Discussion: UMAT being replaced by UCAT

[DrDrLMG!]

Yeah good idea, fingers crossed us 2019 guinea pigs aren't screwed over too badly xd

I guess it'll be important to remember that, at the end of the day, it's going to be the same pool of (hopeful) students sitting the exam (whether it be UMAT or UCAT), so that part won't change. And the part that has changed has changed for everyone. So no-one can really be "screwed over". It's not like the number of places available will change, so whether the spread is greater or not, it'll still be the same X number of top performing people who secure offers. If that makes sense.

If the individual universities (in Aus or NZ) decide to change how much weight to allocate to UCAT/interview/written application/PQA/other factor, then they'll (presumably!) be doing that for ALL students applying to their course. I know the uncertainty makes it more nerve-wracking, that's completely understandable, but it's counterproductive to start worrying about being screwed over because literally everyone is in the same boat so I'd think it would be hard to justify that that could be the case.

 

[AoEAoC]

I guess it'll be important to remember that, at the end of the day, it's going to be the same pool of (hopeful) students sitting the exam (whether it be UMAT or UCAT), so that part won't change. And the part that has changed has changed for everyone. So no-one can really be "screwed over". It's not like the number of places available will change, so whether the spread is greater or not, it'll still be the same X number of top performing people who secure offers. If that makes sense.

If the individual universities (in Aus or NZ) decide to change how much weight to allocate to UCAT/interview/written application/PQA/other factor, then they'll (presumably!) be doing that for ALL students applying to their course. I know the uncertainty makes it more nerve-wracking, that's completely understandable, but it's counterproductive to start worrying about being screwed over because literally everyone is in the same boat so I'd think it would be hard to justify that that could be the case.

Yeah....you're right. Nothing we can do about it now anyway, obviously the best thing to do now is just prepare as much as we can and hopefully things turn out okay ^_^

 

[Perplex]

When should one start studying for the UCAT? I was browsing The Student Room, and they said 3 weeks max.

Who knows? I doubt many people here have sat the exam before (if any). 3 weeks seems arbitrary. How can everyone be of the same competency such that 3 weeks is sufficient? Assess what your weaknesses and strengths are for yourself and go from there. Any number you get here is pure guess work.

 

[geek]

what happens if we are applying for med schools both in the UK and in Aus!
Do we have to sit the test twice or just once?

 

[DrDrLMG!]

what happens if we are applying for med schools both in the UK and in Aus!
Do we have to sit the test twice or just once?

I’d imagine you sit it twice, as we don’t even know for sure at this stage if the UCAT and UKCAT have exactly the same content. But that is a total guess

 

[geek]

I just remembered, I asked the official UCAT ANZ official website through their email the same question before and it completely slipped from my mind.Thank you LMG!
I have attached the response below.
I think this confirms two things
1.The UCAT is similar to the UKCAT
And
2.You can't sit the UCAT or the UKCAT twice (whatever your intentions are, either to trick the system by taking the tests twice from different boards or to applying for both UK and Australian med schools)
Hope this helps!

 

[Numerouno]

I just remembered, I asked the official UCAT ANZ official website through their email the same question before and it completely slipped from my mind.Thank you LMG!
I have attached the response below.
I think this confirms two things
1.The UCAT is similar to the ukcat
And
2.You can't sit the UCAT or the ukcat twice (whatever your intentions are, either to trick the system by taking the tests twice from different boards or to applying for both UK and Australian med schools)
Hope this helps!

By the time I tried to reply, you found the answers. I agree with LMG as we do not know anything about UCAT next year. All we know at this stage is, it may mirror the pattern of UKCAT, but how the UCAT scores will be used in Australia by different universities is unknown. But UKCAT is no exception as different universities consider the UKCAT differently as well. Some do not use SJT scores (SJT is ranked from 1 to 4...a score more than 2 may not be considered for an interview offer at some universities) for example and the minimum total scores are also different for an interview offer and the placement later. They also have BMAT if you run out of options in the UKCAT consortium as UCAS only allows 4 choices of universities for Medicine unlike here. So, you are in a way restricted and need to make your selection of universities with caution. Most of them need an equivalent close to 99 ATAR in the UK. It seems a very long time for me since I took that test. But you are not eligible to attend an interview here if you commenced study over there in the UK...I forfeited couple of interviews here this year as it was the right thing to do for other candidates...I did it on my own as the universities did not know that I commenced the study over there end of Sep 2018. I thought getting over 99 was hard at school with competition, but MBBS study needs much much more... a few very good students failed in the first semester mid term exams having scored lower than 63.50, I am told it will get tougher and tougher as I go to Third (repeat of the year allowed only in 3rd year), Fourth and Fifth year and many have dropped (expelled) out after 4th year and even 5th year due to not reaching the cut off pass mark... that's life in the UK. These are very very capable students. Australia may be different as IDK the pass range there.

One thing is certain, you can not sit UCAT / UKCAT twice in the same year. But I think you may sit UCAT and UKCAT separately once ( guess) mainly for the fact that UKCAT scores may be different in SJT compared to UCAT (again guess). You just need to sit it out and wait. I followed practice questions book from UKCAT and KAPLAN test prep. Please check out the details of UKCAT exam from the medic portal. 4 Steps to Prepare for the UKCAT - The Medic Portal. Hope this helps for a start. The questions seem simpler comapred to UMAT for some, but the speed is the decider. Good luck.

 

[DrDrLMG!]

According to this Australian university, the test is different.

"Is the UCAT (UK) and UCAT (ANZ) the same test?​

No.
To be considered for entry into Medicine or Dentistry at the University of Adelaide you need to register for, and sit the UCAT ANZ.
The UCAT UK (formerly UKCAT) will only be used for selection for Medicine and Dentistry Degrees within the consortium of UK universities. "

UCAT - University Clinical Aptitude Test

I'd simply interpret this as saying the exams are not universally accepted for entrance, and that the specifically titled exam needs to be sat for the corresponding application period (Aus/NZ or UK), rather than any comment whatsoever on the content of the two exams being different (or the same). This definitely doesn't rule out the possibility that the exams are largely the same, content-wise.

Cynical part of my answer: this way they can get those wanting to apply to both to pay the fees twice! But more seriously, it possibly also makes it easier to work out score comparisons. I'd think the Aus/NZ group will have one set of %ile ranks, etc, and the UK application group (including Aus/NZ students who sit both) will have another. The scores will likely be kept separate and ranked separately. It would obviously be possible to move the data around to achieve this without making people sit it twice, but... see my first point

 

[A1]

According to this Australian university, the test is different.

At least the method of scoring for the SJT section will be different. UCAT UK score is in band 1 to 4.
UCAT ANZ
"For 2019 you will receive a scaled score for the Situational Judgement test."

I'd think the Aus/NZ group will have one set of %ile ranks, etc

I don't think UCAT will give individual students a %ile rank, since they get the results right after taking the test before all others have taken theirs.

 

[Numerouno]

Good morning guys. It's been quite some time since I jumped in. Finishing first year Med in the UK with OSCEs next week followed by the SBAs, SAPs, and MCQs, etc... phew... One year has gone like a flash. Hardships many with a few winnings, I am selected as the Med School Rep covering all the years from Y1 to Y5, which is a great Win for me going through a few interviews and presentations and finally got selected. It was more like the Med school admission interview with a few SJT scenarios thrown in verbally. I did not win in Australia but got it over the line here. The position commences next year. Let me park that aside!

Vividly remember when I took the UKCAT in Sydney at the end of 2017. It's good to note that the SJT may not be in the band range from 1 to 4 in UCAT ANZ and I agree that %ile cannot be given as you get the scores when you walk out of the test centre. The chances would almost be known then. It is frustrating to note that no university in the UCAT consortium has released the varied selection pattern for the interviews. I feel sorry for the 2019 group of students who are facing the brunt of the new syllabus in Science subjects (in NSW) and UCAT which is unknown to them. Hope the Universities get their acts together and release the selection criteria from the results of UCAT to ease off some tension. Cheers.

 

[DrDrLMG!]

At least the method of scoring for the SJT section will be different. UCAT UK score is in band 1 to 4.
UCAT ANZ
"For 2019 you will receive a scaled score for the Situational Judgement test."



I don't think UCAT will give individual students a %ile rank, since they get the results right after taking the test before all others have taken theirs.

Nah, I didn’t say students would get their individual %ile rank given to them. And giving scores out immediately doesn’t mean there can’t be percentile ranks allocated to scores/score bands at the end of the testing period for each group.

Regardless, my point was to illustrate the (likely) separate-ness of the cohorts.

 

[Frostybape]

Hello everyone,

I'm a an Australian MBBS graduate. I was teaching some medical students today and they really rouse my interest to come back to this forum to help fellow high school student get into medicine. I'm quite enjoying this forum so far, some of the questions are intriguing.

To start off, I believe medicine entry should ideally be purely based on high school results. Interviews and UMAT/UCAT are both inaccurate in determining whether someone is suitable to enter medicine (of course this is IMO only). Interviews can be biased and UMAT was a joke. For most people (in AU/NZ) the best chance of getting into medicine is at the end of high school. A lot of people I know deserve to be in medicine, but they got slashed at interviews. (come on they are 18yos, interviews?!)

After looking at the practice questions of UCAT, I feel that the change from UMAT to UCAT is more appropriate in terms of assessing student's suitability to enter (and practice) medicine. I don't know about you guys but I felt that the old UMAT was a bit irrelevant to medicine. It felt like a money making scheme to me. During medical school I recognise that people who got high score in UMAT weren't necessarily the right people to practice medicine.

I sat the UKCAT in New Zealand back in 2009 as part of my applications to medical schools in the UK and I feel that it was much more appropriate. I really hope the new UCAT actually helps the right people get into medicine.

FB

 

[A1]

To start off, I believe medicine entry should ideally be purely based on high school results.

Hi welcome to MSO. You've just re-opened this can of worms, we have discussed that many times.

A major issue with basing purely on HS results is it tends to favour the well-off families, who can pave their way to better HS results. At the same time it results in very high ATARs being selected while to successfully complete Medicine does not actually require it that high.

Many believe interview is the most applicable. But they can't interview 3000 applicants per school so UMAT was a way to prune down the interviewee numbers. It doesn't have to correlate strongly with ability to do medicine.

Studies have shown students performance correlates well with ATARs but only for the first 1-2 years. By the time they get to 5th-6th year no discernible difference.

All in all, the best method is ... a Lottery

 

[Numerouno]

Good morning. I will be boarding my flight back to Aus. Finished the first year of Medicine in the UK, a very difficult and challenging curriculum, but I enjoyed it. Out of curiosity scanned through MSO posts to see a glimpse of selection criteria that may have been published by the universities out of UCAT scores. Unbelievably there is none. Why is there such a delay from the universities when the students will be appearing for the exams in a month's time? really sad! Change to UCAT for Med interview selection is in the right direction (not that I wrote in 2017) but it made sense to me compared to sitting the UMAT. I am not sure why the universities are still pondering to publish the selection criteria (scores for each domain - cut off). No wonder we are going backward with Singapore removing three Australian Medical schools and deemed the graduates out of these medical schools as unacceptable to their standards. I only have a cursory view of that news. In anycase, it's a shame on Uni of Newcastle, Flinders, and UTAS!!!UON took about 79 medical students from Singapore in 2019, if I read it correctly. Why can't these places be offered to local highly deserving candidates??? IDK, the background scenario and other financial implications...sad. Selling med degree is pathetic.

 

[Crow]

Out of curiosity scanned through MSO posts to see a glimpse of selection criteria that may have been published by the universities out of UCAT scores. Unbelievably there is none.

What We Know So Far about UCAT

 

[Numerouno]

Oh...great. I was not looking thoroughly. Packing to leave for Annual break from the UK Med school. Thanks for sharing the link. Thanks to A1.

 

[DrDrLMG!]

What We Know So Far about UCAT

Also, while we certainly do pride ourselves on keeping good information here at MSO, the fact is, "unbelievably there is none" (which, as Crow has pointed out, is actually patently inaccurate to start with) doesn't necessarily reflect anything whatsoever about the Universities and any delay (and, apparently, how "backwards" they are travelling and how "unacceptable" their graduates are). Rather, it can only be representative of what information we have had shared here (or had the time/inclination to go looking for ourselves), surely? ETA: and representative of how thoroughly you searched the forums to start with (based on your own admission).

 

[Numerouno]

I do appreciate your tireless work to share the news to all the MSO users (I was one of the beneficiaries last year). Hats off to that. I was only frustrated that the new cohort is kept waiting by the universities in delaying the news. You would share it straight away as soon as you know. I know that very well. No sinister meaning intended on your work. You are doing stellar work. Keep it up for the benefit of all. Time out for me, see you guys in Australia soon.

 

[A1]

UON took about 79 medical students from Singapore in 2019

Med Deans data show for the four years 2015-18 (2019 not published yet) int'l students starting 1st year at Newcastle+UNE were 30-37-27-25. Impossible for UoN to have jumped to 79 in 2019 let alone them all being from Singapore.

No wonder we are going backward with Singapore removing three Australian Medical schools and deemed the graduates out of these medical schools as unacceptable to their standards. I only have a cursory view of that news. In anycase, it's a shame on Uni of Newcastle, Flinders, and UTAS!!!

> https://www.healthprofessionals.gov...for-registration-to-practise-in-singapore.pdf

Singapore Medical Council previously accepted for their registration degrees from 11 Aus med schools. After removing 3 it's down to 8 and guess what, they are the Go8s. For some reason SMC has decided to use that as the distinction, I don't think it's any reflection on these 3 schools in particular.