Rant: You're Doing it Wrong

[Milotic]

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I have been noticing something that goes on not only in these threads but also in medical school.

This is notion that Amount of time put in = Success. For some reason, the lot of medical students believe that if you study enough, you can achieve honors. If you don't get into the honors range from studying hard enough then you're "doing it wrong."

Example: Scores come back

Student #1: "Hey Student #2! I can't believe I got above average after spending the weekend before the exam hiking! I know you probably did better than me because you study so much"

Student #2: "Man, I spent both my Saturday and Sunday studying all day. I only landed average."

Student #1: "Oh jeez, were you taking a lot of breaks, facebooking and watching netflix and youtube?"

Student #2: "Nope 🙁. Just simply couldn't remember everything well enough even when spending so much time studying."

Student #1: "Well you must be Doing it Wrong"

I am sure there are some people that are able to blast through all the material once or even twice and master it well enough to get phenomenal grades.

Why can't people understand that there are just some of us who, even after studying significantly more, just don't have the natural capabilities to memorize and understand well enough and quick enough to score at the honors level? People seem to assume that if you didn't make honors or a 250+ on Step exams, you must not have wanted it badly enough or just studied wrong. In reality, some people try everything out there for them, but just like people are built differently with different sets of natural skills, people have different plateau points for studying medicine at a fast and accurate enough pace.

Specifically on SDN, I see a lot of "If you do X, Y, Z you're guaranteed ______" type of advice. Maybe I am just frustrated in the lack of perspective a lot of medical students have and a lot of them just can't wrap their minds around the fact that there are some students out there who won't even break into the top half of the class in anything regardless of how hard they try or how much time they put in. If such a student appears in front of them, they simply think "They are doing it wrong".

 

[MrChance2]

http://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=e-peen

 

[PL198]

lol you brag to your peers about exam scores

 

[bananafish94]

I have never received this kind of advice. All of the upperclassmen at my school have told me that if you ask 10 people how to study, you will get 10 different answers. The first two weeks of my first block were spent tweaking my study strategies to find something that works well for me, and I did! In the first few days of the next block, I've realized that this strategy is worthless for the new material. I suspect that a great deal of medical school (and life in general) is constant adjustments and experimentation.

 

[eteshoe]

 

[.hematoma.]

If you're happy with your scores, keep doing what you're doing. If you aren't happy with your scores, THEN you are doing something wrong.

 

[Brorthopedic]

If you're happy with your scores, keep doing what you're doing. If you aren't happy with your scores, THEN you are doing something wrong.

This makes no sense

 

[tymont12]

If you're spending hours and hours more than other classmates trying to learn the same material and still doing awfully, there probably is something you could do better. This isn't theoretical physics. Saying you can't do any better is like people who drop calculus in college because, they just can't do it. If class rank is not important to you, then F people who give you crap. But if you're complaining about not doing better, then figure it out.

The people in my class who seem to struggle are those who are less focused on integrating the material and more focused on how they are studying or the method they are using. It's like they think they're going to crack the magical med school learning code with some new plan.

 

[.hematoma.]

This makes no sense

Thought it was fairly clear. OP is frustrated about how people allegedly make judgements about people who don't score well. If you're happy with your scores, you shouldn't worry about what other people say (as long as you're not failing). If you aren't happy with those scores, then you need to make a change.

 

[The Knife & Gun Club]

Theres a dude in my class who spends every night drinking on the undergrad campus with his former frat and still blows up 95+ on every exam.

Idk what the f*** hes doing differently, but I'm clearly doing it wrong.

 

[Psai]

if it's a violin why are they holding it like a cello
checkmate atheists

 

[Sardinia]

Ah yes. September, the first day of classes where we get to convene with our intellectual peers and share stories about how awful our classmates are on SDN.

 

[Ace Khalifa]

Theres a dude in my class who spends every night drinking on the undergrad campus with his former frat and still blows up 95+ on every exam.

Idk what the f*** hes doing differently, but I'm clearly doing it wrong.

Lmao some of your classmates are ridiculous

 

[IsWhat]

I have my doubts these kind of people actually exist, and if they do then they are extreme outliers. One of my best friends graduated at the top of his class and is an ortho resident now - he was one of those people who "had a life" so to speak. Except he would do flash cards at weddings where he was the best man, and when we went to the gym he was doing flash cards in between sets, etc. He basically did flash cards everywhere he went.

My point is, people who do really well in medical study...A lot. Even when it looks like they aren't studying...They are.

 

[cbrons]

The real Q is why people at P/F schools where pre-clinical grades dont count for AOA care about pre-clinical grades.

Sent from my SM-N910P using SDN mobile

 

[bananabreadhunter]

The real Q is why people at P/F schools where pre-clinical grades dont count for AOA care about pre-clinical grades.

Sent from my SM-N910P using SDN mobile

Is there any research showing that doing better in preclinical p/f classes results in better step 1 scores? I have heard the answer is yes, but have yet to see some hard data. I ask because I am doing well in pre-clinical p/f classes but am also aiming for a competition specialty. I'd consider studying less and adding research to my schedule if time allows.

 

[cbrons]

Is there any research showing that doing better in preclinical p/f classes results in better step 1 scores? I have heard the answer is yes, but have yet to see some hard data. I ask because I am doing well in pre-clinical p/f classes but am also aiming for a competition specialty. I'd consider studying less and adding research to my schedule if time allows.

The only time studying harder for those classes is if they are closely following what is tested on boards. At many schools, the PhDs who teach the basic sciences are trashy lecturers and produce garbage notes and even more garbage tests that are not reflective of USMLE. In that case, memorizing their trashy powerpoints for several hrs per day is a waste of time, and you can do self-learning via resources like Dr. Najeeb lectures, reading textbook, Pathoma, etc.

 

[deleted500612]

I have been noticing something that goes on not only in these threads but also in medical school.

This is notion that Amount of time put in = Success. For some reason, the lot of medical students believe that if you study enough, you can achieve honors. If you don't get into the honors range from studying hard enough then you're "doing it wrong."

Example: Scores come back

Student #1: "Hey Student #2! I can't believe I got above average after spending the weekend before the exam hiking! I know you probably did better than me because you study so much"

Student #2: "Man, I spent both my Saturday and Sunday studying all day. I only landed average."

Student #1: "Oh jeez, were you taking a lot of breaks, facebooking and watching netflix and youtube?"

Student #2: "Nope 🙁. Just simply couldn't remember everything well enough even when spending so much time studying."

Student #1: "Well you must be Doing it Wrong"

I am sure there are some people that are able to blast through all the material once or even twice and master it well enough to get phenomenal grades.

Why can't people understand that there are just some of us who, even after studying significantly more, just don't have the natural capabilities to memorize and understand well enough and quick enough to score at the honors level? People seem to assume that if you didn't make honors or a 250+ on Step exams, you must not have wanted it badly enough or just studied wrong. In reality, some people try everything out there for them, but just like people are built differently with different sets of natural skills, people have different plateau points for studying medicine at a fast and accurate enough pace.

Specifically on SDN, I see a lot of "If you do X, Y, Z you're guaranteed ______" type of advice. Maybe I am just frustrated in the lack of perspective a lot of medical students have and a lot of them just can't wrap their minds around the fact that there are some students out there who won't even break into the top half of the class in anything regardless of how hard they try or how much time they put in. If such a student appears in front of them, they simply think "They are doing it wrong".

What your post said

Some students are just smarter than other students.

What your post could have said to make the exact same point and save us all 2 minutes of our lives

 

[Donald Juan]

Med school and residency should be a constant reevaluation of what you are doing and how you can do it more efficiently and more productively. This doesn't ignore the fact that people are on different baseline levels, but when someone comes on to SDN and says they study 16 hours a day 7 days a week and are barely passing, it does make us consider they aren't being efficient enough with their time, or they have poor study habits. This is more likely than the fact that maybe their intelligence level is so low it really takes them that long to be at the bottom of the class, and that there is nothing they could change to do better.

 

[operaman]

Oh yeah I heard all about these same super geniuses when I was a student. Where was Mr. 95% Party Boy when AOA invites came out?

Not. F---ing. There.

Lots of bull stories out there. Don't believe the rumors, believe results. Those who do seem to go out more and actually doing well are studying some other time, either getting up early each day or flash carding it everywhere like the guy above, or something else.

Focus only on yourself and what you are doing and don't waste any time thinking about these fictitious super geniuses who are just coasting by at the top of the class on two hours of studying a week. I promise the reality you see when AOA and other honors are awarded will be very different from the mythology you've been hearing.