TMDSAS Ranking (yet again)

[nervous_premed]

I have been super lucky to have had interviews from many Texas schools. I would greatly appreciate any help in ranking the schools since I am unfamiliar with many of the clinicals, matches, and residencies of the schools.

Some of the most important factors for me include: location, pass/fail, student atmosphere, and focus on health equity.

I am interested in either Psych, EM, or FM.

Thanks for your help!

I have pre-matches from TCOM, McGovern, Texas Tech Lubbock, and Texas Tech El Paso

1-3: Baylor, Dell, McGovern

-Baylor Pros: p/f, TMC, prestige / Cons: I have heard many negatives about the elitism of the students that attend here, Houston itself is pretty boring, do not know much about its promotion of health equity, terrified to get stuck in Temple
-Dell Pros: p/f, amazing pre-clerkship curriculum, small class size, Austin is amazing / Cons: not as established as other schools, I heard the clinicals are not that great
-McGovern Pros: TMC, I have heard amazing things about the students that go here, great reputation / Cons: large class size, not p/f, outdated curriculum, building seems very depressing

4: UTSW
-I can be convinced to rank this higher but I do not like their inattentiveness towards social determinants of health

5-9: Long, UTMB, TT Lubbock, TT El Paso, TCOM

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[randompremed457]

Congrats on all of the interviews first and foremost!


From what I’ve seen during the cycle, the more remote schools have a higher focus on social determinants of health. El Paso in particular (although it’s not exactly remote) had a heavy emphasis on this.

I will say that Long heavily focuses on social determinants of health and their FM department has a LOT of research going on surrounding the topic.

Having met quite a few BCM students and after going on the tour, I really didn’t get a feeling of elitism from any of the students there. IMO the whole elitism thing seemed to stem from McGovern/UH students always talking about how stressed out the BCM students seemed.

If you’re interested in health equity though, BCM Temple seemed very focused on that particular issue. But if you’re totally opposed to living in temple it’s probably a no go.

From what I saw BCM and UTSW had similar focuses on research. At the UTSW tour, we were given the opportunity to go on rotations and I will say that sdoh were heavily discussed. They have a lot of free clinics too so I imagine it comes up frequently.

If I were in your situation, I’d focus on location over everything else. All of these schools will provide you the opportunity to do whatever you want with your career (benefit of being Texan I guess).

Go to where you imagine yourself being happy living. I imagine I’d be miserable if on my very limited amount of free time I couldn’t do the things I love.

If you’re into outdoor stuff and partying, austin seems like the place to be. If you’re a foodie, it’s houston for sure.

 

[wysdoc]

Have you heard of people's attitudes being "glass half full" or "glass half empty?"

@nervous_premed I gotta say, this post comes across as "My glass is empty and I don't like any of the drinks you're offering me to put in it"

Maybe it's because you posted it at 2:41 am. Maybe you are never quite happy and can always find fault with things. But whoa, try to be happy with your success in your applications.

If you truly don't want to attend either Texas Tech location, rank them below your other prematches.
If you truly don't want to attend a DO school, withdraw from TCOM. Another Texan would be thrilled to go there.

From your post history you have an admission to at least one AMCAS school as well.
Your minimum misery rank order looks like:
Dell, McGovern, Baylor, UTSW, Long, UTMB

 

[nervous_premed]

Congrats on all of the interviews first and foremost!


From what I’ve seen during the cycle, the more remote schools have a higher focus on social determinants of health. El Paso in particular (although it’s not exactly remote) had a heavy emphasis on this.

I will say that Long heavily focuses on social determinants of health and their FM department has a LOT of research going on surrounding the topic.

Having met quite a few BCM students and after going on the tour, I really didn’t get a feeling of elitism from any of the students there. IMO the whole elitism thing seemed to stem from McGovern/UH students always talking about how stressed out the BCM students seemed.

If you’re interested in health equity though, BCM Temple seemed very focused on that particular issue. But if you’re totally opposed to living in temple it’s probably a no go.

From what I saw BCM and UTSW had similar focuses on research. At the UTSW tour, we were given the opportunity to go on rotations and I will say that sdoh were heavily discussed. They have a lot of free clinics too so I imagine it comes up frequently.

If I were in your situation, I’d focus on location over everything else. All of these schools will provide you the opportunity to do whatever you want with your career (benefit of being Texan I guess).

Go to where you imagine yourself being happy living. I imagine I’d be miserable if on my very limited amount of free time I couldn’t do the things I love.

If you’re into outdoor stuff and partying, austin seems like the place to be. If you’re a foodie, it’s houston for sure.

Thank you so so much for this insanely detailed response! Truly appreciate your input

 

[nervous_premed]

Have you heard of people's attitudes being "glass half full" or "glass half empty?"

@nervous_premed I gotta say, this post comes across as "My glass is empty and I don't like any of the drinks you're offering me to put in it"

Maybe it's because you posted it at 2:41 am. Maybe you are never quite happy and can always find fault with things. But whoa, try to be happy with your success in your applications.

If you truly don't want to attend either Texas Tech location, rank them below your other prematches.
If you truly don't want to attend a DO school, withdraw from TCOM. Another Texan would be thrilled to go there.

From your post history you have an admission to at least one AMCAS school as well.
Your minimum misery rank order looks like:
Dell, McGovern, Baylor, UTSW, Long, UTMB

Definitely a very happy person thanks Also I am the biggest night owl you will ever meet and do all my work from like 2-5am haha. Since I pre-matched with McGovern i didn’t feel the need to waste time discussing schools 4-9 and just briefly explained a reason why they would be ranked lower. Will be withdrawing my pre-matches after reviewing these responses in case something I was not aware of came up.

I am super excited to have choices with my schools but since it all comes down to ranking and each school is obviously amazing I gotta get down to the nitty gritty flaws that may arise. Thanks for all your help on this site!

 

[tulsajoe94]

Definitely a very happy person thanks Also I am the biggest night owl you will ever meet and do all my work from like 2-5am haha. Since I pre-matched with McGovern i didn’t feel the need to waste time discussing schools 4-9 and just briefly explained a reason why they would be ranked lower. Will be withdrawing my pre-matches after reviewing these responses in case something I was not aware of came up.

I am super excited to have choices with my schools but since it all comes down to ranking and each school is obviously amazing I gotta get down to the nitty gritty flaws that may arise. Thanks for all your help on this site!

Baylor and Dell > McGovern. For the three specialties you like, Dell will be no problem for a good match Baylor has pretty good vacation/holiday time from what I've learned, so that was a pro I didn't know going into med school. Dell has the 3rd year to do something with, but honestly if you don't have a need for any of the masters I might take Baylor's superior vacation + reputation!

There are some cool 3rd year options I think might be up your alley if you like health equity:
Social entrepreneurship - students working on Good Apple, Dollar For, and other health equity organizations
Public health Masters - online, so possibility for travel while learning good skills for health equity research
Public Affairs Masters - LBJ is a top 10 school for public affairs
Remote research year working on health equity -- you'll have to find your own opportunities, but people have done this.

 

[nervous_premed]

Baylor and Dell > McGovern. For the three specialties you like, Dell will be no problem for a good match Baylor has pretty good vacation/holiday time from what I've learned, so that was a pro I didn't know going into med school. Dell has the 3rd year to do something with, but honestly if you don't have a need for any of the masters I might take Baylor's superior vacation + reputation!

There are some cool 3rd year options I think might be up your alley if you like health equity:
Social entrepreneurship - students working on Good Apple, Dollar For, and other health equity organizations
Public health Masters - online, so possibility for travel while learning good skills for health equity research
Public Affairs Masters - LBJ is a top 10 school for public affairs
Remote research year working on health equity -- you'll have to find your own opportunities, but people have done this.

Thanks so much!! I will definitely consider all of that!