U of Sask curriculum

[Guest psyche]

I'm lucky to be accepted to the U of Sask as an OOP student. In the past few days, I've been reading up on the U of Sask curriculum. Can anyone tell me more about the U of Sask curriculum? For example, does it adopt a more traditional style (heavy emphasis on lectures) or the PBL style? Is the curriculum organized in blocks or otherwise? Do they use a Honours/Pass/Fail grading system? The College of Medicine website doesn't appear to have much information about these. Any advise will be greatly appreciated. =) Thanks in advance!

[Guest frenchfrog]

Hey psyche,

I've just been accepted as well, so I'm not speaking from experience with the uofs med curriculum. However, having spoken to a few med students, here is what I understand about the first year (Med I curriculum):

1)Due to having been put on probation, the UofS is trying to move away from being too traditional with too heavy an emphasis on lectures. We will only have lectures in the morning, five days a week. Then, one afternoon a week, we will have Professional Skills, which is learning interview and physical exam techniques with mock patients. The afternoons during the rest of the week are reserved for personal study time and for shadowing physicians. There is a lot CASE-based learning.

2) As far as I know, the curriculum is organized in blocks. And, as of next year, there will be a systems-based approach.

3) I'm pretty sure no specific grades are assigned. Exams and such are marked on a Pass/ Fail system. It may very well be Honours/Pass/Fail...but at least Pass/Fail for sure.

Anyway, sorry that's not much information but maybe it helped. Hopefully if I got something wrong, a current med student will correct me.

[Guest UofS2010]

Thanks for the info frenchfrog, and I look forward to meeting everyone else in August!

 

I was reading some posts a couple years ago and ppl were saying that UofS has a pretty good(if not one of the top) clerkship programs. I was wondering if this is true up to this date, and if U of S students generally get matched better to their preferred specialities/locations

[Guest frenchfrog]

I don't see why this still wouldn't be true. The med class is still small as compared to other med schools, so in theory, med students get to see, do and experience more . . .that extra, valuable experience is what will help them better explain to program directors why a certain specialty is for them and why they are best suited for the program. Of course, that's only in theory and I have yet to be able to say first hand. Anyway, if you check out www.carms.ca, you can see the match reports for any given year.