Caerulus I believe you're asking me instead of Nensis. I'm the one who got a scholarship from NECO and can't decide between the two. I'm strongly leaning towards NECO. I feel like the extra ~50K will worth the education I will get even though as a downside, I won't be able to come home as often (flights are expensive). But again its still a big dilemma for me because at the end we will all have the same degree. I also think there might be more opportunities there in Boston because there are a lot of big universities (Harvard, MIT, Brown, Boston). Connections are always very important.
Yes, I know Waterloo students do well on the board exams but I don't know if its because they have heavy emphasis on theory. I was actually quite pleased with the facilities and the small town environment of Waterloo. Life is definitely less expensive in Waterloo than in Boston. I honestly have no clue how students get by in Boston. So my only concern about Waterloo is its clinical education. I was extremely lucky to have job shadowed 2 ODs in the same office. One was a NECO graduate and the other was a Waterloo graduate. The waterloo graduate told me that he was making less than $50 K a year !!!! I could not believe it! And he was working there part time while the NECO graduate actually owned the business and he was able to do an exam in 15 min while he had a good conversation with the patient (vs. the exam was about 30-40 min. by the Waterloo graduate).
Its a difficult decision.
Congrats on your acceptance into PUCO. I was very impressed by the faculty and the education. =)
