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Title says it all. I'm conflicted between California Northstate and Temple's SMP. Temple has a conditional linkage. If I get a 3.6 in the program, I get to move on to their medical school. However, it is another year of tuition and if I don't hit that 3.6, I'd be done for... At the same time, I'm concerned about the quality of education/reputation of Northstate, especially with it's for-profit status. Any opinions or insight?
There are more choices than these 2. With a Temple SMP acceptance, that means you're at around 3.4+ and your MCAT is at least 30/510. I assume you're in California.
If you take the Temple path or the CN path, you're paying over $300k for med school. If you'll be borrowing most of that, you should consider building up another shot at the UCs. Think about doing a rigorous traditional masters with pubs, at a UC, and reapply afterwards. Usually when I suggest such a thing, people get really offended, my god you'd WASTE more years as a premed instead of picking a sure thing? MADNESS!!! Oh yeah? Well having pubs in hand when you start med school is a major advantage that pays off when you start trying for residencies. A rigorous masters with pubs plus a decent cuGPA plus decent letters from your grad school PI plus maybe a couple more MCAT points on a retake plus a couple more years of maturity is going to make your next UC interview round a completely different experience. And then you take on a lot less debt, with a lot more leverage for residency. Without having to move cross country or sell your soul.
Just think about it. You have time.
Temple is by far the better option if your family is paying your way. Perfectly good school. Crap Philly neighborhood, but otherwise good.
My problem with CN, aside from the total lack of ethical practices with financial aid, is the same problem I have with the Carib schools. The students who do fine in school will do fine in the match and will be fine. The students on the left half of the bell curve are not going to get any help, are at risk of failing out, are at risk of doing poorly on the boards, and are at risk of matching poorly. You can make no assumptions about which half of the bell curve you'll land on. I suggest that you can make no assumptions about CN getting things right in its first couple of classes - clearly the idea of staffing up to do right by their students is not a priority. CN is different from established USMD and DO schools, where faculty and staff take responsibility for applying best practices to student success. More or less.
BTW, having rotation sites is just a basic LCME requirement. It doesn't mean you have a well-known clinical department chair who can/will use his/her contacts on your behalf. It just means that the basic requirements for being a med school are preliminarily okay. By contrast, a med school that has its own hospital is generally going to set you up for a more predictable 3rd year and a more successful 4th year because the clinical faculty are academic professionals instead of community faculty. Sometimes community faculty are amazing teachers and mentors, but it's not their job to pave your career path.
Best of luck to you.
My problem with CN, aside from the total lack of ethical practices with financial aid, is the same problem I have with the Carib schools. The students who do fine in school will do fine in the match and will be fine. The students on the left half of the bell curve are not going to get any help, are at risk of failing out, are at risk of doing poorly on the boards, and are at risk of matching poorly. You can make no assumptions about which half of the bell curve you'll land on.
BTW, having rotation sites is just a basic LCME requirement. It doesn't mean you have a well-known clinical department chair who can/will use his/her contacts on your behalf. It just means that the basic requirements for being a med school are preliminarily okay.