Leaf-- I don't want to say anything bad about Columbia, really, as I agree with you, the residents are super happy there and it really is a friendly and stimulating place. It's just that it did seem to me nonetheless to have a sort of smug "we're the best" undertone even while being nice and not nearly so offensively snobby as Harvard can be.
My attending was very assertive when I asked for advice about NY schools in her claim that Columbia was by far the best, and I thought she was too quickly dismissive about my concerns regarding the narrower range of patients one sees there compared to, say, NYU. On the other hand, that may reflect more her own personality than the department's.
And to some extent also my comments reflect my own sensitivity on this issue (arrogance) and current mental state of being pretty sick of elite research institutions... I'm looking for a very clinically strong, real, hands-on type place, kinda fed up with being in places where academic research is dominant.
Also, thanks for your input about GWU!!
