I guess I'll chip in because I'm currently deciding between these two schools and I'm OOS for both.
Iowa
- Positives
- They're the only school I interviewed at that had a traditional campus (i.e. open, public areas), which I personally enjoy. Most other schools are a dental building surrounded by the city.
- Iowa City. After I interviewed, people asked "Could you really see yourself living there?" Yes! I love real "college towns" as opposed to large cities.
- They're a very well-rounded program. You can be confident you'll get good didactic and clinical experiences, and they offer plenty of opportunities for research.
- I liked their externship program. They had options ranging from all over the U.S. to places in Europe.
- Negatives
- Cost. At about 374k for OOS, you're starting to get in to that pulsing red area on the debt chart. There's an odd meme on SDN that they give out OOS scholarships like candy to bring cost down substantially, but I didn't receive anything and I only remember one person mentioning it in the acceptance thread. Breaking the costs down, they included ~$5k/yr in personal and transportation costs in the estimate; some schools don't add this (Marquette does though, so we'll ignore it). Housing is 12-14k/yr, and I imagine you'll be able to knock a few grand off of that, but for the most part what you see is what you get.
- I wasn't really impressed by their facilities in terms of appearance. All of the clinics that I saw were essentially a bunch of chairs in a large interior room with little separation or privacy. The building itself looks like a soviet-era bunker from the outside, though the interior does has some pretty nice areas.
- This isn't really a negative, but I think they could have done a better job selling themselves. Their intro featured celebrity factoids like "Ashton Kutcher grew up here!" and "Ladies, so and so from whatever season on the Bachelor has a 5 million dollar farm a few miles away!" I appreciated the humor in it but at the same time it was kind of weird.
Marquette
- Positives
- I got a great vibe from the students. Everyone seemed incredibly happy there. Part of me believes that this is the most important thing to look for during tours, while another says it just depends whether or not you have a good tour guide or if you catch everyone after exams. We also went up to talk to one of the professors (I think it was in pediatrics), and he gave everyone a pretty great speech about how we should decide on a school and why Marquette is a great place.
- I loved their facilities. The building is brand new and it looks great. Their clinics are very different than any of the other schools I toured; they had all of their chairs on the outside of a winding room. There was plenty of space and privacy.
- At 352k you're probably thinking it's weird that I'm putting this as a positive, but it's a good deal for OOS students. IS is only like 35k less, so you won't feel like you're getting totally screwed when you sit next to a Wisconsin resident in class. Now, here's where a bit of "magic" happens with their estimated costs... During the financial aid presentation, the lady mentioned that people typically live on around half of what they list for housing. They have their housing portion at 78k total (22k/yr for three years!). Now half that. Your housing expenses are now 39k for four years, which brings that 352k down to 313k. Compare that to 370k+ at Iowa without scholarships, and remember that your debt on loans is going to be roughly double what you borrow.
- They have a great clinical reputation.
- Negatives
- MU is a Catholic institution... and I'm definitely not Catholic. I have complete confidence that this won't have anything to do with the dental school at all since they get public funding from Wisconsin (they emphasized that themselves). However, I'm kind of worried that it will be harder for me to relate to Marquette University as a whole in the same way as my undergrad.
- They openly state that Marquette isn't the best place to go if you're very into research. If you really want to do it you'll be able to, but they won't have the resources of somewhere like Iowa. Their research lab looked like any number of the intro-bio labs I was in at my undergrad.
- I didn't know Marquette had a dental program before I started researching schools. Is that a problem? Probably not. However, Iowa is more of a "name brand" just because it's a larger, public school as a whole. I doubt there's any actual prestige difference between the dental schools themselves.
This is the first time I've written a pro/con list out, so I'm sure I forgot to mention a few things. I'm personally leaning towards Marquette because of the cost and the vibe I got during my visit, but they're both great schools and I don't think you can go wrong. Let me know what you think!
