PSU vs UVA

[golfingoddess]

PSU pros:
- In-State tuition is $10,000 / yr less than UVa, and estimated living cost is $5,000 / yr less than UVA.... overall, ~$60,000 cheaper after 4 years.
- My parents only live 75 minutes away (they live about 5 hours from UVA)
- I'm already familiar with the Hershey area

UVA pros:
- Pass / Fail curriculum (PSU basically has grades)
- The pre-clerkship years are condensed into only a year and a half, allowing for several extra months for elective clerkships at the end of the 3rd year.
- The student body is very surprisingly relaxed, and hardly complained about the work-load. (PSU students definitely did some complaining, especially over anatomy)
- a bit more prestige

Other Issues:
- I'll have to do away rotations at UVA, and I'll also probably have to do away rotations at PSU. But UVA does include housing at these away rotations.
- UVA has an "honors system" for exams (You take the exam at home online over the weekend)... I feel like some people might feel inclined to cheat.
- UVA has a new curriculum, with some logistical problems.


I feel like I would be happy at either place, but I *might* be more relaxed at UVa. (I'm definitely a tightly-wound individual, though).

I know this is difficult, but I'm trying to quantify the pros / cons in terms of the $60,000 difference (the difference is probably much larger once you consider the interest rate...)
So how much is UVA's potentially relaxing environment and extra elective time worth?

Thanks for any input! But for those who comment, I would appreciate it if you could tell me who you are (e.g., PSU / UVA student, other med student, pre-med student, etc)

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[golfingoddess]

Thanks to those for voting in the poll, but I would really appreciate somebody to give their reasoning. I'm trying to make the most logical decision.

 

[HakunaMatata22]

PSU pros:
- In-State tuition is $10,000 / yr less than UVa, and estimated living cost is $5,000 / yr less than UVA.... overall, ~$60,000 cheaper after 4 years.
- My parents only live 75 minutes away (they live about 5 hours from UVA)
- I'm already familiar with the Hershey area

UVA pros:
- Pass / Fail curriculum (PSU basically has grades)
- The pre-clerkship years are condensed into only a year and a half, allowing for several extra months for elective clerkships at the end of the 3rd year.
- The student body is very surprisingly relaxed, and hardly complained about the work-load. (PSU students definitely did some complaining, especially over anatomy)
- a bit more prestige

Other Issues:
- I'll have to do away rotations at UVA, and I'll also probably have to do away rotations at PSU. But UVA does include housing at these away rotations.
- UVA has an "honors system" for exams (You take the exam at home online over the weekend)... I feel like some people might feel inclined to cheat.
- UVA has a new curriculum, with some logistical problems.


I feel like I would be happy at either place, but I *might* be more relaxed at UVa. (I'm definitely a tightly-wound individual, though).

I know this is difficult, but I'm trying to quantify the pros / cons in terms of the $60,000 difference (the difference is probably much larger once you consider the interest rate...)
So how much is UVA's potentially relaxing environment and extra elective time worth?

Thanks for any input! But for those who comment, I would appreciate it if you could tell me who you are (e.g., PSU / UVA student, other med student, pre-med student, etc)

I'm not familiar with PSU, but I voted for UVa because I'm seriously considering to matriculate there since it's unbelievably awesome. However, at the end of the day, go where you'll be happiest. Will you be worried about the extra $60,000 throughout medical school? Then go to PSU. Do you want a Pass/Fail curriculum? Then go to UVa. Once you graduate with your MD, it's going to be the student that makes the school and not the other way around. You're able to get a reputable residency regardless of where you are. So choose a path where you know you'll be most able to succeed, and that correlates with being happy.

 

[Steeler7588]

I know nothing about PSU's med school. I do know there are a number of people in our class who turned it down to come here. Maybe they'll eventually post.

PSU pros:
UVA pros:
- Pass / Fail curriculum (PSU basically has grades)
- The pre-clerkship years are condensed into only a year and a half, allowing for several extra months for elective clerkships at the end of the 3rd year.
- The student body is very surprisingly relaxed, and hardly complained about the work-load. (PSU students definitely did some complaining, especially over anatomy)
- a bit more prestige

Other Issues:
- I'll have to do away rotations at UVA, and I'll also probably have to do away rotations at PSU. But UVA does include housing at these away rotations.
- UVA has an "honors system" for exams (You take the exam at home online over the weekend)... I feel like some people might feel inclined to cheat.
- UVA has a new curriculum, with some logistical problems.

As a first year, I can comment on a few things.

1) P/F is amazing. I learn to help my future patients, not because I'm worried about answering some random question testing an inane fact that will have some effect on my score/ranking. P/F reduces the stress so much and really contributes to the relaxed environment. You can be relaxed in a graded curriculum (a couple students at Pitt didn't care about their curved H/P/F system), but it's definitely harder.

2) I don't think the testing system encourages cheating, since it's P/F and there's no advantage to scoring higher, except in demonstrating a better mastery of the material - in that case, cheating to do better does you no good. Our big exams have to be taken within the library, where you're surrounded by people anyway. I've heard that they can tell from the online software if you're tabbing out of the window, but I have no idea if that's true.

3) While housing is included at UVa away rotations, I've heard sometimes it's essentially like living in a mediocre dorm. If PSU has away rotations as well, it's not a big deal either way, I guess. I would rather do all my rotations in Charlottesville just because I don't want to move away, but there are some perks (increased autonomy, I think Fairfax is a cool location) to accompany the downsides (being split up from friends, living in smaller areas sometimes, dorm housing).

4) Our curriculum is new, but if you had told me this was how medical school was everywhere, I wouldn't have been able to tell. The number of times I've been frustrated (which there certainly have been) is pretty minimal when considering how many different topics we've done. It'll be even smoother next year, so while there will be new things they'll try on you guys (shaped as a result of our direct input), I'm pretty jealous you'll get to go through an even more refined curriculum. It's been great.

Personally, as far as financial differences go, I've seen much bigger disparities than $60k. I personally would choose happiness over that amount of money. However, while people deal with much bigger differences in loans/debt, that is still a significant amount of money. Would $60k + interest bother you after graduation, if you think you could be happy at PSU? If not, come to UVa!

 

[FrazzleSnazzle]

I went to UVa's second look before and I was extremely impressed with everything they offered. The students and faculty are all relaxed and have a distinctive charm. Charlottesville is also a great college town with tons of things to do and is reasonably close to Washington DC. And most of all, you can't beat a Pass/Fail grading system. You don't realize it yet but trust me that you'll be extremely thankful for such a curriculum once you start school. The only downside in my opinion were the away rotations but since PSU also has those, I guess that will be a nonfactor for you.

And don't forget, UVa's class was actually overbooked for quite awhile in May last year. I think that just shows how popular they are.

 

[golfingoddess]

Can anybody comment on how important extended elective clerkship time is? UVA has this built into their curriculum. Do you think this extra time benefits most students? Or there any potential downsides?

 

[Steeler7588]

Can anybody comment on how important extended elective clerkship time is? UVA has this built into their curriculum. Do you think this extra time benefits most students? Or there any potential downsides?

The only possible downside is that by condensing the basic sciences, you either have to cut away some of what you used to teach or it gets really intense (think Duke's 1st year). We did the former, as we only have class from 8-12. Friends in the old version of the curriculum feel like they've streamlined it for us, but maybe there were some lectures that might've been helpful to have?

I think extended elective time is really important, but I also have no idea what I want to do. I talked to people at other schools who felt pressured into decisions about their specialties because they didn't have enough time to explore options properly before applying. Then again, there's always people who know exactly what they want to do when entering med school - having enough time isn't an issue for them.

 

[OrangeandMaroon]

Can anybody comment on how important extended elective clerkship time is? UVA has this built into their curriculum. Do you think this extra time benefits most students? Or there any potential downsides?

Check out this thread.
http://forums.studentdoctor.net/showthread.php?t=808466

 

[golfingoddess]

Thanks for the posts!

I see that the poll and the comments overwhelmingly favor UVA. Any Penn State students care to post?