Hehehe.... time to start a good old fashioned SDN message board argument
just kidding, you deserve an honest/completely non-BS response to your question. This is YOUR future, do what's best for YOU.
Our curriculum is mandatory attendance for about 20 hours a week. The rest is your time. Some (not all, and certainly not a majority) of my classmates don't like that; they'd rather do Anki in their underwear at home all week. They asked admin to remove the attendance policy, admin (very politely might I add) said no.
I do feel for the (small minority) of my classmates who don't want to come to class. That being said, the reason admin didn't budge is because our curriculum
is working. We have patient cases with M2s (who are about to take Step 1 by the way) and we're at their level of clinical performance after 6 months of medical school. It isn't because the M2s are stupid; it's because we have waaaaaay more clinical stuff in the new curriculum. And systems-based is just easier to wrap your head around, you'll see it when you get here.
We're killing it when we go precepting (yes, in August of your M1 year you'll be in clinic), and every person in the class is passing the NMBE-style midterms and finals we take. THE ONLY "CON" IS: you have some structure to your week in the form of mandatory class.
If attendance was optional, sure, you could get in more Anki/research. But, you wouldn't be able to read an EKG or a chest x ray like I can. I'm going to be a better doctor because I came to this school, and I'm going to SLAY my aways. And I say that as a "gunner" who got a 99th percentile score on my MCAT exam. Yeah, board scores are important, Anki is important, but there's more to the art and science of medicine than practicing for a standardized test.
All that being said.... if you have more specific questions, feel absolutely free to DM me or put them here. You need to do what's best for you, and if that isn't Quillen, you'll get nothing but love and respect from us over here. If your dream is to spend the first 2 years of med school doing flashcards in your PJs and never stepping foot on campus, that's not an option here at Quillen. But if you do that, you definitely won't be as good at the start of 3rd year as me. Just food for thought
Oh also- our admin is amazing. They're honestly a little too easy on us, which I was suprised about when I arrived here. They're teddy bears. I can expand on that if you would like. Just to illustrate I'm eating lunch with our deans this week (not me specially, they have lunches every few weeks for any students who want to sign up).
