Advertisement - Members don't see this ad
-
CycleTrack and SDN are teaming up to make medical school admissions more transparent and accessible! Read the announcement to learn how we’re supporting the future of CycleTrack’s free application-tracking tools .
Carib Vet Schools
Started by kinkajou
Get help with your application
Use all the free resources available to you from SDN: articles, guides, expert advising, forums discussions, and school research.
I know this question was posted for Aggiegolf, but I work with a vet who went to Ross and when he lived there with his family he told me that the island economy is very 3rd world and the poverty level is very high. Frequently students houses and cars would be burgularized. That was before they had student housing on campus and the only housing was off campus so I dont know if that is a factor now.
Advertisement - Members don't see this ad
Sorry, did not mean to scare you. Keep in mind this was heresay but I think its something worth mentioning and something you need investigate before deciding on a school. He said he was never fearful of his personal safety but they just learned not to keep valuables in their home or cars while unattended. Not that much different from somes areas of the USA.
I also have been looking into SGU/Ross, and read on a different forum that Ross isn't the safest place to be, and if it comes to it, I'l definitely be looking more at SGU than Ross. Things that scared me about Ross: lot of burglaries, corrupt police force, and supposedly a student actually got murdered down there (read this on valuemd). I also believe the attrition rate is higher at Ross, plus if you fail a course you have to repeat the entire semester. 
Not that I'm planning on failing any, but you never know!
Not that I'm planning on failing any, but you never know!I know it is kind of expensive to do, but if you are interested in the Caribbean schools, and have the time, I beg you to visit the schools and see which school will be the best fit for you. (it can be a fun vacation at the same time)
If you are coming to Grenada, let me know and I will make sure to set up a campus tour for you, have some current students meet up with you, and possibly even get you into one of the classes.
If you are coming to Grenada, let me know and I will make sure to set up a campus tour for you, have some current students meet up with you, and possibly even get you into one of the classes.
This is excellent advice. If you are going to drop a SIGNIFICANT amount of money on your education, it makes sense to make sure you can thrive educationally and culturally.
A word about safety. There is crime everywhere--especially in countries with high unemployment. Violent crime is rare, but can happen. If you use the same common sense you use in big cities, you should be fine. Remember that many Caribbean islands are undergoing a huge transition from a sugarcane economy to a somewhat tourist economy and that entails many growing pains for inhabitants. This is very true with St. Kitts.
Make the effort to interact with the local folk. Like it or not, their impression of you stems from what they have experienced from other Americans, good or bad. Be nice and genuine. Make eye contact and say "hello" to folks. Simple recognition of others may lead to a wonderful and lasting friendship. Don't be an "Ugly American".
The Ross students that I have talked to talked about burglaries as well as some more serious crimes. Grand Cayman is a first world country and it is extremely diverse here. Thus, it was alot easier to fit in here and not worry about becoming a target (although we do wear bright red shirts as part of our uniform😎). However, really bad things happen here also, although most of the crimes are domestic disputes. I haven't heard of any students getting hurt.
I would definitely visit SGU if you can afford it. I wish I had visited the island and campus but I didn't. I was really torn between SGU and SMU.
Jeffrey, do you happen to know the first-time pass rate for students who take the basic science exam for the PAVE? Also, is a PAVE administrator flown to Grenada to administer the exam or do students come back to the states to take it? Thanks!
I would definitely visit SGU if you can afford it. I wish I had visited the island and campus but I didn't. I was really torn between SGU and SMU.
Jeffrey, do you happen to know the first-time pass rate for students who take the basic science exam for the PAVE? Also, is a PAVE administrator flown to Grenada to administer the exam or do students come back to the states to take it? Thanks!
Not sure who will be interviewing you, but....
Mine was one-on-one....the guy actually worked for the Medical school so he didn't really know much about veterinary medicine. Because of this, he focused on my life experiences. He did find some things in my application, tasks I did as a vet tech, very interesting and wanted an explanation about them because he had no clue about the process or why it was done....so that was easy. In general, he was very nice and laid back. One specific question I remember was "what are my feelings about ear cropping?" He owns a bunch of boxers. It was more of a walk in the park compared to my glasgow interview. The same guy interviewed a friend of mine a couple days later....she was accepted too.
Bottom-line....no worries!! You'll do fine. Just be yourself. If you don't know something, admit it. Just don't blabber aimlessly trying to search for an answer...say you don't know and move on.
Mine seemed more like a HR-themed interview. It didn't seem scary at all...I was asked about my experience, why I want to be a vet, how I studied for the GRE, talked about my classes...then she asked if I had any questions for her. I was in there about 45-50 minutes total, but I can't say that's the average because the woman before me was in there about 15-20 minutes. I think she may have asked me how I think I could adapt to island life and being away from my support group. It didn't seem nearly as intimidating as interviewing for 2 faculty members, since I was interviewed by Ross' admissions rep. Just be yourself and you'll be fine....they told me it would be 4-6 weeks before they contacted me, but I got an acceptance call a week later. Good luck, and PM me if you have any other questions!
cOOl..small world. 🙂 we went to undergrad together and worked at the same place before she went to smu
I just scheduled mine the other day and they told me their first opening wasn't until April! Guess they just hate me. 🙄
Advertisement - Members don't see this ad
im sure they dont..hehe...good luck on your interview though! we may be in the same class
im sure they dont..hehe...good luck on your interview though! we may be in the same class
Thanks, good luck to you, too! Here's hoping...
plus if you fail a course you have to repeat the entire semester
That's actually pretty standard as far as I know, maybe even lenient since they let you stay in school.
At my school (and I think, most others) if you fail a core course, that's it. Buh-bye. You're out of school. You need to apply for reinstatement, and if they let you back in, *then* you are allowed to repeat the entire semester. And if it was a fall semester class that you failed, you have to wait all spring and summer to start over with the class that used to be below you. However, if you fail an elective, you'll only be placed on probationary status.
That's actually pretty standard as far as I know, maybe even lenient since they let you stay in school.
At my school (and I think, most others) if you fail a core course, that's it. Buh-bye. You're out of school. You need to apply for reinstatement, and if they let you back in, *then* you are allowed to repeat the entire semester. And if it was a fall semester class that you failed, you have to wait all spring and summer to start over with the class that used to be below you. However, if you fail an elective, you'll only be placed on probationary status.
I volunteered and now work at The Animal Medical Center in NYC. Its an older specialty hospital but still pretty well known around here. While I don't believe any of our current interns were from carribean schools, i think there are about 2 residents from Ross. However, so while grades and stuff probably are very very important, im sure name would have some weight and graduating top of your class at a top 10 school probably looks better. That being said, clearly you can go on to do internships and residencies from any school!
I applied and was accepted to SGU for the fall of '08! As near as I can tell, it will probably be more difficult to get an internship/ residency coming from the carribbean than from other schools, but it's definitely not impossible.
AMC is a very prestigious clinic. There are plenty of Ross grads out there doing awesome.
Luckyduck, how soon after you applied did you receive an interview? Was the interview in the States? How was it?
Thanks. 🙂
yea...im wondering about that too....i just turned in my app. and am now awaiting their answer...
I don't have numbers of the percentage of students from the U.S. and from Caribbean schools that apply for a residency and then obtain one so it is hard for me to give factual information on if it is harder or not. I do know several of SGU students who are currently doing residencies and did not have difficulty obtaining them. Two examples, one grad is at the University of Pennsylvania doing internal medicine, and she beat out many students from U.S. schools for that spot. Another grad is finishing up a surgical residency which was extremely competitive. Since our students attend U.S. or other schools for their clinical rotations, they are able to showcase their skills and abilities alongside the "U.S. students" so if you then apply for a residency at that same school, they already know you and you aren't held at a disadvantage. Just because you go to a U.S. school, does not mean you will automatically beat out a SGU grad for a residency.
That said, I would imagine if two students, one from Cornell, and one from SGU were applying for one spot. Assuming each student had the same grades through vet school, same experience, etc. I wouldn't be suprised to see the spot given to the Cornell grad.
There does seem to be plenty of residency spots available (depending on speciality of course). So even if grads are not getting their first choice, they are getting their second or third choices, and obtaining a residency has not been difficult for our graduates.
I hope that helps.
That said, I would imagine if two students, one from Cornell, and one from SGU were applying for one spot. Assuming each student had the same grades through vet school, same experience, etc. I wouldn't be suprised to see the spot given to the Cornell grad.
There does seem to be plenty of residency spots available (depending on speciality of course). So even if grads are not getting their first choice, they are getting their second or third choices, and obtaining a residency has not been difficult for our graduates.
I hope that helps.
The PAVE exam is administered on our campus, so our students do not have to travel to take that exam.
Our first time pass rate for the PAVE is about 88%. It's interesting because students actually want to give themselves two shots at the exam, so they purposely sit the exam before they are ready for it, knowing that if they fail, they then have another chance to retake it, (at which point just about everyone passes) If students would wait till the end of their third year to sit the exam for the first time, the first time pass rate would be much higher.
Our first time pass rate for the PAVE is about 88%. It's interesting because students actually want to give themselves two shots at the exam, so they purposely sit the exam before they are ready for it, knowing that if they fail, they then have another chance to retake it, (at which point just about everyone passes) If students would wait till the end of their third year to sit the exam for the first time, the first time pass rate would be much higher.
I applied in the fall, I think I hit the submit buttom in the very begining of October (shortly after I finished VMCAS) and was contacted via email for an interview in the begining of November, which I scheduled for 2 weeks later. The interview was really low key, a veterinarian from my area met me at a Starbucks. My interviewer was actually a Penn grad, but has visited SGU and spoke very highly of it and it's graduates. She asked me fairly general questions about myself and about vet medicine (and issues in the field today). It was fairly straightforward and generally a really positive experience that made me really excited about the school🙂. I got the phone call accepting me about a month ago! 
Advertisement - Members don't see this ad
Honestly, what I like about SGU is the idea of studying without much interruption. Most schools are in areas that are more "exciting" than Grenada and so the lack of distraction would be good for many of us, including me. I balk at the cost of attendance and the lack of prestige. Even though the tuition is similar to Cornell (in state), the lack (or small number) of subsidized loans puts the total cost of attending much higher, because the interest gets added to your principal. Of course, going to Penn (OOS) would be quite the same price.
I'm keeping my fingers crossed for UGA!
I'm keeping my fingers crossed for UGA!
No, I applied for the fall '08 semester for both. For a while, they were my only acceptances, so I did all this research thinking I would end up going to either of them....but then I was accepted to Glasgow, so that is where I'm headed now. Hope the info helps you with any decisions you have to make.🙂
It's funny that you say that, because the more I learn about Grenada I worry about being more distracted there than I would be in the states: scuba diving, beaches, hiking in the rainforests, beaches, shopping at open air markets, and did I mention beaches? 😀 But I think that the more relaxed way of life down there will probably be a good thing in terms of being able to focus and stress a tiny bit less.
I'm not 100% certain yet, but it's looking like I will be! I do have an interview with Ross, because as much as I've heard the same concerning things about the island, I feel like I need to give them the same consideration I gave SGU.
There are lots of threads on this already, like this one:
http://forums.studentdoctor.net/showthread.php?t=476544&highlight=transfer+from+ross
And there are more I'm sure if you just use the search tool. 😉
Couple things to correct:
YES, you can get a non-stop flight from NYC to GND (dude, why on earth would anyone pick THAT as the reason to go/not go to a school? I'd base it on reputation, classes offered, safety, residency opps, exam pass rates, etc)
YES you can get a residency if you go to SGU/Ross
YES, you can get a non-stop flight from NYC to GND (dude, why on earth would anyone pick THAT as the reason to go/not go to a school? I'd base it on reputation, classes offered, safety, residency opps, exam pass rates, etc)
YES you can get a residency if you go to SGU/Ross
Just some stuff to share...
My mom told me that we had a family friend stop by the other day and she told him that I was waiting to go to vet school. He told her that his ex-girlfriend went to Ross. (She's about the same age as me) Well, he said that she didn't do too good on some kind of surgery exam or something, and was kicked out as a result. She racked up about $100K in debt and they won't let her finish the program, re-take the exam, or repeat a year...nothing. Simply, kicked out without second thought.
On the other side of things....one of the Vets I work with was placed on some kind of admissions panel where graduates interview for internships (or something along those lines) and one the graduates was from Ross. He looked at her transcripts and saw that she had like 6 D's and a couple of F's for classes in Vet school. He was like, "How in the hell does someone graduate Vet school with those types of grades?!?!?"
So, I guess there's no final word on the topic of Ross kicking people out for poor performance. I guess it's a decision that gets based on the individual and is not set in stone. Just thought people who are considering Ross should know about this...
My mom told me that we had a family friend stop by the other day and she told him that I was waiting to go to vet school. He told her that his ex-girlfriend went to Ross. (She's about the same age as me) Well, he said that she didn't do too good on some kind of surgery exam or something, and was kicked out as a result. She racked up about $100K in debt and they won't let her finish the program, re-take the exam, or repeat a year...nothing. Simply, kicked out without second thought.
On the other side of things....one of the Vets I work with was placed on some kind of admissions panel where graduates interview for internships (or something along those lines) and one the graduates was from Ross. He looked at her transcripts and saw that she had like 6 D's and a couple of F's for classes in Vet school. He was like, "How in the hell does someone graduate Vet school with those types of grades?!?!?"
So, I guess there's no final word on the topic of Ross kicking people out for poor performance. I guess it's a decision that gets based on the individual and is not set in stone. Just thought people who are considering Ross should know about this...
23 schools! Wow, maybe that's one of the (probably multiple) reasons why I didn't get in. I applied to 5 in the US and am now trying to figure out the best way to get into veterinary school - I've also applied to 2 master's programs in hopes of strengthening my academic record - the only 4 classes that the US vet schools seemed to be interested in, I took all at once, in the same semester, and the other classes that I did particularly well in don't seem to matter. I'm a bit frustrated, and am thinking, at this point, whether it would be better to just apply to schools like Ross which are still taking applications or go, spend 2 years, get my master's, and reapply to US schools, and perhaps not even get in.
I've worked extensively with a veterinarian who went to Ross, and he suggested it last year, but I didn't seriously consider it because of wondering if I could be so far away from my social network. Now, after receiving 5 rejection letters, I am seriously considering it. I just wonder if the stigma will follow me around. It's like there is no room in US vet schools for people to have semesters of personal growth - if this in any way negatively affects GPA. I know I can do it - if I can get through Organic chemistry - which I'm not particularly interested in - then I know I can through 4 years of a veterinary curriculum, which I just lap up. The prerequisite courses required seem so strange to me, and any vet I ask pretty much says these courses are not exactly things that pop up in every day practice. Just another hurdle to see if we can be deemed worthy. From this place I must move forward, and in the last month since I received my 5th rejection letter, I keep coming back to the idea that I really am only interested in furthering my education if it is for veterinary school, and that I think I will only be happy if I'm doing this with my life. Plus, going to school in the Caribbean sounds much more pleasant than the last 4 years I have spent in upstate New York.
Anyway, I'm curious to know any other drawbacks that anyone has heard about Ross, particularly any thing besides the stigma and additional licensing exams required.
Thanks.
This isn't going to be a comment about Carib schools, but I wanted to respond to your comment above. I felt like this, too. I graduated college with a low GPA because I struggled with a lot of personal issues (of the "where am I going, what am I doing, what do I really want, who am I?" kind). I still needed time after college to sort those out and to regain confidence in myself, though I was already somewhat on the right mental path at graduation. Out of college, I worked a number of jobs in areas that interested me (they were relevant to vet med, but not to traditional areas that one would think of), completed a masters in infectious diseases, and did several other things that were really neat to me. The adcoms at the schools I applied to obviously liked this stuff, too, as I was accepted to 5 of the 6 schools I applied to. It probably didn't hurt that I did well in my masters program and had good GRE scores, but my point is that you CAN have had a rough academic time due to personal growth and still get to your goal. I graduated 5 years ago from UG, so maybe you can do what took me 5 years faster, or maybe you don't want to wait that long. Maybe the Carib is right for you, but don't think that just because of what you've gone through so far, that US schools are closed to you. They aren't! You just have to find a different path into them.
Best of luck to you!
I posted a thread called "info about Ross" pretty recently. It's mostly just what a friend told me after attending there for a year, but it's a prespective on the whole thing that you may not have heard before. You should check it out.
Advertisement - Members don't see this ad
UNTRUE.
You can fail ONE class while at Ross. If you fail another, THEN they kick you out. That is the way they have been for years.
You can transfer to SGU from ROSS, but you'll have to start over, and do APC stuff.
I don't know of any school that will kick you out just for failing one EXAM.
A unique thing that SGU does, which is an added benefit to our vet students, AND the affiliated schools is we hold a week of clinical meetings every February. A representative from ALL of our affiliates comes to Grenada where they have a chanve to inspect our facilities, meet with our professors and talk to each other. During the day, the group (including myself) holds meetings to discuss, changes in each others programs, and new ideas to improve the programs. During the evenings, each of the schools give a presentation to the students, so the SGU students can get a better idea of the different strengths of each school, helping them make a better informed decision on which school to attend for their 4th year clinical rotations. It's a great week that everyone seems to enjoy.
Ochem is a flipin joke compared to some of the veterinary classes. Also, trust me you will not be completely interested in all of your veterinary classes either🙄
Similar threads
