WOW

• They hire a new professor to teach physio and he don’t even speak English clearly. Well, I don’t understand MOST of what he says.
• He cant explain things clearly which is why after the second day he started teaching, more than half of the class would either come in after break or leave after break because it was simply a waste of time
• I personally thought I needed a translator in his class. Can’t believe I actually wasted my time sitting in.
• He reviewed on Friday for what we should focus on for the exam, and guess what, none of his review points were tested on the exam. Yet again, a waste of one hour review time.
• Exam was today and reflected none of what he taught in class… what a waste of time and part of the tuition I paid ( about 10K, not to mention the living cost )…
• exam questions were NOT USMLE type… options included
  • a VERY CLOSE option
  • Another VERY CLOSE option but probably not the BEST option.
  • Only A and B
  • A, B and C
  • Non of the above
• The process of elimination went out the window… we basically had 2 options to work with… spent half the time thinking that since both the options are correct I should go with c, but the if I go with C, then why not D… and before I knew, I had about 10 questions and 10 min. left and still needed time to fill out my scantron. After the time was up, I thought that I was the only one… looked up and more than 80% students were still sitting there with a blank look on their face, that look of, “WHAT JUST HAPPENED HERE…. DID I JUST GET SCRUED?”
• Questions were freaking LOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOONG… I don’t mind long questions IF the professor had prepared us for the concepts he was gong to test. Heck, I had a micro exam in the morning and it had 80 questions ( as compared to 75 questions on physio exam) and I was done well within the given time with no pressure. And Dr. N Questions are usually kinda loooong too and can make your brain HURT, but he prepares you for the exam during class.
• I’m not the smartest person in the class but I passed both, Exam 1 and 2 and have an avg. of 80, but I know that this exam is gonna fail me… special thanks for Dr. U ( I wrote U for his name for 2 reasons… 1) we cant mention names here on VMD, 2) like Onesolo said in class that if there was a question on exam to spell his name, I mite have to cheat on that one … LOL )
• Finally, I heard Dr. N say in micro that SMU is doing what it can to improve the quality of professors here. Can someone please explain how the quality is being improved when a new professor hired CANNOT speak English properly and CANNOT explain the material and DOES NOT KNOW how to make an exam? Did someone even interview him before hiring ( in English) or maybe he was interviewed in his own language??????? I’m not trying to be mean Dr. U ( if you’re reading this ) I just don’t wanna fail a course because you dono how to teach or at least guide us to what your exam is going to be like…

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That doesn't sound like a "new" prof at all, it sounds like Dr. J. He was one of three profs for that course, the others being Dr. R of histo/embryo fame and Dr. S, the scandal-ridden one. On a related note, physio is one of the tougher subjects to teach yourself for the boards

yup... he's a new prof. Dr U... Dr. J is still here but he did not teach this semester... i seriously would have prefered Dr. J over this new prof.

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yeah the block 3 physio exam was insane. I think with new professors, they allow large curves, so maybe they'll give a 10+ curve on this one, hehe...

wishful thinking...

Is it that the professor "DON'T" speak English clearly or that you "DON'T" comprehend and write English clearly. I'm not ragging you man, but, we all know the ups and downs of the carib. route. You take the good with the bad. He's new....it will balance out. I've had profs in the past that were difficult to understand and most were from my part of the world. You deal! Maybe you should communicate your frustrations with him directly instead of utilizing a blind forum. I would have for lack of communication to get you "SCRUED". Peace and good luck dude!

I couldn't agree more with this post. I went into this exam with over an 85 average and now I question if I'm going to have to struggle to pass the course. The questions weren't USMLE style, at least not according to the questions that I've done in Kaplan and the NMBE. Since when do you have True/False questions on exams at this level? Why not just feel it up with fill in the blanks or essay. What bothers me the most is that numerous people went to talk to him about his teaching style and were blown off. I feel like Physiology was the best taught subject that I've had since comming to this school up till this point. Having Dr. U teach this instead of Dr. P was very harming to the students in this course. Being told not to worry about the diseases is down right insane because that's what medicine is all about. Besides, that's EXACTLY what's going to be on the shelf and the USMLE. Then you sit for this exam and low and behold I'm seeing diseases. Thanks to the BRS that wasn't a problem for me but I'm sure for others it was. I have no idea of where in the world that exam came from. I feel for those students that were boarderline going into this exam because we all know had Dr. P taught it things would have been very different. As for Dr. J...... although we would have been presented with 1000000000 slides, I can assure you his exam would have been more accurate and would have tested you on only items in his slides. Not only was the teaching not up to what I have come to expect at SMU but the exam didn't reflect the given powerpoints or the BRS. Both of which I studied.

For new people reading this I do want it to be known that for the most part the education at SMU is supurb and new additions are being made to continue improving on what we already have. What happen this block in Physio was just down right unfair to everyone who took the class.

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St. Matthews University
School of Medicine

Keep in mind that the fourm is for people to rant and rave. That's what it's here for. As for talking to him directly I speak for myself and the answer to that is yes. As for the english, well that's subjective. What's clear to one individual may not be clear to another. I know some who understood him well while others stopped comming to class because they didn't understand a word he was saying. Personally when I don't understand I ask questions right then but some choose to do that behind close doors. Truth is I felt like it was horribly taught and tested. That's just my take on it though.

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St. Matthews University
School of Medicine

Hotmale_on_a_plate and others:
I personally thought the exam was pretty challenging, reminded me of my undergrad days. I've got to defend Dr. U here.. I think he's actually a decent teacher. His English is fine, just as good as the other two physio teachers. His working knowledge of the subject is phenomenal, unlike many of the other teachers this semester (biochem).
I don't think we should make such a big issue about this, all the professors proctoring the exam saw that nobody was able to finish on time (aprox 60% of the class was still there with 5minutes remaining). I’m sure they will take this into consideration when viewing the grades and assessing a curve.
Who knows, this test format may be more like USMLE/SHELF style, so maybe we should be getting used to it..
lets see the average and curve then we can man's best friend, but I hear you, it was tough.

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University of Florida 2006
B.S. Biology
STEP1: [X], Family Medicine [X], Geriatrics [], Psych [], Dermatology []

a pt. present with a history of taking micro exam in the morning. 2 hours later, he took a physiology exam that tested material not covered in class. He has severe headache, nausea and sudden brain dysfunction. Lab test showed that the material on the exam was infact, not covered in class. During check up, the pt. had a sudden onset of “brain twitching” pain and collapsed. Which if the following is the most probable cause of his symptoms?
a. The micro exam he took in the morning
b. The Physiology exam he took 2 hours later
c. A and B
d. A, B and C
c. none of the above



Yea! I can’t comprehend and write English… that is how I got this far (3rd semester in a medical school…) crazy ha! Maybe you should have come to class more often. MAYBE then you’d know EXACTLY what I’m talking about…

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