Hi! I am building a school list and looking for current M3/M4's that can speak a little bit about Cincinnati!
Specifically, I have the following questions (please feel free to answer as many as you have time for, I know it is a lot!):
- Does Cincinnati have a home hospital?
- What is your preclinical grading system?
- How are students ranked?
- How often did you have exams during your preclinical years?
- Are these exams based more on lecture/in-house or NBME material?
- What are the attendance expectations (for lecture, PBL, etc)?
- What happens if you fail an exam (is it marked on your transcript)?
- What is your clinical grading system?
- What % of students earn honors per rotation (if applicable)?
- Who chooses which order your rotations are in (students, lottery, other)?
- If you could describe the environment during your rotations in one word, what would it be?
- How much time do you have for electives?
- Do you have AOA at Cincinnati?
Thanks so much in advance for answering! I appreciate you making time for this 🙂
Current M3 (almost 4) here. Happy to answer any questions.
Does Cincinnati have a home hospital?
UC is the areas main academic center which is attached to the medical school. Cincy Children's and VA are next door. Plenty of exposure to other nearby hospitals and community sites for those that want them. Generally all rotations can be done at UC if that's desired.
- What is your preclinical grading system? see below
- How are students ranked?
My class is quartile rankings, for us M1 weighted 10%, M2 20%, M3 70%. I think subsequent classes are moving to true preclinical pass/fail but i haven't stayed up on that sorry. The weighting is important, as i was in the bottom quartile all of M1 and M2 and during M3 I've been in the top or second highest.
- How often did you have exams during your preclinical years?
Unsure if this is still up to date, but classically every Monday morning exam during M1. M2 was every other monday.
- Are these exams based more on lecture/in-house or NBME material?
Most of the exams are in in house, but the final exam for each block is an NBME.
- What are the attendance expectations (for lecture, PBL, etc)?
Normal lectures have no mandatory attendance. Previous year recordings are available at all times, and current year recordings are usually posted within a few minutes of the lecture ending. There are some group classes like anatomy etc that have mandatory attendance but that's maybe once or twice a week during preclinical.
- What happens if you fail an exam (is it marked on your transcript)?
No, unless you mean Step exams which are of course reported. I don't know what happens when you fail courses but there's some remediation
- What is your clinical grading system?
H/HP/P/F
- What % of students earn honors per rotation (if applicable)?
Variable but usually around 25% H /50% HP/ 25 P% /0 F. Psychiatry is more like 75% Honors, Surgery is around 50% honors.
- Who chooses which order your rotations are in (students, lottery, other)?
For third year, there's a lottery. I got my first choice, most people get their first few
- If you could describe the environment during your rotations in one word, what would it be?
carbon-based. Seriously though, like all med schools every rotation has different residents, attendings, different buildings, different rules not to mention different specialties are all wildly different from eachother. Even when all of those factors are controlled, one resident might keep you all day and resident who rotates on the next week might send you home at 8am every day.
- How much time do you have for electives?
Not sure what you mean, but I'm on the old 2 year preclinical schedule and still have 16 weeks for interviews and vacation as a fourth year (20 if you include step 2 dedicated). Future students will be on a 1.5 year preclinical and will have way more time to schedule chill electives.
- Do you have AOA at Cincinnati?
Yes. 15 (or is it 20?) % of the class gets it. People who finish in the top quartile are eligibile to interview, and then ~75% of them will get inducted.
At this point I know nothing about the interview/acceptance process but I'm happy to answer questions and DM's about UC in more detail.