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When I was a pre-dental, lurking on these boards a year or two ago, I remember people laughing at the pre-dents for trying to categorize schools as being "clinical" or "academic" type schools. I think one of the moderators might have even suggested that it is only pre-dents who have such notions.
I did a research externship this summer to a dental school in New England. A group of 5 of us from my school (in the midwest) went out for a month. We were joined by 1 student from USC, 3 from Meharry, 2 from Howard and about 20 from the host school. Of the 5 from my school we had 1 D4, 2 D3's and 2 D2's (all upcoming).
The people from my school and the other visiting schools knew so much more about dentistry than the people from the host school. Their first two years of school are almost completely academic. They honestly couldn't hold a conversation about dentistry. On the other hand, they have great scores on the boards. They pride themselves on placing a lot of people into residencies (GPR included). One of them mentioned to me that people from their school don't even consider going into private practice straight out of school. If they don't specialize, they do a GPR. I think most of them do plan on specializing though.
Most people at my school go right into practice. Most don't plan on specializing. And we see patients in the clinic beginning our 1st year. (just prophies, screeing and FMX). By 2nd semester of D2 year we will be doing operative in the clinic. Our school doesn't give us a single day off to study for boards. They couldn't care less if we specialize or not, as long as we pass.
None of this is intended to brag or put down. Just to point out two very different schools, Marquette and UCONN.
I did a research externship this summer to a dental school in New England. A group of 5 of us from my school (in the midwest) went out for a month. We were joined by 1 student from USC, 3 from Meharry, 2 from Howard and about 20 from the host school. Of the 5 from my school we had 1 D4, 2 D3's and 2 D2's (all upcoming).
The people from my school and the other visiting schools knew so much more about dentistry than the people from the host school. Their first two years of school are almost completely academic. They honestly couldn't hold a conversation about dentistry. On the other hand, they have great scores on the boards. They pride themselves on placing a lot of people into residencies (GPR included). One of them mentioned to me that people from their school don't even consider going into private practice straight out of school. If they don't specialize, they do a GPR. I think most of them do plan on specializing though.
Most people at my school go right into practice. Most don't plan on specializing. And we see patients in the clinic beginning our 1st year. (just prophies, screeing and FMX). By 2nd semester of D2 year we will be doing operative in the clinic. Our school doesn't give us a single day off to study for boards. They couldn't care less if we specialize or not, as long as we pass.
None of this is intended to brag or put down. Just to point out two very different schools, Marquette and UCONN.
