Step 2CK and fellowships

[eyespy54321]

---

Members do not see this ad.

Hello,

So I just matched into ophtho residency and am taking step 2ck in a few weeks. I was wondering if having just a decent passing score is good enough or will that affect me in the future for fellowship match?

I know I eventually want to pursue fellowship and I have no idea if step 2 is important for that at all or if it would look bad to have a significantly lower score than step 1. I really don't feel like going balls to the wall with effort right now after having matched.

Thanks for any input

 

[Slide]

Hello,

So I just matched into ophtho residency and am taking step 2ck in a few weeks. I was wondering if having just a decent passing score is good enough or will that affect me in the future for fellowship match?

I know I eventually want to pursue fellowship and I have no idea if step 2 is important for that at all or if it would look bad to have a significantly lower score than step 1. I really don't feel like going balls to the wall with effort right now after having matched.

Thanks for any input

No one really cares about step 2 CK for fellowship. Other things are more important such as your letters and research.

 

[Hanky]

This is similar to the 'Should I care about step 3?' question that you're bound to wonder about next year when you'll still not want to go "balls to the wall."

The short answer is that it will probably make no difference as long as you pass.

The long answer is that it's part of the fellowship application, most people looking at you will probably glance at the three-digit number, and someone might care that you dropped from 250 to 210. Nobody will ever care about it more than your reputation (letters, personal calls, interactions at conferences, etc), and it's almost undisputedly the least important part of your application. However, just 1-2 weeks of effort will likely keep you close enough to your step 1 score that you can rest easy knowing that you didn't mess up the one part of your record that you can control as an MS-4.