It doesn't matter...

where you do your rotations. According to the school. I mean, people have families and stuff, but ultimately, doesn't matter.

At least according to a meeting we went to today and in why it was okay to totally not tell the Global Scholars students that they can't do New Jersey rotations and may not be able to get licensing in CA or NJ.

So if rotations and reputations are a lot of reasons people choose this school, could one also say that it matters equally little whether you choose to go to SGU or AUC, SABA, or Ross, except for the whole hundred grand less thing?

I'm guessing they wouldn't like that assertion. So maybe take the concerns with where we're going to live and pay to work for the next year with a wee tad more respect and quit putting all the administrative mishandling off on the students. Because that's the obnoxious part. Yes, students bitch a lot, and this is part of running a high school, college, or graduate school. Yes, many hardened professors and administrators start to get sick of hearing a lot of lame excuses or being blamed for stuff students do, and I sympathize, though sympathize a little less as that whole dynamic is part of the job description. For instance, as a doctor, I suspect I'm going to have to deal with a lot of sick people.

Part of that job dynamic should involve being *aware* of the legitimate stresses and complaints manifested in the student body. First of all, even petty obnoxious stuff is still a catastrophe in that person's mind, and even if someone has brought consequences onto themselves, that is still a person's life, even if it's annoying you.

Secondly, if over 65% of the class has a beef with you over a specific issue at a specific period of time, maybe it's you. And maybe that 65% plus would be somewhat eased if you didn't keep flipping glib responses at them over how either their concerns or irrelevant or that they should have maintained the academic responsibility of being one step ahead of the next administrative screw up. It's sort of like being under the perpetual control of the snotty guy at the airline desk that tells you it's your fault they lost your luggage because you should never check baggage that you actually need.

To center back on the clinicals thing, the whole "Well we COULD just take out letting you put down your preferences and send you anywhere" thing? Not cool. I appreciate that it's frustrating to have the class mad at you, and I sympathize that it's becoming pretty bloody frequent this term since the class has a lot of reasons to be mad, but totally not the right response. Not knowing where you're going to live in addition to the other stressors, particularly for those who have families, *is* a big deal. Particularly in the economy we're heading back to.

This Cincinnati analogy kept coming up too. Apparently people who go to med school in Cincinnati have to do their rotations in Cincinnati. Maybe some Cincinnati students can back me up, but I feel like it'd be accurate to say that they know that when they enter medical school, and, if they entered medical school with the assumption they were going to get rotations in Cincinnati, and then their school told them they were shipping them to California in their last term of basic sciences because fifty of them actually hadn't been cleared for Cincinnati because the school hadn't cleared it before making the claim, and that it wasn't a big deal, those students would be super-mega-pissed. But correct me if I'm wrong. Cincinnati medical students may just be an enviably laid back lot.

Regardless of what residency programs think, advertising SGU based on its great rotation spots and telling students they have a good likelihood of getting them so they're likely to be able to be near their families, and then not being able to follow through *is* a big deal. We all got the great advertising package about the wonders of SGU, and it's time for the excuses to stop and the results to start. STOP minimizing our concerns.

On the plus side, they finally got Angel working after only being down for the majority of the weekend. Fortunately, I already had my course materials downloaded because I expect this sort of thing. Sucks to be those fourth termers with their exams tomorrow though! Hope they didn't need any revision on their slides.