Longwood:
pros: diverse faculty interests and diverse education, the nicest residents ever, incredible resources in my specific area of research interest, and great hospitals that they rotate at: BID and Brigham Womens with exposure to the most varied patients population; a very good gut feeling for me personally during visit.
cons: they overemphasize CL psych which is not my strongest passion, and hours are more intense than Cambridge and Monte; location would require a commute for me; do not seem as family-friendly as the other two programs i am considering.
Monte:
pros: strong emphasis on personal growth and making space for that by not overworking the residents; emphasis on psychotherapy (is it so or is it just the old reputation); location works for my family reasons; program is very family-friendly, I personally had a good gut feeling in terms of the residents and how I fit. The program also gave me an impression of freedom of thought, and the chair of the dept is amazing, he wrote several books how to live a happy life;
cons: all three PDs are analysts and all faculty seems to be older so I am not sure the program is diverse enought and is moving forward, would be nice to hear if it's true or not; the location is not the best (although not a ghetto); population is almost exclusively lower class/hispanic/AA so not much of a diversity of pts; my concern is that the residents haven't impressed me as much as the Cambridge residents by their caliber however can't say anything negative about them, they were great! Not sure if this program has less of a reputation/prestige than the other two and their overall training is the same caliber as Cambridge and Longwood
Cambridge
pros: love the location and it would mean less commute for me; the residents have impressed me with how smart they are. The program directors are great; the psychotherapy training is strong; the working environment in a smaller Harvard-affiliated community hospital appeals to me and has a cozy feel, they do train many Harvard med students there so I am sure faculty is superb.
cons: a smaller Harvard-affiliated community hospital would probably give less diverse clinical training than that of the Longwood facilities BID/BWH, or Montefiore which is the main big teaching hospital of Einstein; the residents at Cambridge seemed so smart that it was even intimidating; they didn't seem as warm as the Longwood ones.
What do you think? Any input would be great!
