MY STORY:
I am a recent graduate of AUC and I’m about to tell you why I wouldn’t choose AUC if at all possible. For my own conscience I must come clean. Why would I advise you against attending my own school? I believe I have unique perspective coming from the school and all of the headaches, backaches and uhh behind aches from there. Let’s begin from the atrocious beginning to the atrocious end.

THE BEGINNING:
It started when I applied to the school. They lost my transcript and two letters of recommendation. Obviously, this puts one aside for having to ask the letter writer AGAIN if they will write a letter and send it off to Florida. The transcript cost time and money. To top it all off, Phil said my file was completed and I was accepted, then said they were missing those items in my file. This entire incident should have steered me from the school, but I persisted and was later accepted.

Let’s move on to St. Maarten. I, along with other students, met with the housing director. She promptly “recommended” a landlord for a group of us. Turns out that the property was crap, the landlord was dirty and the housing director got a kick back for us to rent there. So we lost more of our student loan money to finance the greed of this institution.

BASIC SCIENCES and ST. MAARTEN
Let’s talk about the basic sciences. I know the big argument against “spoon-feeding” and that medical students have to educate themselves. This is B.S!! Why were we paying over $8,000 a semester to teach ourselves? By the way, this reminds me of the entire process of paying tuition. When you get your loan check, you have to sign it over to the school. The school will issue a refund a week or two later. So, **** (the owner of the school) will sink the extra student loan funds into his bank account in St. Maarten and collect interest while the medical student has to pile up credit card debt until the school finally gives you your money. In fact, the debt is piling up interest against you, while it’s making money for AUC. Once you sign the check over to the school, the money should be yours immediately as you’re being charged interest by Sallie Mae for it. This must be illegal and should be investigated. The fun doesn’t end there though, once they give you the refund check, you have to go to a bank in Phillipsburg. Anybody that knows this area can tell you it is far from safe. Just think of the fun of walking through the town with $8,000 of student loan money in your pocket and you could get robbed at any minute. And, to top it off, one of the student’s that I know got his refund check only to go to the bank and find out that it bounced! Okay, I’m getting off the subject of the actual education. Now we all know how important the USMLE’s are to an IMG. It is the one thing we can be judged on equal ground with our US counterparts. So, you would think that preparing students for these exams would be first and foremost on the minds of AUC? WRONG, some classes were way too much in depth for the USMLE, weren’t clinically related to medicine in any way, or you didn’t learn anything at all, or all of the above. I can’t think of a single class that used test questions even remotely like what appear on the actual USMLE in content or in style. Many US medical students are taught by the actual professors who write questions for the USMLE. Therefore, their classes and content are geared toward the students performing very well on the exam. In other words, they’re spoon-fed the info that makes them successful for a high score on the USMLE’s. They learn the most pertinent information relevant to the practice of medicine. For the $8,000/semester price tag at AUC, I felt I got $1,000 worth of actual “education” and that is a liberal estimate. AUC expects the students to decipher what is most important and what will appear on the USMLE when we know nothing of the exam! Even worse, many students have to waste many thousands of hours learning extraneous material that will never appear on the USMLE in order to pass the classroom exam. This is horrible in two ways: You waste time on material you don’t need and you lose time from learning the material you do need for success on the USMLE. Let’s go over each semester:
1st semester: Biochemistry was good, but a definitely over kill for what you need on step1.
Biostats was okay given the book used was good prep for step1. Professor was worthless.
Anatomy taught by a botanist and a retired Navy Orthopod with a bad hip and a bad temper, and a guy that could barely speak English, but made a killer canine fried rice. Yum, yum. The botanist didn’t know Anatomy, the canine killer had a lot of knowledge, but you couldn’t understand him, and the old guy with the busted hip was insane.
Embryology was okay because we were guaranteed to pass if we showed up and was a good class to nap in before lab.


2nd Semester: Cell Biology and Histology: A decent class, the $1,000 deposit just for slides not withstanding
Physiology 1: okay, but again overkill and the Bern and Levy book is horrible. Definitely not good for step1 prep.
Genetics and Immunology: were taught by the same professor. She’s extremely nice, but I don’t feel she has the grasp of any of those subjects needed to teach it. Either that or she’s not instructed on the core material that she should be covering. Either way, not only did I not learn relevant USMLE material, I didn’t learn anything!

3rd Semester: Physiology 2: was okay, not many complaints
Neuroscience: This failed for several reasons. His class is again taught at a Ph.D. level. A classmate who’s father is Neurologist sat in on class when he was visiting and told his son that the professor was talking about stuff he (the Neurologist) didn’t even know about! Anyway, the class has to use the old tests to pass the exams and you end up learning nothing. Worse, you have to waste time learning the old exams to pass the class instead of studying BRS Neurology, which is all you need for the USMLE.
Microbiology: was taught by a lady that whispered in class and was an Epidemiologist, not a Microbiologist. We learned the African Sleeping Sickness, Malaria, Dengue fever-you know the common ailments in American medicine. Sarcasm aside, we were neither tested on nor learned Microbiology. Not a Staph or Strep anywhere. This class was a true travesty.
Psychology: this class used Kaplan and Saddock’s book. If you look at this monster called “a book”, it is over 1,000 pages long and our professor would test any sentence out of any paragraph in the book. She could even test on the history of Psychology. Once in a great while she may actually test on the criteria for Depression or Schizophrenia, but other than that this class was useless for preparing for the USMLE. Another colossal waste of time when trying to learn for the USMLE.

4th Semester: General Pathology: This class was taught by a Psycho that was as intense as the subject matter. Eventually he got fired for choking a student, but outside of his bipolar tendencies, he wasn’t a bad prof.
Pharma-a-cology: This is another travesty comparable to Micro. This class you will learn NOTHING. In fact, I’d say it’s worse than learning nothing, you actually learn less than nothing because what you do learn are useless 20 year old drugs that are no longer in use. So, you’re wasting brain space. On top of it, the old tests are out there, which you must use to pass his exams. His textbook is HORRIBLE. It’s like a novel with no pictures, diagrams, just run-on sentences and bad English with a thousand typos. Of course, the Lippincott text is all you need for the USMLE, but you will not learn it. You will spend months cursing that you have to learn Pharmacology that you never learned from AUC and now you must learn on your own for the USMLE.
Med Ethics: A week class that taught me nothing I didn’t already know.
Systemic Pathology1: Ditto for General Pathology

5th Semester: Introduction to Clinical Medicine: On of the biggest complaints of Clinical students entering the 3rd year is lack of pre-clinical training. And, with good reason! In this class we learned to appreciate poetry and then do one physical exam. We never saw a SINGLE patient. Just wait until you’re in clinicals and are asked to do a pelvic exam on your own for the first time! The class prof was a nice guy, but his excesses were his demise from what I’ve heard. Don’t expect any work at the St. Maarten hospitals, the school has been giving students lip service on that for years.
Clinical Pathology: Probably the best class we had. This really was worth the price of admission. US faculty that visits for a few weeks “vacation” taught it. They really go over pertinent lab tests and what they mean. I would save their texts and review, as this WAS the best prep for clinical training.
Systemic Pathology 2: Different Prof, as usual not USMLE related, but was interesting.
Introduction to Clerkships: Absolute joke, but at least the 3 AUC doctors they have come down for a week to teach get a nice vacation.


One quick note on safety: I know of many student’s victims of being robbed at gun point, physically assaulted, cars stolen, homes burglarized, and even a couple females raped or assaulted. It is not very safe for a wife or family. The police are corrupt, stupid, or involved in the crime. You must be very careful!

CLINICAL SCIENCES
Let’s now talk about the USMLE and Clinical education. Yes, there are clinical sites in the US, however due to such poor preparation for the USMLE, only minor handfuls of people even pass Step1 for the first time. The last I heard was 50% first time pass rate, but who really knows since AUC doesn’t publish those results. Even the ones that pass may not score high enough to be allowed in at some of the sites. Therefore, many people go to England/Ireland because: 1.they haven’t passed the USMLE and need to stay enrolled to get student loans, 2. Know that the routine in Europe is easier than the US. 3. Can take whole weeks off without losing credit to travel Europe. 4. Do all of the clinicals in one location and in a shorter time frame. 5. Buy into the false notion that the training is somehow better or equal to the US.

All I can tell you is that the training over there is NOT comparable to what I received doing electives in the U.S. You are not prepared for US medicine. I can also say that 80% of the students that I was with felt the same after doing electives in the U.S. As a whole, I feel it was grossly inadequate and I spent all of my electives trying to catch up to my US counterparts. You also lose on an entire year of meeting connections for possible residency. I can also tell you that it was more of a liability going to England than a positive aspect of my residency application. Many residency positions won’t even consider you unless you’ve had at least 6 month of U.S experience or more. Some even require an entire year. Going to England for cores will not satisfy your requirement. If you have to go to England/Ireland for USMLE reasons then do it, but I wouldn’t recommend it. And be prepared to stand out like an *** because you were so unprepared in St. Maarten for clinical medicine. Be prepared to be ignored by the office in Florida and to be generally treated like dirt the entire clinical experience. You don’t receive formal training in anything when it comes to physical exam or other aspects of medicine. If you know somebody going to medical school in the US, they’ll tell you how much training they go through before they reach clinicals and we are sadly lacking anything at AUC. The owner of the school (****) wants students to go to England so that he can make a bigger profit. The school pays about 200/week for each student in the U.S. as opposed to 50/week in England. A 150/week difference on thousands of students is BIG money. Let’s not forget how cheap **** is either. Examples include: The school has universal sewage problems, the new dorms were built not out of the goodness of his heart, but to force students to pay even more of their loan money to him during the first semester. Let’s not forget that the cafeteria food at one time was being smuggled in with the cadavers so he could save shipping costs. I always wondered why my hot dog tasted funny! It goes on and on…

THE END:
My end came in December after paying $800 for graduating, I waited 3 weeks for my diploma to come in the mail. Of course, MEIO wasn’t any help. For my trouble, I received a bent piece of paper first class US mail that cost AUC a grand total of under $2.00 to mail. For my diploma printing and shipping, it probably cost AUC $5.00. That makes another profit of $795 on the graduation fees. They wouldn’t even it ship it Priority mail with a delivery confirmation. That would have cost them an extra $3.00 per student. I’m happy my days with AUC are over, but looking back I can honestly say I was taken for a ride. Now it will be painful paying off loans for an education I didn’t receive, but AUC allowed me to take the USMLE and I do have a residency.



RECOMMENDATIONS:
Just look at the residency placements of St. George grads and some of the specialties that were matched this year and in the past. I can’t ever remember an AUC grad matching in Optho, Orthopedics, ENT, Neuro Surgery, Plastic Surgery, and Urology. Check out St. George’s residency placements over the last 5 years and this year’s placements:

http://www.sgu.edu/nhome.nsf/webcont...ument&top=home

If my story doesn’t convince you, then the residency placements should. The proof is in the residency pudding. Clearly, SGU students that I worked with in electives were better prepared for clinical training, had more connections, and performed very well on the USMLE. The results are their residency placements. And, look at some of the locations that people at SGU are matching at. Here’s a look at this year of 2004 for “competitive” residencies:
SGU:
Anesthesiology: 7
Emergency: 19
Orthopedic Surgery: 2
Plastic Surgery: 1
General Surgery: 18
Radiology: 0

AUC (hasn’t even formally announced their match list)
Anesthesiology: 4
Emergency: 5
Orthopedic Surgery: 0
Plastic Surgery: 0
General Surgery: 12 (only 5 are categorical spots)
Radiology: 1

Some may try to discredit who I am and that is fine. All I can tell you is my story and hopefully you’ll make the right decision for yourself. In the end, all I can tell you is this what I would put as a list of what schools I would choose in order to secure the best possible future for myself:
1. US schools first and foremost. I’d try this for at least 2 years before considering #2
2. D.O schools are more highly regarded than IMG’s. They have a better match rate, attain better locations, and secure better residencies and are easier to get into than US schools.
3. St. George’s if you are to go IMG, this is hands down the place where you will get the best education and residency.
4. AUC if all else fails. Be prepared for one headache after another.
5. If you can't get into any of the above maybe consider another career or risk some of the more well known schools: Ross or Saba.

Thank you for reading, good day.

nobody ever says that AUC is better than SGU.
for many people the cost difference is why they go to AUC.
I would have gone to SGU, but the tuition was too high ( and now that I am paying off my loans, the extra 80-100 grand looks better in my future retirement account than it does on Grenada.
also many students want primary care or care more about living on a nice island, so for them AUC is a better choice.

if you search the archives of the AUC forum you will see where I ( and others ) have repeatedly posted that if you want a very competative residency like a surgical subspecialty, then by all means try for SGU
I don't buy the whole " they didn't prepare me" ** .You can't really fool the graduates , who scored high on our USMLE and have achieved success.
at best you can scare some high school kids

last resort, compared to SGU?
hardly a last resort given the thousands of practicing MD alumni.
A last resort is a place where there is no track record of graduates or a place with multiple states that will not license you

anyway, congrats on your residency

I'll see when I get there. As for classes being taught like PhD courses as opposed to USMLE prep-courses, outside of the USMLE being tougher for you, is that such a horrible thing? I would love to understand the more intricate internal mechanisms than just factoids to identify and spit out.

Actually, that sounds a lot like how my undergrad classes are. I work for a pretty well known neurosurgeon and oftentimes I'm always bringing him my stuff from class so he can study them too.

And as FLK said, I chose AUC over SGU because primarily of $$$$, better locale, and a friend going there.

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Most of your arguments could have happend anywhere. AUC isn't prefect, nor is SXM. Everyone has their own reasons why they prefer one school over another. But I have to say I think the comment above almost cancels out most of the complaints you listed. No one said it would be easy...hell, if it were, there would be more people trying to become doctors.

i don't buy it. I was wait listed in the US but two of my classmates got in and they are whinning and man's best friending about the same crap i am...some profs are good some are bad, one got mugged a week ago and the other had his car stolen last semester so all this painting a rosy picture of the US schools is a load of crap. life at auc just like any other school is what you make of it who you piss off and who you are nice too in admin, finacial aid, etc. some people love st maarten i think it sucks but so did chicago, and so did downtown gainsville it still didn't stop me from going to school there there.....i bet them sour grapes will taste a lot better after residency when you get your first check..... and what kind of magic undergrad on what fairy world did you go to that you never ran into problems with the school i'd like to know so i can tell my boy the easter bunny and my cousin the tooth fairly to attend there....peace

there are plenty of bad things about this place and plenty of good probelm is trying to balance them out towards the end of a semester. and as far as the loan checks are concerned i don't know what you are complaining about here are your options:

1) wrtite them a check for the tuition and they give them to you the day you register.
2) request a partial refund in any amount on a local check so you don't walk around with $8,000 and the rest on a US check to send back
3) request a full refund after tuition in a local check
4) request a full refund in a US check

other than throwing a bouquet of roses and lining the way to the bank with rose petals so that you can prance all the way there while singing we are the world i really don't know what else they can do

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OBGYN PGY II
I see light at the end of the tunnel!!!...wait a minute its just another freakin tunnel!

I find it funny that these posts are usually posted by people with less than 5 total post ever on this forum. Where have this guy been 4 years ago. Why speak out now....why not early?

I find it kind of amusing that this person writes how much better the education is at _____, when they clearly did not attend those schools to give an accurate comparison.

You also have to admit that american students, and I am an american student, for the most part want spoon fed. If they have to think on their own then suddenly the classes are too hard or the tuition is too high for what they get out of it. Sure, you could pick up the texts and learn the material on your own without ever stepping foot in a university. A very few take this path. No, they will never become doctors doing this..unless it is with a degree that is given by a university as and "honor" Phd degree (what are the odds of this happening?).

I am a firm believer in the saying, "you get out of it what you put into it."

I know a couple of people that graduated from AUC. Both of them have stated that you need to be able to learn on your own while being guided in a direction by the prof...ie. you get your syllabus, go to class (usually) and study hard at home, and you will be fine. It also helps to form study groups. Perhaps if this person had followed the above plan and reviewed the USMLE prep test books while they were in basic sciences they would have had a better idea what the test questions and formats were. Perhaps their USMLE scores would have been closer to what they had hoped for.

No medical school is going to be perfect and some may have more problems than others, but ultimately this person is well on their way to achieving their goal...an MD. Therefore, I have to wonder about the reason for the level of sour grapes. So, it wasn't easy. Did anyone ever promise you it would be? If so, I would say that is where your real problems lies.

Sorry for the length of this post. You happened to hit one of my pet peaves.

Good luck on your remaining challenges. I hope your future turns out to be what you want it to be.

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Success is getting what you want. Happiness is wanting what you get.

I have been reading this forum now for 6 months and AUC has become my primary choice, then SGU. In fact, I have already submitted my application online to AUC. I received a letter from an admissions officer outlining missing items such as transcripts. I know they are on the way though. I had a question for this admissions officer at MEIO and e-mailed them more than once and have left a telephone message. Haven't heard anything from them yet. It's beginning to make me wonder because obviously they don't care to satisfy my concerns. I understand they my not be able to reply in one or even two days, but a WEEK!! At least acknowledge you got the e-mail and that you'll reply at a later time.

However, my question is for some of you in school now and those recently having completed basic sciences and taken Step 1. You know who you are because I read your posts all the time. Do you feel prepared with the current teaching faculty? I understand you must study on your own, man, if I didn't do that in undergrad I would not have done well at all. But do they really expect you to self-teach yourself? I am a student that does need classroom enviornment and self-study and even good study partners in a coffee shop. For that reason, I do do better when I have attended class and I don't miss class for anything. I am not afraid to admit I need both otherwwise I'd just do it all from the internet. However, I also now how to sit at home and crack a book and read it too. It takes a combination of all methods of studying to do well, at least for me. And no, I don't need a smart alek telling me that I need to be spoon fed, but I do need to be taught by someone who knows the material. At least the major concepts. I am good to learn details on my own.

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Watch Out!! - The most expensive thing in the world you may ever PAY for is "free-advice."

Hey medic2md I have not had any problems dealing with MEIO. I email and call my admissions person whenever I need to and she always gets back to me right away and sends a note everytime I email her. I am not sure why you are having problems but maybe you can talk to the gal I deal with her name is ************ (edited by teratos...name used).
I am curious about how much self-teaching is going to be required. In my school now we get a decent lecture covering the outline of what we need to know and then we study the material on our own to "master"it but we certainly don't have to go at it cold so I am nervous reading some of these posts.

Self teaching huh? Well that's news to me. I'm starting 3rd semester and of course you go to the books to study, but for the most part we studying LECTURE MATERIAL be it the lecture notes or scribes. When you read a BRS you find few things that weren't covered in you're courses. granted the BRS may make a little more sense, especially in the case of Embyology. Studying the material presented is our responsibility, but that is the case in grade school thru college. You can't just sit in a lecture and think its enough to honor the tests, you at least have to review the material they present.

All i know is this school has produced over 2500 licensed physicians, and each I have spoken with, with the exception of whoever posted this topic, seem rather satisfied, as am I. I don't agree that this school has anymore problems than any other school, and in regards to the tuition issue: I know our tuition is less than I would pay at the U of Michigan. It is actually the high living expenses (ie. housing, travel, etc.) that runs the bills up so high. I don't agree that the island is unsafe either. Sure you should to lock your apartment when you leave, but it isn't half as bad as made out here.

And no one is obligated or would even consider walking down the streets of Philipsburg with $8000. First of all P-burg is not unsafe if it were I would really doubt 1million Americans would come down here on vacation carrying cash as most tourists do being credit cards aren't accepted many places. The city (if that's what you call it) is actually pretty nice with tons of tourists walking around all the time, and anyway there's 3 or more banks in Simpson Bay; why one would choose not to use one of them is anyone's guess??. Most of us don't even use the island banks anyway, we send our checks to US banks.

I like the place and the education and am glad I came down here. Really, living down here is not hell its paradise - but you usually only have the time to enjoy it on breaks ... if you want to do well in your classes!

"Tin Cup"

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"BE THE BALL"
- Chevy Chase