Med School Interview #2 of 2009

Forgive me for my lack of posting recently. A stressful work week and interview anxiety give me little motivation to make a constructive post (I spared you the whining). But here's a recap of my fun times in Long Island.

So my interview was scheduled for 10am with a doctor, with a followup student interview with a med school student at 11.30am. I would be served lunch at noon, eat with some current med students, then get a tour of the school/hospital, and then attend some help sessions on financial aid and other school-related business until 1.30pm, and then I'd be free to go. Only about half of these things happened according to schedule, haha.

First of all, it took FOREVER to get to Stony Brook from NJ. I left at ~7.30am and arrived at the hospital parking lot at ~9.50am. Cuttin' it close ... >_<. Turns out the traffic around the NYC area royally blows. But I rushed to the hospital and searched for the admissions dept for the school of medicine, and found it relatively quickly. I checked in, was handed a schedule, and was told to have a seat in a small conference room for visiting interviewees. There were 3 or 4 others there, and more arrived as the day went on. I believe there were a total of 10 or 11 of us for that day, ranging from ages 21 to 34. I felt quite young in front of some of the other candidates.

So in order to try and calm myself, I ignored the schedule and pamphlets inside my newly obtained folder with Stony Brook school information and whipped out a book to read instead. It worked well enough ... so well that when I looked to check the clock, it read 10.15am. That weirded me out, considering two of the others in the room had been sought out by their interviewer at 10am, and I was still there. At 10.30am, the admissions lady came over to tell me they were having trouble tracking down my interviewer and would let me know what's going on as soon as possible. I was a little panicky at this point, but strangely calm about the whole situation. At first, I had been fearful of my interviewer, having read on my schedule that she was a professor of biomedical engineering and psychiatry. I usually have trouble connecting well, or finding myself on similar wavelengths, with engineers. I tend to think differently than they do, so I was afraid of making points and statements that would counter her own thoughts and opinions, and accidentally leave a negative impact. Well, as it turns out, she was nowhere to be found, and at 10.45am, I was told I'd be interviewed by someone else, a Dr. Nisson Schechter, and it would be a 1pm - so I'd miss out on the info sessions (yatta!).

But, as soon as I heard that name, there was a small bit of unsettling movement in the room. I recall reading some interview feedback posts on StudentDoctor.net about a man who liked to tell dirty jokes and has a crass sense of humor and way of speaking. At this, another student there spoke up and said that he was just interviewed by Schechter, and that he likes to push the interviewee's buttons and tries to kick their feet out from under them with random questions that aren't pertinent to medicine, or that involve controversial, ethical problems. This made me more than a little nervous, but at the same time, I felt confident enough in my own stances on a bunch of issues with legitimate evidence and experience in each point to defend my positions.

After this initial freakout, I went back to my reading until 11.30am rolled around, and a bunch of medical students flooded the room to grab their respective interviewees. I met up with a really chill 2nd year student who just asked me questions about my life, etc. - all the standard stuff. He did biomed engineering as his major, so he greatly sympathized in dealing with classes and such as a premed student - score! Upon his questioning of what I like to do for fun, I told him that I was nerdy and really loved to play video games. He responded, "Dude, don't sweat it, it's not nerdy at all. Just a few nights ago, a bunch of guys in the med school got together and had a 24 person 360 Halo LAN party!" Awesome. I know where I'm going to med school! :p

In the end, the student interview was really relaxed and felt like a normal conversation. After 40 minutes of talking, I went back to the conference room, and had lunch with my fellow interviewees and some first year students. It was incredibly comforting to see that these med students had lives outside of academia, and were not as cut-throat as I had imagined - not at all like Cornell premed. Quite the opposite, actually - the students will make study guides and send them out over the class list-serve ... unheard of! We finished lunch, and went on a 30 min tour of the facilities - we saw the lecture halls, anatomy lab (woo dead people!), library, and other student resource locations. The building is a little tricky to navigate since it's comprised of two tall cylindrical towers with 19 floors each. And I only got to explore floors 5, 4, and 3. I entered at 5, in case you were wondering.

After the tour and bombardment of random questions thrust at them, our 4 student tour guides bid us farewell and the best of luck. They seemed legitimately happy to be there, which was a really good sign. I then returned to the admissions office to find Dr. Schechter waiting for me. He was a formidable looking Jewish man well into his life, but still full of energy and passion. I thanked him for doing this last-minute, and for taking the time to review my file beforehand. He then led me to his office on the 10th floor (4 floors explored, now!), and sat down in a chair opposite him by a nice view of the sea surrounding Long Island. I could tell from his posture, body language, and facial expressions that this was not going to be a normal interview. He was incredibly relaxed, and I tried to follow suit. It became quite easy after the first few exchanges. After telling me what he knew about me, he began asking questions pertinent to my social life, personal experiences, etc. - normal for a med school interview. The thing is, as soon as I would give an answer, it was as if he asked me to defend what I just said by either providing a counter-statement. Most of this centered on religion, actually. We spent 20 minutes talking back and forth on the purpose, meaning, and consequences of religious practices. Luckily, I know quite a bit about many religions, and it turned into a sharing of stories from our different life stories. In the end, we spoke about our resolutions to similar problems of internal conflict with growing up with a hardcore faith-oriented set of parents. His resolution was not the same as mine, but we both respected each others choices and smiled at each others remarks and thought processes.

If you remember, I mentioned that this man had a reputation of telling dirty jokes and such, right? Well ... it's true. That man has a mouth, haha. At first, I was surprised at how unprofessional it seemed, but after the first two seconds of shock, I decided to embrace it. After a while, it felt like having an intellectual conversation with my guy friends from Montville. He used words like, "bullshit, crap, fuck, etc.," and even proceeded to talk about masturbation, the power women have over men by exploiting their libido, and asking if a girl in question that I was talking about was a "total bitch," haha. So you Montville kids who are reading this, sounds like a normal evening conversation, doesn't it?

In the end, Dr. Schechter told me that I interviewed very well. He said he sensed a great sense of compassion and spirituality, which combined with my articulate nature and logical way of thinking, would lead me to becoming a great physician. Luckily, I am incapable of blushing, but I humbly accepted these words of praise. He said he'd do his best to convey an extremely positive image of me to the admissions committee, and told me he had no negative comments or thoughts about me coming out of the interview. AND, that it would be his honor to teach me biochemistry in my first year at Stony Brook Med!

So, I left leaving pretty excited and hoping for the best. My chances are pretty good, I think. About 600 students are asked to interview, and about 300 of them are sent acceptance letters. Pretty good odds, ya? :)

A bit of a rough start to the Stony Brook experience, but the middle portion made up for it. Unfortunately, when I returned to my car, I realized that I had left my headlights on in my rush to make it on time to my first interview, and my battery was dead. Luckily, the campus police was ridiculously nice and helpful and was able to give my car a jump within minutes of a phone call.

In the end, I rate Stony Brook pretty highly. I'd say above UMDNJ. I don't know how I'd deal with living in Newark, so this seems like a great choice. The facilities were much newer than NJMS, and the student-teacher ratio is better. The student body seems more relaxed, and the area is really nice, too. It's far enough away from home, yet close enough, that I would have no problems visiting. And, the city (NYC) is only a one hour train ride away! Awesome.

So, I'll hear back from them in ~6 weeks. So hopefully I'll have heard from NJMS and Stony Brook by the end of March. I'm keeping my fingers crossed, but optimistically speaking ... it's looking good! And thank you, Lunch Table crew, for preparing me for a not-so-awkward and natural interview :)