Its 10 A.M. CST. I haven't slept in...about 2 weeks. Today is the beginning of "Match Week." Basically, the beginning of the next three years of my life. Allow me to explain.
I've been in higher education for about a decade now. The last 4 years have been medical school. After medical school I'll be a Physician, but I wont have any magic powers. I have to spend another 3 years as an indentured servant before I get my magic powers and become a "licensed" physician.
The process by which I become an indentured servant (aka, resident) is "The Match." To make a long story short, you apply to a ton of programs. Then you go on a ton of interviews (assuming the programs offered you an interview), pretend you like every program you visit, and spend tons of money traveling to these locations. Then, you make a list of your favorites, the residency programs make their list, and wherever things match up you go. So if you don't want to be a family practice doctor, you just don't apply to any family practice residencies.
So thats the match in the simplest of terms. "Match Week" is the week when you find out where you are going for residency. In about 50 minutes I find out IF I matched anywhere. Basically I log on a web site and see "matched" or "you're fucked, loser." After today I have to wait until Thursday to find out where I'm going. If I get the "you're fucked" message I have tomorrow and Wednesday to try and "scramble" into a position, which basically means beg my way into an unfilled position in some arm pit locale that no one else wanted to attend.
What makes no sense to me is why they can't tell me where I'm matched today. I don't understand why they need to prolong my suffering. I know the theory is so that the scramblers can do their thing, but why the hell does it matter if I know where I'm going for the dude scrambling.
Ridiculous.
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
No comments:
Post a Comment