Second thoughts on Stanford: Advice please

[CD4]

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The stars were aligned right this spring and somehow I got into Stanford and Penn. With the 15th just a few days away I'm trying to make a final decision ASAP. I was set on going to Stanford. Stanford and Penn are great schools but what tipped the balance was that I'm from LA and I would much rather be closer to home and in warmer weather. In my enthusiasm for Stanford I read all that I could about it on the web and I went to second look weekend. Much of what I have learned makes me think harder about Stanford like:

Stanford's curriculum is way more out of it than I thought. They have a website for the curriculum reform committee. Straight from the committee, comments about Stanford's curriculum include
-"not primed for the future"
-"Our curriculum does not fit our faculty or our students."
-Does not use "the most effective educational methods--i.e., simulations, small group interactive learning, online curricula."
-"Insufficient early patient contact."
-"Insufficient mentorship and advising programs"
-In summary everyone agreed the curriculum needed major improvements, which won't be implemented for several years. I am concerned Stanford's curriculum is so out of touch that it really will impair my ability to reach my highest potential as a doctor. Penn's curriculum on the other hand was just redone. It's integrated, uses lots of technology, has early exposure to patients, etc. Penn's curriculum really is cutting edge
-We have all heard about how run down many of Stanford's educational facilities are. The anatomy labs are brand new but most everything else seems like it's from the 1960s. I don't mind if something is ugly, but again I am concerned this will impact my education. All the facilities at Penn are cutting edge.
-Also from the Stanford reform committee "Facilities inadequate for variety of teaching methods."
-Stanford is having trouble recruiting and retaining top faculty
"The medical school has by far the fewest number of faculty members among the 13 consortium schools -- 614 full-time faculty compared to 1,346 at UC-San Francisco, 1,844 at Johns Hopkins and 5,169 at Harvard. The result is that the faculty-student ratio at Stanford is relatively low at 1.4 faculty members for each student
-I wonder about the culture of Stanford Med. What kind of an administration and faculty members would allow their medical school to slip into such problems. These aren't things that happen overnight. Were they just too full of themselves, sun drunk, and riding on the Stanford name?
-To sum it all up I wonder how Stanford can possibly offer the "world class medical education" they claimed too at the revisit, when it has all these problems.
-Is Stanford med simply perceived to be good because of the magic Stanford name? If Stanford med weren't connected to Stanford I wonder if it would still be perceived as a top med school. I don't want to go to a school just for the name to inflate my ego. I want to get the best medical education whether it's at big name U or no name U. I wonder if Stanford med is a school in decline…..
-What I do like about Stanford is I feel the students are very happy and cool. And I love the area, the weather, and proximity to home. I'd definitely be happier in Palo Alto than Philly. But then now it feels like I'm choosing a med school just for the location. Since I'll be paying seriously $$$$$ to go to Stanford it only makes sense to me to also get an awesome education and training so I can best help my future patients. So maybe I should push myself to go to Penn. I'm don't feel fully comfy to go all the way over there at the moment. But I don't dislike the place either. I know I can learn to like it once I break out of this frame of mind (that's rapidly crumbling) that Stanford is actually all it's cracked up to be.
I'm glad Stanford is finally looking at "reform" and fixing all its problems. However that won't happen for several years and I feel the upcoming Stanford classes just might get the short end of the stick.

Feedback much appreciated. I'm sure all med schools have problems. Are Stanford's not as bad as they look or truly a cause for concern?

 

[schaunard]

As a preclinical student at Stanford, I can probably comment on several issues:

-You can rest assured that Stanford is not going down the tubes, and that the administration is not "too full of themselves, sun drunk, and riding on the Stanford name". Stanford is a great place to be, and the things that make it great - flexibility, resources, faculty, and administration that are all here to help you find your unique way of contributing to medicine - will be in place and will be enhanced in the years to come, curricular changes notwithstanding. In the same discussions which you cited, there was overwhelming agreement that these factors were the major strengths of Stanford. In fact, all of the proposed reforms are trying to capitalize on these strengths even further.

-Minor rebuttal: yes, Stanford's faculty is probably the smallest among its peer schools, but this does not necessarily indicate a difficulty in attracting and retaining faculty. In fact, Stanford takes particular pride in having such a small faculty - it allows for closer interactions among faculty and between faculty and students, and also the quality of the faculty is extraordinarily high regardless of size (e.g. NIH funding *per faculty member* is probably one of the highest of any institution). I'm not just stating the party line here...I came from an institution where the med school had tons and tons of faculty, and I felt lost when I was working there. Bigger is not always better. Since coming to Stanford I have been blown away by the faculty's openness, collaborative spirit, and dedication to education and mentorship, which were huge reasons for my coming.

-Graduates from Stanford do well. See <a href="http://www-med.stanford.edu/senate/CRCbull/Other_Resources/k_vosti_PGY-1_outcomes_7-10-00.html" target="_blank">http://www-med.stanford.edu/senate/CRCbull/Other_Resources/k_vosti_PGY-1_outcome s_7-10-00.html</a>, which asked residency directors about quality/preparation of Stanford grads from 2 recent classes. (yes, investigators were biased, being from Stanford, but I still think the conclusions hold water)

-This last point (i.e. Stanford grads doing well) is not to say that Stanford is for everyone. Yes, the curriculum is centered around lectures (although there are more lab- and case-based components to the curriculum than people realize). Also, it is true that *at the bare minimum*, patient contact during the preclinical years is probably not as early or significant as other schools (lots of my classmates find additional venues to work with patients quite a bit, though). Since Stanford and Penn are so different vis-a-vis curricula, you should decide which learning style works better for you. If you'd be happier with one style and absolutely miserable with the other, that's a key point, as that would get in the way of your learning. If anything, this is much more important than the quality of the educational facilities (which are old but work fine, btw) in determining how much you enjoy your preclin education and how much you get out of it.

I understand that you have concerns, and that this is a huge decision. Bottom line, though, is that you should rest assured that Stanford is doing fine (although it's not problem-free, like any school), and focus on which system works best for you.

 

[alina_s]

Congrats on having to make such a decision! I went to Stanford as an undergrad and am now a first-year med student (not at Stanford). When I was applying to med school, I had pretty mixed feelings about Stanford. My personal opinion is that its high ranking (on assorted med school lists) reflects the school's research faculty more than the teaching and training. Yes, it attracts a stellar student body and yes, the research is great (and there isn't any part of the country I would rather live in). However, the hospital is in a suburban setting and there are lots of competing hospitals nearby. I volunteered in the ER at Stanford and later had a job at an urban teaching hospital. The latter was far superior- busier and much better organized. Residents that I worked with (psychiatry) were also somewhat critical of Stanford's training program- more focused on research than ordinary patient care and training. I would guess that the med student training is similar. I'm also not sure about the way that the pre-clinical courses are scheduled- I really like taking most of the classes together and getting to develop a support network. If you're pretty committed to a career in academic medicine, it might be the place for you. Best of luck.

 

[CD4]

Thanks Schaunard and alina_S! I appreciate your insights. I actually think I won't be an academic, so maybe I'll have to work harder at Stanford to develop my clinical skills, but so far I feel location is more important to me. I'll be much happier on the west coast and hopefully that will enable me to work harder and excel even more. I know Stanford has it's weakesses, but yes, no school is perfect and at least Stanford has been up front about its problems.