Federal loans, of course anyone can go out and get a regular loan. The school is new therefore you have to take out one from a bank instead of the government.
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Regular student loans cap at $250 for medical school before you have to use the Graduate Plus Student Loans. Regular federal student loans have an interest of 5.8% and Graduate Plus are rated at 6.8%. So far, the private loans BCOM students have been offered based on credit reports and background checks hover around the top end of 7% and bottom end around 3.5% interest rates. I don't think private loans are at a disadvantage if you know how to use them and apply for the ones that fit your needs.
Dude or woman I am openly against BCOM, until they are proven I would not recommend it. If you would like to be openly against VCOM where I am going by all means you are entitled to that. The lesser of two evils comment was not directed toward you clearly. I have my opinion and I was discussing with the other poster as they had a good point. The OP should accept BCOM if that was their only choices. Why get so defensive. Let's just leave it at this, or private message me where this belongs.
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BCOM has nothing to prove to those who have no intention of attending their medical school. I actually turned down VCOM for BCOM, but I may or may not still attend BCOM depending on my state school's decision here in a few weeks.
Easy Dusty. Yes it is definitely the lesser of two evils. A new school should always be questioned until it is proven. When it gets government grants for quality research I'll believe the bit about research, when the 3rd year students all have ward based rotations, I'll believe that as well (I am straight up calling BS by the way that they will have mostly ward based rotations), when all of their proposed GME gets ACGME accredited I will believe all of that as well. And it's "association" with NMSU is not a partnership. They let them use some facilities.
Sorry but until BCOM graduates its first class and outs its money where it's mouth is then it should be questioned. And I will most definitely go there if it is my only acceptance next year but I will still be skeptical until they prove themselves. They haven't even matriculated a class yet, I don't know why you are so defensive that it is questioned.
To each their own, but of all of the DO schools in this country I can easily say WITHOUT A DOUBT BCOM is far from my last choice if I had to choose between other schools and BCOM.
I also believe that the exhoribitant nonrefundable deposit of $3000 for BCOM and accepting students extremely early left a bad taste. They only had 30 days to decide, well before other schools have even offered admission. They sent out interview invites starting in June!
I, for one, saw through how terrible 'for-profit' status has done for applicants who were accepted early. You can easily see through how $$$ driven they are. It is NM, where cost of living is cheap compared elsewhere. BCOM could have easily taken their time, picked more quality applicants instead of rushing to fill their class ASAP before October...they wanted to maximize profits hoping people would drop out so they could keep the $3000.
I would've said the same for any school that forced students into $3000 deposits. At least refund half if you decide to go elsewhere! PCOM and Rowan only offer $250 and $200 deposits....
A new list was released showing the top 10 cheapest private medical schools in the United States, both MD and DO schools combined. BCOM isn't on the list due to them not being federally accredited, but their tuition falls between 7-8th place on the list of cheapest private medical schools...Where is the scam in that? No one is forcing your hand into going to BCOM for medical school. So what if they only gave you 30 days to decide if you want to pay the $3,000 or not - everyone has to pay that amount and when you have to pay it plays no part in how they are conducting their admissions procedures. If you don't want to go to BCOM then simply don't pay. Someone else mentioned this earlier, but BCOM is not federally accredited, yet, therefore they cannot give out more acceptances than seats which means that they have to be on their toes when people withdraw acceptances or decline their acceptance all together. Furthermore, BCOM is doing a lot of pre-matriculation activities to prepare students and get them acclimated to the region and the rich history that is preserved over there. BCOM wants their students to be knowledgeable and engaged with the general public of Lac Cruses, New Mexico..not just some student who is passing by to earn their degree without giving anything back to the community.
I know...that's why I said "I would've said the same for any school that forced students into $3000 deposits." BCOM isn't the only one to do this. Also, for a school in NM, where property taxes and standard of living costs are very cheap, I would expect the tuition to be even lower than what it is now. If they want good students, and they're a new school, they should do what they can. CUSOM gave out $10k and $20k scholarships PER year to students in hopes of recruiting them.
Look, we have to be reasonable here. I feel that it is feasibly impossibe
You can't just build a research building and then say that the research you're doing is amazing. You can't say that a new medical school is amazing from the get go. Harvard took over 200 years to get the reputation it deserves today. It takes many many years to make partnerships, relationships with hospitals, and to get its reputation to where the school stands today. Research takes years sometimes to even publish a paper.
Yes, BCOM is promising, and they're doing all they can do establish itself as a good new school. However, they don't really seem to be handling things in a more "humbling" manner. They are acting like they're the new kid on the block and they're better than everybody else. Perhaps it is because of its accepted students are acting like they're super impressed with how amazing it is but are really naïve.
Also, I can't help but think (and I'm not trying to be mean here,) that a for-profit school being in one of the poorest states in the nation is a good combination (especially charging students $3000 just to get a seat.) It just leaves a bad taste, that's all. It just feels like corporate greed is trying to take advantage of NM's "poor status." University of Phoenix is for-profit and we all know how that turned out...
But I will say this...almost everyone will bash a new school. It isn't just unique to BCOM. I'm sure CUSOM had the same "bashing" a couple years back.
The research building is being built in a cooperative manner with the backing of the U.S. Government agencies and the Mexican health authorities with more of a focus than just typical health policies. They are going to focus a lot of resource towards epidemiological studies and ways to better prepare for future illness that may occur. I am not sure if you all are thinking of this in the correct manner - BCOM students do not have to engage in research in the Health Policy research center..that is only an option and will be utilized by more than just the BCOM students and faculty. BCOM students are encouraged to team up with ANYONE who is partaking in a feasible and well-directed research project. There are no limits to what kind of research we can partake in - we just have to make sure we do partake in some kind of research for it is a requirement for graduation.
And it is also fairly ignorant to think that policy research will help all that much come residency application time. If I wanted to study policy I would go get a masters in public health. It's a joke really, people go to medical school to, you know, study medicine and most want to do research in its different fields. It's not that policy research isn't important, it's that it shouldn't be the type of research done by the majority of medical students. Especially the ones trying to do research in their field of interest. BCOM should do better, especially if they are going to advertise thier "research opportunities" to applicants.
*sigh* you do realize that you cannot do health policy research without some kind of data or previous research to back your claims with, right? Policies are researched, studied, and written based on what other research shows. In order to study health policy successfully you will either have to engage in those studies yourself or have a very keen and thorough understanding of the topic at hand. Sounds to me like you are killing two birds with one stone. By the way, Health Policy is NOT the only option ope for research, it is jut ONE of the many options.
What I'm trying to say is that the costs of running a school in NM is probably a lot less than running a school in Philadelphia, or running a school in Chicago. Plus, coupled that with the fact that most students who are attending medical school do not have that much money, it is kind of a slap to the face (for me at least,) that they unnecessarily charged $3000 to take advantage of students wanting to become a physician. BCOM doesn't need that much money, but I feel that the for-profit status caused them to charge that much.
I know this isn't going to be a fair comparison, but there are schools like RowanSOM which offers a FREE pre-matriculation program with only a $200 deposit to their school, for ALL accepted students. They just have to be responsible for living costs, which is expected.
Why isn't that a fair comparison? According to you and many others, you cannot compare anything to BCOM until the school has had time to graduate a class and prove or disprove its ability to be successful. Unless you know the ins and outs of starting a medical school, your assumptions are ridiculous at the least.
This is ridiculous. BCOM just came off of my list of schools to apply to. Why on earth would a student need to write essays before school even starts. The summer before medical school should be for relaxing, moving, and spending time gearing up for the rigor to come, not for writing useless essays and discussion among people who have yet to even take a medical school class yet.
This is why BCOM is not the school for you, sir. BCOM is having their students do this required work because they don't want a bunch of hooligans coming into Las Cruces with absolutely no idea about the history of the place or what kind of symbolism is carried on through the region. Las Cruces is culturally rich and people take pride in that down their, so they want student who understand the area. Also, it teaches about accountability and preparedness for medical school. If you can't find time to do these tiny little assignments, then I would question your work ethic when it comes to crunch time.
We'll see how that pans out in the next couple of years. Generally speaking, the newer schools have to impress the applicants. They are already at a disadvantage. They need to promote their school, and what better way to promote their school than impressing those who are interviewing there and can spread the word? (Like on SDN) Nobody has actually graduated there so of course there is a lot of skepticism going on here.
Older schools don't care about you because they can easily get more applicants to fill your spot. Supply and demand.
Now you just sound like you are saying things to please your cognitive dissonance being attributed to this silliness. Every school dishes a sales pitch to potential students, even Harvard (the favorite school to compare everything to, apparently) - it doesn't stop just because you have a good reputation. If a student is being highly sought after by a school, then you better believe they will be on their A game. BCOM has a waiting list that exceedes 300 applicants, so tell me again who can easily get more applicants to fill your spot if you decide to pass it up?
Gosh, you know, I realize that after I submit this reply I will probably get bombarded with trash talk and silly rhetoric about how I am on the BCOM bandwagon and how BCOM has yet to prove anything, but my question is why should we even have to defend BCOM at this stage of the game? No one on here, literally no one, can say anything negative about how BCOM is being ran or how their curriculum or what have is set up, because they have YET to be given the chance to prove themselves in a real academic year. So, please, quit with the references of what BCOM doesn't have or can't do and just drop it for now. It does you absolutely no good to argue against a school you have nothing to do with. My goodness, people.
