Temple vs UPitt

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DentalDriven

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Just got a late acceptance and thought I was all set but I'm getting confused now. I'm out of state for both so Pitt is a little cheaper (~40K for 4 years) but living in Philly might be a better experience since I've never lived in a big city.

Any thoughts on which program is better? I don't want to pick based on the cities because I'm sure I'll be too busy in either school to really enjoy it anyways.

I know they both will be stressful but the students at Temple seemed more laid back, so it might be less stressful? The class size is better at Pitt (it's smaller) but Temple gives you more clinical experience.
 
DentalDriven said:
Just got a late acceptance and thought I was all set but I'm getting confused now. I'm out of state for both so Pitt is a little cheaper (~40K for 4 years) but living in Philly might be a better experience since I've never lived in a big city.

Any thoughts on which program is better? I don't want to pick based on the cities because I'm sure I'll be too busy in either school to really enjoy it anyways.

I know they both will be stressful but the students at Temple seemed more laid back, so it might be less stressful? The class size is better at Pitt (it's smaller) but Temple gives you more clinical experience.
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🙂
 
DentalDriven said:
Just got a late acceptance and thought I was all set but I'm getting confused now. I'm out of state for both so Pitt is a little cheaper (~40K for 4 years) but living in Philly might be a better experience since I've never lived in a big city.

Any thoughts on which program is better? I don't want to pick based on the cities because I'm sure I'll be too busy in either school to really enjoy it anyways.

I know they both will be stressful but the students at Temple seemed more laid back, so it might be less stressful? The class size is better at Pitt (it's smaller) but Temple gives you more clinical experience.
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I'd say Pitt hands down... you might get better clinical exposure at Temple, but I shadowed a periodontist who was on the faculty at Temple for some time, and he told me that Temple's program is an absolute mess these days. Current students might be better suited to address that...

That said, however, nearly every dentist I've shadowed went to Temple dental, and they're all phenomenal dentists... but then again, they graduated years ago. Things are very different now from what they tell me.

Best of luck...
 
PSU SHC 414 said:
I'd say Pitt hands down... you might get better clinical exposure at Temple, but I shadowed a periodontist who was on the faculty at Temple for some time, and he told me that Temple's program is an absolute mess these days. Current students might be better suited to address that...

That said, however, nearly every dentist I've shadowed went to Temple dental, and they're all phenomenal dentists... but then again, they graduated years ago. Things are very different now from what they tell me.

Best of luck...
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Temple is fine. The grad perio dept. may be considered a mess, but the DMD program is strong. Just spoke with a friend who recently graduated that is in a GPR and he told me that he his hands down the most clinically competent resident. Temple is currently searching for a dean though so things may change. We also tend to use a lot of ancient techniques but really dental school is to learn the basics and hand skills. Once you graduate is when the real learning begins, or so they say. Just to give you an idea of our graduation requirements:

fixed: 15 crowns, includes at least 1 pontic but no more than 3 pontics
removable: 11 arches
endo: at least 3 single rooted teeth and 2 - 3 molars
surgery: 125 surgical procedures (mostly extractions, 1 ext = 1 procedure), 16 nitrous cases
operative: lots
pedo: lots

crowns we do all the lab work and for dentures we do everything up to processing.

I think either school is a good choice but just be ready to do lab work if you come to temple.
 
All that lab work alone for the crowns is enough to persuade me to Pitt. Lab work sucks, schools have you do it to reduce their overhead so they can make more money on the procedures. Schools try and sell it as "experience to help you be a better dentist". I say that's garbage, I can see setting a denture or two of teeth on your own, but we should be able to send out our work after the first few. Stacking porcelain/ processing at least 15 crowns, yikes that's a lot of time. Pitt vs. Temple, I've been in that situation before, take the cheaper one.
 
zoothslooth said:
All that lab work alone for the crowns is enough to persuade me to Pitt. Lab work sucks, schools have you do it to reduce their overhead so they can make more money on the procedures. Schools try and sell it as "experience to help you be a better dentist". I say that's garbage, I can see setting a denture or two of teeth on your own, but we should be able to send out our work after the first few. Stacking porcelain/ processing at least 15 crowns, yikes that's a lot of time. Pitt vs. Temple, I've been in that situation before, take the cheaper one.
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We don't stack porcelain here, just wax the coping. We do all our gold though.
 
The class size is smaller at Pitt. I think that is a benefit. As far as living in Philadelphia, North Philadelphia, where Temple Dental School is located and where you would be spending endless amounts of time while in school for the next almost four years, sometimes day and night, it is not a very nice area. I'm not sure how much time most dental students get to enjoy the city due to lack of funds and time. The area around Pitt seems nicer and a little gentler as does the town. Although, it was many moons ago, I was accepted early to both. I chose Temple, because it was closer to home. I made this decision without visiting either school. Had I taken the time to visit, I would have chosen Pitt for it's location and size. This experience convinced me that when it was time for my kids to apply to college,we made a point to visit the schools before any decisions were made. Good luck with your decision.
 
SydB said:
Temple is fine. The grad perio dept. may be considered a mess, but the DMD program is strong. Just spoke with a friend who recently graduated that is in a GPR and he told me that he his hands down the most clinically competent resident.
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Yeah, my dentist (GP) graduated from Temple and did a GPR at Columbia, and he told me the same thing... that his clinical skills were definitely superior to most of his peers...
 
Wow, I haven't been to these forums in a long time. I graduated from pitt last year (2007). Dental school is what you make of it. You can have a great time with your classmates anywhere. Don't let thoughts of living a grand life in a big city persuade you. I was accepted to both schools back in the day and when I interviewed at Temple the students said that you should be gone before it got dark. At pitt I had no problem walking home at 2-3am sometimes. The pre-clinic facilities at pitt are awesome as well. I'm not sure how they are at Temple. I think they had 1 sim at the time I interviewed. My clinical experience at Pitt was well rounded at pitt. If I remember correctly the reqs were: 3 complete dentures, 3 partial dentures, 11 units of fixed, 90 restorations, 7 RCT (no molar req), ~~20 os cases, and something like 12 quads of s/rp. I didn't have any problem fulfilling these requirements, but some did.
Anyway, just remember...you will have good things and bad at any school you attend. The grass will always look greener. At pitt there were some awesome clinical instructors and there were some that probably couldn't hack it out in the real world of dentistry. Just study hard, practice hard and party hard too. Learn a lot, but don't burn yourself out.

Any specific q's feel free to pm

JOJO
 
zoothslooth said:
All that lab work alone for the crowns is enough to persuade me to Pitt. Lab work sucks, schools have you do it to reduce their overhead so they can make more money on the procedures. Schools try and sell it as "experience to help you be a better dentist". I say that's garbage, I can see setting a denture or two of teeth on your own, but we should be able to send out our work after the first few. Stacking porcelain/ processing at least 15 crowns, yikes that's a lot of time. Pitt vs. Temple, I've been in that situation before, take the cheaper one.
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I just graduated from Temple and I heard that they are starting to send out student's work to labs starting either this year or next year which means that the lab work is greatly reduced......confirm that though.......

Regarding the OP's question, you definitely get time to enjoy the city.....Philly is a very cool city....much better than I thought it would be.....dont know much about Pittsburgh, but everyone in my class who was from Pittsburgh did not talk highly of it........

but then again, Im sure the Pitt campus has a lot of places to go.....but when it comes to Pittsburgh vs. Philadelphia in terms of things to do, I think Philadelphia would wins hands down (Im sure people from Pittsburgh would agree)

Also, Pittsburgh and Temple have much different philosophies. Pittsburgh has very strict rules such as attendance in class......what color scrubs to wear......etc.

Sure this instills a sense of "professionalism", but I dont appreciate being in a professional school and having people take attendance or telling me what color scrubs to wear......but this is just my opinion.

At Temple, its very individualistic and you can do whatever you want.....

if you dont wanna come to class.....then dont
if you dont wanna wear scrubs and wear shorts/sandals to preclinic......sure, why not
if you dont want to book patients this Friday and have a long weekend....then go for it....

thats the Temple philosophy........no one holds your hand there...so as you can imagine, its not for everyone......
 
PantherPaws said:
The pre-clinic facilities at pitt are awesome as well. I'm not sure how they are at Temple. I think they had 1 sim at the time I interviewed. JOJO
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Sims are so useless and overrated....cmon, u graduated already....u should know that

facilities at Pitt are better though........but please dont use Sims as the reason to pick Pitt.....
 
It also depends on what you might like to focus on. Pitt has a lot of implant experience if you want, also, you can become IV sedation certified at Pitt during your third and fourth year. Sims are alright, but I have to agree that I wouldn't let that sway my decision too much.
 
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