Hello everyone,
I have been accepted at ROSS and i am waiting to pay the seat deposit because of the ROTATION problem...but the post on VMD about rotation problems are from 2007....wondering if it has gotten any better now? Any 3rd and 4 year students currently going through the system...your input would be invaluable. Thanks in advance for your time.

I don't think the situation has gotten any better as I know people who had peds and ob/gyn as their last rotations recently . . . if you want to do either of these for residency you are SCREWED as you won't have any electives for them, and also you won't be as well prepared to take USMLE Step 2 CK.

I don't think the situation will get any better. I had such a problem commmunicating with Ross administration/faculty advisors i.e. emails disappear into thin air (does anybody answer their emails any more?) and having to call to schedule stuff that they know we have to take anyway. If you don't have really thick skin then don't go to Ross as it will be VERY frustrating.

The situation won't improve because it is like a bottleneck or traffic jam . . . to fix it they would have to give 3rd AND 4th years their peds and ob/gyn rotations in one year, but this will never happen and can't happen as these spots don't exist, the limited number of peds and ob/gyn spots go first to fourth year who are graduating and the smaller percentage goes to third years. . .

I don't feel as highly respected as Ross student when compared to someone who went to SGU or SABA . . . I should have gone their first, nicer island too in SGU case!

For example, lets say there are 500 peds spots for the fiscal year 2008-2009, and lets say that there are 500 graduating students i.e. fourth years and 500 new third years:

500 peds spots for year 2008/2009:
---------------------------------
400 go to fourth years (some had peds in third year)
100 go to third years, there are 400 third years without spots . . .

so when the fiscal year 2009/2010 rolls around you have:

500 peds spots for year 2009/2010:
---------------------------------
400 go to fourth years (remember these are the guys/gals who didn't get peds as a third year0
100 go to third years (most don't get peds as third year).

So you can see that the cycle is self-perpetuating, the day the problem is fixed is the day that there is double the number of peds spots, for example:

1000 peds spots for year 2010/2011
---------------------------------
400 go to fourth years who couldn't get peds
500 or so go to third years so everybody can take it as a third year

Problem is that for the year 2011/2012 you would only need again 500 peds spots:

500 peds spots for year 2011/2012
-----------------------------------
0 go to fourth years as all have taken peds
500 go to third years who all get peds in third year

I don't think this problem will ever be solved as more third and fourth years would love/need to take peds than the system could provide in one year, and the left out third years become foruth years who must have those peds spots, end of story

This is what is called a VISCIOUS CYCLE because it is self-perpetuating and there is no way to win or escape it!!

what have you been waiting for, acceptance from another school?

As someone that just got their schedule and is about to start rotations, it probably has improved somewhat since the posts in 2007.

My initial schedule has all my cores scheduled, except surgery. The negatives are I will be taking step 2ck next July, but i will not start peds until August, and there is a good chance that I will have to do surgery after that, as well.

The positives are all my rotations are ACGME and I wont be moving around too much. I will also be done with all my cores by interview time and be completly done well before the March 2010 graduation date.

My clinical advisor is real good. I havent had any trouble reaching him and he returns the messages I send him in less than a day. I have other friends that are not able to reach their advisors though, so maybe I just got lucky. I also have friends that got all their rotations already scheduled back to back, so I guess it just varies.

Some opinions: http://www.valuemd.com/ross-universi...t-opinion.html

Some opinions and FACTS:

http://www.valuemd.com/ross-universi...tations-7.html

http://www.valuemd.com/ross-universi...rotations.html

I don't think it has much influence on Step 2. I took my CK before I had done Surgery OR Peds cores...and viola, they were my 2 highest scoring sections... Maybe its best to take step 2 before doing any rotations? LOL

__________________
Ross University School of Medicine, MS4

Step 1: 260/99
Step 2CK: 236/98
GPA: 3.91

Stuck between Surgery, Neurosurg, Ortho, and Sports Medicine (Through Family Med)...

nothing has changed except a few minor rotation spots being added. i was rotating as late as march 2008. i'm done now, i've made it through to the other side.

my ross opinion is that things are going to get alot worse before they get better.
also note that the quality of the rotation sites we do have are pretty crapy. strong rotations are few and far between. rossies are getting ripped off for their clinical years. for what you pay into them you get relatively nothing out of it.

i'm comparing my experience with some of my fellow AMG PGY-1's. I know alot of peole would say forget it and forget your past Ross experience. Which I have done (the bad memories). but i just wanted to put that information back out there for the juniors.

nothing feels better than knowing you are now a member of a professional institution which RESPECTS and takes CARE OF their own.

This institution I speak of is NOT at all Ross. I have never felt more degraded as a human being than my past 2 years at Ross in the MS-III and MS -IV clinicals.
I thought the island was pretty crappy when I left, but in retrospect, and relative to the disasters that awaited in clinicals, the island was a walk in the park.

btw. of the FMG's who matched in my program...they came from SGU, Ross, SABA, and AUC. You don't owe Ross anything special. They should be happy that you put up with them for the past 4 years and paid them while tolerating all their **.

It should tell you alot that I am a Ross product, in residency and STILL bitter about all the ** they put me through. think about it.

It all depends on how lucky you are. If you get the right clinical advisor then you get what you want and when you want it. However, if you don't get the right clinical advisor or strike it off right with your clinical advisor then you have to call literally everday for a month or more to get things worked out.

Fortunately, there are downtimes in Ross electives and cores to do this. I felt weird rotating at a hospital with SABA and SGU students who thought it was weird how I had to call and get cores and electives, when they said that they just got all their core rotations scheduled way in advance and don't have to waste time and worry in this way.

I think I have literally wasted hundreds of hours callling and trying to figure out how and where to get core rotations, only to be put on hold and never being able to get through to anybody at Ross. I think that people who schedule electives at hospital just delete emails from Ross students. I am glad I never have to look at that stupid hospital list again and try to figure out where I can scrounge a surgery elective or family practice rotation. I looked at it some many times that I probably have it memorized and can name at least 15 hospitals in NY that take Ross students for Pediatrics!

My family would ask me what I am doing next and I talk about trying to setup a "Family Practice" location somewhere and I feel more like someone who spends weeks negotiating into electives and rotations than a student. It is embarassing when you tell people you don't know what city you will be in in three months time or don't know when you will graduate or talk about problems getting through to your clinical advisors for *weeks* or *months*.

The extension to the advisors was disabled by Ross as too many students tried to call directly by speed-dial so they made it so you HAVE to go through the operator. I must have called 30 times one week, once every hour to talk to anybody, heck even the operator hung-up a couple times. Please put me through to XXX. And don't consider leaving a voice-mail as none of my 45+ voice mails was ever returned by anyone at Ross.

Sad Truth Is: Clinical Advisors Stone-Wall because not everybody will get green book rotations and therefore not everyone will be able to practice everywhere they want to. Clinical advisor know it, heck they got me on the phone into accepting a rotation that wasn't greenbook by offering me two at the same time and didn't mention the non-green book status.

Or telling PDs on interviews how Ross schedules cores in fourth year and you don't have a grade in medicine or surgery to show to people. Worse yet, PDs who know that Ross has this problem and roll their eyes.

I hate Ross students who took off time during electives or cores to interview for interviews, I was told that I was not allowed to do this and LOST interviews because Ross wants us working even though we do 90 weeks clinicals more than other medical school. Now we are required to take off a WHOLE MONTH OR MORE for step score and interviews. Hello?

Every US student get a ton of time off for interviews, or at least a minimum amount of time off, we get none. This screws us during interview season, but of course helps the school as we are conscripted labor in hospitals and makes Ross students look good so more get to do electives in such hospitals.

One student I know had to cancel dozens of interviews over a three month period because she had electives during this time, i.e. during interview season and was unable to match! I don't think she will get a commendation letter from Ross commending her for "taking one for the team" while showing up empty handed for a residency this year.

Sometimes the hospitals themselves are worse with scheduling cores than Ross is, such as one particular hospital in Brooklyn where the medical student elective coordinator runs around trying to catch students using cell phones and you literally have to schedule four or five appointments to talk to him to get an elective which magically disappears anyway, and who treats you very poorly and with little respect each time you met with him.

Nevermind having to wait months and call repeatedly to get evaluations from hospitals where we did weird little electives.

How do you feel your education stacked up compared to US grads? I have heard that Ross students get compliments concerning their clinical ability when compared to US grads. I had to jump through a lot of hoops but I think it made me a better student in the end.

__________________
Step 1 230+
Step 2 260+

"When life gives you lemons you make lemonade and throw it back in the face of the person who gave you the lemons until they give you the oranges you asked for in the first place."