Touro University - California (TUCOM-CA) Discussion Thread 2016-2017

Applying to Med School? Get In Or Your Money Back
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ABC shuttle has a cheap-ish van that goes from the airports up there - that's what I'm maybe looking to do. Flying SEA-->OAK then either renting or doing the van
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Lycian said:
Hello! Touro OMS III here.

Different people have different attitude about this school. For me personally, I am 11/10 satisfied with it, I think the experience I’ve had here is significantly better than I could have had at any other school, and I am beyond grateful I ended up here.

From what I’ve seen there are 2 (often overlapping demographics) that tend to dislike the school.

1) People who hate osteopathic manipulation and do not believe it should be taught in schools.

2) Gunners who to whom gunning is the end all be all of life.

If you fall into either of those, you probably don’t want to go here.

Beyond the awesome location (Mare Island, where over half the students live, unlike Vallejo is a safe quiet natury friendly communal neighborhood, and basically the only affordable one like that in the Bay Area), there are quite a few strong positives about the school.

General Strengths of the school:

The school has a very focused osteopathic emphasis. Some osteopathic schools are more allopathic and spend very little time on osteopathic work or integrating the principles into the curriculum. Many of the faculty and administration are passionate of maintaining an osteopathic identity to the school. Some students came there for that reason, while others realized they had a deep love for osteopathic manipulation from exposure to this emphasis, and of course a minority regretted this emphasis. There is a lot of fabulous support for OMM, and many students I know at other DO schools (who are passionate for OMM) are basically pissed off they never went here when we’ve compared notes on the OMM programs.

If you take advantage of it and make the effort, a lot of what the OMM program gives is basically magic for 3rd and 4th year, and I cannot count how many people were blown away by what it allowed them to do during clinical years (and many of our long time attendings are comfortable referring tricky cases to the Touro students).

The student base is extremely close and supportive (in other words we are not at a gunner school). On many exams, we’ve gotten through from other students going out of their way big time to help each other, most of the class is on extremely friendly terms with each other, and we can often have fun parties or bonding activities that don’t actually need alcohol to have everyone relax enough to vibe and have fun (although that’s not to say we are opposed to it..).

The administration from my perspective is super cool. They will listen to complaints and suggestions you have, and they go out of their way to open doors for you so that you can succeed or do beneficial things in addition to the normal medical school experience. As far as I can tell, that is not the norm for administrations.

The faculty are also very passionate about supporting their students and go way over the top to support and help their students succeed. Some of the lecturers are also very good. They will also give you a lot of time outside of class to help you succeed.

Give or take all lectures are recorded so you can watch them at home on 2x (or faster with a chrome plugin :p).

We have a very good anatomy program (most schools have significantly less anatomy than me do) and the lab is well ventilated. This might seem like a trivial details, but insufficiently ventilated anatomy labs are a large problem for many individuals I have spoken with.

This school is supportive of holistic practices. For example, we got in the news for having an elective that teaches anatomy through yoga (soooo many facebook shares you have no idea…), there is a weekly meditation class and an integrative medicine elective for interested students.

The school puts a fairly large emphasis on training you to be primary care physicians. As a result, we tend to have a lot of labs and education to work with all that stuff (which is actually turning out to be really helpful for 3rd year shelf exams), and we perform better on rotations. A lot of medical students aren’t really prepped for the clinical years, so as a result they struggle on rotations and I think there is some on going debate in the medical community of how much more it needs to be taught pre-clinically, but our school already does it a lot.

I do not have a good comparison of how it’s done at other places, but our school is invested in the students succeeding and has a lot of support systems in place to address all the issues which could commonly come up. From what I’ve seen, they’ve gone far beyond the duty I would expect a school to do in order to help medical students succeed.

The new system clinical distinction system for 3rd year gives an absolutely amazing degree of flexibility for students and ability to succeed as they want to as a physician. I feel very lucky to be in the first class to get it.

The global health program (where you spend a month in a foreign country like cambodia, ethiopia or taiwan practicing medicine) is pretty awesome and available to anyone who wants to do it.

Overall, I feel confident in generalizing that the students here are MUCH happier than students at a typical medical school.

Debatable Weaknesses of the school:

Touro is one of the most competitive DO schools in the country (due to location). As a result, many excellent candidates I would view as perfect fits for the school are not able to get in.

The school is fairly small, so certain resources you would expect to be present at a large school aren’t there. I actually like the small feel because it’s much more informal and allows much greater flexibility, but many things you would normally expect a large institution to have (ie our gym is functional but quite small) aren’t here.

The school is technically Jewish. In reality that doesn’t mean much, but on a practical level:

1) We get different holidays (pro in my opinion)
2) You are not allowed to use club funds for providing non kosher catered food on campus.
3) All the food in the cafeteria is kosher (so no pork basically).
4) There are lots of free jewish dinners/religious services provided and typically some type of jewish ceremonial thing at each assembly we have.
5) I have asked a lot of people and no one has been able to give me a clear answer on if the Jewish name Touro is pronounced Tour-Ooh or Tuh-Row. (people use both, the former is probably safer at interviews).

We bought the historical buildings from the navy and as far as I understand there are various agreements on how much they can be renovated (historical character needs to be maintained), so the campus is not super pretty.

The school is less board focused than other schools, and emphasizes teaching you useful stuff besides busting you case every day non stop to study for tests (thus happier students). A lot of the random stuff we learn ends up being tested on Comlex so we score a bit above average on it, but if we grilled non stop for boards, given the average MCAT of our school (before they switched to new mcat, we were the only DO school to break a 30 average), we probably do a lot better. On the other hand, we aren’t prepared well for USLME (which matters less now due to merger) and we tend to do much better on Comlex 2. At the end of the day, we have a good match list since the non boards part of preclinical is great preparation for years 3 and 4, and thus there are much better letters evals and rotation interviews.

Politically the climate is fairly liberal (bay area medical school). I like it but I have heard conservative students complain.

School is more open than most schools to non traditional applicants.

The school is very open to changing and improving (both from the faculty/admin debating it and from students proposing ideas), so there are often new programs and curriculum changes introduced, and as far as I can tell, the school is a lot more awesome than it was 4 years ago when I initially decided I had to go here.

Students frequently complain about the school health insurance plan. If you are too lazy to find an alternative option you may have dissatisfaction here.

Parts of the osteopathic program (the advanced useful OMM) require you to either have some natural sensitivity or a willingness to practice and quiet your mind. That is a good life skill to have, but if you don’t have it and don’t want to learn it, some of the Osteopathic manipulation in 2nd year will not be your cup of tea, although you aren’t really penalized for lacking sensitivity it in the grades, it’s just more really frustrating to not be able to do what a lot of other people can.

I really like my 3rd year rotation schedule and think I have it much better than most people I know at other schools, but unlike most schools we do not have an affiliated teaching hospital (way too much competition for sites in the bay area), and as a result we have to split into a lot of different groups (which is super sad because we all got super close in the first 2 years). The rotation experience is slightly different, although still cool and you just need to make sure you get the site that fits for you. There is a lottery to select everything afterwards. I am not positive, but I believe almost all of the class got their first or second choices for rotation sites as only 10 people were asking to trade sites once it was worked out.

Parts of Vallejo have crime, but crime on Mare Island is almost non existent.

Objective Weaknesses of the school:

There is a degree of bureaucratic disorganization with the school, which I believe partly comes from the fact we are partially managed by Touro New York, and amongst other things, from my inquiries the time zone difference actually makes things very complicated. Every person I’ve spoken to has a tale or two of something frustrating happening (ie. if you don’t hear back in a few months, you should make sure your application is in the correct pile). I am yet to hear of any issues that were serious problems however.

The pathology program really needs to be supplemented with Pathoma, and I like many wish I had realized this early on (pathology is hard to teach, and pathoma just does it so perfectly…).

The mosquitos here kind of suck, leave actually irritating bites and can bite through clothing. There is due to a nasty asian species that can only live in this specific biome. The mosquitos aren’t unmanageable, and don't carry diseases, but for some reason this year there have not been very many of them, and they are honestly my least favorite thing about this school.

I will admit in writing this I am super biased towards this school. In the past the only reason I paid for college was because you had to to get the degree, but in Touro’s case, I actually feel like the education I am getting is basically worth what I am paying for the degree. I also probably forgot a few pro/cons but that was everything off the top of my head and a pretty good list.

Good luck!
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You mention that it is competitive compared to other Osteopathic schools. Would a 3.40 cGPA and 3.16 sGPA prevent me from going here? What about average MCAT scores, what are they like?
 
Interview!!! Yay. Oct 31st is the earliest available date.


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Does anyone know how many students Touro typically interviews in a cycle?
 
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first II just now! complete 8/26, IS, LizzyM 69--interviewing on Halloween, my favorite holiday :android: <-- supposed to be an android but looks more like shrek to me
 
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yumpopink said:
first II just now! complete 8/26, IS, LizzyM 69--interviewing on Halloween, my favorite holiday :android: <-- supposed to be an android but looks more like shrek to me
Click to expand...

I interview on the same day. Are we supposed to be in a suit or a costume ???


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I have been complete since june 26th, should I email them? I havent heard from them since their complete email on july 9th
 
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Wow very quiet on this thread :/ where are the IIs??
 
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Damn completed 7/27 and still nothing :(

does anyone know if they send out rejections?
 
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Has anybody completed their interview? I am curious about the types of questions.
 
libertyyne said:
Is flying into SFO a terrible idea?
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I live near the campus. You have a choice of flying into SFO or Oakland. It might be easier flying into Oakland because you can get directly onto the freeway (I-80 east) that'll take you to Vallejo. With SFO you have to go through a couple junctions to get onto that same freeway. Both should relatively take the same amount of time if there's no traffic. But you do have a higher probability of hitting more traffic by flying into SFO


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DocBaller said:
I live near the campus. You have a choice of flying into SFO or Oakland. It might be easier flying into Oakland because you can get directly onto the freeway (I-80 east) that'll take you to Vallejo. With SFO you have to go through a couple junctions to get onto that same freeway. Both should relatively take the same amount of time if there's no traffic. But you do have a higher probability of hitting more traffic by flying into SFO


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Click to expand...
Thanks, what hotel do you recommend? Also if the interview ends at 135 do you think i could make it back to SFO by 4p?

Do you go to tucom? I had some additional questions about the school prior to the interview.
 
libertyyne said:
Thanks, what hotel do you recommend? Also if the interview ends at 135 do you think i could make it back to SFO by 4p?
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There's a hotel across the street from Six Flags. I think it's a Marriott. That's the best one I can think of. It'll be about 10 minutes alway from campus. You are cutting it really close at 4 pm. Especially since SFO car rental return center requires you to take a shuttle back to the main terminals. And at that time of day it could take you anywhere between 1 hour to 1 and a half hours. And in a nightmare scenario 2 hours+ isn't unthinkable. I would personally try to get a later flight (at least 6 pm) or a next day flight.

I don't go there. I'm a fellow applicant like you. I just happen to live in a neighboring city.

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DocBaller said:
There's a hotel across the street from Six Flags. I think it's a Marriott. That's the best one I can think of. It'll be about 10 minutes alway from campus. You are cutting it really close at 4 pm. Especially since SFO car rental return center requires you to take a shuttle back to the main terminals. And at that time of day it could take you anywhere between 1 hour to 1 and a half hours. And in a nightmare scenario 2 hours+ isn't unthinkable. I would personally try to get a later flight (at least 6 pm) or a next day flight.

I don't go there. I'm a fellow applicant like you. I just happen to live in a neighboring city.

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Oh gosh, I guess I might be in for some nightmare travel. I hope traffic isnt a nightmare at 2p i didnt anticipate the shuttle back.
 
libertyyne said:
Oh gosh, I guess I might be in for some nightmare travel. I hope traffic isnt a nightmare at 2p i didnt anticipate the shuttle back.
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You might still have a good chance of making it in time. I would do online checkin for your boarding pass the day before so you can go straight to security at the airport


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How long after the interview before they give a decision? Also how long after decision do you have to put down a deposit? And how much is the deposit?
 
II this morning! Complete 8/16, IS.

EDIT: Nvm, got off early and called. Earliest interview was 11/8 for those who are curious - I was quite surprised!
 
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I'm interviewing on 11/01! Anyone know what the acceptance rate for those who have interviewed? Touro is one of my top choices so I can stay close to home. :)
 
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Hi all, a few quick questions here about the secondary app. For the question about volunteer experiences, did y'all answer this as rather boring list? Or did you approach this as more of a narrative? Did you add descriptions, similar to those used in the AACOMAS application? Does "type of experience" refer to clinical vs. non-clinical? These are all relatively minor details but figured I'd see how other people approached this. Thanks for your help!

Specifically, I am referring to this question: Within the last three years, have you been engaged in any volunteer experiences? Please include the type of experience, sponsor, duration, and position.
 
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Fran0412 said:
Hi all, a few quick questions here about the secondary app. For the question about volunteer experiences, did y'all answer this as rather boring list? Or did you approach this as more of a narrative? Did you add descriptions, similar to those used in the AACOMAS application? Does "type of experience" refer to clinical vs. non-clinical? These are all relatively minor details but figured I'd see how other people approached this. Thanks for your help!

Specifically, I am referring to this question: Within the last three years, have you been engaged in any volunteer experiences? Please include the type of experience, sponsor, duration, and position.
Click to expand...

Howdy,
I did exactly what they say and in that order. For example:
Non-Healthcare volunteer or community enrichment, Burger King, Cheese Burger Educator, 12/2011-06/2015
 
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enter_and_escape said:
OMS1 here. feel free to ask me any questions.
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How are the away rotations managed? Are they of good quality ? What do you love about the school? What do you hate about the school? are lectures mandatory or are they recorded and streamed? Thanks for your time.
 
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libertyyne said:
How are the away rotations managed? Are they of good quality ? What do you love about the school? What do you hate about the school? are lectures mandatory or are they recorded and streamed? Thanks for your time.
Click to expand...

I just started school, so I can't give you an accurate answer about away rotations.
I love mostly everything about the school - from curriculum, to faculty to students.
What I hate about school - gym, and lack of food within a mile radius.
Lectures not mandatory. they are all recorded.
 
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I was complete 6/24 and still have heard nothing..
 
enter_and_escape said:
I just started school, so I can't give you an accurate answer about away rotations.
I love mostly everything about the school - from curriculum, to faculty to students.
What I hate about school - gym, and lack of food within a mile radius.
Lectures not mandatory. they are all recorded.
Click to expand...
what do you mean by gym?
 
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Just got an II. Complete 08/19.
 
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CitizenoftheWorld2016 said:
what do you mean by gym?
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Seeing as I interviewed here today and saw it- I think I can speak on their behalf. It's like a 15x15' room, no windows, think large bedroom with some equipment. Not a strong point of the campus that's for sure.

I will say everyone we met today was super friendly, and I was especially impressed with Dr. Hartwig and the talk he gave, and his honesty about fit - how he said he "wasn't trying to sell the school"


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Saw a couple of you on tour today....lookin real sharp! Good luck everyone


Edit: If you have any questions or concerns..feel free to ask
 
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its been 9 weeks since i have been complete. Should I email them or is that not a good idea?
 
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