Its not too hard to group them into broad pools, like top 4, middle, bottom, etc, but making a distinction b/t, say number 8 and 9 is tough. Probaly does not make too much of a difference the farther down you go. I had a tough time with 2-4. I knew where I liked the most, but I really could not decide on much difference b/t 2-4. Each person will have different criteria they weigh differently. Sometimes ties are decided by which geographic location you or your wife/husband liked. Everyone I talked to changed their list around a billion times. I would not loose to much sleep over deciding b/t programs lower on your list. I have not heard af anyone making a scoring system as formal as what you are talking about. Most people have the top few predetermined in their mind and the rest is a gut feeling type of call. You also can always flip a coin!

I personally am going to rank them based on the reputation they have here on orthogate. Maybe do an informal poll.

I personally am going to rank them based on the reputation they have here on orthogate. Maybe do an informal poll.

jalby- are you the jalby from sdn days of yore? i remember a witty guy by that name... if that's you, you may remember GoodMonkey. that'd be me. i'm saying hey. nice to see ya.

I personally am going to rank them based on the reputation they have here on orthogate. Maybe do an informal poll.

Hopefully you are joking. Ranking places based on their prestige and not on how you feel you would fit there could make for a long 5 years.

Some of the places with the "best rep" have been my least favorite. My top 2-3 are actually lesser known but for me better. I guess you could get down to rep after weighing almost every other criteria more heavily. People get "great" fellowships and have academic careers coming out of every single place I interview.

Come on...he was obviously joking. As much as I enjoy the friendly (most of the time) banter on this site, I don't give a damn what any of you think about where I should go, nor do I expect any of you care about what I would think.

I'm totally lost on the rank list thing. About two weeks ago, I thought I had a pretty good idea, but then I went on a string of great interview days, and now I have a group of 6 great places and don't know which to rank where. I guess that's a great thing about Ortho though, and a nice problem that we all have as applicants. Haven't found a bad place yet...just some that are in places I don't want to live.

rwbrhp29

I personally am going to rank them based on the reputation they have here on orthogate. Maybe do an informal poll.

jalby- are you the jalby from sdn days of yore? i remember a witty guy by that name... if that's you, you may remember GoodMonkey. that'd be me. i'm saying hey. nice to see ya.

Shhh....They might find out it is me.....

Yes, the points thing is extremely nerdy, but what the hell else am I going to do over the next 4 weeks. It did make me carefully evaluate what characteristics I was looking for in a program and the location. Because I had already intuitively decided where I would rank everything, the points method didn't change much. If something didnt' work out the way I thought, I figured the points must be wrong and I just played around with them to make the programs fit where I thought they should. One program had so many more points compared to 2 others that I had intuitively ranked, that I moved it up, but otherwise the only reason to do it is to clarify what you think is important.

location and Gut.....i had a pre-rol prior to starting interviews and with 2 left, my list has not changed much.

I'll start by saying that my ROL is already certified...

I would say that location and GUT - stressing the GUT - would be the way to go (of course, there are many other factors to consider: spouse, children, housing needs, schools, communities, social scenes, etc.). I had a pre-interview ROL, and while - about halfway through - things didn't seem to change much, my second half interviews threw my ROL for a loop. In the end, I knew who my top two were, but it was hard to figure out which to put over the other. My 3-5 were by far the hardest - determining where I would prefer to go if my top two didn't come through. The bottom half/third/quarter is easier to work out, since I think many of us would rather rank all programs (unless you're interviewing at like 12 or 13+) than risk not matching, so even a program that isn't all that appealing will still make it onto the list. Fortunately, I haven't come across any "bad" programs that I would rather not rank than end up at.

As a joke, towards the end of interviews when all of us applicants were candidly discussing programs and ROL's, I suggested that to get a true gut feeling, sometime during the final rank week get drunk to put all of your inhibitions aside, and look at your ROL through "true" eyes. I [probably]won't be taking my own suggestion, but you never know... someone, somewhere out there, may think, "Hey... that's a good idea."