SUNY Schools

[NurseyK]

I heard a rumor today: SUNY med schools generally do NOT accept their undergrad alma maters?!...yeh or neh?

------------------
The grass isn't greener on the other side --- it's just different grass

---

Members don't see this ad.

 

[turtleboard]

The State University of New York is a multi-campus university system that's publicly funded. It's larger than the University of California, which is another, MUCH MORE prominent public system of higher education.

The four SUNY medical schools (Buffalo, Stony Brook, Downstate (Brooklyn), and Upstate (Syracuse)) generally take in students who are New York State residents, have outstanding undergraduate careers, but the SUNY medical schools show no preference for graduates of SUNY campuses.

If you're thinking of a SUNY school for college, I'd suggest SUNY Binghamton which has an outstanding national reputation and is considered the most selective of the SUNY campuses. For what it's worth SUNY Buffalo is the university's flagship campus (Berkeley is UC's flagship, Ann Arbor is UMich's flagship), but its undergraduate program and its students are a little weak compared to Binghamton.

Good luck.


Tim of New York City.

 

[NurseyK]

Tim -

Possibly, I did not make my question clear enough.
I am already a graduate from a SUNY school (many moons ago) and, therefore, not looking for an undergraduate school, and clearly understand the whole SUNY concept.
My question regards the Medical Schools affiliated with their undergrad SUNY schools. Another SUNY grad had stated to me, "Don't bother applying to your SUNY alma mater medical school because they generally do not accept their undergrads (graduates)." This came as "news to me," so to speak, and question its validity.


[This message has been edited by NurseyK (edited 12-19-2000).]

 

[turtleboard]

Well I suppose that's true, but I can't offer you anything concrete in support of that statement. The SUNY med schools generally take in a lot of non-SUNY undergrads, so that's possibly the basis for the rumor.

Why did you think Stony Brook or Buffalo would take more of their own undergrads? Many med schools, in fact, don't draw most of their students from an associated undergradaute college for a variety of reasons.


Tim of New York City.

 

[NurseyK]

I did not think the majority of accepted med students would be from their undergrad institutions. The "don't bother" portion of that person's statement (and further conversation with the person) eluded to blatent disregard for former undergrads - which gave me cause for concern (money spent being towards the top of the list)....

------------------
The grass isn't greener on the other side --- it's just different grass

 

[Test Boy]

I have a friend who went to SUNY Stony Brook for med school. From what I gathered it seemed like a good number of the students there went to Ivy League schools.

 

[turtleboard]

Yes, a lot of SUNY Stony Brook kids are from Ivy schools just as the "feeder" institutions for the other three SUNY schools tend to be Columbia and Cornell. Scary.

Tim W. of N.Y.C.

 

[gower]

SUNY medical schools not accepting students from their own campuses? Nonsense. I know the SUNY system well and the SUNY medical schools well. I cannot imagine how such a rumor started.
Many medical schools had rosters in the back of their catalogs listing the students in the first year class at the time the catalog was readied for the press. Along with the names, the undergraduate school for each medical student was included. In recent years fewer medical schools appear to have been doing that; sometimes, though, they will list the colleges from which the freshman class is drawn. If you have access to a college library you might find catalogs.
Every premedical advisor's office will also have a sampling of catalogs.

 

[gower]

I missed your point about "former" undergrads. I take "former" to mean that you earned a degree from one of the three SUNY campuses on which a medical school is also present: Stony Brook, Binghamton and Buffalo. (SUNY-Syracuse medical school is alongside the campus of the private Syracuse University). However, if you graduated five or more years ago from any SUNY campus, more recent biology/chemistry grades will be expected.
If my guess is right, "nurseyk" means you have a nursing degree. Medical schools usually do not accept science courses taken in nursing programs as satisfying the requirement for biology, chemistry and physics UNLESS they were the same science courses taken by biology/chemistry majors and premedical students, which is uncommon. And the recency factor would apply in any case. If I made a bad guess about you being a nurse, recency is still important and not from a 2-year college.

 

[turtleboard]

Just to correct gower's post. There are four SUNY medical schools, two of which are part of two university centers (Buffalo and Stony Brook), one (Upstate/Syracuse) which is formerly a medical school of and currently located on what used to be a piece of the campus of Syracuse University, and the other is in the ghetto (Downstate/Brooklyn).

SUNY Binghamton/Binghamton University does NOT have a medical school and has no medical school on its campus. However SUNY Upstate has a clinical site in the City of Binghamton (no relation to Binghamton University) to which one-third of the class is banished. The Binghamton clinical campus is mainly a primary care facility without much going on. Students who interview at Upstate are told on the day of the interview which campus they've been assigned to (either the Upstate campus or the Binghamton campus).


Tim W. of N.Y.C.

 

[gower]

Thanks for the correction Turtleboard. An embarrassing lapse on my part.

 

[NurseyK]

Without a long drawn-out background check, Nursing was a career change for me and by no means is the extent of my educational background. I have already been interviewed and interviewed/accepted at a few schools and am currently weighing my options as to my final decision. During my "pondering" I came across someone who spouted nonsense at me (JMHO) and thought I could get confirmation vs denial via a posting at this site by those of you a little more "in" than I.

------------------
The grass isn't greener on the other side --- it's just different grass

[This message has been edited by NurseyK (edited 01-02-2001).]

 

[turtleboard]

Congratulations and welcome to the family.


Tim W. of N.Y.C.