Can a current student comment about what they like/dislike about MCW? What sets this school apart from other medical schools? Thanks!
I've only been an MCW student for only like 2.5 months but I'll tell you what I like so far: there are tons of opportunities for you to do pretty much anything you want. If you want to volunteer with underserved communities? You have plenty of options to do so both through student orgs or outside of school with various groups in/around Milwaukee. If you want to shadow every single specialty to figure out what you're interested in? Literally email any MCW physician whose email address you can find and ask them, chances are they will say yes or point you to someone who likes to have students follow them around. There are a lot of research opportunities at this large institution as well; look up who's doing what research, email them, and try to meet up with them to discuss getting involved. Pretty much everybody that works for MCW wants to be there and help students, all you have to do is reach out. Along similar lines, medical students are the focus of the school. There are no undergrads to compete with for a professor's time. There are some graduate students and there will be pharmacy students next year, but there are more than enough opportunities to go around. Also, at MCW, you really have a voice as a student. There are tons of committees that students can be on, to basically link the student body to faculty and some of the practices of the school. If the students voice concerns about how something is done, and the faculty see it as something they are feasibly able to change, they will change things to better accommodate students. Everybody wants us to succeed here. We've had a lot of talks already about mental health and burnout, and it's been super helpful. I do really feel like people care about our well-being. I've already written more than I intended, but I could talk more about how I like the pathways and how we can personalize our own education, the awesome people of MCW, and the chill atmosphere, but I want to answer some other questions too. But feel free to ask me any more specific questions that you might have.
What I dislike about MCW...not a whole lot so far. Sometimes the class size gets annoying; for Foundations of Clinical Medicine, we have groups of ~12 I think, and so we obviously can't all, for example, practice and improve our history taking or physical exam skills for each Standardized Patient. Some of the lectures could be better, some of the lecturers could be better--but it's unrealistic to expect every lecture to be the best lecture ever, and I would imagine every school has its weak link in the curriculum, so I don't care all that much. I still have what I need to succeed. Overall, I really love MCW, and I'm really glad I ended up here. I have no ties to MCW or Wisconsin at all, but I really couldn't be happier with where I ended up. Hope this helps!
I got a II to the main campus and was complete in late August. Can anyome speak to what to expect from the 1 on 1 (or "2" I guess) interviews here? I've only had group interviews previously. :|
I believe your two interviews are open file, and you might get a faculty and a student interview, or you might get two faculty interviews. Both of my interviews were very relaxed, but they did ask me some semi-challenging questions. With that being said, though, the interviews were still very easy and very chill. They'll likely ask you some generic med school interview questions, but it'll stay pretty conversational and the topics will likely be fairly broad. I know I just gave you some super broad information, but the interviews here aren't something you should worry about. Make sure you have a solid "why MCW" answer, on top of the other generic stuff, and you'll be just fine!