UC San Diego reviews

Personnel decisions made on whim. Poor atmosphere among admin staff, many of who are underworked with overlapping responsibilities. Management has little effective oversight and is able to make arbitrary decisions with no consequences. Demoralizing to know that student tuition, taxpayer money and donations from those with generous intentions are wasted. Contrast between administrative mismanagement and high quality, valuable research by faculty is striking.

1. Intense work environment (this can be good or bad!). Almost every decision feels like it is "life or death " which may be the nature of dealing with Medical Doctors. 2. At UCSD, beyond having the administrator role, the Educational Deans are also faculty & researchers, so their time is very important. Everyone gets that. However, at times, it felt as if the issue I was presenting was not being fully heard b/c the Dean may have been "distracted" or as if the issue was so trivial, s/he seemed irritated by the inquiry. 3. In short, the support staff (non-faculty) who are critical to supporting the medical student experience by providing academic support such as schedule coordination; quarterly enrollment of students; reserving rooms with appropriate learning tools, etc.; creating/facilitating student wellness events including providing admin support (e.g. catering contracts); administration of financial support for student organizations' events; and managing prep & execution of diversity outreach & developing/sustaining community partnerships and large scale events (e.g. commencement & student orientations); were treated as disposable/easily replaceable with a temp. worker. Not a moral booster esp. when one is rarely sincerely acknowledged and thanked for their efforts. Not all people need this; however, as a new employee, it is incredibly helpful to know when you've gone above & beyond that, your supervisor & work directors understand what was needed and appreciate the effort of the team of staff (ex. working on weekends, after-hours, and doing the work of two positions because the unit is understaffed). To clarify, the difference between the newly hired staff & the "veteran" staff was that the latter was better-compensated so they could better afford the long-term therapy needed to survive the daily stress at the UCSD School of Medicine Medical Education Division.