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Finished 1st year at Schulich AMA


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Hi Everyone!

The title sums up the main point of this thread. I've read similar threads before I got into dentistry and I told myself that if I ever get in I would repay the help that I receive from all these kind, anonymous people. So feel free to ask me anything about Schulich dentistry (particularly first year, though I'll try my best for other years)! :)

If any Schulich students are reading this thread and have answers to any of the below questions, feel free to answer them! And any questions answered I'll most likely skip.

-shm

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Thanks for this shm :) Few questions off the top of my head:

1. How do courses and blocks work? Are there midterms, assignments, as in undergrad or something very different with just finals?
2. I've seen the schedule for first year may have you in lectures or labs from 8-5 some days with only an hour lunch. How do you recommend paying attention during days like this, with barely any break in between anything?
3. How do you recommend studying in first year with the heavy course loads at times?

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21 hours ago, longhaul said:

Thanks for this shm :) Few questions off the top of my head:

1. How do courses and blocks work? Are there midterms, assignments, as in undergrad or something very different with just finals?
2. I've seen the schedule for first year may have you in lectures or labs from 8-5 some days with only an hour lunch. How do you recommend paying attention during days like this, with barely any break in between anything?
3. How do you recommend studying in first year with the heavy course loads at times?

1. I'm not sure if I can explain this accurately. We have many courses and they all start and end on different months. It's not like undergrad where your schedule is split 1st term and 2nd term. During our December exam period we have a combination of finals and midterms. There are lab quizzes, midterms, assignments (essays), and some 100% finals.

2. Personally what worked for me was a restful sleep the night before and a cup of coffee or two.

3. The answer to this question is really dependent on your study habits. So I'll just tell you a bunch of things that I or my classmates have done. Some wrote their notes (but you may not have enough time once things get really busy), some collaborated and made notes together (this is a HUGE time saver!), some reviewed all lectures taught that day (seems unimaginable, but if you're disciplined enough you can do it), some made flashcards, some skipped classes (especially with professors that don't teach well), some formed study groups (having the same schedule makes coordinating study sessions very easy) and some study by themselves. I think its best you try out all these methods, maybe use a combination of these study strategies depending on you and the course material. Also, we'll give your class something called "Pinks" USE IT! It contains AMAZING notes, images, practice questions....etc

 Great questions! Hope my answers help :)

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16 hours ago, staystaystay22 said:

Thanks for this!!

 

1. What is having a class size of 56 like? 

2. How do clinical classes work? 

 

:D

Np hope this helps:
1. I love it! In terms of in-class lectures, you don't have to do anything and the professor will most likely recognize you (and possibly know your name) but that can also be bad if you like to skip classes :P . If you participate in class (even just a bit), the professors will likely get to know you much faster than in undergrad. Also, no trouble with whichever seats you want, we all have our "unofficial" seats now. I think I found the small class size most helpful in our sim clinic, you will have plenty of space to work in (I don't know how previous years worked with such a small surface, I seem to use up every space I get), good quality time with clinical instructors/professors, not too crowded wet lab area, and short line up to use various equipment.

2. Clinical classes are mandatory. They start with a 1 hour lecture followed by a 3 hour independent work. You will be told what you should complete that day. Most projects are not marked after the end of each session. You will be seated in pods of 6-8 students with an instructor assigned to your pod. These instructors rotate each class so you get to hear different methods, opinions, suggestions on how to complete your tasks. Also, with marking they are usually the one to mark your project. So you will never have that "hard" person mark all your projects since they rotate. For some projects, instructors will each be assigned to mark one aspect of the project for the whole class and the course coordinator will evaluate all criteria for the whole project for each students. So the marking is pretty fair.

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23 hours ago, shm said:

1. I'm not sure if I can explain this accurately. We have many courses and they all start and end on different months. It's not like undergrad where your schedule is split 1st term and 2nd term. During our December exam period we have a combination of finals and midterms. There are lab quizzes, midterms, assignments (essays), and some 100% finals.

2. Personally what worked for me was a restful sleep the night before and a cup of coffee or two.

3. The answer to this question is really dependent on your study habits. So I'll just tell you a bunch of things that I or my classmates have done. Some wrote their notes (but you may not have enough time once things get really busy), some collaborated and made notes together (this is a HUGE time saver!), some reviewed all lectures taught that day (seems unimaginable, but if you're disciplined enough you can do it), some made flashcards, some skipped classes (especially with professors that don't teach well), some formed study groups (having the same schedule makes coordinating study sessions very easy) and some study by themselves. I think its best you try out all these methods, maybe use a combination of these study strategies depending on you and the course material. Also, we'll give your class something called "Pinks" USE IT! It contains AMAZING notes, images, practice questions....etc

 Great questions! Hope my answers help :)

Thanks smh!

1. I know that on your transcript after each year, your percentile is included. Does that mean grading is based on a curve, apart from the letter system?
2. Would you recommend recording lectures if you dose off during a lecture/a prof is too quick or unclear or does it get overwhelming with the amount of content you'd have?
3. How are the professors in teaching quality and do they care about the students? How approachable are faculty members?

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On 2017-06-03 at 11:06 PM, longhaul said:

Thanks smh!

1. I know that on your transcript after each year, your percentile is included. Does that mean grading is based on a curve, apart from the letter system?
2. Would you recommend recording lectures if you dose off during a lecture/a prof is too quick or unclear or does it get overwhelming with the amount of content you'd have?
3. How are the professors in teaching quality and do they care about the students? How approachable are faculty members?

You're welcome! :)

1. They used to give percentiles, but I believe they do not anymore. Once we get all our grades, I'll check to if I see any percentiles.
2. Yeah, you can do that. Personally, rather than recording I just asked my friends if I didn't catch something. I think it's much faster than trying to listen to the recording all over again. Though I guess it wouldn't hurt you to record.
3. I would say our professors' teaching quality are amazing! If you have friends who attended Western for their undergrad, you most likely heard of them talking about how great their professors were and guess what? We have those same professors! Faculty are all very approachable and I felt they really cared about us. When your entire class get multiple free breakfasts and lunch all paid for by your prof I think it's fair to say they like us. I can only think of one professor who might not be as approachable, but don't worry we will warn you about this professor during orientation week!

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On 2017-06-04 at 8:45 AM, koft said:

I guess things never changed in Schulich.  pink notes still exist.  I guess some profs are too lazy to change their questions.

Lol of course it exist ;P I'm not sure when you attended dental school but it's been consistently updated. The stuff from the 1990s isn't the same anymore but good practice questions nonetheless!

That reminds me, any incoming first year students reading this, make sure your laptop or usb has over 10GB of space or else you won't be able to get all the pink notes!

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Doing it for a 2nd year now...

  1. Apply to the program; write a small statement/letter and attach CV
  2. Get the list of professors which are also applying for the grant
  3. Set up an interview with your desired professors/project
  4. Chose/rank your top 3 choices, the professors do the same
  5. Wait.


Competitive? depends on the prof./project combo, but wouldn't say it's overly competitive because most students would rather have a break during the summer months or go on mission trips etc etc...

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Thanks everyone for answering our questions!

1. What are the difficult classes first year? I heard general medicine is tough.

2. Are all class evaluations based off of lecture notes or are some questions coming from other sources/from something the prof might have mentioned verbally in the lecture?

3. For dental sim clinic, do they dedicate time at the start for improving hand skills or are we thrown into it head first and our hand skills develop that way?

4. Any things you wished you knew or would have done differently in your first year? Also, would you recommend having other dental students as roommates?

5. What will the backpacks look like?:D Anyone have a picture of the 2020 ones?

 

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The area of London most students go is downtown and it's tailored more towards undergrads, but there are some nicer/more low key bars if you're into that. Spoke is also great. My advice is find clubs or intramurals that you're interested in.

Campus is amazing! Rec centre is as good as it gets and campus is beautiful. My only complaint might be lack of studying space in Weldon/Taylor during finals, but as a dent student you can study in a couple other areas only for dents in the med/dent building. Do current students know if the areas I mentioned get packed a lot?

Adding on to that, UWO is truly in its own bubble. When you go east... just don't go east.

You should have seen the room where the tour guides said they have pretty much all their classes in there.

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On 2017-06-10 at 3:42 PM, Pingu48 said:

Thanks everyone for answering our questions!

1. What are the difficult classes first year? I heard general medicine is tough.

2. Are all class evaluations based off of lecture notes or are some questions coming from other sources/from something the prof might have mentioned verbally in the lecture?

3. For dental sim clinic, do they dedicate time at the start for improving hand skills or are we thrown into it head first and our hand skills develop that way?

4. Any things you wished you knew or would have done differently in your first year? Also, would you recommend having other dental students as roommates?

5. What will the backpacks look like?:D Anyone have a picture of the 2020 ones?

 

1.  That's a hard question to answer as everyone comes in with a different background. Though I'm not implying that I'm smart or anything but overall IMO, I don't think there are any hard courses. They are not picky on the questions. It is just the volume of material that I felt made studying "harder". Gen med is a hit or miss course. You either do really well or you don't.

2. Lecture notes are the way to go! They may recommend textbooks but I never used any....

3. We were thrown into it, but don't worry, they know everyone's learning curve is different so they won't expect you all to be geniuses. There will be clinical instructors to help you out. :)

4. Great question! I wished I knew to just chill out more. Dental school is very demanding so if you don't find things to do outside of studying you might start to burn out. In terms of studying, I think I should've focused more on the big ideas. It's not like undergrad where they will ask you about something the prof only mentioned briefly on one slide that everyone probably ignored. Looking back now, I think I should've better made use of hours.There's probably a lot of things I wish i should've done/known but I can't think of anymore more for now. Definitely ask us during welcome week!

With roommates, I think that depends on you and your roommate's personality. I like living by myself and a lot of my classmates do too. There were some classmates that lived together too though. So I think its doable.

5. I don't know how this year's backpacks will look like. So I we'll both find out this fall! :D

 

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