Our pathology exam grades have been up for about an hour and already there are three official complaints on the online forum because one of the questions required us to perform (OMG) DIVISION out to TWO SIGNIFICANT DIGITS. But wait, it was WITHOUT A CALCULATOR!
I have pointed this out to three people. One, like me, recalled sighing and picking up the whiteboard to work it out. One guessed at the right answer and multiplied to check it, because multiplying is easier than dividing (no argument here). The third was not sure how to do long division exactly but reasoned out the answer using some complicated algorithm involving completion percentages in hockey which I couldn’t quite follow.
This is not one of the days I do not feel smart enough to be in med school.
But if I don’t get back to studying the heart exam, tomorrow will be. Toodles!
Ha. Funny stuff. I remember being a bit perturbed at a few math questions on exams - like there’s not enough non-math stuff to test us on.
I really hate it when they throw a math problem on a test that you don’t expect to see math on (it usually seems to involve logs). I, personally, am a math phobe, so I block as much math out of my head as possible. Thus, it really throws me when a calculation shows up on an exam that you weren’t expecting to see. Although, I think I could handle long division without too much difficulty. 
NOW I see why a lot of schools require or strongly recommend Calculus!!!
The lecturer walked us through similar problems in class. Of course, she didn’t make us do the long division.
Some of my classmates made arithmetic mistakes but didn’t complain. Some forgot how to do long division but tried out a couple of the answer choices using multiplication. Some people who got it right went on the exam discussion forum and nobly leapt to the defense of people who got it wrong.
I’m trying to mind my own beeswax and study for my next exam, but it’s all just too funny.
How dare they expect an indivual in a doctoral-level curriculum be capable of something so fundamental as one of the 4 basic math functions! My other favorite question, from back in my MS-1/MS-2 years was the inevitable question - whenever we had an essay or paper assigned - “Will spelling or grammar count?” Jesus Christ dude, you are in DOCTORAL-LEVEL program AND you have a computer with word processor software…if you cannot handle this, drop out, go home & get a job flipping burgers at Wendys!
Not to be trite, but this was what I referred as the “grade grubber” syndrome. Folks have it so engrained into them when they are pre-meds that they must snatch every single point that they can to maximize their grades. This, in rare situations, is what I felt prompted some of the pre-med sabotage crap you see - greedy little turd sniveling for points & screwing up others folks stuff just get a leg up on them.
The practice & the attitude carry over to med school where they become obscessed with class rank. they truly believe that if they are not in the upper 10% or upper-quartile, I will not be able to match into pediatric orbitology - never mind the fact they have never even seen or met a pediatric orbitologist to KNOW that is what they want. Their decision is primarily based upon how competitive/exclusive the position is.
“Grade grubbers” largely equal “gunners” except that gunners are usually sufficiently smart that they do not feel compelled to do others harm in order to stand out. But, they are usually the ones that you hear a collective class-groan when they begin to ask questions that everyone knows they already know the answer to in order to draw the professors attention to just how smart they are.
LOL - in the end, none of this crap matters. The grubbers & gunners are shocked that folks like me, Denise, Amy & many others match into things they felt were restricted to only the elitely-ranked. Then, they may discover that their fantasy career is actually BORING & end up doing something totally different.
If anything, medical education & training should make you grow up & re-focus on what is important. However, sadly, it does not always succeed in this.
Haha… good rant, Dave. I agree with most of it.
I will say one thing, though. A year or so ago, I was studying for the GRE for some reason. Most of it was pretty straightforward - the one thing I really had to re-learn was long division. It’s just one of those parts of my brain I haven’t exercised in so long, it rusted 
.
I don’t actually mind too much when people forget how do do division by hand, much as the idea flummoxes me. I’m just blown away by the idea that people feel they have to get all the possible points, and anytime they don’t get 100 there must be some way to fix it by complaining.
Later in the drama, one classmate posted on the forum kind of suggesting people suck it up, and three people jumped on her case. I would like to say that at that point I went back to micro and stopped following the drama. That would be so neat if it were true. But no, I chimed in and said that although some questions are poorly written sometimes, the vast majority of the time when I get something wrong, it’s because I didn’t know something I was supposed to know or I made a mistake. And that’s no one else’s fault.
One of my classmates, a VERY nice guy, was more succinct: “We were given a whiteboard and a pen. I believe we had everything we needed to solve the problem.” No one jumped on him because he is a little sweetie-bear.
What’s funnier is when classmates either complain about a question or ask about it, and some freakin’ gunner explains to us why we were all wrong.
And funniest of all is that when the complainers get me points back on a test, I happily take them. Even as I make fun of the whining.
Yes, those videos are great!! Adam, who created the “Men of Genius” series from the Univ of Maryland, and his stars are all friends (and not just people in my class) from med school. They were made for our annual follies show. Adam is currently a PGY-2 in EM/Peds at Maryland. He is a great person, someone who would stop what he is doing at any moment to help someone. Those videos are hilarious and I still pull them up when I need a good laugh.
Tara
- OldManDave Said:
Not to be trite, but this was what I referred as the "grade grubber" syndrome. Folks have it so engrained into them when they are pre-meds that they must snatch every single point that they can to maximize their grades. This, in rare situations, is what I felt prompted some of the pre-med sabotage crap you see - greedy little turd sniveling for points & screwing up others folks stuff just get a leg up on them.
The practice & the attitude carry over to med school where they become obscessed with class rank. they truly believe that if they are not in the upper 10% or upper-quartile, I will not be able to match into pediatric orbitology - never mind the fact they have never even seen or met a pediatric orbitologist to KNOW that is what they want. Their decision is primarily based upon how competitive/exclusive the position is.
"Grade grubbers" largely equal "gunners" except that gunners are usually sufficiently smart that they do not feel compelled to do others harm in order to stand out. But, they are usually the ones that you hear a collective class-groan when they begin to ask questions that everyone knows they already know the answer to in order to draw the professors attention to just how smart they are.
LOL - in the end, none of this crap matters. The grubbers & gunners are shocked that folks like me, Denise, Amy & many others match into things they felt were restricted to only the elitely-ranked. Then, they may discover that their fantasy career is actually BORING & end up doing something totally different.
If anything, medical education & training should make you grow up & re-focus on what is important. However, sadly, it does not always succeed in this.
OK I want to ADD to this:
"Are we going to get a review?!!!" "We need one to pass Dr......"!!!!!
OMG the Professor in anatomy said "Uh how do we review? " "Everything I just lectured about this month?" Student "JUst what we need to know for the test." Professor "You need to know everything and more then I lectured." Student "But thats not fair! You should not test us on what nots presented in class!" Professor "Whats fair about Medical school?, You need to know everything for your patients they are not just some test it's their life" Student "But the USMLE..............."
OMG I got sick of these people I can tell you.