I’m starting my 2nd year as a Residential student here and I just want to warn any of you looking into PT schools or possibly wondering if the tuition to USC is worth it that it is indeed NOT worth it in my opinion.
The faculty for the most part do teach well and are great in person but the thing is the program has suddenly switched to barely any in person. Now I do have to clarify that with COVID happening my 1st year at the program this form of online recordings and lectures and barely going on campus was definitely expected. However, it was often conveyed to us that as soon as we could be all back on campus we would. We reached a point in LA Health Restrictions where we were allowed to be back on campus for the Fall and all of us were excited to finally be on campus but alas, the heads took this as an opportunity to switch all material learning to online recorded lectures, and we would then go onto campus for an hour or 2 each day to discuss the topics we learned via lectures online.
This is called a “flipped classroom” and in theory sounds not so bad. Where it falls short is that with the travel time to and from school, the live discussions, AND the shear quantity of online material we have to watch, there’s just no time for anyone to benefit from the target effects of doing a flipped classroom. On top of this all the classes are in absolute mayhem as we switched onto canvas for ALL of our lecture material, assignments, and supplementary dissection videos. Every class has files located in different areas and there’s no opportunity to ask questions for things we’re confused about because the only way to do so is during the short time we’re on campus OR email (which people take FOREVER to respond to, and that’s if you’re lucky) Since we aren’t actually learning material in a lecture setting and cannot ask the professor questions in real time.
We had heard that USC was pushing for this style of classroom during our 1st year as they saw us do very well with the flipped classroom during the pandemic and we made it abundantly clear that it was something we did not want under any circumstances. We had many meetings and as a class representative I made sure to consistently remind the faculty that our class HATED online recordings and just wanted to be back to the traditional classroom setting. We were told that moving into the Fall we would have less online lectures and more in person learning and everyone calmed down a little. Until we found out a few weeks before the start of the semester that nothing was going to change expect that we had to go on campus for our live session discussions now instead of doing them over zoom, AND that we have MORE online recordings to watch.
Basically you’re paying the price of a small mortgage for endless hours of YouTube/Kahn Academy videos, a random chaotic jumble of assignments, faculty leaders that don’t care what your opinion as a class is and will treat you like a child, and maybe maybe maybe you might make some faculty connections but it’s highly unlikely because we’re only on campus for 4-5 hours total a day and as soon as class is over we hurry home to watch the absurd amount of online recordings that’s required of us to complete prior to class.
If you like the sound of that then maybe it is worth it. There are 1 or 2 people in my class who definitely prefer the online style of learning and that’s totally fine.
But beware that you’re paying a lot of money for very little face to face teaching.
Hope this helps anyone looking into whether or not to go to USC DPT.
The faculty for the most part do teach well and are great in person but the thing is the program has suddenly switched to barely any in person. Now I do have to clarify that with COVID happening my 1st year at the program this form of online recordings and lectures and barely going on campus was definitely expected. However, it was often conveyed to us that as soon as we could be all back on campus we would. We reached a point in LA Health Restrictions where we were allowed to be back on campus for the Fall and all of us were excited to finally be on campus but alas, the heads took this as an opportunity to switch all material learning to online recorded lectures, and we would then go onto campus for an hour or 2 each day to discuss the topics we learned via lectures online.
This is called a “flipped classroom” and in theory sounds not so bad. Where it falls short is that with the travel time to and from school, the live discussions, AND the shear quantity of online material we have to watch, there’s just no time for anyone to benefit from the target effects of doing a flipped classroom. On top of this all the classes are in absolute mayhem as we switched onto canvas for ALL of our lecture material, assignments, and supplementary dissection videos. Every class has files located in different areas and there’s no opportunity to ask questions for things we’re confused about because the only way to do so is during the short time we’re on campus OR email (which people take FOREVER to respond to, and that’s if you’re lucky) Since we aren’t actually learning material in a lecture setting and cannot ask the professor questions in real time.
We had heard that USC was pushing for this style of classroom during our 1st year as they saw us do very well with the flipped classroom during the pandemic and we made it abundantly clear that it was something we did not want under any circumstances. We had many meetings and as a class representative I made sure to consistently remind the faculty that our class HATED online recordings and just wanted to be back to the traditional classroom setting. We were told that moving into the Fall we would have less online lectures and more in person learning and everyone calmed down a little. Until we found out a few weeks before the start of the semester that nothing was going to change expect that we had to go on campus for our live session discussions now instead of doing them over zoom, AND that we have MORE online recordings to watch.
Basically you’re paying the price of a small mortgage for endless hours of YouTube/Kahn Academy videos, a random chaotic jumble of assignments, faculty leaders that don’t care what your opinion as a class is and will treat you like a child, and maybe maybe maybe you might make some faculty connections but it’s highly unlikely because we’re only on campus for 4-5 hours total a day and as soon as class is over we hurry home to watch the absurd amount of online recordings that’s required of us to complete prior to class.
If you like the sound of that then maybe it is worth it. There are 1 or 2 people in my class who definitely prefer the online style of learning and that’s totally fine.
But beware that you’re paying a lot of money for very little face to face teaching.
Hope this helps anyone looking into whether or not to go to USC DPT.
