The End of the Beginning

Well... that does it. It seems like just yesterday I was stressing out about the start of summer anatomy and here I am. My first year of dental school is done! It's hard to really comprehend the fact that's it's over because it just went by so unbelievably fast.

Here are some things I learned about the Air Force, dental school, and life in general, during my first year.

1. The Air Force are emailing professionals:

These people are so efficient at answering questions and replying to emails, it's staggering. I'm not exaggerating either. Only twice have I sent an email during business hours and not gotten a reply in 15 minutes. They're extremely helpful and professional and get stuff solved ASAP. Great people.

2. Dental school is way more than grades:

So many people in my class, including myself, have missed certain grades by a fraction of a point, but when it comes down to it, that's not what really matters. Sure, some may be wanting to specialize, but in the end, it's about learning as much as you can to be a competent dentist. This is especially true with science classes. Yes, these are tough and often worth quite a few credit hours, but they have little to no bearing on how you will perform as a dentist. Take it easy, and focus energy on doing well in the dental classes if you are taking them simultaneously.

3. If you have 55 people in your class, you'll have 55 personalities to deal with:

This is pretty obvious, but it's an interesting dynamic in dental school. Never since elementary school are you with the exact same people all day, every day, taking the same classes with the same teachers. Amazing friendships are born, and some strange dynamics take shape. Some like to isolate themselves, while others will make a scene just to make a scene. In the end, you have to learn to respect each person for who they are or else you won't be able to fully appreciate anyone. Everyone has their strengths and weaknesses and just because someone isn't like you, doesn't mean they're doing something wrong. In fact, the only person like you, is you.

4. Finals week is 50% studying and 50% what you did leading up to finals:

What I mean is this. If you have a strong cushion going into finals week, you will hate your life far less. If you are stressing about a final because you need a 90 to get a B, while your friend needs a 70 to get a B, that sucks. Work your butt off during the semester when tests are more spread out to give yourself the luxury of picking and choosing where to concentrate during finals instead of worrying about just passing every class. Even if you could care less about getting an A, B, or C, study for the highest grade you can going into finals. Then you can slack off. You don't want to be the person that needs an A on a Biochemistry final just to pass the class and not get it.

5. Find what works for you:

Don't feel pressured to study in a group if you study better on your own. Don't feel obligated to use someone else's study notes just because they made a study guide for everyone. Don't feel like you have to stay isolated if you want a group to study with; just ask someone! Long story short, do what works for you.

6. Work together:

Like I said earlier, some in your class may want to specialize and that's fine. The way I see it is this: those that want to specialize will figure out how to. The more you all work together, the better you class will collectively do. Those at the top will still rise to the top, but those at the bottom will be a little higher as well. Don't let your ego get in the way of helping others and enjoying your time.

7. Your brain is not a to-do list or a calendar:

So don't trust it to be either. Get a to-do list app (I recommend wunderlist) and a sync-able calendar if you have a smartphone (Google Cal). Put EVERYTHING on there so you won't have that lingering thought in your head wondering if you've missed something.

Well that's about it for me. One quick note is that I ran for and was elected class president a couple weeks ago! I'll start serving in that capacity beginning June 6 and will end my term at the end of next spring. At that point, I can either run again or step away.

As always, email me if you have any questions!

Getting up to speed

Well, if you've been keeping track of my other posts, you'd know that I'm a few weeks into fall semester now. Anatomy ended back in early August, and I began fall semester exactly 1 month ago. So far, everything has really been great! I've made a lot of friends in my class and we all seem to be working together and helping each other out a lot. This is making it much easier, not just from a grade standpoint, but also just from a sanity standpoint. It's much easier to get through the day when you feel like you're part of a team rather than doing this alone.

Switching gears a bit, you may recall that I scored decently on my first anatomy exam. A C on the practical and a B on the written test. I ended up getting A's on both for the final and received a high B in the class. Well, as it turns out, that first C I made still holds the record for lowest grade in dental school so far! I made a B on a quiz, an 88 on two tests, and everything else has been an A! It seems like I just needed to really get back in the swing of things and remember how this whole school thing worked... I think I've got it figured out.

One of the hardest parts about studying in dental school is feeling overwhelmed. That's no surprise really when you're in 25.5 credit hours in one semester. With so many classes comes so many tests and quizzes. You really have to sit down and make a list of what needs to get done, decide what's most important, and do that first. It can be difficult at times, but you've got to make yourself do it. Another thing about studying is that it just doesn't work to study everything when a test gets closer. You almost literally have to study each night that which you learned in class earlier in the day. It's crucial to make sure you at least understand it all early enough that you can ask questions before a test rolls around.

As for the Air Force, not much has changed here. I've only sent in 1 more reimbursement since my books and it was paid for with no problems. They're still, by my measurement, the fastest e-mailers on the planet. It's a really pleasure to not only have a financial burden lifted, but for the people doing it to be so helpful and professional.

Well, I'm just plugging along. I'll try to update within the next month again, even though this right here is probably going to be the story until December.

Maybe something crazy will happen that I can share.

As always, don't hesitate to look around on here or e-mail me questions!

Stage 1: Complete

Well, I did it! Today I took my anatomy final and I am officially done with my first class of dental school. It was a bit weird because I've pretty much been doing nothing but anatomy for a bit over a month so it seemed to come to a very abrupt end. I don't have my scores from my test yet, but I'm almost 100% certain that I'll end with a B in the class. I needed a 98-100% to get an A, so I can bet that didn't happen. We start up again August 18th will our fall classes, so I have a small little break and I hope to let of some steam and just hang out (and maybe study ahead?) until then.

A quick word about grades for everyone...

I was the kind of guy that HATED getting B's in college and I managed to stay in the A range all but twice. In dental school your mindset has to change a little because it's just not the same game anymore. Not only are your classmates far more intelligent/hardworking than your peers in undergrad, there is more material in less time and it's often more difficult. You've made it to dental school, and now all you have to do is pass to become a dentist. If you get bent on getting A's, you'll kill yourself trying to get them. Now, with that, you need to do your VERY BEST to get good grades if your intent is to specialize. As another side note, getting a C is alright, but odds are you know much less than people making A's and B's and thus, theoretically, they'll be a better dentist. In reality though, just relax and do your best. Remember, your best is ALWAYS good enough!

My 3rd reimbursement came in the other day (for health insurance) as well as my 2nd stipend. All of my tuition/fees for the fall have been deferred and everything is still running unbelievably smoothly. I had my doubts coming into this thing, but I'm truly blown away with how great the Air Force has been. I just e-mailed out a reimbursement for my fall semester books so I'll keep you all updated on how that goes. So far, it looks like it's taking roughly 20 days to get money from a reimbursement from the time I send it to AFIT and the time the money appears in my bank account.

(AFIT stands for Air Force Institute of Technology. They are my point of contact while I'm on scholarship. In other words, they handle everything other than my stipend stuff)

Off to do a whole lot of nothing for a while!

And so it begins

Well, I've got my first 3 weeks of dental school under my belt and it has certainly been an interesting experience. One of the things that surprised me most was how young I was compared to my classmates. I came to dental school straight out of college but most (and when I say most, I mean about 45 of the 60) have taken at least 1 or 2 years off, probably half are re-applicants, and many are in their late 20's or early 30's. This really surprised me because I had always assumed it was normal to go from college to dental school. I feel very fortunate to have made it this far so early in my life.

Another thing that I've been doing is my anatomy class. We take anatomy in the summer (from about July 1 to August 5) so it's pretty crazy. We got quick lectures on arms, legs, and back, but will only be tested on material covering the thorax, abdomen, pelvis, head, and neck. Our first test was a few days ago (thorax, abdomen, pelvis) and so far I only have my results from the lab practical. It was a standard dissection lab where we rotate through and identify structures on a human body. I've never been good at this, I much prefer the more "problem solving" type learning rather than memorizing type stuff and I ended up with a C on this part. I was a bit shocked at first because it had been about 2 years since I made a C on a test. One thing I remember coming into dental school was all the students really emphasized the fact that grades are not the most important thing in school (unless you intend to specialize) and I'm still coming to terms with this. Not that it's ok to do poorly all the time, but that you just have to accept what you get and move on because when it comes to it, you'll be a dentist regardless. I hear this our most difficult class the first year so I'm sure everything will be fine. I'm glad I got that first test out of the way because now I know what worked and what didn't when trying to cram a huge amount of information in my brain for a test in just 8-10 days. Besides, I feel better about the biochemistry/neuroanatomy, etc. type classes coming up because I've never been much of a 'lab' guy. I'm ready to start doing some dentist stuff! I'm sure it will all work out, and I feel much better about the written portion of the test that we took that same day. Still waiting on the results for that part, I'll tweet that in a day or two when we get the scores. Hoping for an A!

As for the Air Force HPSP, all of that is going well. I got a reimbursement rejected last week for not giving adequate proof of who my insurance was purchased from, but I plan to e-mail a credit card statement in a few days which should clear that up with no problem.

I finally got a regular stipend payment on the 15th of July, and it was exactly what I expected. It was $1030 (half of the monthly $2060) minus some taxes. Came out to about $930. One thing I have loved about this experience is how little I've had to do. I literally had to do nothing to get the school and the Air Force on the same page, the Air Force handled all of that for me. I have already verified that my bursar tuition/fees were covered by the Air Force and I have had absolutely no hiccups with the finances at all. More importantly, the Air Force treats me with as much respect as I treat them, and I take this relationship very seriously. It's great to have such an organized and professional group of people on your side. I couldn't be happier with my decision up to this point.

As you might have seen, I haven't done COT yet but will be going next summer. Just a reminder for anyone looking into what that's like. I'll let you know in a year!

More on that really quick. If you are selected on a 4-year scholarship, you're expected to go to COT before your 1st year unless you have a scheduling conflict with school. Well I did have a minor (it was an informal welcome dinner type thing, not nearly as critical as I had expected) conflict and got COT moved, but in hindsight, I wish I would have gone to COT this summer before school. I think I would have felt more like a part of the Air Force team and it would have been a good kickstart to dental school. I also loved having the time off, but right now, part of me wonders if waiting on COT was the best move. I'm sure it's not a big deal either way, however, it would have been nice to get paid a few thousand $ for that and feel more like a part of the Air Force.

That's all for now... I'll probably update again when anatomy is over around August 5th! School starts up again on August 18th (weird timing... I know) so I'll have a little break before my ~25 credit hours come crashing down on me.

Don't hesitate to e-mail me if anyone out there has questions about the program or dental school!

Reimbursements and the days ahead...

A lot has happened since my last blog post a few months ago, and a lot is about to come my way. I'll go one by one, starting with the Air Force stuff, and then narrow down to some odds and ends I've been doing. Then I'll close with what's to come... enjoy!

First off, the Air Force.

2 things I need to cover here. For those awarded a 4-year scholarship, Commissioned Officer Training (COT) is supposed to happen the summer before their first year. For 3-year scholarships, COT happens after the last year. For me being on a 4-year, mine was supposed to be this summer. However, the dental school I'm attending starts so early (I'll talk about that soon) that COT would have ended too close to the start of school so it was deferred to next summer, between my 1st and 2nd year. So you'll have to wait another year to hear all about that!

Now about reimbursements and dealing with AFIT (Air Force Institute of Technology, where the people you'll be in contact during your scholarship work, located at Wright-Patterson AFB in Ohio). Let me say that dealing with AFIT has been one of the easiest, quickest, and overall amazing experiences I've ever had. The people working there are extremely fast at responding to e-mails, accommodating my needs, and making things absolutely clear. It truly has been a joy to have my questions answered so quickly and to deal with such professional people. One of the best parts is about reimbursements. When I was awarded the scholarship, I was under the impression that I would need to mail my reimbursement packages to the Air Force base, which would be a big pain, and if anything was wrong, I'd have to mail it in again. Well all those worries went away when I was informed that reimbursement packages can be submitted by e-mail! It was such a relief, because they respond so quickly to my e-mails, I could get almost immediate confirmation that my package was accepted or what needed to be altered. Huge weight lifted off my shoulders. For those that are wondering what a 'reimbursement package' is, it's fairly simply. If I buy something the Air Force will pay for, lets use my textbooks as an example, then I go buy the books and then assemble what's known as a reimbursement package. A reimbursement package is simply 4 things, proof of requirement (I have to prove that my dental school makes me have what I'm asking to be paid for), proof of purchase (basically a receipt or a credit card statement), an AFIT form 31 (this is where you list everything you are buying and total it up for the AF), and an EFT form (a form where you verify who you are with SSN and signature and give the AF the bank account # where you want them to direct deposit your money). All in all, reimbursements are much easier and smoother than I could ever imagine, one of many reasons I am very happy with my choice so far! My first reimbursement was submitted by email around May 22, and my account had the reimbursement money in it on June 15. Only about 3 weeks! I was very impressed.

Secondly, about what I've been up to since my last post.

I went and paid for my scrubs! Cost me about $250 and the Air Force actually doesn't cover the whole cost of that, but it's enough! They cover basically everything else in full.

I got health insurance through the dental school which the Air Force will pay for too, awesome!

I finally got my military ID and have gone over to Tinker a few times. It's pretty weird still to think I'm in the military because I haven't really done any 'military' type stuff yet.

I think I've got all the teeth I need. I almost had 100 at least check and I've got a bit more than that so I'm sure I hit my mark. I hear we don't need them until spring anyway so I'm considering the possibility of continuing to collect them this fall.

Class starts for me on June 29, so I've got all my anatomy books ready to go. We take anatomy by itself from June 29 to about mid-August, so it's going to be pretty intense. Once it hits mid-August, anatomy ends and we start in on our normal 24-25 credit hour schedule... ahh!!!

For now, that's all I can remember. School starts for me next Tuesday... wish me luck!