VCOM-VA vs NSU-KPCOM vs. PCOM-GA vs. KCU-Joplin

[just4fun]

I'm super thankful to receive offers from these schools and would love feedback before the 12/14 deposit deadline!

VCOM- VA
Pros

• Sports medicine focus/fellowship
• Affiliated with VA tech- more resources
• International mission trips
• Friendly atmosphere, students seemed to feel supportive

Cons

• Mandatory
• Heavy exam schedule (would appreciate comments on how bad this really is)
• Dress code to class
• Hiking seemed to be really only activity around

LMU- Knoxville *edit: no longer considering

NSU-KPCOM- Tampa
Pros

• Location, sibling lives there
• Dean seems to value international trips/global mindedness
• OMM fellowship, India rural rotation
• Students seemed to feel supportive, everyone friendly
• No mandatory classes

Cons

• 3rd and 4th year rotations limited?
• Location, farther from home
• No cadavers
• Lower board scores—education properly preparing students?
• Cost of living

PCOM- GA

Pros

• Well-established name
• Near Atlanta (+ residency advantage for students?)
• Supportive feel from students, seemed like a relaxed and friendly environment
• No mandatory classes + manageable exam schedule
• OMM scholars program

Cons

• Involvement- seems not as much focus on clubs/international missions/research
• Never been to area, so hard to judge the feel

KCU- Joplin

Pros

• Well-established name
• Supportive feel from students, seemed like a friendly environment
• No mandatory classes
• P/F (not sure how big of a pro this is)
• OMM/anatomy fellowships
• clubs and global opportunities
• 3/4 year rotations are not lottery style

Cons

• Never been to area, so hard to judge
• farther from home-- more limited support system
• farther from cities-- is there anything to do to outside of school?
• unsure of research opportunities

Summary: I'm mainly leaning towards NSU-KPCOM or PCOM-GA. Overall, I know you get out of medical school what you put in and administration is bad everywhere, but I still want a school that will provide me with opportunities to get involved and prepare me for residency. Cost is slightly important, but not the biggest factor. I would love to hear everyone’s thoughts, thank you!

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[Hollow Knight]

Congratulations!

VCOM is a good school. I know they have mandatory attendance, but I think you're allowed to just put noise-cancelling headphones on and study during lecture if you want. If that's the case, I wouldn't consider it to be much of a drawback.

LMU is a scam of an institution, PLEASE don't go there. You'll have a hard time matching. Tell all your friends. All the attendings where I'm at sit around dunking on the LMU students because they arrive as 3rd years without a clue as to how to practice medicine.

I know nothing of the other schools you mentioned.

Edit: oh also, when it comes to board scores- this has very little do to with the medical school's curriculum. It's more of a question of "Did students at this med school do UFAPS like good little med students or did they read their professors' PPTS and not crack UWorld until dedicated?" If the student is the former, that student will be fine on boards. If the latter, even if the school's curriculum is "high-yield," they'll probably perform poorly.

I know the thinking after step went P/F was that students could focus on their classes..... that's just not true. It turns out, if you want to do well on step exams, you should spend more of your time studying for step exams. My entire med school class is VERY stressed right now because we all thought we didn't have to really study that hard for step 1, so when you get to your M1 year, make sure you're correlating your school's curriculum with Pathoma, Sketchy, Boards and Beyond, Anki, etc from day 1.

Sorry for the rant, just trying to save you from making our mistake But as far as picking a school- if that school has like 40 hours a week of mandatory stuff, it will be harder for you guys to prep for your boards, period. I'm not saying don't go to a school like that, but keep that in mind.

 

[just4fun]

Congratulations!

VCOM is a good school. I know they have mandatory attendance, but I think you're allowed to just put noise-cancelling headphones on and study during lecture if you want. If that's the case, I wouldn't consider it to be much of a drawback.

LMU is a scam of an institution, PLEASE don't go there. You'll have a hard time matching. Tell all your friends. All the attendings where I'm at sit around dunking on the LMU students because they arrive as 3rd years without a clue as to how to practice medicine.

I know nothing of the other schools you mentioned.

Edit: oh also, when it comes to board scores- this has very little do to with the medical school's curriculum. It's more of a question of "Did students at this med school do UFAPS like good little med students or did they read their professors' PPTS and not crack UWorld until dedicated?" If the student is the former, that student will be fine on boards. If the latter, even if the school's curriculum is "high-yield," they'll probably perform poorly.

I know the thinking after step went P/F was that students could focus on their classes..... that's just not true. It turns out, if you want to do well on step exams, you should spend more of your time studying for step exams. My entire med school class is VERY stressed right now because we all thought we didn't have to really study that hard for step 1, so when you get to your M1 year, make sure you're correlating your school's curriculum with Pathoma, Sketchy, Boards and Beyond, Anki, etc from day 1.

Sorry for the rant, just trying to save you from making our mistake But as far as picking a school- if that school has like 40 hours a week of mandatory stuff, it will be harder for you guys to prep for your boards, period. I'm not saying don't go to a school like that, but keep that in mind.

Thank you so much for your detailed reply! I've decided to no longer consider LMU. I recently heard back from KCU and was accepted to the Joplin campus if you have any insight! Each school has also talked about board prep they supply and it differs between each, is there any particular prep you would consider more worthwhile than others?

 

[Hollow Knight]

You really should bookmark/take a picture of this post. You're going to get all kinds of bad advice from upperclassmen who got super lucky and barely passed.

So for a P/F step 1-

Pathoma is gospel truth, you have to do this, anyone who tells you otherwise doesn't know what they're talking about and you shouldn't take advice from them

You have to know the material in sketchy pharm and sketchy micro, period. Now some people hate the cartoons, so you don't have to use these resources, but you DO have to know that staph aureus is a gram positive cocci, etc

Boards and Beyond is a good resource for everything else. However, you don't have to do ALL of this like you do sketchy and pathoma. But if you have time what the heck. What I did was do boards videos that corresponded to my school's lectures.

And, a pass of UWorld. Again, you basically have to do this (or at least as much as you can. If you start early it isn't bad, if you wait till dedicated it's impossible)

AnKing- now, I recommend downloading this deck and doing the corresponding cards for the above resources. Anki (and spaced repetition in general) is evidence-based. Spaced repetition works for everyone, period. I hesitate to say you MUST do anki because people do well without it; however, there's so much data behind anki I recommend you at least try it. If you hate it, ditch it and just keep a journal of missed UWorld questions or something.