You think I'm going about this correctly? A few questions about deciding.

[Tely]

Hey everyone,

So I am fortunate enough to have the opportunity to decide what dental school I will attend. I am still waiting on three more decisions (ASDOH, UCSF and harvard), and am currently deciding between (UCLA, Penn, Tufts and Michigan).

With my current options, I seem to be set on LA. As far as how I have narrowed down my decision, it pretty much has come down to:

1) price,
2) pass/fail grading
3) location / distance from family
4) specialization rates (that's my goal, along with 90% of other incoming D1's...haha)
5) clinical strength / patient pool
6) weather / community / people (I really care about having a diverse student body and network)
7) Specific programs (ex. Clinical Honors, externships, etc...)

So from all these, I have a few questions:

A) Do you guys think there is any other big deciding factor that I have completely forgot about?

B) Do you - specially current dental students - agree with this ranking of factors that will decide where I will spend the next four years of my studies?

C) Lastly, here is a rather specific question: is pass/fail grading that much of a blessing in D school? Some students seem to love that system, but people who wanted to specialize seemed to be under more stress in a pass/fail/honors system. I am way wrong for that observation? Can you give me any advice on this based on experience??

Thanks everyone for any advice/feedback. I have tried not to add to the huge cluster of threads on this site for the past few months, but at this point I can use any input from those more experienced than myself.

Happy new years and holidays to ya'll, wishing you happy sleeping and/or partying

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[sparky450r]

Hey everyone,

So I am fortunate enough to have the opportunity to decide what dental school I will attend. I am still waiting on three more decisions (ASDOH, UCSF and harvard), and am currently deciding between (UCLA, Penn, Tufts and Michigan).

With my current options, I seem to be set on LA. As far as how I have narrowed down my decision, it pretty much has come down to:

1) price,
2) pass/fail grading
3) location / distance from family
4) specialization rates (that's my goal, along with 90% of other incoming D1's...haha)
5) clinical strength / patient pool
6) weather / community / people (I really care about having a diverse student body and network)
7) Specific programs (ex. Clinical Honors, externships, etc...)

So from all these, I have a few questions:

A) Do you guys think there is any other big deciding factor that I have completely forgot about?

B) Do you - specially current dental students - agree with this ranking of factors that will decide where I will spend the next four years of my studies?

C) Lastly, here is a rather specific question: is pass/fail grading that much of a blessing in D school? Some students seem to love that system, but people who wanted to specialize seemed to be under more stress in a pass/fail/honors system. I am way wrong for that observation? Can you give me any advice on this based on experience??

Thanks everyone for any advice/feedback. I have tried not to add to the huge cluster of threads on this site for the past few months, but at this point I can use any input from those more experienced than myself.

Happy new years and holidays to ya'll, wishing you happy sleeping and/or partying

Put your deposit down at UCLA . Price and localization to family prove to be amongst the most important factors time and time again.

 

[ushaseos]

Your list seems spot on. I think those are the most important factors, though not quite in the same order (don't care much about the student body, but do rank family as 2).

UCLA and Michigan are your best choices because they are much cheaper while still being solid programs. UCLA is statistically a good choice if you want to specialize...but given that most D1s there are also planning the same it might be a little more challenging. If you're a CA resident UCLA is the place to go to since it'll be reasonably cheap for a good school. If your a MI resident then U Mich is the place to go.

Penn is a damn good program and probably more rounded than UCLA's academically focused equivalent. Penn is also DAMN expensive so unless you nabbed yourself a Dean's scholarship that covers half the tuition Penn is a no go in my humble opinion. Also the graded system will only make the competitive nature of your peers more prevalent.

Tufts is also super expensive but with a certain more reputed dental school around, I suspect Tufts Dental school will be in the shadow of that other one's. I know in medicine, at least, Tufts has a bit of an inferiority thing with Harvard so close by. Not going to say much about the program since I never looked into it in any great detail. I know that Tufts has a lot of nice and pleasant folks though!

 

[Tely]

Thank you both for your feedback!

 

[doc toothache]

Is this post about choosing a ds or is it about showing off the marbles collection?

 

[diasIItema]

along with 90% of other incoming D1's

Maybe at UCLA and maybe as a pre-dent. Reality is only about 10-20% of D1's actually want to specialize. Most just want to graduate.

Do you guys think there is any other big deciding factor that I have completely forgot about?

My number one factor was where I would be happiest spending the next four years of my life. Everything else, considering price was equal between the institutions, was secondary to that. You can specialize from anywhere if you so choose. Pre-dents really have no idea what they're talking about.

is pass/fail grading that much of a blessing in D school?

I think p/f grading is a joke where everyone gets a trophy. We have to earn 95's at my school to get an A in the class. At least in P/F/H you have something to work for.

That being said, UCLA is a fantastic school and would be the one I would choose out of your selections based on third-party knowledge alone and the fact that I hate cold weather.

 

[sparky450r]

Is this post about choosing a ds or is it about showing off the marbles collection?

Your a dentist. Why are you browsing pre-dental forums and trashing on people?

 

[doc toothache]

Your a dentist. Why are you browsing pre-dental forums and trashing on people?

Advice comes in a variety of shapes, sizes and colors.

 

[UltimateHombre]

This is kind of a sub category of #5, but i think it is really important...

1. Number of chairs in clinic compared to number of students who use them
2. Whether or not you have to find your own patients or if you are assigned them
3. Types of specialty programs that might steal complex cases

Last thing you want to be doing your senior year is fighting over clinic chairs and struggling to find patients to actually treat.

 

[Tely]

Is this post about choosing a ds or is it about showing off the marbles collection?

Thank you everyone for helping me here.

Doc Toothache English is my second language and maybe I am misunderstanding you, but I had no intention to show off from this post. I actually spent a a bit of time writing up this thread, and I know that everyone who gives me advice on here is taking their free time to do so. I respect that too much to go through this trouble just to say I got into dental school to people I've never met online. Apologies again if I misunderstood you.

On a different note thank you for all the data you have compiled for pre-dents in the past. They really helped me before the application process a year ago!