St. Martinus, is this school legit?

[RUJC05]

I keep on hearing about SMU, so I applied to St. Martinus University. However, I found out that SMU was St. Matthews. I feel like such an idiot. Anyway, anybody heard of this other SMU school (St. Martinus)? Is it a good school?

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[Brainy]

Dear RUJC05
I am a student at St. Martinus University, Curacao, Netherland Antilles.
Yes our school is legitimate. It's true we are new school but we are growing. I have finshed basic medical sciences and currently preapring for USMLE Step 1. In september many new student are coming probably more than 20. We have clinical rotations in USA at ACGME accredited programs. Currently we have clinicals setup in 3 states, Atlanta, GA, Bridgeport, CT, Maryland, MD. The faculty is excellant, experienced and very helpful. The facilities at St. Martinus are awesome, you will be surprised when you come here. We have all the labs with cadavers, wireless internet 24 Hrs. Library with many books and classrooms with all modern facilities.
Curacao is the best place to live. The climate is so good, cool breeze, well developed, crime free and you can get everything. There are big supermarkets, malls and movie theatre.
We have our own SGA website, you can log on to; www.sga.martinus.edu
You have any questions, please mail me or leave a pm.
Hope to see you soon on the island.

I keep on hearing about SMU, so I applied to St. Martinus University. However, I found out that SMU was St. Matthews. I feel like such an idiot. Anyway, anybody heard of this other SMU school (St. Martinus)? Is it a good school?

 

[Trunion]

The American Association of IMG...www.aaimg.com, lists this school among those with Signficant deficiencies. Here is what they say:

St. Martinus University, Curacao, Netherlands Antilles, 2003
It appears every Dutch island with the exception of Aruba now has a medical school. There is a sketchy web page showing a minimal basic science program crammed into four short trimesters. The new medical is located in Otrabanda, a charming, older area trying to attract business and tourist interest. The facility is a cavernous, old school building sorely in need of renovation for basic medical school facilities such as labs and a library. There were a handful of students and three faculty (one was the Dean) present. The Dean was a former administrator at the University of Sint Eustatius. This school hopes to attract Venezuelan and South American students with plans for extensive development and charges a great deal of tuition for a practically non-existent program. There are no loan programs to date. Curacao is a large island with one large major teaching hospital and more sophisticated medical community than most Caribbean islands. For the time being, St. Martinus rates Global Deficiencies Categories I-VIII

 

[mario567]

so I got into st. martinus,

is it not accredited in canada and states?

Does it mean after finishing and spending money (with no loan from the school) the degree is useless in canada and states?

thnxx

The American Association of IMG...www.aaimg.com, lists this school among those with Signficant deficiencies. Here is what they say:

St. Martinus University, Curacao, Netherlands Antilles, 2003
It appears every Dutch island with the exception of Aruba now has a medical school. There is a sketchy web page showing a minimal basic science program crammed into four short trimesters. The new medical is located in Otrabanda, a charming, older area trying to attract business and tourist interest. The facility is a cavernous, old school building sorely in need of renovation for basic medical school facilities such as labs and a library. There were a handful of students and three faculty (one was the Dean) present. The Dean was a former administrator at the University of Sint Eustatius. This school hopes to attract Venezuelan and South American students with plans for extensive development and charges a great deal of tuition for a practically non-existent program. There are no loan programs to date. Curacao is a large island with one large major teaching hospital and more sophisticated medical community than most Caribbean islands. For the time being, St. Martinus rates Global Deficiencies Categories I-VIII

 

[dragonfly99]

No, the school is not accredited in the USA. The only schools accredited in the USA are accredited by the Liason Committee on Medical Education (LCME) and are located in the USA (plus Puerto Rico, a US territory) or Canada. For all other schools, you're pretty much on equal footing with someone who went to school in India, Pakistan, the UK, Poland, etc., etc. The Caribbean medical schools are accredited by whichever country/island they are on, and they have no oversight or accreditation by the people who run US medical schools. There are a few medical schools in the Caribbean that have significant clinical experiences in the USA (for example, St George and Ross University). However, even for these schools your degree WOULD be worthless as far as practicing in the US if you do not do well on the US medical licensing exam (USMLE). Many of these schools in the Caribbean have a very low passing rate on this exam, which you MUST pass in order to do any residency in the USA. The pass rate for US students attending school in the US is somewhere above 90%. For most of the Caribbean schools the passing rate is well below 90%. So you could spend a ton of tuition and then not be able to ever practice in the USA.

The Caribbean schools are an option for US or Canadian students who can't find a spot in a school in their countries...at least for them they already have citizenship in their home country, which will make getting a residency a little easier. If I were a non-US or Canadian citizen, I don't think I'd be very quick to enroll in these schools. Probably better to enroll in a school in your own country (i.e. if you are Venezuelan, enroll in Venezuelan medical school) then if you want to practice in the US or Canada, try to do a couple of months there as a visiting student and then take the USMLE test and try for a US residency.

 

[mario567]

Thank you so much for the detailed and fast reply.

So the whole point is to get residency in states or canada? If someone gets that, they're done right? after finishing rotation and residency they can go and open up their own practice? I am canadian citizen. I have no idea how it works for canada, like states has USMLE how about canada?

If someone gets a great score on USMLE from st martinus does it mean they can get the residency in states and canada? is it only based on USMLE mark?

I really really appreciate your response

 

[mario567]

1)Is passing the USMLE the most important thing in carribean med schools ? like you can go to any carribean med school and as long as you pass USMLE with very high mark you're safe? or even if you do so well in USMLE depending on the school you went to they may or may not give you residency in states and canada?

2)why everyone talks about USMLE and not canadian exam? does canada have similar exam as USMLE - that if someone wants to get residency in canada must pass? or USMLE works for both states and canada?

3)so what are the steps ?USMLE 1 +trying to get rotation and reidency incanada or states+USMLE2+ graduation=>you can work as a doctor anywhere in canada or states?

4) what is the difference between accredite university and not accredited one?is the only difference the USMLE part?

Dear RUJC05
I am a student at St. Martinus University, Curacao, Netherland Antilles.
Yes our school is legitimate. It's true we are new school but we are growing. I have finshed basic medical sciences and currently preapring for USMLE Step 1. In september many new student are coming probably more than 20. We have clinical rotations in USA at ACGME accredited programs. Currently we have clinicals setup in 3 states, Atlanta, GA, Bridgeport, CT, Maryland, MD. The faculty is excellant, experienced and very helpful. The facilities at St. Martinus are awesome, you will be surprised when you come here. We have all the labs with cadavers, wireless internet 24 Hrs. Library with many books and classrooms with all modern facilities.
Curacao is the best place to live. The climate is so good, cool breeze, well developed, crime free and you can get everything. There are big supermarkets, malls and movie theatre.
We have our own SGA website, you can log on to; www.sga.martinus.edu
You have any questions, please mail me or leave a pm.
Hope to see you soon on the island.

 

[dragonfly99]

mario
You seem very confused and I am concerned. You need to do a lot more research before you enroll in ANY medical school. Make sure it's what you want and that going to the school will get you to where you need to go.

I don't know what the rules are for practicing in Canada because I'm not Canadian. I do know that they have a test similar to the USMLE (but it's not the same test and the USMLE doesn't "count" for getting in to Canadian residencies). You should talk with some Canadian doctors, and/or premedical counselors at a Canadian university, about this.

For the US, the only accredited medical schools are ones located in the US, Canada or Puerto Rico. These schools are accredited by the Liason Committee for Medical Education (google LCME or the American Association of Medical colleges, AAMC, for more info). For people who attended any other medical school, they are considered an "international medical graduate" and even though they sometimes can get a residency in the USA, they have to do extra things to get one. For example, they have to get a visa, and some other things. They usually only can get a position in some of the specialties that are less popular in the USA (like family practice, internal medicine, psychiatry). It is usually not possible for them to get a residency in some of the specialties that are most popular in the USA or that only have a few residency positions in the USA (dermatology, plastic surgery, neurosurgery, for example).

Some of the Caribbean medical schools are kind of a swindle/fraud and you definitely need to be careful. If you go, I would only go to one that has a proven record of having students graduate and go on to practice in the USA. And I don't mean just 4 or 5 students. The school should be able to prove that 90% or more of its students can pass the USMLE exam. Nobody who doesn't pass that exam can get in to any residency in the USA. It isn't allowed for the residency to take them. Usually people who pass the exam but don't score well might have trouble getting any residency in the USA, if they are not US citizens and didn't go to medical school in the USA.

Steps to getting residency in the US if you are not going to a US medical school.
1) attend a foreign medical school, pass USMLE Step 1 after the first half of your medical school (would be 2 years in the USA). You need to get a good score.
2) start doing clinical rotations for 2 years (better if some of these are in the USA). pass the USMLE Step 2 and USMLE Step 2 clinical skills exam. You need to get a good score.
3) in summer or fall before you graduate from medical school, apply to residency in the USA. You need to work on getting a visa if you aren't a US citizen, and also something called a ECFMG certificate. I don't know the details of that - you'd have to ask someone who attended a foreign medical school.
4) do 3-7 or more years of residency in the USA (depends on your specialty field). Get a medical license (may be harder to get if you didn't go to medical school in the US, particularly in certain states like California or New York). Now you can legally practice. Usually you also need to pass another exam in your specialty area (like family practice or surgery) to get a good job.

 

[NAVYLABTECH08]

Easy way to rule schools out, go to the VA website and look to see if MGIB benefits can be used at that school. If your school is not on the good to go list, you need to do some serious accredation research because that school has conflicts with some US states or all of them!

 

[mario567]

Thank you both for your response, I really appreciate it.

 

[mario567]

well none of carribean med schools are in the list . at least in the list that i searched maybe i didnt look into the right list. should i search under affiliation with med schools?/

 

[NAVYLABTECH08]

well none of carribean med schools are in the list . at least in the list that i searched maybe i didnt look into the right list. should i search under affiliation with med schools?/

Yes they are. You must serach by the island and not the name of teh school. If you don't put the name 100%, it will not show. Forexample, if you search the island of Dominica for VA affiliated schools, Ross shows up. I know for a fact that all big 4 schools show up. This means that you can get a US state license in all states. Search again more closely.

 

[mario567]

Thank you so much NAVYLABTECH08

Yes they are. You must serach by the island and not the name of teh school. If you don't put the name 100%, it will not show. Forexample, if you search the island of Dominica for VA affiliated schools, Ross shows up. I know for a fact that all big 4 schools show up. This means that you can get a US state license in all states. Search again more closely.

 

[mario567]

I still couldnt find it, would you mind sending me the link , the VA website seems confusing.

 

[User13579]

I was accepted into the medical program at St Martinus University. Before my arrival, I was told I had to submit a $1,000 down payment in order to secure a spot. I was assured that this deposit was refundable. I went down to the school to check it out and make sure it was the right choice. Shortly after I arrived I realized that the Island was not what I thought and it became clear that this was not the place for me. I left and returned to Canada, and a month later the school finally (after 2 attempts) answered my email stating that I would not get the refund back. The email is below:


We understand that you will not be attending St. Martinus University this year, but as per the admissions policy, the $1,000 seat deposits are non-refundable. However, if you are interested in attending in January 2012, please let us know and we will reserve your seat.

Thank you again for your interest in St. Martinus University Faculty of Medicine and we hope to see you in 2012.


However, the policy in question states that "A seat reservation fee is a one time non-refundable fee of $1000 US and will be deducted from the cost of tuition upon attending." Since I never attended the University, (Ie., I just visited the Island and withdrew my application before school even began) the money should be refunded in full. In my correspondence with the school, I was assured this was the case. The deposit was to be fully refunded so long as I did not attend the school and withdrew my application BEFORE classes began. In this instance, it's safe to say that the school has grossly misrepresented themselves.

Their willingness to steal my money truly shows how desperate this school is for cash, which reaffirms my decision to not attend. I hope other students don't have to go through the same thing. If anyone wants any information, feel free to contact me. I will be launching a very public campaign until I get my money back or settle in court.

 

[BarcaBest23]

ummm, not sure what you misinterpreted in the "fine print" when it said NON-REFUNDABLE, regardless of what "they" told you over the phone, this written statement proves that you will not get your money back and will only be made available to you if you attend the university as it will be included towards your tuition. Pretty straightforward if you ask me. Situation sucks regardless.

I was accepted into the medical program at St Martinus University. Before my arrival, I was told I had to submit a $1,000 down payment in order to secure a spot. I was assured that this deposit was refundable. I went down to the school to check it out and make sure it was the right choice. Shortly after I arrived I realized that the Island was not what I thought and it became clear that this was not the place for me. I left and returned to Canada, and a month later the school finally (after 2 attempts) answered my email stating that I would not get the refund back. The email is below:


We understand that you will not be attending St. Martinus University this year, but as per the admissions policy, the $1,000 seat deposits are non-refundable. However, if you are interested in attending in January 2012, please let us know and we will reserve your seat.

Thank you again for your interest in St. Martinus University Faculty of Medicine and we hope to see you in 2012.


However, the policy in question states that "A seat reservation fee is a one time non-refundable fee of $1000 US and will be deducted from the cost of tuition upon attending." Since I never attended the University, (Ie., I just visited the Island and withdrew my application before school even began) the money should be refunded in full. In my correspondence with the school, I was assured this was the case. The deposit was to be fully refunded so long as I did not attend the school and withdrew my application BEFORE classes began. In this instance, it's safe to say that the school has grossly misrepresented themselves.

Their willingness to steal my money truly shows how desperate this school is for cash, which reaffirms my decision to not attend. I hope other students don't have to go through the same thing. If anyone wants any information, feel free to contact me. I will be launching a very public campaign until I get my money back or settle in court.

 

[thuc]

i agree with BarcaBest23.

User13579, you stated the policy that the Reservation fee is non-refundable. St. Martinus University states it on their website that the Reservation fee is non-refundable.

Once you give them your money, you're saying hold me a seat, don't give it to any other student who applied so that I don't potentially have to wait a semester to start from the class filling up. Whether you actually attend the school is a different story.

You said you had correspondence stating it was refundable. If it was in writing then you might be in luck for fighting to get it back. Otherwise, probably not.

Sorry and good luck.