oldfart1997 said:
hmmm i'll try bringing the thread back to the original post... so I too am debating whether to go to UCSD and was really put off by how stressed out and depressed the students were when I interviewed. Apparently, the med school is a complete meat grinder. Comparing how much the students study with those of other schools I visited (11 in total), SD kids have much less free time because of the work load. And apparently are not happy with the fact they have to learn things at such a level of detail that will not be a benefit to them on the Step I or later as a doctor. It seems like the faculty is so old school that they take pride in the lashing the students get. Not to mention if the students are really competitive...
Seems like a glum place, anyone have a different angle?
Hi, I'm an MS-II at UCSD
The school is what you make of it. I have lots of free time and I know I'm not the only one. There are lots of people who work really hard (and are often depressed as a result), and I think for most of these people, they could get away with studying less, but choose not to out of A) paranoia and/or B) desire to do really really well. It is difficult to get Honors in a class, but in my opinion passing a class is not especially hard. I doubt that passing is significantly harder here than at other schools. (Beware anyone who makes definitive comparisons with other schools -- who has attended more than one?)
There are a lot of students here and depending on which subset you get exposed to on interview day, you'll get a very different impression. A lot of people (myself included) aren't at school that much so you're less likely to talk to us in the first place.
Regarding "detail": We do learn a lot of stuff that doesn't seem likely to come up on Step 1. Sometimes it can be frustrating. But I don't mind it for a few reasons. First, as I said above you don't need to learn every little detail to pass. Second, learning some things in depth really helps you understand the basics better. In some classes I find that it helps to build an understanding of the material that goes beyond memorization. The trick is to figure out why the details are true and to be able to predict them based on your understanding of core material. Brute-force memorization of the details is counterproductive but it seems a lot of people here use that approach. I imagine it is painful. Third, many of the details they give us are very clinically relevant -- the kinds of things that might not come up on Step 1 but probably will come up 3rd year or as a doctor. I can imagine some of this stuff appearing on Steps 2 and 3. It's the kind of thing that might be frustrating now but should help somewhat down the road. We don't have doctors coming in to discuss their obscure research, for instance (that was one thing I heard as a premed that turned out to be untrue), but we do have lectures on things like bedside considerations when dealing with a cancer patient that have zero boards-relevance.
Regarding "competition": People here work very hard, but I think only a few are actively trying to do better than everyone else. We share our study aids and in general help each other out a lot. This has more to do with the people who the admission committee selects than with the curriculum, in my opinion. The current dean of admissions is not the one that admitted my class so I can't really comment, except to say that the MS-I web forum is full of students sharing their study tables and illustrations and notes.
All in all I don't think it's the best place for learning how to get a high boards score, but one of the best places for learning how to become a good doctor. If you want to learn just the "high yield" facts and ace the boards with minimum effort, don't come here. If you seek the lowest-resistance route to a Derm residency at MGH, stay far away. But if you want to develop excellent clinical skills and your learning style is more about understanding than memorization (obviously some things like drug names have to be memorized), UCSD has a good system in place.
Finally, no matter what schools you're deciding between, I would be wary of basing your opinion on what MS-II's and (especially) MS-I's have to say. Seek out MS-IV's and get their perspective. You will find it 100x more useful than anything I could tell you. I can't say much about 3rd and 4th year here, but ultimately that's the most important part of medical education.
Thanks. And good luck for everyone.
. Unfortunately their guatemala program is only for MS1's. Maybe a lab position?
on the person's head)
