Happiest med students

[222premed222]

Which medical schools have the happiest, collaborative medical students?

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[couldbeawinchester]

None, give up on that now lmao

 

[Blueprint Med School]

As a general rule of thumb? Schools with true pass fail grading. As in, it's not ranked, and there's no secret internal ranking that is shared in your residency letter.

Kevin W, MCAT Tutor
Med School Tutors

 

[Detective SnowBucket]

As a general rule of thumb? Schools with true pass fail grading. As in, it's not ranked, and there's no secret internal ranking that is shared in your residency letter.

Kevin W, MCAT Tutor
Med School Tutors

Dude, forreal. This right here. I'm at a tiered grading school (sorta like letter grades but with different names). We're pretty collaborative but only because we aren't ranked on top of that. Absolutely first thing to making a collaborative student body is no ranking, not even internal. Also, the stress will quite literally melt away if we could switch to a true p/f so don't even mess with a school that doesn't do p/f unless you have no other choice.
-Sincerely, a butthurt m1.

 

[?doctor]

.

 

[DarklingThrush]

As a general rule of thumb? Schools with true pass fail grading. As in, it's not ranked, and there's no secret internal ranking that is shared in your residency letter.

Kevin W, MCAT Tutor
Med School Tutors

This 100%. My school is this way. I LOVE medical school. I don’t feel pressure (except competing against myself), I feel like I’m able to learn the material AND enjoy the process. P/F with no internal ranking is a game changer. In addition to my school being heavily focused on student wellbeing, med school has been a great experience thus far. (To be fair I’m only 3 months in, but my friends who are a year ahead feel the same way too)

 

[Goro]

Which medical schools have the happiest, collaborative medical students?

Mine

 

[Lucca]

how to achieve maximum zen in med school
-true p/f
-no internal ranking
-no AOA
-p/f clerkships

but most importantly:
-you, the med student, are 100% dead-set on community IM/Peds/FM
-have a full ride to med school

the misery tends to come less from the place and more from the grind + debt consuming your life, but some places are better at blunting the grind than others

happiness comes from within, so avoid being eviscerated

 

[jamaica jan sun princess]

Ross or SGU. Or so I’ve heard.

 

[tunaktunak]

Which med schools are true P/F with no internal ranking?

I'd really like to know this as well lol. Are there any resources other than MSAR where we can quickly see which med schools do P/F?

 

[viralhiker]

how to achieve maximum zen in med school
-true p/f
-no internal ranking
-no AOA
-p/f clerkships

but most importantly:
-you, the med student, are 100% dead-set on community IM/Peds/FM
-have a full ride to med school

the misery tends to come less from the place and more from the grind + debt consuming your life, but some places are better at blunting the grind than others

happiness comes from within, so avoid being eviscerated

Why would you say that the happiest med students are those that are committed to IM/peds/FM?

 

[Blueprint Med School]

I'd really like to know this as well lol. Are there any resources other than MSAR where we can quickly see which med schools do P/F?

Nope. It's actually really hard to find this information, as schools love to advertise being P/F but still keep internal rankings.

 

[Kracin]

schools love to advertise being P/F but still keep internal rankings.

Also, MS1's at interview day (whether virtual or zoom) probably won't know the answer. The only great way to dig into it with upperclassmen and asking more direct "how are clinicals ranked?, do you know if performance is reflected on residency letter?"

 

[EdgeTrimmer]

Why would you say that the happiest med students are those that are committed to IM/peds/FM?

Easier to match in those?

 

[CliveStaples]

Happiness comes from within.

I went to a school with internal ranking based on numeric grades and I never once asked the registrar for my class rank (I believe a quartile/quintile was put in our Dean's Letters - I have no idea which one I was in). It wasn't actionable information to me so I didn't need to know it. I think it made me much happier than my peers who obsessed over such things. It was never a barrier to finding a group of friends that I studied with and still communicate with daily, years after my graduation. Even on clerkships with people I wasn't as close with, I was committed to making sure that we as a group would excel, so in turn my peers would do the same for me. It's corny, but be the positive impact you want to see.

Whether you have grades or not, a pass/fail Step 1 or not, etc. the nature of applying to residency after medical school necessitates a system of differentiating applicants. Seeking to remove this process will simply shift it to some other anxiety-provoking system if you allow it. Be above it.

I found my happiest moments were when I felt like I was excelling at clinical medicine and positively impacting patient care. I don't know if I went to the school with the happiest medical students, but I found happiness in medical school because I tried to be happy.

 

[Tenk]

For most it’s “the only school I got into.”

 

[ciestar]

Easier to match in those?

Much.

 

[ciestar]

For most it’s “the only school I got into.”

‘Twas me

 

[Lucca]

Why would you say that the happiest med students are those that are committed to IM/peds/FM?

their souls are most likely to be intact by the time they get out.

 

[culturekweenXx]

Honestly? I think it's the hypercompetitive students who ensure that they're never happy. That's what I see with my classmates at least. Being satisfied with average performance (and pursuing a specialty that allows for it) is such a boon for mental health.

 

[Bloobury]

Agree with everyone who says it's more of a personal thing. Some schools may have more or less in the way of student supports or wellbeing initiatives, and each school has its own culture (which may attract happier/more chill people or more competitive/anxious/stressed out people). Some schools may be more toxic and others may be more supportive but ultimately what will make the difference is your coping skills and mindset.

I have seen many friends go through medical school. The ones who were happy and self-aware and humble and collaborative and caring before medical school are by and large still happy and caring and didn't think medical school was all that bad. The ones who were stressed out and hypercompetitive and anxious and hyperfocused on their singular goal of getting into medical school are by and large burned out/less satisfied/less happy with their experience/now in recovery from substance use problems. Granted, this is a sample size of like 15-20 of my friends and former classmates who went through medical school over the last decade (and working at a medical school for years), but it's enough for me to believe there's something to it. If you aren't in a good place when you go in, you're not likely to be in a great place when you come out.

[Edit: After thinking on it for a moment I think it could also be observed that for some of those people there was an "attitude of gratitude" and others had more of an expectation that they deserved something for all their hard work to get into school. This also seems correlated with their observed/expressed happiness, anecdotally. Do with that completely non-scientific observation as you will.]

 

[TelemarketingEnigma]

Besides grades: Look for somewhere that students seem to have lives outside of medicine. Whether that's sports, hobbies, just hanging out with friends. I am so so happy that I have things in my life besides medicine and it helps if the school community is supportive of that.

 

[deleted1044921]

This 100%. My school is this way. I LOVE medical school. I don’t feel pressure (except competing against myself), I feel like I’m able to learn the material AND enjoy the process. P/F with no internal ranking is a game changer. In addition to my school being heavily focused on student wellbeing, med school has been a great experience thus far. (To be fair I’m only 3 months in, but my friends who are a year ahead feel the same way too)

What school is this? Sounds too good to be true

 

[datboi_58]

As an applicant who never knew what to look for in med schools, P/F curriculum would be one of the things on the top of my list now that I’m a med student.

 

[last in line]

Ask a school how they did on the AAMC Graduation Questionnaire where graduates have the opportunity to rate their satisfaction with their medical education. Summary reports are available here,

Graduation Questionnaire (GQ)

All Schools Summary Reports present national data from the GQ, combining student responses from all participating medical schools into a single report.

www.aamc.org

but I don't think you can get access to any individual school's data. Some schools may post their results on their website.

 

[Putkernerinthehall]

This 100%. My school is this way. I LOVE medical school. I don’t feel pressure (except competing against myself), I feel like I’m able to learn the material AND enjoy the process. P/F with no internal ranking is a game changer. In addition to my school being heavily focused on student wellbeing, med school has been a great experience thus far. (To be fair I’m only 3 months in, but my friends who are a year ahead feel the same way too)

Are you still loving it ? Any regrets ?

 

[DarklingThrush]

Are you still loving it ? Any regrets ?

I am very happy to be in medical school. I still don’t feel any pressure to be the best in the class, and I love P/F curriculum. I enjoy learning the material. I had some serious extenuating circumstances this year which has made med school much harder for me. At times I wish I had more support from my school in that regard. Despite being online, I have gotten to know a few faculty who I greatly admire and would not be surviving MS1 without their support.

I don’t have regrets about choosing medicine. If I had to choose a regret, it would be not deferring one year. I’m not sure anyone expected to be online the entire year, but that has been very difficult. I am someone who thrives off of in-person lecture and interacting with faculty. It makes me very sad to know my entire preclinical time will be spent on a laptop (accelerated preclinical curriculum). I want nothing more than to be at school.

 

[mailloxe]

Late to this post but I have genuinely loved medical school so far. I 100% echo the sentiment about true P/F being a game changer. With p/f it somehow makes Med school both easier and harder than undergrad - the amount of info thrown at you is insane, and I have definitely felt overwhelmed a few times, but overall with p/f I am really able to titrate how much time I dedicate to studying vs fun stuff. Like it is absolutely possible to do fun things on the weekends or take a random mid-week day trip to the beach or drive up to the mountains to ski or have friends visit. The first couple of months are an adjustment period for sure, but once you get comfy with pass fail you realize that there are some things you just won’t learn the first time around, and sometimes you won’t have the time to truly understand every concept like we all tried to do in undergrad and you have to become ok with just taking some facts at face value! But the beauty (or ugliness?) of MD training is: if it’s important, you’re going to learn it again later, so don’t stress too much about learning absolutely everything right now! Get the big concepts, try to cram as many facts in as you can but accept that you won’t memorize them all and that’s ok, and definitely spend many hours studying. But also be ok with knowing when to just take a break bc it’s ok to not know 100% of everything — with P/F you just need to know at least 70% right now and the rest you’ll pick up when you study for step, or go on rotations, or study for step 2, or during your intern year, or during residency, or fellowship, or by doing a quick google search as an attending.

people say a lot of scary stuff about Med school on SDN, and I am not saying it isn’t hard, but it is absolutely possible to be happy and have fun! I have truly loved Med school so far (I’m an MS2). I also have MS3 friends who have loved rotations even though it’s a grind and some attendings or some rotations suck more than others — if you really want to be a doc, then it should all be exciting anyway even if it’s hard, because it’s really cool to finally be learning the stuff that we will actually be using every day for our careers! V different than undergrad where so much of what you learn is ultimately irrelevant, even if you enjoy learning it at the time.

tl;dr I have had a blast in Med school so far, and I do think P/F definitely facilitates extra happiness. It will still be hard but it can certainly be manageable. Also I think being intentional about making time for sleep/hobbies/days off is v important

 

[proudofmykids]

For those in p/f programs, out of curiosity, what is the typical Median and Mean percentages on exams.

 

[CricB4Tube]

UConn is another true p/f with no internal ranking and the students I talked to in private there seem extremely happy. These were some of the biggest factors in my decision to matriculate to UConn. Quinnipiac is also p/f although not sure about internal ranking.

 

[Dr.K124]

It seems to really depend on the person. Unfortunately you don't really know until you're deep into it... but I'd imagine P/F is helpful.

 

[Rheopecty]

Didn't see it mentioned yet, but Pitt is Preclinical P/F, no AOA, no rank. Students during and outside of interview day appear happy.

 

[Putkernerinthehall]

For those in p/f programs, out of curiosity, what is the typical Median and Mean percentages on exams.

You mean on Step exams ?

 

[DarklingThrush]

For those in p/f programs, out of curiosity, what is the typical Median and Mean percentages on exams.

Depends on the exam/block. My school uses NBME retired board questions via the NBME interface, and we are usually higher than the national average. Typically the class average is somewhere in the 80’s... maybe upper 70’s on a difficult block.

 

[Rheopecty]

It's still on AOA's website, I can't find anything that says they actually ended up dropping it?

I've spoken to 3 separate MS1s. They dropped AOA and there's no contact person on the AOA website either.

 

[ThatSerb]

I've spoken to 3 separate MS1s. They dropped AOA and there's no contact person on the AOA website either.

what is the harm in aoa anyways?

 

[Rheopecty]

what is the harm in aoa anyways?

The criteria for being inducted is not standardized, but it's a well-regarded society in residency applications. So not having it at a school means you can't be differentiated based on that subjective factor in resapps.

 

[proudofmykids]

You mean on Step exams ?

No the pre clinical modules.
I'm asking to see just how much studying is done due to p/f?
What scores are the median and averages on most modules?

 

[KnightDoc]

No the pre clinical modules.
I'm asking to see just how much studying is done due to p/f?
What scores are the median and averages on most modules?

Why does this matter if it's P/F? Isn't the whole point of P/F to eliminate any distinction between median, average, high, low???

Given that it's P/F (true P/F, not BS P/F where there are still internal rankings), are these metrics even captured? If so, why on earth would they be published? Who would be looking at it?

Your kid is in school now, correct? She's passing, correct? If so, why do you care how much she is studying, or how much anyone else is studying? Just asking for a friend.

 

[EdgeTrimmer]

No the pre clinical modules.
I'm asking to see just how much studying is done due to p/f?
What scores are the median and averages on most modules?

How would one know? Do professors show class median and mean in the school portal?

 

[proudofmykids]

Why does this matter if it's P/F? Isn't the whole point of P/F to eliminate any distinction between median, average, high, low???

Given that it's P/F (true P/F, not BS P/F where there are still internal rankings), are these metrics even captured? If so, why on earth would they be published? Who would be looking at it?

Your kid is in school now, correct? She's passing, correct? If so, why do you care how much she is studying, or how much anyone else is studying? Just asking for a friend.

This is related to this whole thread on happiness! (to demonstrate the reality of actual p/f programs). This has nothing to do with my kid.

So, my question to current students, is relative to being in a p/f program, how much do the students actually dial down the studying intensity to help them be happier with less stress? If you are a student at a p/f program, are you really going to ‘let yourself’ study less, and you be happier knowing you were consistently one or two standard deviations below the mean? Or would it be just as stressful?
My specific question is essentially trying to understand whether scores means/medians are ‘lower’ resulting from less intensity reflecting p/f? If they do, then it is likely less stressful. However, it is really less stressful, IF the mean / medians are pretty high, and requires intense studying to get the high mean with a narrow std deviation?
So, now you understand why I asked what some of the means/medians are at some of these p/f schools, to see if they reflect expected p/f behavior by the class.

At my kids school, a p/f school, I was pretty shocked at how high the module test scores were! This meant that to shoot for the mean, each kid had to study as if it wasn’t p/f. The only difference was that you could worry less about falling short. Means we’re consistently in the low-mid 90s% with narrow steps deviation.

Does this make more sense?

You mention various types of p/f programs, with/ without rankings, with/out AOA. Many schools got rid of rankings but not AOA because Residency Programs still value that yardstick. So you connect the dots if AOA is Not just based on clinical rotations at schools that ‘don’t rank.

 

[proudofmykids]

How would one know? Do professors show class median and mean in the school portal?

I was asking current students. Yes, students see the reports on the modules.

 

[mailloxe]

For those in p/f programs, out of curiosity, what is the typical Median and Mean percentages on exams.

in my experience it varies a lot depending on the unit/class. People still work super hard, it's just that some of the harmful stress of needing to achieve 'perfection' is removed from the equation. I don't know if we always see the exam averages but iirc it is usually in the 80s, I know for one particularly hard organ system exam it was low 70s but it was aggressively hard. PSets or mini-exams are more in the low 90s.

 

[Damson]

I believe Albert Einstein is true p/f

 

[Matthew9Thirtyfive]

My school is honors/pass/fail. We are extremely collaborative. It’s more about the class culture than the grading scheme, though it does help I’m sure.