I had my interview day at EVMS yesterday (9/9). Here are my impressions:
Campus: Small, but clean and attractive. The school is located in or just next to Ghent, a very nice part of Norfolk that seems to have a number of high-dollar homes. The school library looks to be quite new, but the rest of the facilities appear to be somewhat older. School facilities are not ultra-modern. The Children's Hospital of the King's Daughters, however, was beautiful and amazing.
Norfolk itself is an up-and-coming city. It's located right next to the Chesapeake Bay and within 20-30 minutes of the beach. Within the last 10 years, there's been quite a lot of change in the upscale direction. You now have your pick between high-end shopping and entertainment and small-town charm; MacArthur center, a large multistory shopping mall, is located just minutes away from a 50-year-old drive-in diner whose founder claimed to have invented the waffle cone in 1904. There's a well-regarded aquarium, a zoo, a very impressive art museum, and lots of other cultural attractions nearby.
Academics: EVMS places a high priority on developing excellent clinicians. The first presentation of the day was from the director of their standardized patient program, who brought with him one of their standardized patients. His portrayal of the condition was impressive (depression/slightly suicidal), but the feedback he then gave the volunteer interviewer was amazing. Students apparently spend a significant portion of their time with the program, and it seems to me that it would almost certainly lead to a well developed clinical skillset well before the clinical years.
There was some mention of the quality of the science curriculum. EVMS boasts the highest board pass rate among the three Virginia schools, comfortably above the national average, along with a strong showing in the residency match each year. All of the students we met said that their professors have been very accessible and willing to help outside of the classroom. I wish there had been more discussion about the basic science years during the interview day, although I wouldn't have wanted to miss the standardized patient presentation.
Student Life: Being a smaller med school has its advantages. Everyone I met at EVMS was friendly and happy to be there, and there was a very cohesive, tight-knit feel to the community. At the lunchtime presentation, the outgoing director of admissions was cracking jokes about an M2 who had just given a presentation on the school; I was impressed that he knew the students at a level where he could do such a thing. (Maybe it helped that the slide show included a photo of the director, a 60-70-year-old man, wearing a pink wig.) There seemed to be a very non-competitive and helpful atmosphere, to the extent that class notes/study guides/crib sheets/old exams were shared freely.
EVMS seems to offer a lot of opportunities to get involved with the school and the community at large. Students volunteer in and around Norfolk and run some of their own charity drives. There are also opportunities to travel abroad, both to volunteer and to get some medical experience.
Overall: I walked into the interview expecting to find a decent school: Good academics, decent facilities, reasonable community. My expectations were greatly exceeded. EVMS is quite serious about training great doctors, and the quality of their education is clearly excellent. Moreover, I get the sense that the students and faculty form a very supportive, tight-knit community that fosters greatness in everyone. It's hard to rank med schools before finishing my interviews, but I know that I'd be happy to call EVMS home.
Campus: Small, but clean and attractive. The school is located in or just next to Ghent, a very nice part of Norfolk that seems to have a number of high-dollar homes. The school library looks to be quite new, but the rest of the facilities appear to be somewhat older. School facilities are not ultra-modern. The Children's Hospital of the King's Daughters, however, was beautiful and amazing.
Norfolk itself is an up-and-coming city. It's located right next to the Chesapeake Bay and within 20-30 minutes of the beach. Within the last 10 years, there's been quite a lot of change in the upscale direction. You now have your pick between high-end shopping and entertainment and small-town charm; MacArthur center, a large multistory shopping mall, is located just minutes away from a 50-year-old drive-in diner whose founder claimed to have invented the waffle cone in 1904. There's a well-regarded aquarium, a zoo, a very impressive art museum, and lots of other cultural attractions nearby.
Academics: EVMS places a high priority on developing excellent clinicians. The first presentation of the day was from the director of their standardized patient program, who brought with him one of their standardized patients. His portrayal of the condition was impressive (depression/slightly suicidal), but the feedback he then gave the volunteer interviewer was amazing. Students apparently spend a significant portion of their time with the program, and it seems to me that it would almost certainly lead to a well developed clinical skillset well before the clinical years.
There was some mention of the quality of the science curriculum. EVMS boasts the highest board pass rate among the three Virginia schools, comfortably above the national average, along with a strong showing in the residency match each year. All of the students we met said that their professors have been very accessible and willing to help outside of the classroom. I wish there had been more discussion about the basic science years during the interview day, although I wouldn't have wanted to miss the standardized patient presentation.
Student Life: Being a smaller med school has its advantages. Everyone I met at EVMS was friendly and happy to be there, and there was a very cohesive, tight-knit feel to the community. At the lunchtime presentation, the outgoing director of admissions was cracking jokes about an M2 who had just given a presentation on the school; I was impressed that he knew the students at a level where he could do such a thing. (Maybe it helped that the slide show included a photo of the director, a 60-70-year-old man, wearing a pink wig.) There seemed to be a very non-competitive and helpful atmosphere, to the extent that class notes/study guides/crib sheets/old exams were shared freely.
EVMS seems to offer a lot of opportunities to get involved with the school and the community at large. Students volunteer in and around Norfolk and run some of their own charity drives. There are also opportunities to travel abroad, both to volunteer and to get some medical experience.
Overall: I walked into the interview expecting to find a decent school: Good academics, decent facilities, reasonable community. My expectations were greatly exceeded. EVMS is quite serious about training great doctors, and the quality of their education is clearly excellent. Moreover, I get the sense that the students and faculty form a very supportive, tight-knit community that fosters greatness in everyone. It's hard to rank med schools before finishing my interviews, but I know that I'd be happy to call EVMS home.
