School List Comments?

[backsideatk]

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[backsideatk]

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[nothingman]

I think by the numbers/on paper, you should be competitive at most of the places you've listed. If you interview well, that list is almost certainly sufficient.

If you'd like to be extra careful, you can add 2-3 other mid-tier MSTP programs in the northeast/eastern midwest (perhaps in somewhat less "stellar" locations) that offer solid research and medical training. Case Western, SUNY Stony Brook, Indiana, come to mind, among others.

 

[MiniPanda]

I'm pretty sure that BU doesn't give a stipend during the med school years.

 

[backsideatk]

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[Ombret]

Seems like a good list. I don't disagree with nothingman's additions. Iowa would be another to throw into the mix. If the interview invitations do start rolling in, you might selectively prune the list, depending on what the reasons were for your regional bias. Good luck.

 

[eighty-twenty]

My suggestion would be to figure out which labs interest you most at each of those institutions. Obviously, places like Harvard, Penn, Cornell/Rockerfeller would have a lot to choose from. Look into the PI grants and see what funded projects they have and for how long. (go to reporter: http://projectreporter.nih.gov/reporter.cfm ). Pare down your list by city (you are going to live there for 7+ years), lab and what type of hospital training you like (urban setting, VA, community-ish, tertiary referral or mixed). All those on the list seem to be places where if you do well, residency placement shouldn't be an issue.

 

[Ombret]

Picking a program based on a specific lab is a great idea if you have a definite area of interest. However many applicants are pretty undifferentiated and of course your interests can change. The labs that look the best (most productive, etc.) on paper may either be rough places to work, or be at full capacity when you are ready to go into the lab.

I think the right level of resolution is to look at the institutions' overall strength in your presumed area of interest, not to find a specific lab ahead of time but to prove to yourself that there will be opportunities in that area once you hit the lab. If you like, I don't know, molecular neuroscience, then be sure that you look only at places that have SEVERAL labs working in that area. If one implodes, another person doesn't make tenure and leaves, a third gets recruited away... the strength should still be there.

 

[eighty-twenty]

I agree...never meant to suggest that you should just choose one lab....labs with a pleural.