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Bachelor of Dental Surgery General Discussion

I've recently become really interested in becoming a dentist :)
It wasn't my original game plan following school so I didn't take physics at school.
Academically, I could've preformed much better at college if it weren't for procrastination and lack of motivation (since I didn't know what I wanted to do).
I did well in bio but failed chem. I am willing to take a preparatory course at AU for physics and chem next semester and then (maybe) apply for HSFY next year. Do you think this and hard work will be enough for me to attain a high GPA in HSFY next year?

I know there are 56 places, but how many people apply?

Also how long is the interview? What questions did they ask you? I'm good at interviews which I can prepare for, but not so much ones where I have to think on the spot.

I do really want to become a dentist but if my chance are very slim and out my hands I don't want to waste my efforts, money and time on something I won't even be able to achieve.:oops:
 
Hi, a bit late on the reply but I am currently a 2nd year dentistry student at the University of Otago. How you find HSFY honestly depends a lot on your background. A lot of people in my class who sat Cambridge in their Year 13 ( or Y12 in Australia) found it somewhat easy to do HSFY as a lot of the material, particularly chemistry was covered during their final Cambridge year. Others however may find it very challenging if they do not have an extensive background in physics, chemistry and just biological sciences in general. To be competitive, you will want to aim for an A average (minimum 85%) across your papers which is reasonable if you work hard.

Another hurdle is UMAT. Again some people find this very natural to them while others struggle endlessly no matter how much they prepare for it. It is one of those exams which you honestly can't really prepare for and is akin to an IQ quest, albeit quite a lot harder. Your UMAT grade does not directly depend on how many you get correct, but rather depends on how well you did relative to everyone who sat the test (includes all New Zealand and Australian test takers). For dentistry, you'll want to score at least 50 percentile in all 3 sections minimum, but of course aim for as high as possible. If for example you get 100th percentile in section 1 and 2, but score 30 percentile in section 3, your overall percentile will be very high, but chances are you will not get an interview as you need to meet a threshold. The threshold is hidden and can change from year to year depending on the strength of the applicants.

Your UMAT solely decides whether you will receive an interview or not. If for example, your GPA is A+, but you don't meet the UMAT thresholds, then you won't receive an interview and your GPA will not be considered. First, you need to do well in UMAT, which will grant you an interview. You will also need to score a threshold score in the interview. If both those thresholds are met, then you will be ranked based on your GPA and offered a place accordingly.

In total you will be competing against 1500 to 1800 applicants I believe, but I cannot be certain.

Good luck and all the best!
 
@CSUDental: On a slight tangent, Do you have an idea of the interview dates for BDS at Otago? An estimate would do. Cheers

Hey there, our interviews were towards the end September last year. My understanding is they come out around a week after UMAT results are released. To be precise, my interview was held on September 29th of last year. As you may already know, they are offered to the top 250 or 300 candidates which includes all of HSFY, postgrad and alternative entries.

All the best!
 
Hey there, our interviews were towards the end September last year. My understanding is they come out around a week after UMAT results are released. To be precise, my interview was held on September 29th of last year. As you may already know, they are offered to the top 250 or 300 candidates which includes all of HSFY, postgrad and alternative entries.

All the best!

Thanks so much for getting back so quickly! I haven't received any interview invites :/

Do you know how my final year grades will be factored into the selection of candidates for the interview?

A bit of background: I'm currently doing BSc (Hons). My dissertation makes up 90 points (plus 2x 15 point papers). I only have the result for 1 of my papers at the moment (A+), I'm doing my second paper this sem, and I hand in my thesis on Nov 2 (it'll probably take a few (3-4) weeks after that for my grade to come back after external assessment).
 
In terms of receiving an offer for a dental interview, the main factor that will be taken into consideration are your UMAT scores for each of the 3 sections. Historically, the threshold is 50-50-50 but it does fluctuate and is suggested to be sitting around 45-45-45 in some instances. Your GPA does not contribute much if at all to receiving an interview. However, if there are over 300 candidates sitting above these thresholds applying for Otago BDS, I believe the top 300 are selected according to the overall percentile but I may be wrong. It could very well be then GPA is considered. Presuming you have met the thresholds, you should be receiving an interview within the next few days so relax! Our UMAT results were released on the 17/09 last year, and I received an offer of interview on the 24/09.

Good luck!
 
If I am considering Dentistry, what range of marks do I need to be considered? (HSFY grades)
 
If I am considering Dentistry, what range of marks do I need to be considered? (HSFY grades)

To be competitive, you will want to aim for an A average (minimum 85%) across your papers which is reasonable if you work hard.

From above! This topic has been discussed a few times. Unfortunately all we have to go on is anecdotal evidence; I know people who got into dent with an A- average, to be safe you should be getting at least an A. For the record I had an 85.5% average. GPA isn't everything in dentistry, you also have to pass the UMAT threshold and the interview. If you look at past rank score threads there are people who had A+ averages who didn't get into dentistry, so it's not black and white.
 
We should try running a thread& to determine the dent cut-off like we do for med this year. It'd be quite a bit harder given how much smaller the intake is, but it could give us slightly better info than our current anecdotal guesstimates.

*from memory we tried this once? Did we?
 

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We should try running a thread& to determine the dent cut-off like we do for med this year. It'd be quite a bit harder given how much smaller the intake is, but it could give us slightly better info than our current anecdotal guesstimates.

*from memory we tried this once? Did we?

I tried but it didn't look any good. We need more people to post. In particular, people need to come back and update their status.
 
We should try running a thread& to determine the dent cut-off like we do for med this year. It'd be quite a bit harder given how much smaller the intake is, but it could give us slightly better info than our current anecdotal guesstimates.

*from memory we tried this once? Did we?

I've tried to in regards to umat cut-off for interviews but it didn't go well :(
I think last year I asked people to put in the rank score thread if they applied for dent but I don't think many people did, although to be fair I haven't actually gone thru and looked at every single post
 
Hrm, maybe we should try really advertising it at the end of the year. Even if we only get a really large range for the cut-off like 'didn't get in 79%, did get in 84', it'd be a lot better than what we've got now.

Unless the interview is now somehow used in ranking rather than its old 'pass fail' use? That'd complicate things.
Edit: But I guess we could find that out, if someone gets in with a lower score than someone who missed out.
 
Hrm, maybe we should try really advertising it at the end of the year. Even if we only get a really large range for the cut-off like 'didn't get in 79%, did get in 84', it'd be a lot better than what we've got now.

Unless the interview is now somehow used in ranking rather than its old 'pass fail' use? That'd complicate things.

I think we should. I tried to advertise it a little last year but we didn't have a good turn out. They still only look at the grades for offers.
 
I think we should. I tried to advertise it a little last year but we didn't have a good turn out. They still only look at the grades for offers.
Excellente. My exams finish before all the offers panic, so I'll definitely help push for it.
 

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I got 44 in one section do you think I will still get invited for an interview. thanks

Hi,

That's really hard to tell. We don't have much information and we don't really know the scoring process. It's even harder to tell when you only provided one value (I assume it's a %ile) of unknown section.
 
I got 44 in one section do you think I will still get invited for an interview. thanks

Hey guccibandz, I'd say you have a good shot but the thing is thresholds change every year so we can't guarantee you anything, esp as unfortunately unlike the rank score data we have, we don't have good data on UMAT thresholds (hint hint nudge nudge wink wink pls share your results health scis this year pls). It'll depend on how well you did compared to the rest of your cohort, as I suspect it's probably more of a 'well interview 300 ppl' or whatever rather than 'well take everyone over this'.

PS: please don't post in more than one thread, we're generally pretty good at checking the threads so don't worry more likely than not we'll see your question and answer it!
 
Hey guccibandz, I'd say you have a good shot but the thing is thresholds change every year so we can't guarantee you anything, esp as unfortunately unlike the rank score data we have, we don't have good data on UMAT thresholds (hint hint nudge nudge wink wink pls share your results health scis this year pls). It'll depend on how well you did compared to the rest of your cohort, as I suspect it's probably more of a 'well interview 300 ppl' or whatever rather than 'well take everyone over this'.

PS: please don't post in more than one thread, we're generally pretty good at checking the threads so don't worry more likely than not we'll see your question and answer it!
Cool thanks for your reply and sorry I am new to posting been a lurker for a while xD
 

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