Current student at PCOM-GA. Was accepted to LECOM Seton Hill and I have to say, if I could go back I would take it. I'll try to answer some of your questions based on the answers I got when interviewing.
Q: Potential problems for studying is that the library is small. Seton Hill students actually are not very fond of LECOM students. There are lots of complaints about how LECOM students are "entitled" and take up their study space even though the LECOM students have their own library. Back in the day, there was in app called Yik Yak and there were A LOT of complaints about LECOM students on it. Take that with a grain of salt lol.
Q: I would say knowing what I know now, PBL would be awesome. Anything that gives me the least amount of lecture time I would take. PCOM-GA has a lot of BS mandatory lectures during second year. They'll take off percentage points from your grade if you don't attend and a lot of it is not board relevant. It's information that would be useful for 3rd and 4th year rotations, but as someone who is trying to focus on boards, it's incredibly difficult with all the mandatory lectures.
Q: You can travel for research. I've asked other LECOM-SH students and some go to Pitt (40 minutes away) to do research. Some students at PCOM-GA do research in Atlanta which is 40 minutes away from campus. Lots have done summer research programs. Although, it is pretty easy to get "on-campus" research as a lot of the faculty at PCOM-GA are really into research.
Q: Not sure. At PCOM-GA we don't get much pre-clinical exposure unless we go out and venture for it. There are workshops that the clubs do like suture clinics and ER simulations, but I'm sure this is the same for most med schools.
Q: You set up your own rotations at LECOM-SH. To me this is awesome. It's a lot of leg work, sure. But at PCOM-GA most of our rotation sites are in rural cities with nothing. I got placed in the most rural city Moultrie, GA where there is literally nothing around. Best thing they have is Walmart. You can Google it if you want. Looking back, I'd rather set up my own rotations where at least I have some control on where I get to go.
When you get to Greenville for your LECOM-SH interview, you probably won't like it. It's nothing like Suwanee, GA if you like suburban and city life. I liked PCOM-GA my first year. But as a second year, you'll probably get real fed up. I have friends at both the Seton Hill and Bradenton campuses and they're relatively happy. A lot of people on SDN crap on LECOM's administration for the dress code and water/food thing. I bought into it but honestly, dress code isn't a big deal. PCOM-GA has a dress code when "guest lectures" visit. During your second year, that will be a lot. We have mandatory lectures from 8am to 4pm a lot nowadays where we have to dress up.
Go into your interview open-minded about LECOM-SH. I read a lot of bad stuff about LECOM here and I went into the interview with those preconceived notions. But I will say, and if this is the only thing you get from my little info session/rant, everyone is right about anatomy lab being a time sink. I thought "anatomy lab will be awesome, I need to go to a school with an anatomy lab." It's a waste of time. It will take 10+ hours of your time a week. You'll spend 4 hours of your time taking out the fat and fascia. Then you'll have to try and examine the other dissections that everyone botched, trying to figure out how the rhomboids ended up on top of the trapezius. It's just not an effective way to learn (if surgeons did the dissections, I think it would be) and if I could go back, I'd rather my 50k tuition go to something more worthwhile.
