Hey, current NYMC student here (M4). Congrats on your acceptances! I'll weigh in for what it's worth, not sure if you decided already (I know today's the deadline, but I personally decided at 11:59pm the night of lol)
Re: NYMC:
-Closer to NYC and family/friends
There is definitely something to be said for proximity to family/friends -- though bear in mind that your time to hang out with people outside of med school will be more limited, so even with them living close by it will be significantly more challenging to see them frequently. Also, many make friends in their med school class which become their primary community during med school. That said, I chose NYMC for similar reasons (sibling and friends in NYC) and ended up being really grateful for this (vs. going with a school that was nowhere near anyone I knew). Since you'll be so busy / time so limited, the length/arduousness of the commute will 100% make a big difference in how often you realistically see NYC friends/family during the next 4 years.
In terms of proximity to NYC per se, this is a nice perk if this is important to you. We would occasionally make group trips down into the city to do stuff (if you catch the express Metro-North it's only ~45 min into Grand Central), and many move into the city for their clinical years. That said, your time to really make the most of this is pretty limited especially during M1-M3 so definitely wouldn't think of NYC trips as more than a rare, 2-3 times per semester type thing.
-Admin seems very supportive of student body
I would agree with this personally. Admin isn't perfect, but they do their best and seem genuinely invested in the students. They are very accessible by way of direct e-mails, periodic student/admin town halls, and via Student Senate (each class year elects 5 class senators which meet 1x monthly with the admin to bring up student concerns). As an M4, I've been impressed with the changes they've made since my M1 year, which I take as evidence that they do take student feedback/concerns into consideration.
-Students say it is pretty easy to get shadowing/volunteer opportunities
Would agree that many of the faculty at our main associated hospital (Westchester Medical Center right next to campus) are receptive to students and getting students involved, as are the residents there. WMC is also bringing in a lot of new young attendings of late, who are often very accessible / engaged with student teaching.
-Would probably commute from NYC
I know a couple current M1s who do this. They basically commute up in the AM, stay on campus for the 'business day' and commute back down in the evening. One nice thing is that doing the reverse commute = less rush hour traffic, but as you likely know traffic is ubiquitous in NYC no matter what. While living in the city, I personally preferred to take the MetroNorth up for that reason and keep my car at North White Plains to drive the rest of the way to campus (overall ~1 hour door to door). This is tough but doable, depending where you live in the city. If you do this, I would try to aim for a spot near a highway (if you're driving) or a quick hop away from the MetroNorth. It gets easier M2 year when there are fewer mandatory in-person activities. One caution would be it might make it a bit more challenging to build strong community on campus and if you have family/SO waiting at home, you'll often be gone for 10+ hours a day.
Stony Brook I obviously know much less about, but picked up some info from my friend who has visited / knows students there. He had the following to say:
"it seemed like they had a decent program but they did things differently than nymc. Like they took step 1 and 2 before clinical rotations so she was stressed to have to study for both. The hospital was big, a bit ugly imo lol, but had nice facilities and research seemed to be a focal point. The area is typical long island, nothing really to do but has nice beaches to enjoy in the summer. I think it depends on what this person wants for rotation wise and also if they're okay with hanging out mostly in long island for the entire time as well as the step 1 and 2 thing"
My personal editorial: the Step 1/2 together thing seems absolutely wack to me. IMO, it is stressful enough to prepare for one exam that I definitely needed some time to recover after each one. Moreover, it seems you're taking the more basic science-oriented Step 1 long after your pre-clinical phase-- as opposed to NYMC which takes Step 1 right after learning the information, then takes the more clinically oriented Step 2 after your clinical rotations (which feels far more intuitive to me personally). But take my opinion with a grain of salt.
I am a fan of the fact that SBU administers NBME exams at the end of each block. Seems like it would be helpful in prepping for board exams, whereas NYMC still has in-house exams which are professor-written and sometimes overly emphasize details that feel relevant to PhD lecturers but are not super important for clinical / board exam purposes. They are slowly/steadily working on changing this though by bringing in more MD lecturers; I've noticed a substantial uptick in the quality of the preclinical lectures from my M1 year due to that
