Discussion: Medicine Entry Bonus Points and Subquotas

[Mana]

I think there is something to be said about the ethics of this suggestion. Don't get me wrong - I think this sounds like a rather incomplete policy that could be improved, and you've definitely identified at least one potential shortcoming of this system. I am all for change in the right direction and honestly sometimes this takes realisation of the policy-makers to the fact that a) the system can be gamed and b) there is an obvious shortcoming in particular disadvantaged groups that is not addressed.

I'm not sure where I stand on this; on one hand, if you want to improve the policy then you need outcomes, but if you want to get these places to the disadvantaged students that they were intended for, then the suggested action is obviously ethically questionable.

 

[Smelly Boy]

If you aren’t disadvantaged then you shouldn’t be getting a disadvantage bonus

for people that are actually disadvantaged, you’d know that the LEAST of your concerns is about being around “better students”or affording tutoring or getting a 99+ atar etc. and that what you’re actually worried about is having your studies affected by your life circumstances e.g. general financial disadvantage/poverty/worrying if you’ll have to move houses for the 3rd time this year/can’t go to the library because your parents may get into a physical fight and you won’t be able to intervene/not being able to pay the bills/experiencing the after-shock or implications of early life disadvantage/ filling in for mum and completing her daily reports because she’s sick and she can’t afford to take a day off work and so you NEED to fill in at the expense of your own study and so on.

if you don’t have any of these challenges or similar challenges then it’s 100% wrong to go get a disadvantaged student bonus. Yes some people game the system but you don’t need to further disadvantage the legitimate disadvantaged students applying through these streams by compounding the issue of having non-disadvantaged students enjoying the bonuses for the disadvantaged.

just because a school doesn’t get a single student with a 99 ATAR, it doesn’t mean they’re disadvantaged. disadvantage doesn’t mean you don’t get a good atar. It means the circumstances (both “visible” such as financial disadvantage and “invisible” such as a disability which is not apparent) of your life (which are completely out of your control) make it extremely difficult to do well in the things you want to do well in.

yeah you might get into the course you want but it’s probably at the cost of a genuinely disadvantaged person who may have achieved SLIGHTLY lower scores than you but has put in 3 times the effort to get those scores.

as Someone who is considered disadvantaged and has worked with disadvantaged schools for many years, I can imagine how painful it would be seeing a non-disadvantaged person getting into medicine by wrongly benefiting from the disadvantage bonuses. We could all give analogies to show how this is wrong no matter how you twist it but I’m sure we all know (either outwardly or quietly) that it is wrong.

if you think your life is so hard because you can’t get into medical school that you have to cheat then the most I can do is tell you that your conception of “hard“ comes from a place of huge privilege and that you really need to educate yourself on disadvantage before you push those down who have already been kicked down by the circumstances out of their control.

Being a trailblazer is hard and disadvantaged students applying to medicine have to be trailblazers in so many ways in their life: they have to be the first/one of the very first people from the family to finish year 12 AND finish near top 1% of all students in the country while having circumstances in the bottom ~30% of the country AND balance many extra responsibilities and worries while being expected to academically excel AND be an anomaly with regards to the research that clearly demonstrates the correlation between disadvantage and academic scores AND volunteer when you can’t “afford “ to (how can you volunteer if you NEED to work or fill in extra responsibilities at home which will never be recognised at all/as they should be recognised in a professional capacity) AND get made fun of for being a “try hard who will never make it” (heard this many times myself when I used to study at school) by virtually everyone around you AND be looked down upon by people from “better schools” AND never be taken seriously at uni open days/uni info days at school (my experience also ) AND, AND, AND.....

You don’t deserve the bonus if you don’t face disadvantage. It’s wrong. And you don’t need to add to the worries of people that are disadvantaged for your own comfort.

Loosely reminds me of a Malcolm X quote :

“I have no mercy or compassion in me for a society that will crush people, and then penalize them for not being able to stand up under the weight.”

edit: I’m not saying the system is perfect. Just saying that if you aren’t disadvantaged then don’t try and game the system innit bruv

 

[Deleted member 37212]

Just thought I would add my two cents here given my experience is somewhat different, and I think that the concept of hardship isn't so black and white. For context, I went to what is often characterised and bashed by the media as an 'elite' private school in Sydney. I agree with Smelly Boy in that there are many who face circumstances which are out of their control and they qualify (as they should) as disadvantaged by any measure. That said, I can confidently say that having money or not being in an abject state of poverty doesn't mean that one doesn't experience forms of hardship.

At my school, both when I was at school, and from what I hear now there are multiple cases each year of boys having to deal with domestic violence, drug abuse, financial pressures and even a parent(s) in prison. At university when I am asked, and subsequently answer, where I went to school most of the time I get a derision filled reply (interestingly mostly by people who themselves received disadvantage bonuses and scream about their hardships from the rooftops...) as if me and everyone who went there have never worked for anything in life and our goals and ambitions are somehow less important. For the purposes of obtaining EAS (in NSW at least) our school is not in a disadvantaged postcode (nor are other private schools), most parents even if facing financial ruin will not be able to demonstrate so as they do not receive transfer payments and most boys do not qualify for socio-economic indexes based bonuses based on their residential address provided to UAC. More worryingly, most incidents are not reported and students, even if eligible to get bonus points for a severe family disruption or excessive familial responsibilities, will not claim them as they'll get taunted by their peers for taking the 'easy way,' will be perceived as weak or it would mean having to publicly reveal their circumstances. Is it to say that just because someone prima facie has resources at their disposal, that their personal circumstances and situation doesn't put them at a disadvantage compared to the average student?

I don't think privilege should be so explicitly conflated with having wealth or the school you went to, and I don't think it helps per say to create an 'us' vs 'them' mentality in the education system. I've definitely seen lower middle class (but not eligible for EAS) students game the system (parents getting an on paper 'divorce' seems to be an alarming trend???), and I've seen kids who genuinely deserve the bonuses not get it. I suppose the real question, to which I don't have an answer, is how can we objectively identify and account for disadvantage, without letting factors such as schools/wealth/parents' level of education/postcodes get in the way?

 

[A1]

If you aren’t disadvantaged then you shouldn’t be getting a disadvantage bonus

I don't think you guys & the mod team truly understood my point.

I wasn't suggesting the person to fake being a disadvantaged student. The case is UWA & Curtin have a separate pathway/pool for disadvantaged schools i.e. the school is in that category, not every student there comes from a disadvantaged family. Also it does not say student has to be at the school for the whole 6 years or X number of years (if that were a matter of concerns the unis would have stated minimum X years in the criteria like WSU says 5 years for GWS, but they don't).

So, becoming a student of a disadvantaged school to be eligible for disadv-school pathways, why is it wrong or unethical? It's no different to a uni graduate enrolling a semester/year at Flinders to be eligible for Flinders-student quota. Or hypothetically an SA student doing Y12 in Melbourne to be eligible for Monash's locals intake. Would anyone call them unethical? I don't.

And to those who say these pathways are meant for long-time students at these schools, my question is who are you to say you know better than the unis who set the eligibility policy?

 

[DrDrLMG!]

I don't think you guys & the mod team truly understood my point.

Yeah, nah... I can’t speak for anyone else, obviously, but I can confirm I absolutely understand your ‘point’, I just fundamentally disagree with it and all that it implies.

As I’ve mentioned elsewhere, your attempt to draw a parallel between an access system designed to support equity and diversity in the health system with a money-making scheme designed to drive up desirability of undergraduate degrees or full fee paying post graduate diplomas is frankly absurd.

The notion of encouraging, normalising, and justifying that young people in positions of relative privilege should deliberately tread on those in less fortunate positions in order to get what they want is a world view I could never support.

 

[Crow]

Yeah, nah... I can’t speak for anyone else

I also understood just fine.

I think it screams of privilege to encourage piggy-backing off an educational disadvantage scheme by jumping into a new school at the last minute when you’ve not previously come from a disadvantaged background and otherwise wouldn’t qualify for a disadvantage scheme. All this does is take places away from those who the scheme was actually designed for.

Just because there’s a flaw in the policy doesn’t mean it should be abused.

 

[chinaski]

So, becoming a student of a disadvantaged school to be eligible for disadv-school pathways, why is it wrong or unethical? It's no different to a uni graduate enrolling a semester/year at Flinders to be eligible for Flinders-student quota. Or hypothetically an SA student doing Y12 in Melbourne to be eligible for Monash's locals intake. Would anyone call them unethical? I don't.

It's very different to the two scenarios you have cited there. If you honestly can't tell the difference, then I'm actually very worried for you.

 

[Smelly Boy]

And to those who say these pathways are meant for long-time students at these schools, my question is who are you to say you know better than the unis who set the eligibility policy?

I think the unis who set the eligibility policy don’t know what they’re doing and are run by highly privileged people who have no idea about disadvantage

I know when I was in school (and pretty much every surrounding disadvantaged school), for 10 years I don’t recall a single student getting over ~97 ATAR. I clearly recall the surrounding schools having a 94 ATAR dux every single year. By literally every disadvantaged school scheme, that’s about ~500 students every year not coming close to the academic marks needed for a medical school spot. multiplied by 10 (for each year), that brings us to ~5000 students never having a score good enough for a medical school spot. *edit: to the numbers in the above paragraph*

for UNSW to say (at least I know this used to be their rule) you need a 96 ATAR to qualify to for bonus points (how does that even make sense? Why do you need anything besides disadvantage to qualify for disadvantaged bonus points?) demonstrates the unis have no real idea for what they’re doing. And before anyone says something like “they require a minimum of 96 to see if you can handle the academics of medicine” that’s untrue because you have amazing doctors and students from rural and/or indigenous backgrounds with lower ATARs/UAIs who handle the course just fine! Monash medicine’s deputy dean reckons a mid 80 ATAR is enough to handle the course in this article (i also have friends that got into Med the year after high school and they did just fine with their 80 ATAR from year 12 in the JMP).

for USyd to have a disadvantaged scheme which brings medicine down to a 99.5 demonstrates the ignorance of USyd when it comes to disadvantage too. Both people who got in through the E12 scheme that I know of came from a rich private school which excels academically and happens to be in a disadvantaged area (I know knowing people isn’t really strong evidence but I knew 2 out of ~5 people that got in in one of the years which is a big chunk).

Honestly, at least with regards to Med school bonus point schemes, I feel like I (and many others) can see that the unis aren’t doing a very good job with these policies. Just to name a few things: I have been disadvantaged my whole life, Ive always lived in a disadvantaged area and currently live in an area which is known as a crime hotspot in the country (or at least it used to be known as this) and I’ve worked with disadvantaged schools as an ambassador in person since the day I started uni in order to get them to tertiary education via the various schemes available. I really believe I’ve got a better idea than the unis with regards to disadvantaged applicants and medicine. I can confirm (from the disadvantaged school ambassador perspective) that the point of the schemes are for disadvantaged students only and not for Tom who couldn’t get into medical school with his own mark so he made A last minute enrolment into a “disadvantaged school”.

I think for all courses in general, the unis are OK (Not perfect) at the whole disadvantage bonus point thing but when it comes to medicine they really are embarrassingly bad at it

also A1 I really didn’t want to write this because i feel it’s sort of like a pile on but I promise I don’t dislike you or anything I’m just writing what I feel is right and I love you long time my dear ❤ Personally, I couldn’t bring myself to vibe with your point on this matter, innit... Probably not the best way for me to come out of my hibernation on this lovely website by disagreeing with such a lovely helpful mod in this fashion but yehhhhh

 

[A1]

The notion of encouraging, normalising, and justifying that young people in positions of relative privilege

How do you know the student I made the suggestion to is of relative privileges?

There are heaps of students who fall into the big gap between privileged and categorised as disadvantaged, thus get neglected. Otoh we see students in millionaire families, going to expensive private schools, get bonuses thanks to their residential addresses.

You guys preach that students in the neglected gap should just resign to their unfortunate fate. I believe since the system is so haphazard they better fend for themselves by looking for available avenues. You don't have the moral authority to bar me from making these suggestions.

 

[Unluckydude]

This is a bit off topic, but I heard that the rural entry scheme is also being abused by some privileged families. They send their children to rural boarding schools just to make them qualify for the rural pathway.

 

[TKAO]

This is a bit off topic, but I heard that the rural entry scheme is also being abused by some privileged families. They send their children to rural boarding schools just to make them qualify for the rural pathway.

I personally have never heard of this one. Though I have heard of people who lived rurally and then sent their kids off to boarding schools in the city - thereby getting the private school education along with the rural bonuses.

 

[Mana]

I personally have never heard of this one. Though I have heard of people who lived rurally and then sent their kids off to boarding schools in the city - thereby getting the private school education along with the rural bonuses.

This one is pretty hard for the medical schools/selection people to contend against because a very large area of Australia doesn't have access to a nearby school (public or private) and so this is an entirely reasonable action.

 

[Deleted member 37212]

What utter garbage.

'Relative privilege' simply means privileged relative to someone who attends a disadvantaged school. 'Relative privilege' does not necessarily mean 'millionaire with mansion and swimming pool' levels of privilege. If the OP does not attend a school that is disadvantaged, they are definitionally 'relatively privileged' by that metric compared to someone who does attend such a school. Yes, it's an imperfect metric, as has been pointed out before, but I'd rather have a slightly imperfect measure of inequality being used to arbit medical school admissions than have it devolve into a free-for-all conniving shitfest like you're suggesting.

Enough with this rhetoric about these oh-so-neglected students having to 'fend for themselves' against an 'unjust' system. As many of us have mentioned before elsewhere -- and as most people have no trouble understanding -- the point of medical school admissions is not to be 'fair' to individual applicants, but to actively select cohorts which are representative of socioeconomic and other forms of diversity in the pursuit of more equitable and representative healthcare. I also find it really interesting that you're bleating about students being 'neglected' because they don't qualify for disadvantage schemes, while failing to address the multiple posts in this thread that provide people's first-hand experiences of what true socio-economic neglect actually is.

As a moderator of this website you should be familiar with the above, and you should be using your position to support disadvantaged students trying to break out of entrenched cycles of socioeconomic underprivilege, rather than doing the exact opposite by enthusiastically exhorting other students to selfishly snipe places away from them.

Just to clarify - why is it so important that medical school cohorts be representative of the general population? The only arguments I can think of are that it's important for doctors to be from a broad range of backgrounds so that they can better understand the difficulties faced by certain sections of the community and as a result empathise with them and provide better medical care. Why should this not apply to say Law school? Is it not important that people representing other people in the legal field, and who largely go on to hold influential positions in government, the judiciary, politics and legal firms should not be representative of the general population which they affect? At present I can confidently say that at the Law school I attend, 60% of students are from private schools (not just non-government schools, these are the $30k+ a year schools), 30% of students are from high-performing from selective schools and maybe 10% or so are from no-name public schools. These statistics are even more skewed towards private schools at the other Go8 Law school in Sydney. I don't know how true this is for Medicine, but for Law there are an incredibly high number of cliques based on high school circles and there is a certain level of pedigree expected of those who enter the profession and things like bedside manner, the way you dress, the university you attend, how you network and where you live all matter to a certain extent. I don't necessarily support this aspect of Law - but at the same time I understand that along with people being skilled in interpreting the law, the profession needs a certain level pomp and regalia to maintain its image. Of course you have to be amazing at what you do at the same time, but I'd be interested to hear from anyone if this matters at all in Medicine? (I also ask because literally every Specialist that I know of/have visited/have googled in Sydney either went to USYD or UNSW)

I am all for uplifting people who are disadvantaged, but at the same time the tone of your post Helmut is overly simplistic. I don't agree with the angle that we should uplift everyone and anyone at all costs. That's not how society works. That's not how high pressured careers work. I would never have someone with an 80 ATAR operate on a close friend or family member, because no matter how disadvantaged you are I think an 80 ATAR is really not that difficult to achieve in the big scheme of things if you're actually that motivated to pursue a career in Medicine. I'm sorry I'd rather have someone with a 99 ATAR and 90%tile UCAT who just missed out on say UNSW Medicine operate on me - and I am sure that there are plenty of other people that I know and people on this thread who feel the same way.

I know of rural/disadvantaged students with 80 ATARs and 30-40%tile UCAT/UMAT scores getting into Medical school. Are you saying that being rural is of such a disadvantage that for the sake of having representative cohorts that we are willing to accept objectively shit scores? I do not necessarily support A1's view of being able to use access schemes in a 'free-for-all' race, but at the same time I echo the sentiment that I don't want substandard doctors looking after myself or the people I care about. Life is tough for everyone (even for many 'wealthy' people as I outlined earlier), sure more so for some than others, but surely there's got to be a place where we draw a line in just accepting people with shit scores for the sake of 'egalitarianism.'

 

[Cal]

I would never have someone with an 80 ATAR operate on a close friend or family member, because no matter how disadvantaged you are I think an 80 ATAR is really not that difficult to achieve in the big scheme of things. I'm sorry I'd rather have someone with a 99 ATAR and 90%tile UCAT who just missed out on say UNSW Medicine operate on me.

This has to be ironic.
ATAR has absolutely no bearing on the quality of the health-care professional. Do you really think this way? how does ATAR at all apply, especially when said person has passed medical school, and has received accreditation. There is a reason they are able to practice. I would be very surprised if there was any correlation between ATAR score of medical professionals, and quality of care. Quite the elitest mindset. Implying an 80 ATAR is easy to achieve in all capacities, is disrespectful. I am sure there are many people who are struggling to pass High-school and would make amazing medical professionals, but have external sources stopping them from achieving said grades. I am frankly worried about this mindset coming from someone who wishes to help other people for a living.

 

[Deleted member 37212]

ATAR has absolutely no bearing on the quality of the health-care professional. Do you really think this way?

ugh... yeah I would say it does to a certain extent when judging 18 year olds??? What does a candidate's ATAR say about them? It is a reflection of their ability to sit down and focus on their academics for two years. Their level of motivation. Their level of desire and ambition. Is that not the whole reason why we have bonus points/schemes? That people who have the talent/motivation/ability are not able to demonstrate it due to extenuating circumstances? I am not saying that Medicine can't be completed by someone who has an 80 ATAR, I am saying that sure there has to be a place where the person with the 99 ATAR/90 UCAT shouldn't be denied a place because they weren't disadvantaged enough. As for quality of care, I am sure they'd be able to complete the tasks/procedures required fairly competently, but that's beside the point, circling back to what the ATAR is a reflection of.

 

[dotwingz]

Whilst I wont comment on alot of the issues at bay in this thread, I think you will find that there is a correlation in the fact that these selection procedures arent as common in Law and the fact that there are a large amount of pompous assholes that form large cliques based on what expensive private school they went to

That's not how high pressured careers work. I would never have someone with an 80 ATAR operate on a close friend or family member, because no matter how disadvantaged you are I think an 80 ATAR is really not that difficult to achieve in the big scheme of things. I'm sorry I'd rather have someone with a 99 ATAR and 90%tile UCAT who just missed out on say UNSW Medicine operate on me - and I am sure that there are plenty of other people that I know and people on this thread who feel the same way.

To those on this website who know how completely wrong this is, its actually a comment ive heard been made before that Id rather have a smarter doctor than one who can smooth talk in an interview better (quote ive heard in isolation from many different people across a wide range of socio economic groups)

A full training of medicine is a long one, the performance in the ATAR when you are 17 has no bearing on your performance as a surgeon 20+ years after that. Just because you get into medicine doesnt mean you will finish it, just because you work as an intern doesnt mean you will get a house officer job in your speciality of choice, just because you get a house officer doesnt mean you will become a registrar, etc etc with registrar training, college exams, and actually getting a job in the end, and keeping that registration as a dodgy surgeon.

Your surgeons are examined on their ability as surgeons. Not on how Margaret Atwood was able to successfully portray Shakespeare's The Tempest over 400 years beyond it's original performance by using extensive post modern tools, notably metatheatre. That is a mute point

(Also regarding your point about every specialist being from UNSW and USYD, thats probably because WSU didnt become a thing until like 2007 which is really not that long ago in med training terms ... and newcastle has only had a small program in most of its history)

 

[Deleted member 37212]

I am frankly worried about this mindset coming from someone who wishes to help other people for a living.

I have made a concerted effort here to be objective, and am more than open to my position being changed. There is literally no need to get personal. Cal I don't appreciate you questioning my mindset or personal motivations, which you have absolutely zilch knowledge of.

I think a valid discussion is being had here and that it's important that we question the process of selecting students for Medical school. As it's been said here, and many times before.

 

[Cal]

I have made a concerted effort here to be objective, and am more than open to my position being changed. There is literally no need to get personal. Cal I don't appreciate you questioning my mindset or personal motivations, which you have absolutely zilch knowledge of.

I think a valid discussion is being had here and that it's important that we question the process of selecting students for medical school. As it's been said here and many times before, the impact they have on society is significant.

When was I getting personal? I made no inference of your personality. The mindset was portrayed from the post, and I made it clear that this was worrying to me.

I think you are misunderstanding the difference between questioning the selection process, and making sweeping judgements about groups of people, and implying that somehow the people (no matter their circumstance) who cannot achieve a high atar will not be good doctors. I am defending people who you have attacked by saying that their disadvantage is insignificant, and essentially saying that: "oh well you are stupid, you cannot get high atar in high-school, you aren't going to be good doctor", regardless of the scenario they live in. 80 Atar may not be something you perceive as being difficult from your, implied, position of privilege, but maybe think how difficult it would be for people who have to 2 jobs to help support their family, or have family issues where they cannot attend school 50% of the time, or people going through illnesses which require extensive treatment. Do you think someone who is bed-ridden for the whole of year 12 should be able to attain an 80 Atar? does this make them a bad doctor? You saying those things is essentially undermining everyone who relies on those schemes to literally get into university, not medicine specifically. It is extremely disrespectful.

 

[Deleted member 37212]

When was I getting personal? I made no inference of your personality. The mindset was portrayed from the post, and I made it clear that this was worrying to me.

I think you are misunderstanding the difference between questioning the selection process, and making sweeping judgements about groups of people, and implying that somehow the people (no matter their circumstance) who cannot achieve a high atar will not be good doctors. I am defending people who you have attacked by saying that their disadvantage is insignificant, and essentially saying that: "oh well you are stupid, you cannot get high atar in high-school, you aren't going to be good doctor", regardless of the scenario they live in. 80 Atar may not be something you perceive as being difficult from your, implied, position of privilege, but maybe think how difficult it would be for people who have to 2 jobs to help support their family, or have family issues where they cannot attend school 50% of the time, or people going through illnesses which require extensive treatment. Do you think someone who is bed-ridden for the whole of year 12 should be able to attain an 80 Atar? does this make them a bad doctor? You saying those things is essentially undermining everyone who relies on those schemes to literally get into university, not medicine specifically. It is extremely disrespectful.

Don't try me with semantics Cal ,

I am frankly worried about this mindset coming from someone who wishes to help other people for a living.

Getting personal is not limited to making inferences about one's personality... and any reasonable person would infer that as you getting necessarily personal. For the record: I appreciate the concern, but you don't need to make it clear if my motivations/mindset are worrying to you when you know absolutely nothing about them, you're not a moral authority here .

Also Cal really? At my 'privileged' school a close friend was in hospital for 2 months during Y12 (has an ongoing illness requiring frequent hospitalisation), had his parents get divorced (his father was a long term substance abuser) and he managed to achieve a very high 99 ATAR. There are boys at my school who abused Adderall/Ritalian to be able to stay up for nights to study and achieved high ATARs. There are several students who did all of the above and managed severe domestic violence issues at home (not many know, but Rose Bay in Sydney, although an affluent area, has one of the highest level of reporting statics for domestic violence). I know of someone who had to sell all his personal belongings and take up a job to pay the last instalment of his school fees because his parents assets were frozen - he had absent parents, no support network and a slew of personal issues at home. I was dealing with another boy just the other day whose dad has currently been put in prison in the middle of his HSC, and has had a bunch of other long-term issues and is still on track to achieve an amazing ATAR. These sorts of issues are not exclusive to my school, and are quite common in a number of others, they are just far better hidden than in low SES schools/areas. When will people get that privilege (relative or not) does NOT mean that one is unable to experience hardship for God's sake - and as I've said before this group of students don't qualify for bonus schemes to get into universities. They don't air their hardships in public. They don't use it as leverage in every given conversation. Just because they don't have people advocating for them because they are already branded as 'privileged,' doesn't mean their forms of hardship are less worthy of being recognised. Also the extreme examples given of people being in hospital/bed-ridden all year or having extensive medical treatment/illnesses are of course instances where I would support (and in fact encourage) people to seek bonus points/schemes but aren't useful to what we're discussing here - what I believe we are all referring to here is a more middle-ground, 'generic' form of hardship e.g. based on postcodes or general disadvantage or general poverty (DISCLAIMER: not using it as a term to diminish anyone's experience(s), just using it for the sake of comparative discussion).

I think it is fairly agreeable to assume that if you want to get into Medicine you have a higher than average level of ambition/talent/motiviation etc. Now on the contrary, a person who is disadvantaged say to the same extent as some of the people/cases I've mentioned above and yet gets an 80 ATAR and feels they are entitled to get into Medicine. Tell me why they deserve to get into Medicine - or any other university course - when someone with the same level of hardship managed to get the marks? Instead of generalising the experiences of people who don't obtain bonus points/schemes, tell me why it is continually acceptable to ignore a high 98/99 ATARs, when the level of hardship experienced, as measured by your metrics is comparable? Tell me why having relative privilege yet undergoing some very horrific and traumatic forms of hardship, comparable to those you mentioned, means that your hardship is 'less' worthy?

As I have said before I am not against bonus schemes/points (they are a necessity frankly) but a line has to be drawn between objectively shit marks being accepted for high pressure/high demand/high stakes courses. Point noted about someone with an 80 ATAR having the ability to become a decent doctor, but as I addressed earlier it doesn't matter if you're ignoring people with an equal level of hardship with much higher ATARS, given how I have said its not entirely irrelevant when judging 18 year olds for entrance into university. So when it comes to questioning the selection process, yes there most definitely needs to be an assessment if the level/type of disadvantage received by two students is comparable and if so which ATAR/UCAT is a better reflection of a person's ability to work through that and do the very best they can in their given situation - regardless of relative privilege.

So circling back on this entire issue (and I've decided this is the last post I am going to make on this topic). Disadvantage and hardship exists for students from a wide scope of socio-economic backgrounds and geographical backgrounds. This hardship needs to be accounted for by the admissions process for Medicine (and all university courses broadly speaking). I don't agree with this universal attitude of uplift anyone and everyone that we can by shoeing them into high pressure/high demand/high stakes courses - I don't think that serves the professions we are talking about in the long-term and I don't think it serves the community in the long-term (whether this is Medicine, Law, teaching etc.). I don't think that the ATAR is entirely irrelevant in making an initial assessment of a candidate (though I can now see how it maybe isn't useful 20+ years down the line).

To end on a lighter note, all the best to everyone receiving interview invites over the next few days!

 

[dotwingz]

Whilst I empathise with their position, you must realise that only being able to pay for 11.5 years of elite private schools (I’m assuming elite to the use of “boys” and the amount of high 99 atars I may be wrong but the point still stands) instead of 12 years whilst your parents assets are frozen is not going to attract that much empathy in circles where parents have nothing to be frozen.

Taking up jobs to support your family and not owning completely optional assests that can be sold for tens of thousands of dollars on a whim to pay school fees are a common occurrence in above average families, let alone the ones that are disadvantaged enough to be receiving bonuses.

I also empathise with the medical conditions that your friend had during school, one of my friends would often (a few times a term) just pass out and have to go to the hospital, sometimes staying weeks or months at a time. I have family experiences that matches that scenario of your friends dad being arrested, and whilst happened well before I was born, I can still see the emotional effects that it’s caused decades onwards. which I won’t discuss for personal reason.

But saying that, what you don’t seem to understand, and what I didn’t understand up until recently when I had to personally witness an entourage of terrible events happen to multiple members in my extended family who have lived very different lives to myself. What separates the individuals response who are of high SES and low SES are not their resilience, it’s not that they’re silent about it and don’t use it to their every advantage in every moment of their life, it’s not the results of pulling themselves by their bootstrap of which I was taught.

It was that these people weren’t set up to win.

Being born into a wealthy family who supports your education isn’t a dimishment of your achievements, it’s not saying that you didn’t experience hardship because everybody does. It’s just that they were born with a probability of success much higher than others, and you weren’t held back in every front by your upbringing

Think about that for a moment. Think about being born with everything stacked against you.

I know an individual of whose relationship with myself I won’t discuss, who’s parents named her after a euphemism for a sex act... Think about the level of social dysfunction not only she was born into, but how she had to grow up in that household. It’s a shockingly terrible situation and I couldn’t imagine possibly being neglected for the point of some sick joke. Think about how that shaped her confidence as a teenager, and her life as an adult, and how being our in that environment might hold her back in all parts of her upbringing. Now think about how she might be able to emphasise with someone else who might have also been given the short straw in life.

My cousin who is of my age had his father leave him when he was less than one week old. A single working mother took care of him by working a job in the local workers club for more than a decade. Speak about the stress of a father going to prison? Think about never having one. Think about coming home as a child and mum not being there and being taken care of your sister who is only 6 years older than you. He didn’t try his hardest in his HSC and got an ATAR well below average and less than half of what I got, but by most accounts he’s an intelligent kid who used to be in the selective streams of his school before becoming lazy to school around the same age I did, but didn’t have a mum to pull his head in. Imagine how he might be more empathetic to people who have been given a short straw in life.

I can go on with personal anecdotes but I think I’ve made my point. What you don’t understand is not that nobody thinks you’ve haven’t experienced hardships, because it’s likely you have. It’s just that when the bills come knocking for essentials (e.g. food, not private school tuition), very few people can sell off the assets they had lying around.

By selecting medical students who are of this low SES background, they are more likely to empathise with this fact of life, that you can be born with everything stacked against you. And be a little more understanding of their situation and not to tell them to pull themselves up by their bootstraps because “I had to sell my boat to afford by 40k/year private school fees”. (Obviously an exaggeration to make a point)

Are the only applicants who can empathise with these scenarios ones who have lived them themselves? No of course not, but selecting them is a sure fire way of ensuring that they have more than a rudimentary understanding of the situation.

As someone who has lived a life of immense privilege I used to think that “oh I’m disadvantaged because I had to face X and Y” (of which I can say x and y are not trivial reasons), and I used to think it was so unfair aswell. I still can’t fathom being born into such disadvantage.

Think about the examples you gave of hardship above, and reframe them in a scenario where the family didn’t have a spare boat to sell, or a second property to stay the night. Then maybe you might understand what we’re talking about. (Exaggeration for the point)

For what it’s worth in this discussion. I think there should be a distinction between the very rich at the most expensive private schools and the average. Although I don’t think gaming equity schemes is the morally correct thing to do so

As a side note: Don’t be offended by others comments. This is a discussion and we would love for you to stick around and participate in this civil discussion.