• Welcome to MSO!
    We are an online community for current and prospective medical, dental and allied health students and early career professionals from Australia and New Zealand.

    Please read: About MSO | Annual Welcome and Important Information | MSO Rules

    Quick Links To Forums
    Tests/Interviews: UCAT | GAMSAT | Interviews
    Entrance Discussion: Graduate Medicine | Undergraduate Medicine | Dentistry

  • Register with us

    Please consider registering on MSO. Benefits of registering are:
    • Able to post and participate in the forum
    • After 10 posts: Private Message Other Users
    • After 25 posts: Access to the Chatbox
    • After 100 posts: Custom user titles and Ad-free experience

    If you would like to get involved with MSO or have ideas, suggestions, comments, criticisms or other feedback please Contact Us

Admissions Centres Preferencing: General Discussion

mafkyhm said:
Good Afternoon,

Applying for: Medicine
Application Type: School leaver
Predicted ATAR: ~99.95 (IB score of 45)
UCAT Percentile Rank: 80th
VR: 700
DM: 700
QR: 710
AR: 670
Total: 2780
SJ: 687
Current State: NSW
Applying to: All universities
Rural Applicant: No
GWS Applicant: No
Indigenous Applicant: No
Other: N/A
Specific Question: For my situation, do you mind having a look if this is the best way to order my preferences? Thank you!

UAC
1 - USYD - Bachelor of Arts
2 - USYD - Bachelor of Science
3 - UNSW
4 - WSU
5 - JMP

VTAC
1 - Monash (CSP)
2 - Monash (ERP)
3 - Monash (BMP)
4 - Melbourne (chancellor's scholar)

QTAC
1 - UQ (CSP)
2 - UQ (BMP)
3 - JCU
4 - Griffith

SATAC
1 - Adelaide Uni (CSP)
2 - Adelaide Uni (BMP)
3 - Flinders (Adelaide)
4 - Flinders (Darwin)
Click to expand...


Given your IB score but low UCAT youre gonna get a USYD interview, Melbourne Chancellors Scholars, Griffith place, and Flinders

Your in a good place for a JCU interview aswell but due to the application its impossible to predict

Otherwise your UCAT would likely make you too low for anything else

Re: your preferences, it looks mostly fine to me. Although I would probably put UQ BMP below JCU and Griffith, and Adelaide BMP below Flinders

May I ask why in some states you preferred provisional programs (e.g. USYD and UQ) and others you prefer Undergrad? (Adelaide and Monash)?
 
mafkyhm said:
Good Afternoon,

Applying for: Medicine
Application Type: School leaver
Predicted ATAR: ~99.95 (IB score of 45)
UCAT Percentile Rank: 80th
VR: 700
DM: 700
QR: 710
AR: 670
Total: 2780
SJ: 687
Current State: NSW
Applying to: All universities
Rural Applicant: No
GWS Applicant: No
Indigenous Applicant: No
Other: N/A
Specific Question: For my situation, do you mind having a look if this is the best way to order my preferences? Thank you!

UAC
1 - USYD - Bachelor of Arts
2 - USYD - Bachelor of Science
3 - UNSW
4 - WSU
5 - JMP

VTAC
1 - Monash (CSP)
2 - Monash (ERP)
3 - Monash (BMP)
4 - Melbourne (chancellor's scholar)

QTAC
1 - UQ (CSP)
2 - UQ (BMP)
3 - JCU
4 - Griffith

SATAC
1 - Adelaide Uni (CSP)
2 - Adelaide Uni (BMP)
3 - Flinders (Adelaide)
4 - Flinders (Darwin)
Click to expand...
It mostly looks good to me, but I'm curious as to why you would rather a bonded place over an unbonded place - this is SA and QLD specifically.
 
mafkyhm said:
Good Afternoon,

Applying for: Medicine
Application Type: School leaver
Predicted ATAR: ~99.95 (IB score of 45)
UCAT Percentile Rank: 80th

Specific Question: For my situation, do you mind having a look if this is the best way to order my preferences? Thank you!
Click to expand...

You* should preference courses in the order you* would like to study them. If you are not eligible for a higher preference, you won't get it and will instead get the highest preference you are eligible for. The way you preference things does not increase or decrease your chance of being competitive for an offer, that is purely your ATAR/UCAT/interview performance.

As I'm sure has already been pointed out, you are highly unlikely to get interviews for UCAT using universities, so while you should definitely still include them initially, once interview invites have been released, you can replace those with your* back-up plans.

ETA: i have popped an asterix next to a couple of you and your references as I'm aware a parent has posted from this account previously and I want to emphasise that I personally firmly believe these should largely be the students choices with some family factors taken into consideration (such as finances, interstate moves), especially things like back up plans... If this post is from the student herself, then... welcome to MSO! Do you have any other questions?
 
Last edited:
mafkyhm said:
Specific Question: For my situation, do you mind having a look if this is the best way to order my preferences? Thank you!
Click to expand...

Out of these TACs I suggest you focus your attention to preference between USyd/UMelb/Griffith/JCU/Flinders, because tbh 80%ile is unlikely to get an interview at the other listed schools.
 
mafkyhm said:
Answered

Good Afternoon,

Applying for: Medicine
Application Type: School leaver
Predicted ATAR: ~99.95 (IB score of 45)
UCAT Percentile Rank: 80th
VR: 700
DM: 700
QR: 710
AR: 670
Total: 2780
SJ: 687
Current State: NSW
Applying to: All universities
Rural Applicant: No
GWS Applicant: No
Indigenous Applicant: No
Other: N/A
Specific Question: For my situation, do you mind having a look if this is the best way to order my preferences? Thank you!

UAC
1 - USYD - Bachelor of Arts
2 - USYD - Bachelor of Science
3 - UNSW
4 - WSU
5 - JMP

VTAC
1 - Monash (CSP)
2 - Monash (ERP)
3 - Monash (BMP)
4 - Melbourne (chancellor's scholar)

QTAC
1 - UQ (CSP)
2 - UQ (BMP)
3 - JCU
4 - Griffith

SATAC
1 - Adelaide Uni (CSP)
2 - Adelaide Uni (BMP)
3 - Flinders (Adelaide)
4 - Flinders (Darwin)
Click to expand...
There doesn’t seem to be any consistent theme among these preferences other than Go8 status / the prestige of the universities - would this be a correct conclusion for me to have drawn? I would recommend placing a higher value on the CSP vs BMP, location and length of the degrees as these are more important than prestige, which doesn’t matter at all in medicine.
 
Thank you all very much for you assistance and advice!

I will move the bonded places down my preference lists and focus my attention on the uni's that do not use UCAT.

In that case, do you think I should place all the provisional uni's higher on my preferences?

Thank you very much again!
 
Crow said:
There doesn’t seem to be any consistent theme among these preferences other than Go8 status / the prestige of the universities - would this be a correct conclusion for me to have drawn? I would recommend placing a higher value on the CSP vs BMP, location and length of the degrees as these are more important than prestige, which doesn’t matter at all in medicine.
Click to expand...

Also, scholarship options and accommodation availability would be more useful to consider than prestige, I'd think? (if prestige has been a motivator here)
 
mafkyhm said:
In that case, do you think I should place all the provisional uni's higher on my preferences?
Click to expand...
Not at all, only if you’d actually prefer to study at the provisional entry uni than the direct entry one.

LMG! said:
Also, scholarship options and accommodation availability would be more useful to consider than prestige, I'd think? (if prestige has been a motivator here)
Click to expand...
Agreed. Finances are absolutely another important consideration!
 
mafkyhm said:
Thank you all very much for you assistance and advice!

I will move the bonded places down my preference lists and focus my attention on the uni's that do not use UCAT.

In that case, do you think I should place all the provisional uni's higher on my preferences?

Thank you very much again!
Click to expand...

If you desperately want to study at UAdel over Flinders (for example), then you should preference them in that order. Quite simply, if you don't get a UAdel interview, you can then remove it or, if you have no other SATAC choices, leave it and recognise that you will be skipped over but could still get a Flinders offer.

While we are generally pretty accurate with our offer/interview advice, strange things have been known to happen, and this is 2020 after all! We would never tell you categorically that something won't happen, maybe just that we are 99.9% sure :)
 
mafkyhm said:
In that case, do you think I should place all the provisional uni's higher on my preferences?
Click to expand...

This is really a discussion of personal preference. Some of things you need to think about are

- Direct/Undergrad Universities are Typically shorter, although not by much in the grand scheme of training
- The specific course structure (e.g. research years, clinical years, etc)
- The opportuinity to explore your passions outside of medicine
- Entering medicine as a more mature adult, with better experiences and perspective

Direct vs Provisional Entry Questions and Discussion

Hi there, On top of deciding my subjects for senior, I have begun research the medical schools in Australia and which one would be most suitable for me. I have listed some questions below which related to my research: What is the best university for medicine in Australia? I have done some...
medstudentsonline.com.au

Theres alot of discussion about the differences here
 
Hello,

My school's career's adviser recently sent out this email:

Other Medicine offers, such as the UNSW degree, do not come out in December but in January. This means it is important you choose another degree as Number 1 preference in UAC for December. Keep your options open. Have another degree as back up. Once the December round is done, accept the offer made and remove it from your preferences. Now place Medicine as Number 1. If this still feels unclear the best option is to contact the Uni involved.

Just want to get some confirmation that this is correct? Never heard of this from anyone else. Apologies if its already been asked before.
 
ALT said:
Hello,

My school's career's adviser recently sent out this email:

Other Medicine offers, such as the UNSW degree, do not come out in December but in January. This means it is important you choose another degree as Number 1 preference in UAC for December. Keep your options open. Have another degree as back up. Once the December round is done, accept the offer made and remove it from your preferences. Now place Medicine as Number 1. If this still feels unclear the best option is to contact the Uni involved.

Just want to get some confirmation that this is correct? Never heard of this from anyone else. Apologies if its already been asked before.
Click to expand...

Yep, this is a feasible plan, and akin to what has been talked about in various places here before. That said, it’s also possible (I think A1 has talked about this) that because UNSW/JMP med etc don’t take part in the Dec round, even if they are your first preference, this will be ignored and you’ll be offered your first eligible Dec offer degree regardless, but I’m less certain about that than I am the preference switching strategy.
 
ALT said:
Other Medicine offers, such as the UNSW degree, do not come out in December but in January. This means it is important you choose another degree as Number 1 preference in UAC for December. Keep your options open. Have another degree as back up. Once the December round is done, accept the offer made and remove it from your preferences. Now place Medicine as Number 1. If this still feels unclear the best option is to contact the Uni involved.

Just want to get some confirmation that this is correct? Never heard of this from anyone else. Apologies if its already been asked before.
Click to expand...

This info is sort of correct and it was required as such in the past, but no longer required. You can have three meds at pref #1, 2, 3, and two back ups at #4, 5 at December; for the Dec offer round since the med schools don't participate UAC will overlook these prefs and offer you either 4 or #5 if you qualify.

If you are also applying for CSU Dent, they do release offers in Dec so best to put for the Dec offer round CSU Dent 1st, then the three meds & the backup can be in any order. Then re-arrange soon after the Dec offers are released.
 
Hey,

Just wanted to confirm that there's no way to actually preference in the following way
  1. UoN JMP (unbonded)
  2. WSU JPM
  3. UoN JMP (bonded)
Also am I correct in saying I will only receive a maximum of one offer if I preference in the following way?
  1. UoN
  2. WSU
Thanks!
 
rv123 said:
Also am I correct in saying I will only receive a maximum of one offer if I preference in the following way?
  1. UoN
  2. WSU
Click to expand...

If you are a non-Qld interstate applicant it's possible to receive both offers - WSU in the 1st round + UoN in the 2nd round for interstate.

If you are NSW/ACT/QLD it's unlikely (since WSU doesn't have a 2nd offer round and JMP is not known to re-consider locals in the 2nd round). However I think it's possible to get a 2nd offer in a top-up, provided you don't answer their top-up phone call with I already got the other offer 🤣 .
 
A1 said:
If you are a non-Qld interstate applicant it's possible to receive both offers - WSU in the 1st round + UoN in the 2nd round for interstate.

If you are NSW/ACT/QLD it's unlikely (since WSU doesn't have a 2nd offer round and JMP is not known to re-consider locals in the 2nd round). However I think it's possible to get a 2nd offer in a top-up, provided you don't answer their top-up phone call with I already got the other offer 🤣 .
Click to expand...

JPM/WSU appear to have made an announcement that interstate applicants will be zoom interviewed in January again (as per their process for 2019 entry and earlier), which would make the above scenario unworkable, I think. For 2020 entry, WSU interviewed all applicants in Nov/Dec (regardless of location), but there has been an announcement (second hand reported here) that they've reverted back to the old timing structure for 2021 entry (locals in Nov/Dec, interstate in Jan - the poster was unsure of the process for rurals).
 
  • Like
Reactions: A1
hey everyone, I need a a bit of a hand here.
So I'm applying for UQ med and dent, and the offers for UQ dent are given out somewhere in January. But I am also applying for Bond Uni medicine, however they invite you for psychometric test in about February start. But if I put bond uni medicine above UQ dent, will I be getting a UQ offer for dent before bond? Or will UQ wait for me to sit the bond psychometric test and then interview and wait and see if i get an offer or something? Im really confused I dont know what I should do. If i put UQ dent above bond uni medicine, does that mean after receving a UQ dent offer in Jan, i wont be eligible for bond uni medicine in February when they give psychometric test/interview ?
Or is there perhaps some sneaky preference changes I can do after receiving UQ dent, and after doing so, put bond uni medicine to the top of my preferences and snag both offers?
NOTE: I do want Bond uni medicine over UQ dent, but preferencing it above UQ dent may result in me getting neither!
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top