first off i should note that it's rediculously obvious who i am, so i'm not going to post anything inflammatory about USF. that said, i have generally strong feelings about the program, and as i've mentioned before, if not for my desire to leave tampa i'd surely apply and would strongly consider the program.
Strengths:
Many solid faculty - from my experiences with them, I feel there are solid faculty in the following areas: hematopathology, neuropathology, dermpath, cytology, gyn, liver and kidney, forensics, and microbiology. I have a specific person I'm thinking of for each here, and they're all very good at what they do and also good teachers. I don't have much exposure with the other faculty, so I won't comment about them.
Moffitt - a top notch cancer institute in the southeast. you'll see plenty of pathology here, including some of the zebras
Improving program - I think they're expanding the program in the next year or so, and from my observations, the lower-level resident classes seem to have increasing numbers of americans. i'm not knocking some of the upper-level FMGs, but i think we can all agree that more US MDs corresponds with more competitiveness.
Ancillary staff: at both the VA and Moffitt, there is plenty of support from some very knowledgeable and friends PAs. I can't speak about the TGH experience too much as I haven't spent much time down there.
young faculty: many of the faculty are relatively young - late 30s, early 40s. when i've spent time with many of them, they're cool people - the kind you'd go grab a beer with on a sunday afternoon and watch the bucs game or something like that. i think this contributes to a pleasant working environment.
USF med students: path residents help teach the MSII's pathology labs, and most of us are pretty cool.
tampa cost of living: much cheaper than anything up north, and the market is down lately because builders went a little crazy the last few years and demand is now less than supply.
Weaknesses:
disjointedness: the USF pathology department only has 3 actual practicing pathologists on faculty to my knowledge - the chairman, the PD, and the second year course director. all the other faculty are employed by the VA, Moffitt, county ME's office, etc. i don't know if this is intrinsically good or bad, but i would imagine there are issues sometimes about who's in charge. as a counterpoint, i've never heard of any problems because of this, and everyone got along just fine at the Christmas party.
lots of travel: the tampa bay area is big, and USF utilizes a lot of sites, some of which are up to 1 hour from each other (more in rush hour traffic, which
sucks here). no matter where you live, you're going to have to travel sometimes.
tampa weather: think swamp April thru October. you practically need malaria prophylaxis the bugs can get so bad. November thru early March tends to be rather pleasant though.
i'd be glad to try and answer any other questions thru PMs.