A school that won't give Match results or Step1 scores?

[streetdoc]

---

Members do not see this ad.

I was just accepted off a waitlist and drove 500 miles to have a "second look" at the school. I stoped by the admissions offices and asked if i could see the list for residency placemants. She said, "oh, we don't give that info out."
now, there i am, an accepted student with a choice to make between my state school and this more expensive school and i don't even know where their students go!!!??? it's not like i'm a crazy stalker looking to hunt down one of their graduates, but i give her the benefit of the doubt.

Anyway, i asked if she knew the avg USMLE scores (step 1 or step2) and she replied, "oh, we don't give that info out."

Is this normal? i couldn't find the match or avg score on the internet, so i guess she's serious about not giving out that info.
How am i suppose to make a choice without such important information? is such a school to be trusted?
thanks for any ideas.

streetdoc

 

[tBw]

thats kind of strange. Though I did find some schools reticent to give me average step scores all of them gave me match lists. I would call the dean or someone other than the secretary and try again. Failing that the following website has some match lists on it but the list of schools is far from complete and many of the links have now gone down for some reason (however, you might get lucky):

http://www.undergroundmed.filetap.com/

 

[MichiMO]

I had the same experience at Meharry. They told us step 1 scores but would not provide a match list. I found it a little strange too. It would seem worse to me to hide a match list than to have a "not so good" match list. Know what I mean? I don't know if they won't show it because it is not good or if there is some other reason, but it was frustrating nonetheless.

 

[southerndoc]

streetdoc, which school is this? I'm sure there are some SDN'ers on here that have a match list and Step I average for the school you are inquiring about. 🙂

 

[Brewster]

Not giving out the average step I score does not seem all that strange to me, since it is pretty much a meaningless statistic anyway.

However, hiding the match list does seem strange. I am the first to admit that judging a school by its match list is far from an exact science, but it is something.

Have you done an SDN search? There are lots of match lists floating around here.

 

[streetdoc]

hey, thanks for the replies!
i *guess* it's good to hear that other schools don't give out USMLE scores too often either.
does anyone know the match list for WVU?
thanks again,
streetdoc

 

[pathstudent]

how do you figure that USMLE step 1 is meaningless.

I bet you all I got that the scores on Step 1 are fairly well correlated with GPAs in schools that have them.

 

[Brewster]

Originally posted by pathstudent
how do you figure that USMLE step 1 is meaningless.

I bet you all I got that the scores on Step 1 are fairly well correlated with GPAs in schools that have them.

I agree 100%

Step I scores themselves are not meaningless...the average step I score for a given medical school is meaningless. Step I is all about individual achievement...how much you study, how well you test...the school you go to has little impact on your step I performance. Besides, the standard deviation around the mean step I score for a given school is probably huge.

Your step I score matters. The average step I score at your school does not.

 

[Mike59]

Originally posted by Brewster
...the average step I score for a given medical school is meaningless. Step I is all about individual achievement...how much you study, how well you test...the school you go to has little impact on your step I performance. Besides, the standard deviation around the mean step I score for a given school is probably huge.

Good advice, that's exactly what I was going to say 😉

Besides, weren't Harvard and Yale both experiencing lackluster USMLE averages in recent years (or unsually high number of fails by first time takers) because of their non-didactic curriculums?