Thanks for the feedback!
Armorshell: you truly think that getting out earlier really makes close to a "wash" of the tuition differences? I will be 100% financial aid, so I'm so worried about taking out all the loans. But at the same time I feel I may be happier at UoP because of the supporting environment etc. (and being in Pac Heights 🙂 ).
Also, I want to specialize, I know it's possible to specialize from UoP but from what you've seen, do you think I will have to sacrifice all social life to do that? Since the program is so much more intense.
UCSF2012: are there advantages to UCSF like being on more of a medical campus with med/pharm students etc? are there social activities set up with students outside of dental? also, how hard is it to get the letters of commadation? i'm concerned with p/f grades plus p/f boards there is going to be so little to be evaluated by for specialty programs, other than GRE I suppose. I've taken the GRE and I feel it really doesn't test "how smart you are".
Every once in a while, we mingle with other programs. The school added a new interprofessional class where students just discuss implications of certain clinical scenarios, analyzing how it may impact other health professions. (or something like that. They added it after my class, so I havn't done it.) And a great many of us hang out with other programs like physical therapy, nursing, med, pharm, etc. We go to their parties, and they occasionally come to ours. But it's your responsibility to seek out the opportunities. On the flipside, a great many of us also only hang out with dental.
Letters of commendation don't mean anything. Residencies don't rely on them, because they still can't guage students from each other. These letters are the single cause of stress within the program and should be eliminated. Getting them affords no perks, but because they exist, some students in the class are gungho.
Don't worry about p/f and residencies. A great many residencies aren't hard to get into, because they never really cared about board scores to begin with. Endo, perio, pros, pedo, and select omfs programs never really, really cared about super high board scores to begin with. It's more about whether you want to go into that field. For example, it's virtually unianimous that we hate pros. We don't care how well prosthodontists do, we're not becoming one ourselves.
UCSF and UoP are polar opposites in terms of [required] time commitment. UoP being the most consuming in the country, and UCSF being somewhere near the bottom, if not at the very bottom. There comes a point where we just have too much free time on our hands. Sometimes, our schedule just works out such that we have a 4 day weekend. At least, it feels like it.
