Spartan has had it's share of problems. You can make it from any school, but some schools have a much better chance of getting you where you want to go with minimal problems. Cost shouldn't be a big issue, especially when considering this is the biggest decision of your life with the exception of who you should marry. G

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AUC Class of '99
Bored certified
I may be a jerk, but I'm a Jedi jerk like my father.

Some say I look like Buzz Lightyear....
(They're right)

DISCLAIMER: I have no financial stake in ValueMD, or any medical school.

ah the mental gymnastics again. somehow my comments on the dangers of induling the twisting of logic has resulted in logic being twisted. the hate didn't come from I posted. but one can sniff an aweful lot of it in the phoney "lauging out loud" quoted above. I strongly suspect you were hardly laughing when you wrote that. There are no point that come from defending IMGs by somehow concluding that US students are weaker overall. But Hey, convince yourself that us grads are duds if that makes you sleep better at night. But don't expect to be taken seriously with that view. And if that's the biggest piece of garbage you've read then you've lived in a wonderfully earnest world.

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Steph
If you get a warning, put on yer manpants and stop whining about it.

Some of us, however, have very easily verifiable credentials. Credibility can go a long way, if you have it.

__________________
AUC Class of '99
Bored certified
I may be a jerk, but I'm a Jedi jerk like my father.

Some say I look like Buzz Lightyear....
(They're right)

DISCLAIMER: I have no financial stake in ValueMD, or any medical school.

You are so right!

And to tell thr truth, i will be doing the same when it comes to finance my education....mostly family funding and out of pocket=dimes and quarters. I must be really careful for those big loaders that I will not have enough to cover for. Thanks for looking out!

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Something that bothers you, just flush it off and wipe the remaining patiently. RS-Stanislas

you can study on your own and make it, no doubt. poingt is that a faculty that has taught at US med schools can point you in the right direction of what you need to study b/c the material on the usmle is between a review book and a robbin's type book. you will not get all you need from a review book and its impractical to do four classes with robbins style books each semester with a prof with easter european/middle eastern/indian etc, teaching experience. and for thise with foreign profs in undergrad X class, you weren't studying for a huge licensing exam that you invested 50k in.

i think any great student could probably make it without academic support, in fact that is probably the only type that would make it and going by what s&a has posted about highly successful spartan alum, maybe that is the only type of student that does make it through that sort of darwinian med school???what i ask about spartan are how many students matriculate each semester and how many make it through to graduation from each class?

just remember you get what you pay for, specially in education

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

Since you are being so nice why dont you loan me some money or co sign so i can go to the school of my choice if not then you are not helping me out.

but i play the will they won't they finance me game every 4 months also. its a tough choice to make no doubt. maybe if i was in the position that i had to start school right away then i would give spartan a shot for a semester i mean 4k isn't that much in the grand scheme of things....then if you don't think you can study on your own there you go back home and work on getting your credit. at the very least all these schools will give you a shot, some may give you better odds of success but in the end its your determination that matters to finish a program, getting residency/licensed is another issue all together and there all foreign schools are not the same

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

After reading the less-than-enlightened replies to currentstudent’s latest thread, I feel compelled to come to the defense of my classmate. In a nutshell, CurrentStudent stated in his thread that the students from US medical schools with whom he is in Pediatrics rotation are not Albert Einstein in white lab coats. CurrentStudent went out of his way –- albeit not artfully –- to suggest that he was not trying to beat his chest at the expense of the other students doing the Pediatric rotation with him. Why is CurrentStudent taking so much flack, instead of getting a pat in the back? Let me try to analyze what is going on here, while fully expecting to take some heat for my too-candid statements

Some Caribbean med students believe that they are not worthy because of the string of rejection letters they collected from probably more than one US med school over probably more than one year. The trauma inflicted on their self-esteem has left some nasty scars. In the case of a small number of students, such trauma has left some wounds that have yet to be healed. Misery loves company. In a futile attempt to boost their battered self-esteem, they studiously search for students at other Carib schools to whom they can point as being less worthy than them. If they could voice their aggressively repressed feelings, they would articulate such feelings as follows: “I know that I am much dumber than med students from US medical schools, but students at Carib school X are dumber than me.” I do not claim to be either a psychologist or a psychiatrist, but you do not have to be a genius to realize that some non-Spartan students posting on the Spartan forum are in dire need of expert counseling, preferably from a psychiatrist specializing in low self-esteem disorder, if such a disorder exists.

Currentstudent, I applaud you for having the guts and the wisdom to state emphatically that “We are Spartan, Our Medical Education is second to NONE” Nobody, but nobody could have taught us Anatomy better than Dr. Sri did. No one, but no one could have taught us Pathology better than Dr. Valdez did. Does Spartan have bad professors? Absolutely, as CurrentStudent admitted in his thread. So does every medical school, every law school, every B-school throughout the world. The distinguished Spartan faculty members who are overworked and underpaid, deserve better than to be derided by Carib med students looking for cheap thrills. Frankly, I am tired of maladjusted individuals trying to boost either their pitiful journalistic career (Dolan and Julien from the Hartford Courant) or their less than sterling medical school career at the expense of Spartan, its students, and above all, its dedicated faculty. CurrentStudent praised not only worthy Spartan students but students at other Carib med schools as well.

It appears to me that Students from US med schools are not necessarily smarter or more assiduous than FMGs. Their talent to do well on standardized tests may not readily translate into superior ability to diagnose diseases from signs, symptoms, history and lab test results. In a nutshell, CurrentStudent should not be blamed for stating that the students with whom he is clerking are not adjusting as fast as he is. More power to you, CurrentStudent.


Notice that I did not state that “We are Spartan, Our Medical Students are second to NONE” CurrentStudent did the same in his post. Please, read his post again, if you disagree with me. Now let me address some specific points set forth in the replies to the CurrenStudent’s thread.

MindProbe in a (“How should I call this?) mindless statement blamed CurrenStudent for not posting his USMLE Step I results on the forum. This is a dull-witted statement, if I ever heard one. CurrenStudent could have posted that he got a 260 on Step I. How could Dr. Mindless verify the accuracy or lack thereof, of such score? By the way, CurrentStudent was not trying to brag when he stated in his thread that he passed Step I. Rather, he wanted to share the good news with his friends in St. Lucia and in North America.

MindProbe went on to state that “Kirst has said something to the effect that Currentstudent is one of about 60 or so students to have passed that she knows of who passed Step 1 on the first go round.” The burden of proof is on Dr. Mindless to confirm that 1) Kirst did in fact make such statement, and 2) such statement is indeed factual. For your information, Dr. Mindless, Kirst did post that “currentstudent, along with two others, are the only students that i know of thus far, from my trimester (~40 students) and from trimester before mine, to have passed step 1 on first attempt prior to commencing their rotations. i know of 7 that wrote the exam this april but failed.” Dr. Mindless, if you got your facts from the previous statement from Kist, then, 1) You have my sympathy; 2) You should consider any other profession where patient’s lives will not be dependent on your, let us say, superior analytical skills. Writing for the National Enquirer seems to be a good choice. Dr MindProbe, it appears that you are using your probe on matters other than your own mind.

Stephw concluded from her reading of CrrentStudent’s thread that CrrentStudent suggested that “US students are weaker overall” in an attempt to make himself feel better or sleep better at night. In all due respect, I believe that Stepw read more in CrrentStudent’s thread than is set forth therein. Allow me to be bold here. While CurrentStudent was not, shall I say, very articulate in his thead, the gist of CurrentStudent thread can be couched as follows. CurrentStudent, after reading all the threads denouncing how awful Spartan is, expected to be the weaker student among all the geniuses from US med schools at his Peds rotation. To his surprise, he found out that instead of being the weaker link, he is indeed the best student.

I thought that more cortical power was required for X-ray reading than Spartan-forum-thread reading. I may be wrong.

CurrentStudent, keep on keeping on, your classmates from Spartan are pulling for you.

Well said old dude, i know 1 thing for a fact that i have learned(more like noticed) from these forums is that what ever mindprobe is male/female is a pretty stupid person. You should read his/her posts, total idiot i wonder how ignorant people like that exist its a sad thing.

ummm, mindprobe is a graduate of Spartan. anybody who can make it via Spartan I would not consider an ignorant.