Lecom

I wouldn't put too much into whatever feelings you percieve. If you like the school then go there. There are very few schools that will leave you with as little debt as lecom, between tuition and really low cost of living. That should be one of your main concerns.

I was actually very impressed with both LECOMs.

My decision would have been much more difficult if I didn't have the opportunity to stay so close to my family and friends.

Not to mention, if you plan on doing Primary Care or Family Medicine, LECOM is the ONLY school that offers a 3 year DO program for those routes.

I thought it to be a really nice school when I interviewed. I dunno about "LECOM having the lowest stats"...where did you get this from? I remember reading about several schools having a much lower GPA and MCAT cut off for entry. I personally did consider it my #1 choice Backup school, but only because my first choice is my state school.

I don't know much about DMU or Western, but I know CCOM is seen as one of the most competitive DO schools. It is very old and well-established.

LECOM is a relatively young school, and the Bradenton campus is VERY young. This fact alone scares some people. Also, Erie is a dreadful place, IMO. Even the doctors I know who went there were like "seriously...don't go to Erie." I think it's a fine school as far as education goes. I didn't end up going to my interview there purely because of the weather - after 23 yrs of this crap I feel like if I have one more horrible winter I will collapse in on myself like a dying star.

They are very receptive to nontraditional applicants, which probably skews their admission stats. Ex. If someone has been a PA for 5 years in a busy ER, does it matter that his undergrad GPA is 3.3?

utahgirl89 said:

if you go to mdapplicants you will see that the people who get accepted to lecom have low stats compared to CCOM or DMU or Western.

I liked the school except for the OMM room.

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If you are so worried about the stats of the entering students and the possibility of LECOM being a backup choice then don't apply to LECOM (or DO for that matter).

p.s. I was accepted to Western and chose LECOM over it.

utahgirl89 said:

if you go to mdapplicants you will see that the people who get accepted to lecom have low stats compared to CCOM or DMU or Western.

I liked the school except for the OMM room.

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I wouldn't take the stats on mdapplicants too seriously. There are people who fudge their info for anonymity or don't fill everything in. Plus I know there are not too many people from here on mdapplicants. I had a profile on their but I never finalized it after I was accepted here. I think we have middle of the pack stats here. I can tell you from experience that stats don't mean anything when it comes to determining how likely a student will excel. I am doing very well here even though I had a low GPA.

Also, why didn't you like the OPP lab? What were you expecting? It is very practical for what we use it for. To learn OPP, all you need is a table and a partner.

utahgirl89 said:

if you go to mdapplicants you will see that the people who get accepted to lecom have low stats compared to CCOM or DMU or Western.

I liked the school except for the OMM room.

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MDapplicants isn't the be all, end all of reliable information. Take what you read with a grain of salt.

Honestly, you shouldn't be so hung up on people using it as a backup or not. Who cares why other people chose to attend there, there could be thousands of different reasons that are unique and applicable to each person. Backup or not, it is still a good school for many reasons (going to either of the 2010 LECOM threads is a better place to look for honest input from accepted and current students).

I go to LECOM-B, so not sure if this is helpful to the OP in talking about Erie.

From the very non-scientific poll of classmates I've talked to since school started, most said this wasn't top pick, and wasn't their last choice. I think you'll find that at a lot of mid- to low-reputation schools, both DO and MD.

State schools often get picked #1 for low in-state tuition, and big name places are often #1 by reputation. Apart from that, you never know what's going through a person's head when he/she decides where to go. People get very different vibes from the same experience at an interview. And given that the median # of schools applied to is like 12 or 13 IIRC, odds are most folks end up somewhere in the middle... just like most folks I've talked to.

So by all means, listen to what people say about LECOM and all the other schools you're applying to, and don't be afraid to ask questions... but it's probably more productive to think about whether a school's a good fit for you, rather than trying to divine posters' motivations for bad-mouthing schools here on SDN.

Yeah, I had the same issue. Erie gets a weird rap on SDN - either people seem to be very "eeeeh.." towards it, or they absolutely would give a kidney to go.

Personally, I was skeptical about the school. I have to say that I was pretty impressed with it after my visit, and really, you can't contest that their students do well on boards. Even if you want to compare matches (and by now, everybody knows you really shouldn't), their students match well. I think the thing that still concerns me is the location. I'm fine with living in such a quiet place (it really isn't that quiet), but I guess I just want to be around a place where there's a huge hospital. Without having gone through medical school I can't be sure that having a large, urban hospital nearby will be beneficial to my education, but at this point, I think it couldn't hurt.

I also think that the school suffers a lot because it looks so much like a prison. Even though everybody knows logically that the school does a solid job of educating students, it's like selling houses. Buyers just feel more positive about a cozy, clean house, complete with the smell of baking cookies or whatever. It colors your general impression. While that might not seem important on paper, many of us are going to make our ultimate matriculation decisions based on a gut feeling or sense of fitting in.

@KG - I think utahgirl's question is valid. I don't think she's hung up on LECOM's reputation so much as wondering why others don't seem to be excited about it. For me, that's important. If nobody's excited about a school, isn't it in your best interest to know what their reasons are before making a final judgment of the situation? If there's something seriously wrong with the school that everybody but me knows about, well, there's a problem. Whether or not that will affect utahgirl's ultimate decision is up to her.

utahgirl89 said:

What's your problem you frea$%ing *****! I am allowed to post a thread to get other people's opinon about the school. DID I ever say I wasnt interested in DO?!?!?!?!?!?!?! DUH!!!

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I don't have a problem. YOU wrote the following:

utahgirl89 said:

I am interested in LECOM. I visited the school and it seems to have a good reputation. I just feel as though many people are using this school as a backup or safety school in case they dont get into their "top" school. Is this true or is it just me. I get this vibe from reading what people wrote about the school. the school also has the lowest stats around and seems to be one of the easier schools to get into. Why is this the case when the school has been around for so long and has their own hospital - Milcreek with competitive residencies such as Ortho, Optho, General surgery, Gastro, etc. Is it because of the weather and that it snows so much there? Why do I feel that most people dont want to go here esp people with the best stats?

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Like it or not, DO schools are perceived to be backups/safety schools for many people. If that bothers YOU so much that YOU start a thread about a school being considered a backup w/ lower stats, maybe the higher prestige and stats of MD school would fit YOU better.

I got invited to interview to the Erie and Bradenton campuses. I declined the Erie offer due to its location. Some people tout its proximity to Buffalo, Pittsburg, and Cleveland, but let's be real, it's a trifecta of boredom. No offense, but I couldn't see myself living there.

I did attend the Bradenton interview, however, and the location is pretty good and it's hard to beat the beautiful Florida weather. The school's building is pretty bare bones and kind of cold. I know this may seem trivial, but the mandatory shirt and tie policy really turned me off. LECOM is definitely doing something right as evidenced by its students' boards pass rate. Overall, I left with a favorable impression, and I might have attended if I didn't accepted to UMDNJ.

utahgirl89 said:

whoaaaaaaa, first of all, I said I was INTERESTED in lecom, and based on my perusal of the threads it seemed as though people withdrew their acceptance to lecome once they were accepted somewhere else.

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i'm getting the feeling that you've only been looking at lecom and so you keep seeing people withdrawing from there to go other places. but if you looked at other threads, you'd probably see people withdrawing from other schools, too, to go to other places like lecom. if you really want to know people's personal reasons for choosing x over y, i'd suggest you pm them because they might not feel comfortable sharing everything on the forum, or they might not have thought to share their reasoning.

utahgirl89 said:

What's your problem you frea$%ing *****! I am allowed to post a thread to get other people's opinon about the school. DID I ever say I wasnt interested in DO?!?!?!?!?!?!?! DUH!!!

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Don't act like that.

utahgirl89 said:

I just feel as though many people are using this school as a backup or safety school in case they dont get into their "top" school. the school also has the lowest stats around and seems to be one of the easier schools to get into. Why do I feel that most people dont want to go here esp people with the best stats?

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I think the sources your getting your information (MDapps, random opinions on SDN, etc) are a bit skewed and not a good representation of those that go to LECOM. When I applied to LECOM I looked at their supp. app requirement in the CIB and I thought they were a little higher than the other DO schools I applied to. I ended up getting a really early interview and loved the school and am very glad I am going there. I think no matter what school you look at there will be people who aren't thrilled with it and have negative things to say. There will always be people there because it was their "back up plan". Look for what fits you best and as long as their are no major red flags go for it.

OP if you have any questions about LECOM, send me a PM. I will try to answer as completely as possible. I really do like it here. Erie isn't that great but I don't go out much due to school and studying. We have some really great departments and some ok departments. In fact, some of our instructors (micro, anatomy, neuro) write questions for COMLEX/USMLE and/or teach for Kaplan. In the end, all that matters is the effort you put into it. I am really weak with pharm so I try to flashcard myself everyday on the drugs I am weak at. Hopefully this pays off for me. You will get a great education at a great price here. Yea the school looks like a business and blah blah blah, but it has all the amenities you will need to excel.

OP, LECOM-SH was my top choice because of tuition, location (I want to stay in western PA), PBL and the quality of 3rd/4th year clinical rotations. I liked the fact that you could stay in Erie, Greensburg or move to another location if desired for your rotations. In fact, several of the UPMC hospitals can be part of the rotations, and UPMC is one of the leading academic medical centers in the US. UPMC is a very DO friendly system as well. Therefore, I feel I will be getting a great clinical education at LECOM.

I am about to graduate from LECOM-B, felt I had a fantastic education, and very flexible rotations so I can go wherever I wanted. plus the FL weather can't be beat. 100% passing rate and the class ahead of mine had #2 highest board scores was a nice touch.....although I think my class changed that! either way, I'd do it again and only chose here b/c of PBL learning. good luck, feel free to PM. also do a search, i know lecom vs ? has been discussed before

utahgirl89 said:

lecom students are so nice, y'all are so helpful and willing to answer questions. i've already emailed bleeker10 and he's answered all my question. UPMC is a big plus as well, great to hear they are open to DO students!!!

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Rotation sites change, and no one really knows how Erie and Seton Hill will have their rotations divvied out yet. I'm just saying that it would be unwise to choose lecom assuming you'll be able to do many rotations at UPMC...

LECOM Erie is my top choice mainly because of location and tuition. And seriously, the snow isn't that bad.

Erie Bradenton had a 100% board exam passing last year. What other school has that?

DmanGTR said:

LECOM Erie is my top choice mainly because of location and tuition. And seriously, the snow isn't that bad.

Erie Bradenton had a 100% board exam passing last year. What other school has that?

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they make you take a pretest thing and if you don't do well on it, you can't take the real test. some schools do not do this diagnostic, and allow everyone to take it if they feel they are ready.

The Poet Sings said:

they make you take a pretest thing and if you don't do well on it, you can't take the real test. some schools do not do this diagnostic, and allow everyone to take it if they feel they are ready.

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This is not true. The pretest is to see where you are currently scoring on the COMLEX and not as a tool to determine whether you should take the test or not.

The Poet Sings said:

they make you take a pretest thing and if you don't do well on it, you can't take the real test. some schools do not do this diagnostic, and allow everyone to take it if they feel they are ready.

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I took step 1 in 08....I don't remember this stipulation unless things have changed. although I do remember if you didn't get a certain score you had to do an extra week of test prep which is more diagnostic testing and personal tutoring.

The Poet Sings said:

they make you take a pretest thing and if you don't do well on it, you can't take the real test. some schools do not do this diagnostic, and allow everyone to take it if they feel they are ready.

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Thats not true. One of the people at my interview session specifically asked this question to the main interviewer guy and he told us that there is a pre-test which students take, but it doesnt matter what you score as to whether you can sit to take the COMLEX or not.

ok well, when i went, that's what a student told us during the lunch. so either they didn't relay the correct information, or i misunderstood. but that's what i remember hearing...

The Poet Sings said:

they make you take a pretest thing and if you don't do well on it, you can't take the real test. some schools do not do this diagnostic, and allow everyone to take it if they feel they are ready.

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ShinyDome19 said:

Thats not true. One of the people at my interview session specifically asked this question to the main interviewer guy and he told us that there is a pre-test which students take, but it doesnt matter what you score as to whether you can sit to take the COMLEX or not.

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During my lunch at my interview in Bradenton, we had 3 student ambassadors that told us the same thing as what The Poet Sings said...I've seen it on these boards at some point as well.

Interesting...

KG216 said:

During my lunch at my interview in Bradenton, we had 3 student ambassadors that told us the same thing as what The Poet Sings said...I've seen it on these boards at some point as well.

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good to know i haven't lost my mind. maybe the student ambassadors misunderstood what the diagnostic test was for, then? i dno. now i'm a little curious to see what's been said about it on the lecom-b boards. but i probably won't bother to check because i'm not going to that school anyways lol.

ok i lied and went and looked it up.

http://forums.studentdoctor.net/showthread.php?p=8682830#post8682830

so at that post they start talking about it. so feel free to read the back and forth (especially posts 202, 237, and 249) on what they do and don't do. perhaps the student ambassadors could be a little more clear on the policy in the future, because it's causing confusion.

A lot of people don't like LECOM for its strict attendance/dress policies and its poor location. Its reputation suffers for this reason. It happens to be in a state with PCOM, which is a very well regarded school and one of the top DO schools in the country, it suffers by comparison. In addition it always has had a reputation of being kind of weird with all the different pathways at one place.

There is no pre test that I have ever heard of. The only stipulations for boards are if you have under a 3.0 GPA you have to attend mandatory board review classes. In the past, any student over a 3.0 had a 100% chance of passing the boards (or so I've been told). The diagnostic COMLEX in the winter is to see where you are at and to see what you are weak in, like the Kaplan MCAT diagnostic. There is also a pharm one-liner test you take in the late winter that consists of 150 random high yield one liners for pharm and you have to fill in the name of the drug. I heard it's not too bad though.

FutureCTDoc said:

In addition it always has had a reputation of being kind of weird with all the different pathways at one place.

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Honestly, if you have ever talked to anyone who went or is going to LECOM, this is one of the best and most advantageous reasons to attend here. You have the choice to pick a pathway that fits your learning style. Every single PBL student I know says they would do awful if they had to sit in class all day like I do. They can't pay attention for even a couple hours a week in class. Whereas I purposely chose not to apply to schools with PBL curriculum because I hate reading out of textbooks and feel I would fail.

utahgirl89 said:

what do you mean by rotations being divided out? I got a big list of rotation sites during the interview. Does this mean that certain rotation sites are just for erie and certain rotation sites are just for seton hill??

Are the rotation sites divided equally among both schools or do erie students get more options because it is more established?

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My understanding during the interview was that you either pick a location- meaning general area you'd like to stay in or the month you'd like off. And that Erie students would have some preference over the Erie area rotations and the Seton Hill student would have some preference over the Pittsburgh/Greensburg rotations for obvious reasons... since they already live there.

But that was just my understanding... I believe Erie and Seton Hill student get equal amounts of options.

We don't really know how its gonna work since this is the first year for SH. Remember that there are only ~100 students at SH. We have a rotations update meeting in a few weeks. I doubt we will have first choice over SH. The way I've heard is we are all put together and go from there. I saw a list of a bunch of affiliated hospitals and they are all over western PA, OH, NY, WV and even some in FL. If you are that worried, email Dr. Regan Shabloski. He is the dean for clinical ed

utahgirl89 said:

whoaaaaaaa, now i'm getting scared. I really want to know what's the truth. if seton hill gets to chose after lecom erie choses their rotation sites, that is just not fair!!!!!!!!!!!!

if any current students can confirm this that would be wonderful!

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As Bleeker10 said, we just don't know yet. I hope it all works out well for everyone, but we have no idea how things will be decided. We are officially the same campus, but obviously some of us live in Greensburg and some of us live in Erie. There are a lot of people at Seton Hill who want to do their rotations in Pittsburgh - probably more than the spots that will be open. There are several ways they could run it; we don't know what they will decide.

- As far as fair goes: life isn't fair, and that has been especially true at Seton Hill so far. One hopes that it will get better.

- As far as what an admissions or student affairs person tells you at an interview: they don't know anything, and they would not tell you anything that they think you wouldn't want to hear. The students you talk to should be able to give you better information

This problem with getting rotations is not unique to Lecom. The main thing that happened is that all these schools opened up (Seton Hill alone added ~100 students), yet the number of rotation sites has not kept up the same pace.

So what you will see is more competition for everything, and more likely you will have to do rotations all over the place.

The schools will probably do a lottery system, and getting your top pick will be just that much harder. There is no real guarantee to stay in one area, you will have to do rotations some place else at least 2-3 times.

Igor4sugry said:

This problem with getting rotations is not unique to Lecom. The main thing that happened is that all these schools opened up (Seton Hill alone added ~100 students), yet the number of rotation sites has not kept up the same pace.

So what you will see is more competition for everything, and more likely you will have to do rotations all over the place.

The schools will probably do a lottery system, and getting your top pick will be just that much harder. There is no real guarantee to stay in one area, you will have to do rotations some place else at least 2-3 times.

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Having just gone through this whole process, just thought i'd add my point of view...

While our year was setting up rotations many of the LECOM-Erie students wanted to go to Pitt for their entire 3rd/4th years because that's where they were from... We didn't have enough rotations for everyone, so students often times would have to come back to Erie for numerous rotations. That was BEFORE Seton Hall was around... So I would imagine it will only be more difficult to get Pitt rotations, unless LECOM sets up more rotations for everyone. LECOM has generally had pretty bad reputations with distance medical education offices because they DO NOT pay hospitals to take students, and they are generally strict in all areas...

That being said, LECOM gives you a wealth of electives that you can do at a wide variety of hospitals which allows you to tailor your 3rd/4th year to a specialty of your choosing. I was able to do 6 radiology rotations (and one during my vacation) during my 3rd/4th years and I wouldn't have been able to do that at many other schools... So in my case, it worked out!

This is my thought about rotations from a pre-med perspective: You have no idea where you will be in 2, 3, 4 years so worrying about SH taking up Erie rotation slots will just give you added stress that you don't need. You may decide you want to stay in Erie (maybe for family or personal reasons) or maybe you want to spend most of your time traveling to different states to rotate. I have friends who are going to California, Colorado, Indiana, etc to rotate. I think that's a great thing. If you go to a school with a teaching hospital, you are relegated to doing rotations there. What if their IM rotation is awful? You are stuck. Whereas here, if you know a certain hospital has a great IM rotation then you can try to pick that hospital. I am glad I came here for that reason alone. I can tailor my schedule based on what type of experience I want (teaching hospital vs. community hospital vs. VA). Also another benefit for me is I can also do rotations at Army hospitals. So there is a good chance I will be in Hawaii in January or February for a rotation and I won't have to pay to get there. One of the few benefits of HPSP

During my visit at SH, they told me that they recognize the issue of number of clinical rotation sites and were in the process of finalizing new rotations at the Excela Healthcare system in Westmoreland county. Hopefully, this is still the case.

I do like the idea of being able to do rotations at different sites/locations, especially, if I can get exposure to both academic and community/rural based programs.

voitokas said:

As Bleeker10 said, we just don't know yet. I hope it all works out well for everyone, but we have no idea how things will be decided. We are officially the same campus, but obviously some of us live in Greensburg and some of us live in Erie. There are a lot of people at Seton Hill who want to do their rotations in Pittsburgh - probably more than the spots that will be open. There are several ways they could run it; we don't know what they will decide.

- As far as fair goes: life isn't fair, and that has been especially true at Seton Hill so far. One hopes that it will get better.

- As far as what an admissions or student affairs person tells you at an interview: they don't know anything, and they would not tell you anything that they think you wouldn't want to hear. The students you talk to should be able to give you better information

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1/2 empty = New satellite med school (that the first class doesn't even start rotations for over another year) is not sure how rotations will go because it is a new school, and well, it is in the future, so it is scary.

1/2 full = Wow. A new med school opened up another 100 spots for 1st year med students, expnading opportunities in a profession where demand is going to skyrocket. That is another 100 students this year, and probably more this year that would not have a chance to even begin to dream about having to worry about roatations in 2 years.

I'm just saying.........

punkiedad said:

1/2 empty = New satellite med school (that the first class doesn't even start rotations for over another year) is not sure how rotations will go because it is a new school, and well, it is in the future, so it is scary.
1/2 full = Wow. A new med school opened up another 100 spots for 1st year med students, expnading opportunities in a profession where demand is going to skyrocket. That is another 100 students this year, and probably more this year that would not have a chance to even begin to dream about having to worry about roatations in 2 years.
I'm just saying.........

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Ha ha! Yeah, that's not my glass half-empty. I'm not bashing LECOM's clinical ed - I'm just saying that we don't know anything yet. From the unofficial word down the grapevine, I think that the distribution of rotation sites will be equitable and mostly student-run. Personally, I think it will work out fine.

I can say that, after 3/4 of a year at LECOM Seton Hill, I have absolutely zero trust or confidence in anything that LECOM says or in COCA's ability or willingness to create or enforce any sort of standards, so it's probably not a good idea to count on what someone tells you at your interview. I am glad that more seats are opening up, and I appreciate LECOM's willingness to recruit outside of the trad box - the class of 2013 at Seton Hill has great people in it, and LECOM did a really good job of bringing those people in. Whether that makes up for what we've gotten is something that every student here has a different opinion on, I'm sure. I hope that my opinion of the school changes in the future, but for now the opening of 100 extra seats does not sway me toward the glass half full.