What's wrong with Boston U?

[wisedawg]

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So far in this forum, I haven't seen a single person who's going to BU. I also read some negative posts about BU. I am not advocating BU because I am going there. But when I looked at the school and students there, the atmosphere was really nice. Also i don't know why people say Tufts is good and BU is bad. According to the ADEA guide to Dental School, Boston U has average dat score of 19/19 for incoming students, and Tufts has 17.9/17.3. I just want to hear from you why so many people in this forum think BU is a bad school besides the expensive tuition.

 

[yell326]

I am not sure where you found your ADEA stats at b/c my guide book ranks BU below Tufts. Tufts' entering GPA average is a 3.4 with BU being a 3.3 and the DAT scores are around an 18 or 19 for both schools. The difference is that Tufts was ranked 7 in the nation last year and BU wasn't even in the top ten. Tufts is also slightly cheaper than BU. Plus Tufts screens their applicants before they invite them to an interview and BU doesn't. I visited both schools and thought that BU was a nice school but Tufts did a better job at selling their school.

 

[ktran02]

what are those rankings based on & how did you find them.

 

[DesiDentist]

It's all about the board scores! Tufts is always in the top 10 every year. Also, tufts has a long history and most of Harvard's faculty is from Tufts.

DesiDentist

 

[smiley80]

hi!

where did u find that Tufts is in the top 10, based on National Boards?

J

 

[puzzle]

It's on the interview information package. There, you can find a break down of their scores for national boards. I guess you probably can find that on the school's website too.

 

[yosemitesam]

If you personally do well on the boards, how much does it matter which school you went to? Anybody know?

 

[juan7677]

Even if you do well on the boards, the school you went to have some say in cases of getting into a specialty program. I don't think its a huge factor but still its a factor. For example, if 2 students have similar board scores, gpa, and research background than the student who went to a school like Harvard, UCLA, or UPENN will probably get chosen over the student from a lesser known school. So the schools name and reputation have some factor. I personally know this b/c the PI who I do research for is on the Admissions Comittee for the Endodontics Program. In spite of this, I wouldn't worry too much of the school's name. It's ultimately up to you on how competitive an applicant you will be.

 

[pandaman]

Juan, you are right. At the end, what it comes down to is your rank and numbers on NB. If you go to known schools like UPenn and Harvard, you might have a slight advantage over applicants from other schools, but you also gotta realize that those known schools tend to have more competitive students, so it's tougher to stand out among classmates. I know one guy for instance, he knew he wanted to specialize, and he was smartest guy I've ever seen, but he went to Howard, and he was no. 1 in his class, and eventually got into ortho program at Temple.
So the fact is you gotta study hard and try hard if you want to specialize.

Oh, one more thing. i am not implying that people at Howard are less intelligent. It's just that statistically speaking, one has a better chance if you go to less competitive school.