NSU vs LECOM-B

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I would go to

  • LECOM

    Votes: 12 20.3%

  • NSU

    Votes: 47 79.7%
  • Total voters
    59
allantois

allantois

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So I'm sure there are some people here who have applied to both schools or might apply to both schools.

Which one would you go to if accepted to both?

I think that the biggest case for LECOM is that their tuition is so much lower than that of Nova.


In pre-allo it seems that the consensus is pretty much to always go with cheaper option.
 
allenlchs said:
So I'm sure there are some people here who have applied to both schools or might apply to both schools.

Which one would you go to if accepted to both?

I think that the biggest case for LECOM is that their tuition is so much lower than that of Nova.


In pre-allo it seems that the consensus is pretty much to always go with cheaper option.
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NSU will provide you with strong clinicals, research opportunities, and overall is affiliated with a great university that will give you the university lifestyle.

LECOM-B will provide you with Independency with PBL, some research opps, but most importantly will give a better range of places to so your clerkships at. Be wary though that you may find your clerkships in community clinic as opposed to hospitals.

Hope that helps!
 
allenlchs said:
So I'm sure there are some people here who have applied to both schools or might apply to both schools.

Which one would you go to if accepted to both?

I think that the biggest case for LECOM is that their tuition is so much lower than that of Nova.


In pre-allo it seems that the consensus is pretty much to always go with cheaper option.
Click to expand...


The big thing with LECOM-B is their PBL. If that's your thing, then you should go there. I know people in my class that were accepted to both LECOM-B and NSU, but chose NSU because they liked the curriculum here better. I know other people that chose LECOM-B because they really liked the PBL. It depends on what works for you and what you like.
 
Agree with the others that the curriculum is key. If you think that PBL would be a better fit...go to LECOM-B. I did...and my wife did after...neither of us regret our decisions. You should get a quality education at either place.
 
NSU is the safer bet. Unless you are from Tampa I would say nsu
 
DoctorSynthesis said:
NSU is the safer bet. Unless you are from Tampa I would say nsu
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It's not like you can commute from Tampa to Bradenton 😀


Btw guys, we are talking about $50,000 difference in tuition over 4 years.
 
allenlchs said:
It's not like you can commute from Tampa to Lecom 😀


Btw guys, we are talking about $50,000 difference in tuition over 4 years.
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50 Grand well spent. Better educational quality/opportunities. At lecom you have to set up your rotations. NSU is getting research center/emergency facility/small hospital. NSU is close to fort Lauderdale/miami.
 
psychic_hearts said:
students at nova: do you guys at nova feel the material taught in lecture and tested will help with board preparation, or distract? i.e. are there a lot of non board-material related classes and tested material or do you guys feel the lectures are really valuable in preparing for boards? does Nova help students in any way for board preparation? also, are there any bad professors that test a harmful way i.e. i've had a SMP prof test on memorizing exact sentences vs actually learning the material.... worried about similar bad professors.

students at bradenton: I know bradenton has higher board scores so i was wondering if students at bradenton felt this was because of the PBL and if not, what is it at bradenton that prepared you so well??


The area I am interested in had more matches at bradenton which was my other issue. i want a competitive specialty residency in south florida and the ratio for this residency as far as matches was 5 to 1 bradenton to nova...(even though noone at either school matched this area in south florida, unfortunately.... wondering if the supposed specialty residencies at Larkin actually exist since i never see matches in them although the website claims they offer specialty residencies)

is that Nova hospital happening anytime soon? i am wondering if so, if it will provide more residency (hoping specialty)... opportunities for students at nova? Nova was my number one choice for medical school for past three years and only recently leaning more to bradenton but.... as tuition is comparable given i would be able to not pay for housing at nova, those other issues are the main questions i have...
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More news coming on the hospital in December. However don't count on it for specialties. It will be a small community hospital. However NSU has an association with lots of hospitals.

For ex:

http://www.browardhealth.org/?id=1155&sid=1
 
psychic_hearts said:
very nice- i didn't see residents in derm on match list for either bradenton or nova though- i am wondering if it is listed in a unique way? does this program accept a good amount of nova grads?

i know their hospital was pushed back because their initial location in mind had too many local hospitals nearby so it was rejected. nova should add some specialty residencies for that hospital
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My derm is an NSU graduate. So it can definitely happen.
 
Looks like the overwhelming opinion here is to go NSU. I respectfully disagree. Both schools will provide a quality education and will get you where you want to go, provided you are willing to work hard and take advantage of opportunities.

You don't just save 50,000 dollars by going to LECOM-B. You also save the interest on that difference in the loan amount. Sometimes, one ends up paying twice or even thrice their principal loan amount because of added interest payments throughout the duration of loan repayment.

So you may find that you save closer to 100k overall by going LECOM-B. Keep that in mind. My opinion is, go to the school that will save you a 100k. @allenlchs
 
Also, LECOM-B does have close to a 100% residency match rate, just like NSUCOM, and a strong residency match list to boot. So I don't know why some people think NSU is way way better than LECOM-B. It's not.

It's not like residency program directors are going to be like "Oh we have to always choose a NSUCOM grad over a LECOM-B grad, no question" That's simply not true. For the residency PDs, grads of both schools are considered "DO grads" that's it.
 
@Goro ,

I wonder what Goro thinks since it has always been recommended to go with the cheaper school. Does that also stand with DO schools?
 
j4pac said:
BTW...LECOM B student do NOT need to make their own schedules. That's 100% false.
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I thought you said that you need to schedule your own rotations
 
I would look at not only tuition, but match rates, curriculum, location, and fit.

Me personally, I dislike LECOM's mandatory dress codes and class attendance rules. You're adults and can make your own decisions as to how best you learn. My school doesn't have a dress code, but whenever my students so much as look at a real patient, they're dressed very professionally.


allenlchs said:
@Goro ,

I wonder what Goro thinks since it has always been recommended to go with the cheaper school. Does that also stand with DO schools?
Click to expand...
 
NSU hands down for me. PBL is meh.
 
psychic_hearts said:
students at nova: do you guys at nova feel the material taught in lecture and tested will help with board preparation, or distract? i.e. are there a lot of non board-material related classes and tested material or do you guys feel the lectures are really valuable in preparing for boards? does Nova help students in any way for board preparation? also, are there any bad professors?

students at bradenton: I know bradenton has higher board scores so i was wondering if students at bradenton felt this was because of the PBL and if not, what is it at bradenton that prepared you so well??


The area I am interested in had more matches at bradenton which was my other issue. i want a competitive specialty residency in south florida and the ratio for this residency as far as matches was 5 to 1 bradenton to nova...
Click to expand...

There's a good amount of fluff, but I mean..what do you expect? It's lecture. The people giving the presentations are experts in their field so they do go way into depth sometimes. I haven't taken boards yet, so I can't really tell you if lectures are valuable. But based on my limited board prep experience I would say that lectures aren't THAT valuable for boards...If I had to choose between Pathoma and my huge stack of path lectures, I would choose the former. I'm not trying to say lectures are useless or anything. They're alright for getting the basic idea down and laying a foundation from which to build off of, but there is a lot of fluff you need to go through to get to the 'important' board stuff. That being said, a lot of our professors (especially during M2 year) say something like "This part is high yield for boards, mark it in your notes". So..they do try to focus our studying to some extent. Anyway, that's my experience here.

What's supposed to help us with boards is making us take this academic review class every Friday where faculty go through board-style questions. The only problem is that it's more of a class discussion and everyone is on such different levels of prep that you pretty much just end up with a small group of people that are actually actively participating. I haven't really gotten much out of it. I get more done sitting in that class going through FC.

You also get a copy of FA and if you have good class reps, you can get good discounts on question banks and other prep materials.

There are *few* professors that I would say are "bad". They're actually brilliant people that are just horrible at teaching. I think most schools have those though.

If you have any other questions, PM me. We're about to get into finals though so I might not respond immediately.
 
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allenlchs said:
I thought you said that you need to schedule your own rotations
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ctran019 said:
NSU hands down for me. PBL is meh.
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PBL is awesome for some people...I know I wouldn't have done it any differently. There is a reason why LECOM-B had some of the top board scores in the country within the first 5 years of their existence. They had lower admission requires and still essentially mop the floor with the competition. LECOM-B is now becoming more competitive due to the success of their students (boards and residency matching)...so the program really is building steam.
 
I didn't know if I would like PBL, that's why I chose Nova. Since starting I've come to realize I learn best through lecture so I don't know that Lecom would have been good for me. However, many people in my class have said they get nothing out of lecture and would rather just read the material themselves. The nice thing about Nova is that attendance is not required except for a few classes so whichever way you choose to learn is up to you. Nova has a lot of faculty that work at local hospitals so that comes in handy for clubs and other events that allow you to get to know these people and give you a better sense of certain specialties. For example I recently went to a radiology club tour of the rads dept at a hospital where our radiology professor was the chief of the dept and then had a Q&A about residency programs. So far Nova has been great, but in the end I think your preferred style of learning has to be the biggest factor, not cost.
 
HeronsBeak said:
I didn't know if I would like PBL, that's why I chose Nova. Since starting I've come to realize I learn best through lecture so I don't know that Lecom would have been good for me. However, many people in my class have said they get nothing out of lecture and would rather just read the material themselves. The nice thing about Nova is that attendance is not required except for a few classes so whichever way you choose to learn is up to you. Nova has a lot of faculty that work at local hospitals so that comes in handy for clubs and other events that allow you to get to know these people and give you a better sense of certain specialties. For example I recently went to a radiology club tour of the rads dept at a hospital where our radiology professor was the chief of the dept and then had a Q&A about residency programs. So far Nova has been great, but in the end I think your preferred style of learning has to be the biggest factor, not cost.
Click to expand...

Hard for some people to know what their preferred style of learning is before they join medical school. As we've both found from our interactions with other students, many students don't benefit from a lecture based format. So there may be more people who may enjoy and thrive in a PBL format than you may think.

I agree that cost should not be the only factor but it is undoubtedly an important factor worth considering. There is a reason why so many attendings and residents tell pre-meds to go to the cheapest school here in SDN.

Another important factor apart from cost is the match rate, quality of match list, and the school's performance in board exams. Both Nova and LECOM-B have performed very well in this department so hard to say one is better than the other.

Location and fit is another important but subjective factor. OP has to decide by himself on this one.

As for mandatory attendance and professional dress code, I personally don't mind it all. I like to dress up and this will remind me that I'm a professional and should behave like a professional every day of medical school and beyond. As for mandatory attendance, I know how easy it is to fall back on work in medical school if one slacks off so I will attend class every day regardless of it being mandatory or not. These issues aren't that important for me but the OP has to decide if it's important to him or not. I've found that we humans are very adaptable creatures. Even if we're not used to dressing professionally every day or attending school every day, we get used to it if we have to, especially if everyone around us is doing it too.
 
Both will likely get you where you need to be as they are reputable instituatiuons...it just depends where you would prefer to be and what you like. Myself, I am not a fan of the persnickety rules of LECOM like the dress code and mandatory attendance and if given the choice between the two schools would pick NSU. However, take this with a grain of salt as I did not apply to either school because neither seemed to strike an real chord with me.
 
SkipJunior said:
As for mandatory attendance and professional dress code, I personally don't mind it all. I like to dress up and this will remind me that I'm a professional and should behave like a professional every day of medical school and beyond. As for mandatory attendance, I know how easy it is to fall back on work in medical school if one slacks off so I will attend class every day regardless of it being mandatory or not. These issues aren't that important for me but the OP has to decide if it's important to him or not. I've found that we humans are very adaptable creatures. Even if we're not used to dressing professionally every day or attending school every day, we get used to it if we have to, especially if everyone around us is doing it too.
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Even though I will attending a school with no attendance policy, at this point, I believe that I will attend lecture, HOWEVER, I really appreciate the option to miss lecture if need be and have access to a recording. Things come up in life, you get sick, your car needs to go in the shop, you need to schedule a doctors appointment during business hours, or you have an exam and its more time efficient to stay home and watch the lecture and study. In addition, I am all for professional attire, but when I am sitting in a lecture hall, I would prefer to be conformable rather than feeling uptight in a shirt and tie. Just my 2 cents, but OP should take his/her own preferences into account here.
 
Mad Jack said:
This is practically a non-question. The only reason to choose LECOM is lower debt if you are dead set on primary care.
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http://www.fcbc.net/archangel/woa/m...ublic_admissions/2014 LECOM Match Summary.pdf

If you click on the link and scroll to the last page, you will see the 2014 residency matchlist for lecom-b. Sure there is a emphasis on primary care, like the overwhelming majority of DO schools. However, lecom-b grads are matching into both osteopathic and allopathic residences that are not primary care.
 
SkipJunior said:
http://www.fcbc.net/archangel/woa/mgServeFile.php?fn=0_49_public_admissions/2014 LECOM Match Summary.pdf

If you click on the link and scroll to the last page, you will see the 2014 residency matchlist for lecom-b. Sure there is a emphasis on primary care, like the overwhelming majority of DO schools. However, lecom-b grads are matching into both osteopathic and allopathic residences that are not primary care.
Click to expand...
It's not that you'll only match primary care as LECOM. It's that it's worth paying the 100k+ to go elsewhere if you are going to match in anything that's not primary care. Because LECOM is horrible. Horribly horrible. LECOM is an oppressive prison camp of an environment that's best avoided if possible. If you want the kind of structure that LECOM provides, just go to USUHS. They have fantastic students- anyone would have to be to put up with what they put them through- but the school itself's structure is awful.
tumblr_n1f51zwiEF1t7py5eo2_500.gif
 
Mad Jack said:
It's not that you'll only match primary care as LECOM. It's that it's worth paying the 100k+ to go elsewhere if you are going to match in anything that's not primary care. Because LECOM is horrible. Horribly horrible. LECOM is an oppressive prison camp of an environment that's best avoided if possible. If you want the kind of structure that LECOM provides, just go to USUHS. They have fantastic students- anyone would have to be to put up with what they put them through- but the school itself's structure is awful.
tumblr_n1f51zwiEF1t7py5eo2_500.gif
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"Horribly horrible" "LECOM is an oppressive prison camp of an environment that's best avoided"

Those are some very strong statements. How do you know this so well? Do you know many LECOM-B students? Have you visited LECOM-B and attended class for a while? I'm surprised that neither @j4pac or his wife, who are both LECOM-B grads, considered it to be a bad school.
 
SkipJunior said:
"Horribly horrible" "LECOM is an oppressive prison camp of an environment that's best avoided"

Those are some very strong statements. How do you know this so well? Do you know many LECOM-B students? Have you visited LECOM-B and attended class for a while? I'm surprised that neither @j4pac or his wife, who are both LECOM-B grads, considered it to be a bad school.
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It's not a bad school, there's just plenty better. Mandatory lectures, mandatory shirt-and-tie every day, no food or drink in the classroom, security guards that watch you every second of the day... Yeah, I'm good. I was accepted and chose not to attend after both speaking to many current students during my interview (all of which encouraged me to go elsewhere if possible) and after taking in LECOM-B for the day.

Also, ugh, florida.
 
SkipJunior said:
Looks like the overwhelming opinion here is to go NSU. I respectfully disagree. Both schools will provide a quality education and will get you where you want to go, provided you are willing to work hard and take advantage of opportunities.

You don't just save 50,000 dollars by going to LECOM-B. You also save the interest on that difference in the loan amount. Sometimes, one ends up paying twice or even thrice their principal loan amount because of added interest payments throughout the duration of loan repayment.

So you may find that you save closer to 100k overall by going LECOM-B. Keep that in mind. My opinion is, go to the school that will save you a 100k. @allenlchs
Click to expand...

Skip haven't you learned the cheaper option isnt always the best? You get what you pay for.


psychic_hearts said:
I'm leaning very much towards LECOM-B even though I live in fort lauderdale... I figure my last two years, I can choose rotations in south florida in any case.... but given family and relationships are in fort laud, NSU would have been a more convenient choice... very hard decision 🙂 hopefully more posters will provide insight
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If you live in fort Lauderdale no brainer nsu
 
Mad Jack said:
It's not a bad school, there's just plenty better. Mandatory lectures, mandatory shirt-and-tie every day, no food or drink in the classroom, security guards that watch you every second of the day... Yeah, I'm good. I was accepted and chose not to attend after both speaking to many current students during my interview (all of which encouraged me to go elsewhere if possible) and after taking in LECOM-B for the day.

Also, ugh, florida.
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okay good point though I still feel those are subjective points of criticism. I wouldn't mind any of those things and considering LECOM-B has a full class every year, other people feel the same way as me too.

Also, for this particular thread, both schools are based in florida.
 
SkipJunior said:
okay good point though I still feel those are subjective points of criticism. I wouldn't mind any of those things and considering LECOM-B has a full class every year, other people feel the same way as me too.

Also, for this particular thread, both schools are based in florida.
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Miami is Miami. Florida is Florida. 😉

Plenty of people go to schools they would rather not attend because it's their last resort. Most of the people I know that ended up at LECOM fall into that category, though there were a few who attended for financial or geographic reasons. I don't know a single person that attended LECOM because of their stellar reputation or their love of rules.
 
DoctorSynthesis said:
Skip haven't you learned the cheaper option isnt always the best? You get what you pay for.




If you live in fort Lauderdale no brainer nsu
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Well, considering LECOM-B pretty much has a 100 percent residency match rate and considering I have met several LECOM-B grads and students who genuinely like their school, I would have to disagree with you.
 
Mad Jack said:
Miami is Miami. Florida is Florida. 😉

Plenty of people go to schools they would rather not attend because it's their last resort. Most of the people I know that ended up at LECOM fall into that category, though there were a few who attended for financial or geographic reasons. I don't know a single person that attended LECOM because of their stellar reputation or their love of rules.
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Plenty of people attend DO schools for similar reasons. Nothing wrong in that as long as they can succeed at the school and looking at LECOM-B's residency match rate and match list, they sure can succeed over there.
 
Mad Jack said:
It's not a bad school, there's just plenty better. Mandatory lectures, mandatory shirt-and-tie every day, no food or drink in the classroom, security guards that watch you every second of the day... Yeah, I'm good. I was accepted and chose not to attend after both speaking to many current students during my interview (all of which encouraged me to go elsewhere if possible) and after taking in LECOM-B for the day.

Also, ugh, florida.
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My experience and my wife's experience were very different than you describe...as well as my many friends from LECOM-B that I still associate with.

There's security...that's a bad thing?

You are rarely in the building because it's PBL. So you wear a shirt and ties s few hours most days. You do understand that professional attire is pretty standard for physicians, right? You can eat or drink, but not in the lecture calls. As a result everything looks brand new. I had no problem waiting a few minutes to eat or drink.

Attendance is mandatory...but is minimal because of PBL. LECOM-B is very different than LECOM-Erie. I have never even been to Erie. I've seen Silvia Ferretti twice in my life...once at my graduation and again at my wife's. They expect professionalism and hard work from their students. Probably part of the reason why students match to residency so well...along with destroying the USMLE and COMLEX.

I am very well traveled and the Tampa area is one of the finest in the country. If is by far the best area of Florida, but better than Miami which is dirty, overpriced, and pretty dangerous. We had the nicest beach in the US to unwind at after tests.
 
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SkipJunior said:
Well, considering LECOM-B pretty much has a 100 percent residency match rate and considering I have met several LECOM-B grads and students who genuinely like their school, I would have to disagree with you.
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I think LECOM is fine. Rules are weird though. Doesn't compare to NSUcom.
 
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