First week

So this was my first official week of school. Last week was mainly all orientation stuff and introductions to faculty and staff. During this week we were given our schedules and then we hit the ground running. My typical day consists of class from 8 to 12 with an hour lunch and then class until 5. Depending on my day I will occasionally have clinicals from 5 to 9 pm. So in a nutshell, school goes from anywhere from at least 9 to 13 hours. Now if we were to take into consideration study time--I dont have much. As for curriculum, I am taking a whole slew of classes. A refresher course in genetics, biochem, Head and Neck anatomy, Evidence based medicine, Optics AKA Physics, clincals, Dr/patient relationship, Clincal problem solving, all the labs and more. Needless to say, it is pretty much all the stuff I have learned in undergrad and more! Plus, they go super fast. For example, I have never had anatomy and I am having to learn it very fast and incredibly thoroughly. For the most part, I have met a lot of nice people but it is definitely a wake up call. I am easily one of the two tallest people in a class of 160 students. My class mainly consists of 66% girls, 16% are married and the diversity is nuts! We have people from Albania, Trinidad, Canada, China, Vietnam, Nigeria etc... As of right now I mainly hang out with all of the East Indian people. The school divides us up into four cohorts or groups and then really stress groups. I am not a huge group-study type of person and so this has been kind of difficult for me. All in all, it is crazy and I cant wait for you to experience this Ernie because it is absolutely insane. One good thing from all of this is that we get free eyecare and huge discounts on eyewear and since we are in Philly and there is every type of professional school imaginable we also get discounts for things like Dental care at Temple University. Overall, it was a hard week but at the same time—very rewarding. I admit that I am a geek and I enjoy learning. There are so many things out there that we just don’t know about or understand, so it is pretty cool to that those glimpses.