Where I Stand? PCOM Estimating Quintile Grading

[MDD DO2014]

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Hey guys,

This is a question directed at people who have finished their first two years at PCOM. I was a humanities major undergrad, and I have never been a very intense person about my grades. Still though, I hate that we have to wait so long to figure out where we stand in terms of Quintiles.

I know, I know, I ought to focus on "passing" and "actually learning the material" so that I can "do well on my board exams" and "really shine during my clinical rotations..." Haha. I get it. But still...

The GPA number on my report is basically useless right now. I know it's maybe three or four points above the average, but I have no idea what that means.

I know that "every class is different." I've also heard that "the difference between being in the 2nd through 4th quintiles comes down to a few percentage points." Lastly, I've heard that unless you're in the 1st or 5th quintile, it's probably not going to be impressive or incriminating enough to make a real difference come time for matching.

There are a lot of reasons why I shouldn't care about where I'll wind up, quintile-wise... But isn't everybody at least curious what the break down has been like in past years!?

Please don't judge me too harshly, but I think it would be nice to know, for PCOM students of the future and for myself, how the break-down has gone in years past. I realize that most people probably only know what GPA he or she personally received and which quintile that GPA put him or her into personally.

I was hoping to give people a chance to compile a list of GPA to Quintile. Even if my particular class winds up being very different... Or even if each particular response from each particular year winds up being wildly different and no conclusions can be drawn.... Having a list of GPAs with the Quintiles in which those GPAs wound up, would still be interesting to know for other reasons (if one year's tests were harder than the next, the annoyance of knowing you were .03 GPA points off from the next quintile up, etc).

When I find out what Quintile my GPA places me into, I will come back and post it.

Just for the sake of full disclosure:
Current GPA through SPOM and CMBM = 85.03 (see, it's not like I'm 97% guy desperately needing to know that I'm top of my class)

Thanks Everyone!

 

[Bacchus]

RK has said the ranking system is being reworked to a potential # system. AKA 98>90>85. As second years we have no idea where we stand.

 

[MDD DO2014]

You guys still haven't been told!? So we have no idea whether we might need to totally rethink what we are doing career-wise? I know people say that these first two years don't matter.... But that sounds like total BS to me. How could two years worth of hard work and testing not matter? I understand that Board Scores and Rotations are MORE important, but I'm really getting sick of being told that class-rank and the rest of the measures from the first two years is irrelevant. I met this fourth year student when I shadowed and I think he had a good point... Even if you're not trying to go into Dermatology or Anesthesiology or whatever, why not try to go to the best place you can get into...

So try your best, they say? What difference does it make knowing where you stand? Isn't your best still your best? That's a lame argument. People ought to know where they stand so that they can have some idea what they are going to need to plan for. I don't understand why they insist on keeping us in the dark. I think the argument that says that making us unaware of our ranking, makes us less competitive is HOGWASH... Actually, I think that assumption is insulting. Here's what I mean...
I want to do well. I don't want to do "average" and I don't want to do "below average." That DOES NOT MEAN THAT I WOULDN'T HELP SOMEONE LEARN SOMETHING AT THE ANATOMY-LAB TABLE!? Or refuse to share my notes with someone after they missed a class, etc.
Assuming that I'm going to be a jerk, simply because I want to distinguish myself as an intelligent and hardworking person (the same way everybody else does) is insulting.
Moreover, it's useless. Everyone realizes that--in the end--they are still going to be ranked (one way or the other), so why try and hide it from us for two years? I just don't think it makes any sense to keep us in the dark. Am I wrong?

 

[Kuba]

With complete awareness this may cause you to vomit all over your keyboard, I could not resist letting you know that indeed those two years of hard work, cramming, and likely throwing your fellow colleagues under the bus do not matter when it comes down to securing residency training. As much as you think its BS right now, you'll come around in a couple years. I realize I am uninvited to this thread since I did not attend PCOM, but this is true among all schools. All that hard studying did pay off if you actually managed to retain 10% of that information.

 

[Rollo]

Well first off, your grades from first 2 years REALLY don't matter. Why? Think about it. Every medical school's curriculum is different, not so much in content, but more so in how it is delivered, and even more importantly, how it is tested.

Residency directors across the country really have no way of objectively comparing your pre-clinical grades with another student from another medical school. Is an A in GI from PCOM really equivalent to an A in GI from NYCOM? Is it equivalent to an A in GI from Temple? How about from UPenn?

Answer isn't so clear, is it? Yes, yes you could be compared to rest of your classmates but again, how do we really decide the quality of that rank? What does it mean if you were in the 1st quintile at PCOM but managed to score at the 50th percentile on COMLEX?

(As an aside, I must say that this scenario is unlikely simply because if you were in the 1st quintile, you really knew your stuff from 1st 2 years and are more than likely to achieve a very high score on COMLEX).

I happen to agree with the policy that your ranking be kept from your for the first 2 years. Here is why: it breeds competition. Ugh, sorry I know you hate that explanation. But think about it.

You find out your ranking, and you want to do better. Fine, but what is your true motivation to do better? Your motivation is to achieve higher grades, and this can be done by spending countless hours MEMORIZING minute details that you're bound to forget a day after the test.

Memorizing details = bad in the long run. Why? You've sacrificed "learning the concepts" for "memorizing the details". I'm gonna make a disclaimer and say I'm definitely not the top quintile student but I took the time to LEARN the material and UNDERSTOOD the concepts well. This meant that I didn't have time to memorize all the tiny details which, I have no doubt, would have secured me 5-10 more points on exams.

Now, as we're studying for boards, I'm doing well above average and the material is sinking in faster than I anticipated. Even the mountain of details is easy for me to remember now because boards-studying forces you to link the concepts together from multiple systems. Memorizing details becomes a cake walk when you understand the major concepts.

So back to why keeping ranking from you is a good idea? Because if they hadn't, then it forces you to achieve higher grades by spending time memorizing specific details rather than understanding the concepts. This ultimately, will affect you in the future as a clinician because you never trained yourself to think in a "problem-solving manner"; you trained yourself to think in a "regurgitate facts on a piece of paper" manner.

Do you understand the difference?

Also, by keeping your ranking from you, they're also doing you a favor by saving you time from unnecessarily worrying about your grades and increasing stress levels. I mean, look at you now with your posts! You're freaking out over something so obvious (well obvious if you look at the residency data and listen to the clinicians/older classmates).

In the end, grades in first 2 years are almost a paradox. They are important in that you need to learn the concepts first, and memorize details second. Your grade will reflect this because if you understand the concepts, you're bound to score in mid-high Bs on the exams. However, the grades are NOT important in that they won't make you or break you (ok fine, they might if you're shooting for derm, rad onc, etc.).

Hope this helps. Work your butt off in LEARNING the concepts (especially all those pulm micro you have coming up, learn these bugs well NOW). But don't stress yourself out over memorizing the tiniest details that Hingley, Balin, or McDonald will put on their exams.

Enjoy rest of your 1st year, and first half of the 2nd year, and thank God that you're doing average amongst a group of very, very intelligent and hard-working people. Bottom half of your class prays to be in your shoes.

 

[Bacchus]

Kuba you have good advice. Thanks for posting! The 1st years are a bit tense bc they have a renal exam this week, hehe.

Just bc rank isnt known yet doesnt mean you have to rethink anything. BOARDS are what matters. To warn you, you might explode when they tell you rotation order doesnt matter either.

 

[MDD DO2014]

Rollo and Bacchus, thank you guys so much. I think I am just going to have to accept that you guys are right, because... well... you guys are right.

I still have one problem with all the supposed relationship of releasing class rank and competition. IF THEY REALLY ARE CONCERNED ABOUT COMPETITION THEN THEY SHOULDN'T RANK US. The shortest distance between any two points is a straight line. Can we really deny the simple truth that class rank will ALWAYS inspire competition? What real good does hiding our rank do?

Personally, I think rank ought to be irrelevant... I am a Humanities major, so I tend to look at things a bit more philosophically than most. What does it really say about me if I do well and someone else doesn't? "No man is an island, entire of himself..." Ought I to be concerned AT ALL about how I am doing relative to my classmates?

Believe me, I am an idealist.. But I have been (repeatedly and systematically) beaten and broken by these never-ending selection processes. I am the first in my family to do this and haven't really had a lot of help along the way. I thought it would be easy sailing when I got in... And now I read about these students who are "scrambling..."

At this point, I just sort of assume the worst about everything. If it would suck if it were true, then it's probably true. I swear to God, that is 100% my logic right now. Would it suck if my grades this year and class rank actually mattered and I couldn't afford to just spend time learning it? Yes... Yes that would suck. So yes, it's probably true. My understanding of the world of medical school is a very dark one, where everything that I don't want to be true IS true, and nothing is the way I want it to be. Would I really like it if DOs were given equal respect when applying to an MD residency program? Would I like it if I only had to take the COMLEX in order to get into an MD residency? Do I want it to not make a difference if I actually do an MD residency versus doing a DO one? I am basically just starting to accept that everything I want to be true isn't going to be. It's like my dad's been telling me my whole life: everything worth doing is difficult, there is no such thing as a short-cut. Period.

So, fueled by this cynical anger at the way things seem to be, I am quickly becoming sick and ******* tired of being told to relax. Do I want my class rank to matter? Do I want to have to COMPETE against these kids, who probably all had science majors and who know how to memorize/regurgitate all the important stuff without having to do the reading??? (Yes, I DO ALL THE READING)... Would I like to be able to focus on learning, so that I could work toward my board grades as well? Do I really want to have to do BOTH--> Memorize for Regurgitation Now AND Learn for the Sake of Knowing It for the Rest of My Life (Boards, Rotations, and BEYOND)...? No, I do not want to do BOTH. I just want to learn it, I don't really want it to matter where I stand in terms of everybody else. But I just find it hard to believe that something like that would really go my way. I don't know how and I don't know why, but I am SURE that somehow, only doing average (or worse if I wind up dipping performance-wise), will wind up biting me.

Sorry for having a stroke, but I just really really really hate that I have to still worry about being a "competitive applicant".

I know you guys are going to do well? You know why? Because neither of you seem all that nervous... I had a buddy in college who wasn't nervous about getting into medical school, now he's at Rochester getting 90+ on all his tests. People who are really really smart never seem to be worried about the way things will turn out...

Seriously though, it was really nice of you to respond to me like that. I will make sure that, when the time comes I will be able to put myself in position to do something I can see myself doing for the rest of my life.

Sorry for losing my **** there, I just read this post written by this kid who was "scrambling" or whatever at NSUCOM... but damn do I feel better now. By the way, they caught Osama. U.S.A.

 

[MDD DO2014]

By the way, pretty much NONE of that was sarcastic. You guys really do seem to have your act together and I probably will feel exactly like you do when I get to that point. And Kuba, I went to Catholic school my whole life before PCOM, and I still go to Mass every weekend. If anything, I am probably too earnest. I am NOT a science-loving, misanthrope. I would never, ever toss somebody else under the bus to make myself look good. As a Humanities Major, I've felt like an outsider from the beginning. My College courses were called "God," "World" and "Human Person." I still haven't read enough of Robbins Pathologic Basis of Disease to have read more of it than of Leo Tolstoy's "War and Peace" or Cervante's "Don Quixote." If I am acting at all like a cynical jerk, it's because I'm having to learn how to care more about stuff like that in order to survive in this "brave new world."