What don't you like about pharmacy school?

[deleted205891]

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I don't like curves either...I don't like any kind of grade inflation. Either you EARN the A or you don't get it.

So if the average for a test (that is worth 40% of a grade in a class) is a 65 and the highest grade anyone out of 220 students got was an 87.5, you wouldn't want it curved and you'd want people to fail the class? That was the average on our law midterm (yes, I know, law, that's supposed to not be a hard class). Thankfully he curved it 12.5%, but you really would just want people to fail in that case?

Our therapeutics averages are sometimes around a 65 or even lower. They don't curve those, but they sometimes throw questions out if the wide majority of the class got them wrong.

 

[SHC1984]

You can still get a residency with one C. Relax. Your scholarship is more serious. But a good scare would do you a lot of good. Let us know how you did on the exam, and don't expect it to get any easier.

I work my ass off and got an 93.3 on this last exam. It was harder than the first one but I also studied harder! 🙄 So I have a LOW A right now in that class...We have a final exam in that class that's worth 35% of our entire grade...I don't really have much time to study for that exam...but I will try my very BEST. I would really hate to make a B+ in anything. I am a perfectionist in EVERYTHING in life, whether it's grades, my weight, my looks, my car, my overall life whatever...I have to have everything PERFECT. I am really stress out about that class right now...but like I say...I will try my BEST. 🙂

 

[SHC1984]

So if the average for a test (that is worth 40% of a grade in a class) is a 65 and the highest grade anyone out of 220 students got was an 87.5, you wouldn't want it curved and you'd want people to fail the class? That was the average on our law midterm (yes, I know, law, that's supposed to not be a hard class). Thankfully he curved it 12.5%, but you really would just want people to fail in that case?

Our therapeutics averages are sometimes around a 65 or even lower. They don't curve those, but they sometimes throw questions out if the wide majority of the class got them wrong.

If that was the case most people in the class must have not worked very hard. It doesn't matter if it's just one lazy person or an CLASS FULL of lazy people etc. if you don't study you don't deserve to pass.

 

[diastole]

Same here. I have never argue with a professor over a grade (but I rarely make anything below an A so...LOL...). I have asked them questions about a problem before, but I have never flat out told a professor," look, my answer is right and yours is wrong! change my grade now!" I would never argue with a professor b/c that is plan rude and disrespectful. I don't like students that are rude to their professors.

I don't like curves either...I don't like any kind of grade inflation. Either you EARN the A or you don't get it.

In my school, arguing with the profs is built into the program. Right after the exam, we have a review and you get to make your case for the answer you chose. You could have argued that you chose Zoloft because it has less withdrawl symptoms and that might have been enough to get you the point. I hate reviews because students will argue for answers that are just flat out wrong, not because they think they are right, but because they want the point and their potential three day weekend if they pass the exam. I understand their motivation but it makes the review torture to sit through when I have to listen to some pretty crazy arguments. It is my least favorite part of pharmacy school.

 

[diastole]

I'm always the first one done on exams (I just test quickly) and I inevitably have to listen to everyone dissect the exam for the next hour as they trickle out of the room. "What was this question, what was that question, what did you put for such-and-such?" WHO CARES! You already turned in the exam, and in about a week you'll be able to see which questions you got right and which questions you got wrong. Stop asking me. Just because I finished before you doesn't mean I know anything about that exam. It takes almost no time to guess. The last thing I want to do is re-hash that thing with you. It's over. Let's start studying for the next one instead of trying to figure out which questions we missed.

Oh, and then they start figuring out which ones they're going to argue IF they get them wrong. That's right, my class not only argues for wrong answers, they argue for conditional wrong answers.

Our exams are two hours long. I'd rather sit in the exam room and do nothing for an hour than go out in the hallways and talk about the exam. We are pass/no pass and get the results the same day so people get really stressed out about whether or not they are going to pass. They try to figure out what questions they missed so they can tell if they passed or not. Consequently, there is a lot of discussion about the exam and lots of worried students. All that stress is not good for my serenity so I people watch in the exam room when I'm done. I'm just worried that I'll get accused of looking at someone's paper someday.

 

[ucrx]

If that was the case most people in the class must have not worked very hard. It doesn't matter if it's just one lazy person or an CLASS FULL of lazy people etc. if you don't study you don't deserve to pass.

Sometimes the test is just that hard, the professor did a bad job teaching a subject, or the questions are written poorly. Do you think a question should be included if every single person in the class got it wrong? To me that indicates that there was something wrong along the way, not that the class was too lazy.

 

[ttopping]

If that was the case most people in the class must have not worked very hard. It doesn't matter if it's just one lazy person or an CLASS FULL of lazy people etc. if you don't study you don't deserve to pass.

That would be our law professor for you. Knows his stuff (runs the law review for the board exam), very knowledgeable, different style of teaching...translates into very difficult, thought provoking, situational, subjective questions. Trust me, it's not that the class is lazy, law can be difficult to learn as a first year student, especially with the amount of detail he goes into. Like I said though, he's great with law. If I ever had a specific question I couldn't get answered I would ask him first.

 

[Athelas]

I could not stand squinting at six little boxes on one side of paper and call that learning (powerpoint handouts).

Pick up a journal, Pharmacist Letter, Medscape, etc - Young'uns! Remember you are sacrificing 4+ years of your life to develop your mind 😍

 

[Its Z]

I could not stand squinting at six little boxes on one side of paper and call that learning (powerpoint handouts).

Pick up a journal, Pharmacist Letter, Medscape, etc - Young'uns! Remember you are sacrificing 4+ years of your life to develop your mind 😍

Young'uns??

Didn't you like just get out of RX school?

 

[Sparda29]

Young'uns??

Didn't you like just get out of RX school?

Average age in my class is 34. I'm the youngest male at 23.

 

[Athelas]

Young'uns??

Didn't you like just get out of RX school?

Hey, I'm trying to influence a group (students & residents) fresher than me! 😀

 

[GoldfishPharmD]

If that was the case most people in the class must have not worked very hard. It doesn't matter if it's just one lazy person or an CLASS FULL of lazy people etc. if you don't study you don't deserve to pass.

It just amazes me how you equate not getting a good grade as being lazy. You do realize that there are a number of reasons why someone might not do well on a test or in a class? People have different learning styles, the professor isn't a great teacher, responsibilities outside of school (family, work, etc). Just reading your posts on this forum makes it obvious you don't have any real world experience and that you've never had to struggle for anything, which I guess is lucky for you because I don't think you could handle it.

 

[type b pharmD]

It just amazes me how you equate not getting a good grade as being lazy. You do realize that there are a number of reasons why someone might not do well on a test or in a class? People have different learning styles, the professor isn't a great teacher, responsibilities outside of school (family, work, etc). Just reading your posts on this forum makes it obvious you don't have any real world experience and that you've never had to struggle for anything, which I guess is lucky for you because I don't think you could handle it.

👍

 

[pharm B]

I just got my first copy of Student Pharmacist in the mail from the APhA.

One thing bothers me. It's something stupid, and it's been discussed here before.

The magazine is called Student Pharmacist. Well, we're on Student Doctor Network, so I can't gripe about that too much.

The magazine's contributors are referred to as PharmD Candidates, while non-pharmacy students are referred to as 1st-year medical student, 2nd-year PhD student, etc.

I'm a damn pharmacy student. I'll even work with Student Pharmacist. But PharmD candidate? Why not call the medical student an MD candidate? Because it sounds ridiculous? 🙄

 

[crazybob]

It just amazes me how you equate not getting a good grade as being lazy. You do realize that there are a number of reasons why someone might not do well on a test or in a class? People have different learning styles, the professor isn't a great teacher, responsibilities outside of school (family, work, etc). Just reading your posts on this forum makes it obvious you don't have any real world experience and that you've never had to struggle for anything, which I guess is lucky for you because I don't think you could handle it.

👍👍👍👍👍 👍👍👍👍👍

 

[pharm B]

👍👍👍👍 👍👍👍👍👍

Just for you, bob.

SHC, I respect your ability to get A's, (and you obviously work at it, as your scholarship depends on it), but you're pretty harsh when it comes to your classmates.

I'm not sure what particular branch of pharmacy you're pursuing, but will you be this callous with your coworkers or, especially, your patients?

 

[Zetch]

This man. We had a lot of people in our first semester bitching about professors going way too fast. They knew they were coming to a 2+2 program and that the didactic portion would rush by. Someone actually wrote an anonymous letter to the state board like within the first 2 weeks. It pissed off everyone in the class.

Thank God that the letter was an incoherent mess. It was just filled with nonimportant complaints like professors going too fast, or professors using Blackboard too much. The guy from the state board came down, asked some questions, seemed like the claims on the anonymous letter were baseless. He asked us some questions and then we never heard from the guy again.

This made me LOL so hard

 

[Tinkerbell22]

UF actually has dorms that lack AC... 😱

😱 so does UT (Tennessee) don't they know we live in the southeast?

That reminds me: one thing I don't like is there is always that group of students who always think they're better than everyone else in the world. When you talk to other classmates about them, that clique is full of people who make fun of classmates, spread rumors, and other crap. Does anyone else notice this too?

not really... not more so than people in this world in general.

Couldn't agree more Bob. I hate when I am working with someone who doesn't want to talk. Just makes the day crawl by.

I wonder if those people hate working with "chatters". They probably think the same thing about it making the day feel longer.

I prefer to work with people who talk a lot. I want to die crying when I am working with people who don't talk (or talk much) to each other. It's literally torturous to me.

ohhh I absolutely LOVE cancer biology. what are you guys working on? i'm about to start drafting an IRB for a project I came up with for the honors degree (at my school you have to do a research project to graduate with honors). It involves possible epigenetic induced changes in CML patients started on imatinib... about 30% of these patients develop multi drug resistance due to imatinib treatment for 6 months. "pharmacoepigenetics"... new field that has the possibility to explode.

hmm cancer biology... soo like tumor suppressor genes and proto-oncogenes and stuff? never took a cancer biology class... had to drop mine because of scheduling conflict.

 

[crazybob]

I prefer to work with people who talk a lot. I want to die crying when I am working with people who don't talk (or talk much) to each other. It's literally torturous to me.

I thought you were like outgoing and stuff, so I didn't think you'd have a problem starting conversations with your coworkers.

 

[Sparda29]

I prefer to work with people who talk a lot. I want to die crying when I am working with people who don't talk (or talk much) to each other. It's literally torturous to me.

One of my preceptors complained that one of the students that was interning at the same time as me talked too much and laughed too loud.

 

[owlegrad]

I thought you were like outgoing and stuff, so I didn't think you'd have a problem starting conversations with your coworkers.

I am and I don't. But I have one pharmacist that I work with who prefers not to talk while she works, and she prefers that no one else talk as well. She likes to work in silence, I guess to help prevent errors. Or maybe she just likes peace and quite. But I hate working with her. My 4 hour shifts with her feel longer than my 10 hour shifts at CVS. Nice lady, but I don't care for working in a library.

I don't think she likes working with me either, although I can't put my finger on why that is. Of course I could be wrong anyway, but I always get the feeling that she would be happier if I wasn't there.

 

[owlegrad]

One of my preceptors complained that one of the students that was interning at the same time as me talked too much and laughed too loud.

Oh yes that would be me for sure.

 

[Sparda29]

Oh yes that would be me for sure.

For me, I was talking too much when paired with a young male pharmacist. Instead of talking about the IVs we were making, we would be arguing Jets Vs Giants, Mets Vs Yankees, etc.

 

[crazybob]

I am and I don't. But I have one pharmacist that I work with who prefers not to talk while she works, and she prefers that no one else talk as well. She likes to work in silence, I guess to help prevent errors. Or maybe she just likes peace and quite. But I hate working with her. My 4 hour shifts with her feel longer than my 10 hour shifts at CVS. Nice lady, but I don't care for working in a library.

I don't think she likes working with me either, although I can't put my finger on why that is. Of course I could be wrong anyway, but I always get the feeling that she would be happier if I wasn't there.

Because she's a pharmacist, she can't afford to make any mistakes, so she probably prefers it that way. When we (as interns) make small errors, our preceptors, coworkers, and other pharmacists catch them, so we can usually learn from that. If the pharmacist made a mistake, it would be a license on the line.

 

[owlegrad]

Because she's a pharmacist, she can't afford to make any mistakes, so she probably prefers it that way. When we (as interns) make small errors, our preceptors, coworkers, and other pharmacists catch them, so we can usually learn from that. If the pharmacist made a mistake, it would be a license on the line.

I'm hurt Bob. Not sure why you would direct this at me. 🙁 😛

Perhaps I sounded like I don't care what her reasons were? Not the case at all, that's why I included the line about error prevention. I respect her decision, I just don't like working with her.

All the other pharmacists I work with will make small talk in between activities, but she prefers silence for the entire day. It makes for a long shift.

 

[crazybob]

I'm hurt Bob. Not sure why you would direct this at me. 🙁 😛

Perhaps I sounded like I don't care what her reasons were? Not the case at all, that's why I included the line about error prevention. I respect her decision, I just don't like working with her.

All the other pharmacists I work with will make small talk in between activities, but she prefers silence for the entire day. It makes for a long shift.

Hey now, at least I didn't use the word "you" this time

I think I would prefer working with a quiet pharmacist over the one that talks a lot IMO.

What if you asked her questions about work? In that case, you two would talk because you have to in order to get things done. In that case, it would make things a bit less like a long shift.

 

[owlegrad]

Hey now, at least I didn't use the word "you" this time

I think I would prefer working with a quiet pharmacist over the one that talks a lot IMO.

What if you asked her questions about work? In that case, you two would talk because you have to in order to get things done. In that case, it would make things a bit less like a long shift.

She is a tough nut to crack. I wasn't joking when I said that I think she prefers me to not be there. She isn't nasty at all, very polite, but she answers questions as swiftly as possible and makes it very clear she would prefer not to be interrupted.

When she is there I basically just pull for Med-dispense and fill labels as they are printed. If I do not stand by the printer and fill the labels as they are printed (for instance if I am making deliveries or processing credits) she will fill the labels herself. I always get the feeling that I am just getting in her way.

She is the only pharmacists I work with who sends me home early. I don't mean that she sends me home as punishment, but she will say stuff like, "That's enough for one day owlegrad, why don't you go home know?". Or worse she will say something like, "I think that's about everything you can help with, why not call it a day?". I can't decide if she is trying to be nice or just get me out the door.

She will answer a question if I ask, but like I said she doesn't want to be interrupted. On more than one occasion when I have asked her a question her response has been for me to leave it and she will do it herself. I think she is just the type who prefers to do everything herself rather than be bothered with other people.

On the other hand, she has showed me some things at the hospital that no one else has (faster ways to put things in the computer system, practical ways of doing things faster, how to find a particular nurse if I need to, etc.). She has the most seniority and in many ways is the best pharmacist there. She really knows her stuff, particularly regarding day to day operations. But the whole being quite thing still makes her my least favorite pharmacist to work for.

 

[crazybob]

She is a tough nut to crack. I wasn't joking when I said that I think she prefers me to not be there. She isn't nasty at all, very polite, but she answers questions as swiftly as possible and makes it very clear she would prefer not to be interrupted.

When she is there I basically just pull for Med-dispense and fill labels as they are printed. If I do not stand by the printer and fill the labels as they are printed (for instance if I am making deliveries or processing credits) she will fill the labels herself. I always get the feeling that I am just getting in her way.

She is the only pharmacists I work with how sends me home early. I don't mean that she sends me home as punishment, but she will say stuff like, "That's enough for one day owlegrad, why don't you go home know?". Or worse she will say something like, "I think that's about everything you can help with, why not call it a day?". I can't decide if she is trying to be nice or just get me out the door.

She will answer a question if I ask, but like I said she doesn't want to be interrupted. On more than one occasion when I have asked her a question her response has been for me to leave it and she will do it herself. I think she is just the type who prefers to do everything herself rather than be bothered with other people.

On the other hand, she has showed me some things at the hospital that no one else has (faster ways to put things in the computer system, practical ways of doing things faster, how to find a particular nurse if I need to, etc.). She has the most seniority and in many ways is the best pharmacist there. She really knows her stuff, particularly regarding day to day operations. But the whole being quiet thing still makes her my least favorite pharmacist to work for.

The only times I heard something like that was when I was shadowing a preceptor.

So this is at inpatient? I guess that could be why she's more likely to not want to be interrupted.

 

[owlegrad]

The only times I heard something like that was when I was shadowing a preceptor.

So this is at inpatient? I guess that could be why she's more likely to not want to be interrupted.

Yes.

This is one thing I miss from retail (one of the few), always someone to talk to and the time flies by. I like the constant interaction that comes with working with the public.

 

[crazybob]

Yes.

This is one thing I miss from retail (one of the few), always someone to talk to and the time flies by. I like the constant interaction that comes with working with the public.

I like working with the public. I also like explaining things to them and making sure they understand.

 

[owlegrad]

I like working with the public. I also like explaining things to them and making sure they understand.

Have you any experience with inpatient? I was suprised by how much I like it. I have a pretty strong retail backround so I always figured I would go the retail route, but I wanted to see what it was like in a hospital. And now that is what I want to do. Funny how things work out.

 

[crazybob]

Have you any experience with inpatient? I was suprised by how much I like it. I have a pretty strong retail backround so I always figured I would go the retail route, but I wanted to see what it was like in a hospital. And now that is what I want to do. Funny how things work out.

Nope. The closest I've been to an inpatient setting is barely seeing the computer screen from sitting in a chair (about 20 ft away) while waiting for a preceptor to talk to me about an intern position.

 

[medicalCPA]

hmm cancer biology... soo like tumor suppressor genes and proto-oncogenes and stuff? never took a cancer biology class... had to drop mine because of scheduling conflict.

I have never taken one either, and I'm getting a PhD in it!

However, that will change in January.

 

[spacecowgirl]

Have you any experience with inpatient? I was suprised by how much I like it. I have a pretty strong retail backround so I always figured I would go the retail route, but I wanted to see what it was like in a hospital. And now that is what I want to do. Funny how things work out.

I swore up and down I would never in eleventy billion years work in a hospital.

Joke's on me.

 

[owlegrad]

I swore up and down I would never in eleventy billion years work in a hospital.

Joke's on me.

Wow was there any particular reason for your strong aversion to hospital? Also, what changed your mind?

 

[spacecowgirl]

Wow was there any particular reason for your strong aversion to hospital? Also, what changed your mind?

I worked as a hospital intern all through pharm school and everyone seemed to be miserable there. The techs bitched constantly, the pharmacists complained all of the time, the nurses were crabby, everyone was hurried and miserable and seemed to hate their jobs. It was busy as hell all of the time and overall just a toxic place to work. I stayed because the pay and hours were good and I truly liked my coworkers.

I hit a career crossroads during residency and interviewed at my current place. I saw that not every hospital is like that large teaching hospital just like not every community pharmacy is a 1000+ script Wags. I love working in a small hospital. Where I work now is about 1/20th the size of where I interned so it's an entirely different atmosphere.

 

[Kumura]

One thing I hate about pharmacy school is exams after exams! It never stopped.

 

[fullmetalphrm]

I worked as a hospital intern all through pharm school and everyone seemed to be miserable there. The techs bitched constantly, the pharmacists complained all of the time, the nurses were crabby, everyone was hurried and miserable and seemed to hate their jobs. It was busy as hell all of the time and overall just a toxic place to work. I stayed because the pay and hours were good and I truly liked my coworkers.

I hit a career crossroads during residency and interviewed at my current place. I saw that not every hospital is like that large teaching hospital just like not every community pharmacy is a 1000+ script Wags. I love working in a small hospital. Where I work now is about 1/20th the size of where I interned so it's an entirely different atmosphere.

After shadowing in small/medium hospitals I can securely say that working in a smaller hospital setting is a great place to work. It's kind of what I'm aiming for, but I'm open to other choices as well.