Maybe I can shed some light on some of these issues. I am a first year student at AZCOM, and I have been very happy with the basic sciences so far. That said, I am in a class with 147 students and everything seems to be a good fit for our class size. Obviously, I cannot say much about what will happen when the class size increases.
Last year while I was applying, it seemed that SDN was bombarded by students with grudges and there was little from the students that are happy with their education. This seems to be an SDN-phenomenon, because the overall opinion I have gotten from talking with current students (not through SDN) is that most 2nd, 3rd and 4th year students are very happy.
3rd and 4th year rotations are really the major issue from what I have heard, and it all stems from the fact that in the past, AZCOM has been offered additional costly ward based rotation sites but has opted to go with cheaper proctor based rotations to fill the gaps. To compound this, they used to allow students to set up their own rotations and go on as many out of state 3rd year rotations as they wanted. They changed that policy as the ball got rolling on more secure instate rotations, which angered some students - especially current 2nd years who came to AZCOM after being told they would have these open rotations during their interviews.
Dean Kemper seems to be very confident about the changes being implemented and the fact that there will be enough rotations to go around.
In the past on SDN, I have said that I would worry about the rotation issue if I were an incoming student, and I still see this as a negative for the school.
But, here are some of the positives from my point of view:
1) Most of the faculty is awesome. They genuinely care about how you are doing, and try their best to help. The department chairs go above and beyond in a lot of ways (for those of you who are incoming students, you will understand exactly what I mean when you see the spiral notebooks for anatomy).
2) The note system is great, what you need to know is right on the notes that you are given every week. Some of the lectures are better written than others, but if its on there, it is fair game - so that takes away a lot of the guess work.
3) There is a great atmosphere of support among the students, both from our class and from the 2nd years. I think this is a reflection of the school and faculty as a whole. They support us, we support each other.
4) The killer board pass rate - and trust me, having exams every week will ensure that you have plenty of warning if you start to fall behind. The exams also ensure that you have a deep understanding of the material.
5) Exposure to clinical medicine in the first two years. The clinical ed professor for the first year is an AZCOM grad and extremely invested in making sure that you enjoy his class and learn what you need to be a great hands on doc. From what I have heard the 2nd year clinical med doc is great as well. During your first year you also participate in a program called TOPS which I have heard is a great experience and there are multiple standardized patient interactions, and lab sessions where you get to practice what you are learning. Next week, the first years are doing a blood draw lab - which I am stoked for.
6) Impressive residency matches.
My feeling is that the school will work out all of kinks with rotations before the 2012 class begins their 3rd year (an extra 100 students can pay for a lot of those expensive rotations). AZCOM also is gaining ground in the struggle with UofA for rotation sites and will hopefully secure more government support for rotations and residencies. Still, I think it is a valid concern and something that should be factored into your decision to attend.
