the ones with the least bedside manner' is just not helpful; whoever youa re is already formed; if you have no bedside manner and arent willing to cultivate it; no school is going to change you. and in the end you will be an od if you pass the boards; if you went to berkeley or puerto rico. i think people should really just take some personal responsibility and not rely soo heavily on the schools to make them into an od... you have to do that for yourself
 
cunikki said:
I really agree with p.dot! 🙂 i mean; in the end i really believe its going to be what you put into it. All schools teach a little different; but you are going to put the effort in and study and whatever else; you could pass the boards at any school you attend. When it comes down to it, statistics are just numbers... why should you really care if your school has a 70 percent pass rate vs some other school with a 90? kids who went there obviously got the preparation they needed and learned materials to pass ... so if you want to try hard then you can pass too.
In the end, all the talk about this school is better, or i am worried about going to x school cause i cant get into a different one but i wont pass the boards just seems pointless to me. even if you get into ucbso does not guarantee you will pass the boards on the first try; even if its got a 97% pass rate, that still means that 2 kids didnt pass it; so you could just as easily be one of those 2 kids if you arent gonna try hard or whatever. it just seems to me that blanket statements like 'berkeley has the smartest od students, or they have the ones with the least bedside manner' is just not helpful; whoever youa re is already formed; if you have no bedside manner and arent willing to cultivate it; no school is going to change you. and in the end you will be an od if you pass the boards; if you went to berkeley or puerto rico. i think people should really just take some personal responsibility and not rely soo heavily on the schools to make them into an od... you have to do that for yourself
Click to expand...

So true cunikki. The schools that have low board pass rates could just be schools that have some students that didn't take advantage of the education they were offered at the institution they attended. Board pass rates are a reflection of the effort the students put in, NOT how well information is spoon fed to them at the school they choose. I am so tired of seeing the same schools bashed over and over on this forum. It's all about how crappy Puerto Rico and Nova are, and how great Berkeley is and on and on for others. It's a vicious circle...people keep bad reps alive for schools that don't even deserve it. Students in this forum give their opinion, and suddenly that's the absolute opinion of all the people in here. I don't think prospective students should listen so much to all the reputation stuff on this forum. Think critically and form YOUR OWN OPINION.
 
SuperSara said:
So true cunikki. The schools that have low board pass rates could just be schools that have some students that didn't take advantage of the education they were offered at the institution they attended. Board pass rates are a reflection of the effort the students put in, NOT how well information is spoon fed to them at the school they choose. I am so tired of seeing the same schools bashed over and over on this forum. It's all about how crappy Puerto Rico and Nova are, and how great Berkeley is and on and on for others. It's a vicious circle...people keep bad reps alive for schools that don't even deserve it. Students in this forum give their opinion, and suddenly that's the absolute opinion of all the people in here. I don't think prospective students should listen so much to all the reputation stuff on this forum. Think critically and form YOUR OWN OPINION.
Click to expand...

In theory this would be true if a particular school had a low pass rate in any given year. BUt my experience was that schools tended to have the same pass rates year after year after year. So it stands to reason that either

A) those schools are consistently admitting a large percentage of students who don't put in any effort

B) those schools are doing such a deficient job of conveying their information that even 30% of bright young minds are failing.

I would not make a decision on where to go to school based on pass rates of part I of the NBEO. But there is a reason that some schools consistently have a high pass rate and some don't.

Jenny
 
Although the school cirriculum may influence board scores to some extent, I believe the large gaps we see on scores on Part 1 are primarily affected by the type of students the school accepts. Those schools that require more pre-req courses and have higher standards may have students that are more 'book smart' and posses a stronger science background. However, being a good optometrist certainly requires more than book smarts. It is just as important to be clinically prepared. As indicated from the high scores reported by many of the schools, it appears that most of the optometry schools out there do a pretty good job of preparing their students clinically.

So yes, a lot of it does depend on the student. It's up to you to study.

Ning-Ju
 
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