Importance of Pail/Fail to Choosing a School

[ace12345]

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I hear people discussing this fairly frequently on here, but I was hoping to get some advice on it directly. In choosing between schools, how important is Pass/Fail in the curriculum? Life-changing, or not a huge deal?

 

[Pacna]

I honestly don't care when I'm choosing, but if you consider yourself successful only due to the amount of studying you have done (not intrinsically intelligent), then you may want to consider a less competitive school. This can mean pass/fail, but it's more important that the class is not ranked. I don't think pass/fail classes alone ensure a lack of competitiveness.

 

[ace12345]

I honestly don't care when I'm choosing, but if you consider yourself successful only due to the amount of studying you have done (not intrinsically intelligent), then you may want to consider a less competitive school. This can mean pass/fail, but it's more important that the class is not ranked. I don't think pass/fail classes alone ensure a lack of competitiveness.

Not sure where you were going on this one with the intelligence comment, but it appears to be counter to what I've seen when interviewing. As in the "Higher ranked" schools are more often pass/fail.

What I'm basically wondering whether pass/fail makes it easier to participate in research without worrying about grades, etc.

 

[Pacna]

Not sure where you were going on this one with the intelligence comment, but it appears to be counter to what I've seen when interviewing. As in the "Higher ranked" schools are more often pass/fail.

What I'm basically wondering whether pass/fail makes it easier to participate in research without worrying about grades, etc.

Oh I'm sorry. When I've been at interviews, the questions about pass/fail usually revolve around competitiveness between the classmates (and a general culture of family vs backstabbing).

I found that most schools are pass/fail in one way or another. ABCDF is really pass/fail, too. It doesn't matter what grade you get as long as you pass unless you're interested in radiology, orthopedic surgery, etc.

I can't comment on how they differ in time commitment.

 

[Jumpstartmy5HT]

I honestly don't care when I'm choosing, but if you consider yourself successful only due to the amount of studying you have done (not intrinsically intelligent), then you may want to consider a less competitive school. This can mean pass/fail, but it's more important that the class is not ranked. I don't think pass/fail classes alone ensure a lack of competitiveness.

Even at schools with a p/f system, the students are ranked...

The p/f system basically attempts to facilitate a more cohesive atmosphere where students help one another.

And to answer the OP's question: I personally place very little weight for the grading system at schools. At the end of the day, all schools have a ranking system that they use. Students at 5-interval grading system schools and percentage grading schools who do well may have something extra to show off on their residency applications, but the GPAs are less important in that scenario anyway. I think the step scores and the letters all carry more weight.

 

[sinombre]

Even at schools with a p/f system, the students are ranked...

Not all schools are ranked, and some only rank in groups (e.g. top quartile)

 

[solitarius]

I don't think many people will have the chance to choose. If I found myself in that fortunate position, P/F would be a major factor in my school decision, but I would assess it in the context of everything else. So basically, I wouldn't focus on P/F, but I would focus on whether the curriculum philosophy is one I adhere to.

School X may be P/F, but if it tends to recruit high achievers, the bar to pass will be higher. Also, School Y may be P/F, but they may compress the pre-clinical into 18 months. School Z may be P/F, but they don't use blocks. Stuff like that.

 

[notbobtrustme]

grading system doesn't matter; the amount of labs and mandatory attendance do matter.

Some schools have tons of labs (eg histo/anatomy/micro/clinical skills/etc etc). I'd be wary of joining a school that emphasized lab learning because you actually don't learn very much. Of all the labs we've had in our first two years, only the clinical skills labs are worth anything. If a school has mandatory attendance, that would be an automatic no-go for me personally. I find so much of lecture to be worthless so having the ability to skip around and speed up each presentation saves me so much time.

These are what you should be looking at when you decide on a school, with respect to the pre-clinical years. The number of residencies that care about your pre-clinical performance can be counted on one hand, regardless of grade. Even class rank isn't all that important; it's the most important thing of the things that don't matter.

 

[darkjedi]

I go to a school that is P/F the first semester and then converts into H/P/F for the other two. I can honestly say that I did not feel that the personality of the class changed at all. We are still super collaborative and share notes and flashcards. How much you stress about the H in H/P/F is entirely up to your personality. There are some people that will stress about anything, even if there were no honors. I personally don't put too much stock on whether I am shooting for any specific grade. I study how I always studied, and if I capable of getting honors, that's great. There really is no competition as it's just a straight cutoff. We are constantly told that even residency directors don't really care about pre-clinical grades, and what is most important are the Step 1 scores, your clinical grades and your letters from faculty/admin.

For what it's worth, we also have the top step 1 scores in the nation. How much H/P/F contributes to that is anyone's guess, but it's clear it doesn't hurt us.

 

[mcloaf]

I hear people discussing this fairly frequently on here, but I was hoping to get some advice on it directly. In choosing between schools, how important is Pass/Fail in the curriculum? Life-changing, or not a huge deal?

At least at my school, P/F is very much the panacea it's purported to be. Everybody is super collaborative and shares all their study guides etc. I still choose to put a lot of effort into studying and trying to score well, but there are plenty of people who use the system to allow them to have extra time for outside EC interests and research.

Even at schools with a p/f system, the students are ranked...

No. This is school dependent. Some schools are true P/F, others are not. I am a true P/F with no rankings.

 

[Jumpstartmy5HT]

At least at my school, P/F is very much the panacea it's purported to be. Everybody is super collaborative and shares all their study guides etc. I still choose to put a lot of effort into studying and trying to score well, but there are plenty of people who use the system to allow them to have extra time for outside EC interests and research.




No. This is school dependent. Some schools are true P/F, others are not. I am a true P/F with no rankings.

Your institution doesn't even rank people in quartiles?

 

[Pacna]

Your institution doesn't even rank people in quartiles?

I was told by two schools that they do not rank students in any way. I asked about how residency directors considered that and nobody had a clue.

 

[Jumpstartmy5HT]

I was told by two schools that they do not rank students in any way. I asked about how residency directors considered that and nobody had a clue.

That's interesting. Can you share what schools?

 

[mcloaf]

Your institution doesn't even rank people in quartiles?

Nope. All the transcript shows for the first two years is that you got a "P" in all your classes.

I was told by two schools that they do not rank students in any way. I asked about how residency directors considered that and nobody had a clue.

My school and others continue to match students just about anywhere they'd like to go. As pointed out earlier in the thread, preclinical grades are not really that important for matching in the first place assuming you're not failing anything.

 

[PennDippody]

I think ranking has more of an impact on competitiveness than does stratified grading. We are not ranked but still have 4 pass-levels (in addition to fail). This coupled with the fact that we are never graded on a curve makes us incredibly collegiate. And, as stated above, we match pretty well historically.

 

[thegypsyqueen]

Even at schools with a p/f system, the students are ranked...

The p/f system basically attempts to facilitate a more cohesive atmosphere where students help one another.

And to answer the OP's question: I personally place very little weight for the grading system at schools. At the end of the day, all schools have a ranking system that they use. Students at 5-interval grading system schools and percentage grading schools who do well may have something extra to show off on their residency applications, but the GPAs are less important in that scenario anyway. I think the step scores and the letters all carry more weight.

In 3rd year they are ranked, but some schools do true pass/fail for pre-clinical.

 

[eefen]

Just to throw my $0.02 in the hat... Instead of focusing so much on whether the school is "pass/fail" (which can mean many different things), I would suggest looking at things like required attendance (as mentioned), learning structure (labs vs lecture vs pbl vs on your own, etc.), whether grades are curved (imho, this seems like it would be a better predictor of collegiality vs "gunnerism" than p/f would be), and the like.

 

[Charles_Carmichael]

Grading system doesn't matter.

Mandatory attendance does.

 

[mcloaf]

Grading system doesn't matter.

Mandatory attendance does.

This is true.

I'll fly the true P/F flag all day, but I'd much rather have grades before I consented to mandatory attendance. That would be a nightmare.

 

[Kinch]

.

 

[Ismet]

Just looking at the pre-clinical years, I have to agree with what has been said in this thread.

My order of importance:
1. Non-mandatory lectures
2. Recorded lectures
3. P/F.

The class above me is H/P/F and honestly there's no huge difference in competitiveness. I would choose H/P/F over mandatory lectures. But P/F is pretty nice 😀

 

[Ismet]

I asked about how residency directors considered that and nobody had a clue.

Because pre-clinical grades are so low on the totem pole of things that matter to PDs that no one really needs to have a clue.

 

[Plecopotamus]

I also attend a school without grades or any ranking system whatsoever. We have an impressive match list, so clearly it's not impeding our applications.

Mandatory attendance is important.
However, I disagree with those who said it doesn't matter if you get grades. Although residencies don't focus so much on performance in didactic years, I would not want to be worried about having B's vs A's and wondering how it would hurt me. Med school is super competitive to get into, so even the bottom of the class or the person performing worst on a given exam is probably pretty darn smart -- it doesn't really benefit the school or such unfortunate individuals when labels are applied to indicate they are #100/120 . . . among the teeny tiny elite segment of the population that gets into med school.

 

[dahassa]

I currently go to a true pass/fail school with no internal rankings (I go to Columbia) and I can honestly say it has made a huge difference in my med school experience. This wasn't something I even considered in my application cycle. But after having had my current experience, I would never go to a not-pass/fail school if given the opportunity. It isn't just about class competitiveness but my personal mental state. Med school has not been as stressful for me and my classmates as it could have been. In fact, it has been less stressful than undergrad. So far no one in our class has failed a test. As long as you study, you will probably not fail. And, even if you fail the first time, you get to take it again the 2nd time and still get a pass (without it showing up on your transcript). They honestly want you to pass. There is literally no competition.

Everyone in med school is unbelievably smart. I can't imagine having to compete against these people (seriously). I doubt I would do well. But with p/f this isn''t a problem. I get to focus on the material I find interesting (into as much detail as I want) and not worry about studying for an A. I have time to do research, play in the orchestra, explore NYC lit everyone other day, and hang with my classmates. We also don't have any mandatory class and all of our lectures are recording. This also adds to decreasing stress levels. But as someone who generally goes to class, p/f is clutch.

We have an amazing matchlist. Residency directors use clinical year grades and step 1 as a guide. A lot of other schools are p/f like Harvard, Yale, Emory, ect. So it is rather common. If all things equal (money, location, quality), always go p/f.

 

[PennDippody]

Grading system doesn't matter.

Mandatory attendance does.

I couldn't emphasize this enough. Our school has worked it out to where there is SOME kind of mandatory function/lecture or whatever almost every day. This is the one thing I would change if I could.

 

[Dires]

I don't know if it's because I'm in med school or that I'm in a P/F system, but I have noticed that I have started to want to learn the material because I want to be competent and want to perform well. This is as opposed to cramming/studying just for the A.

EDIT: and I don't mind the mandatory lectures. I love being around my class. Sure it's not as efficient, but it sucks studying by yourself/in your same clicks constantly and not seeing everyone.

 

[Dr Feelgreat]

Not all schools are ranked, and some only rank in groups (e.g. top quartile)

+1 here.

Also, some don't rank at all, by percentile, quartile, or otherwise.

Also, these percentiles may be used to determine who is eligible to apply for AOA, an honors society and another form of ranking. Likewise, some schools do not participate in AOA.

It's probably helpful to keep in mind that students are evaluated at all schools, sometimes with grades and percentiles, but always also more implicitly through written evaluations etc.

Anecdotally, I attend a pass/fail school and really appreciate the lack of pressure over studying so far, compared to college. I haven't noticed competitiveness among my classmates.

 

[PennDippody]

I would focus on whether the curriculum philosophy is one I adhere to.

Or one you can SEE EYE 2 EYE with?!?!?!?