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General Medicine Entry Discussion and Advice Requests
- Thread starter H2.
- Start date
My thoughts are exactly what the pitfalls thread has to say. Given your home state is South Australia, your 99.6 ATAR rules you out of Flinders and only Adelaide is left over. You're suggesting you want to take an entire year off to resit a high stakes two hour exam and hope that you improve a good 22+ %ile on your previous score (which is the most reliable indicator of future performance) to give yourself a chance at landing an INTERVIEW with Adelaide. Then, your interview score needs to be so high that it will allow you to be in roughly the top one sixth of other interviewees. To bank an entire year on those hypothetical outcomes seems rather ludicrous to me, but that's merely my opinion (and, I'd think, the same as that in the pitfalls thread).
Hypothetically you could redo some senior subjects at a school that qualifies for UES bonus points to get your Flinders ATAR to 99.95 and then redo UCAT again (and perhaps some people would recommend this) but you'd still need a huge improvement on your UCAT score so I stick with my comments above. Apologies if I sound blunt, as it's not at all my intention - just offering an alternate viewpoint. Good luck with the decision!
no!! thank you for your honest opinion. I did think so, that in taking a gap year, if i even did ucat well the second time round (and i doubt i will improve, i felt super nervous with how high the stakes were first time round), it would only guarantee me only an interview, and i'm not amazing at interviews (butchered the one at jcu). Guess it must have been wishful thinking because I'm afraid to move outMy thoughts are exactly what the pitfalls thread has to say. Given your home state is South Australia, your 99.6 ATAR rules you out of Flinders and only Adelaide is left over. You're suggesting you want to take an entire year off to resit a high stakes two hour exam and hope that you improve a good 22+ %ile on your previous score (which is the most reliable indicator of future performance) to give yourself a chance at landing an INTERVIEW with Adelaide. Then, your interview score needs to be so high that it will allow you to be in roughly the top one sixth of other interviewees. To bank an entire year on those hypothetical outcomes seems rather ludicrous to me, but that's merely my opinion (and, I'd think, the same as that in the pitfalls thread).
Hypothetically you could redo some senior subjects at a school that qualifies for UES bonus points to get your Flinders ATAR to 99.95 and then redo UCAT again (and perhaps some people would recommend this) but you'd still need a huge improvement on your UCAT score so I stick with my comments above. Apologies if I sound blunt, as it's not at all my intention - just offering an alternate viewpoint. Good luck with the decision!
Also, from another thread, i thought that the University language, literacy and math schemes for UES bonus points don't apply for the flinders med?
They don't, but crow is suggesting that you could attend a disadvantaged school (I think?) to take advantage of bonus points. Alternatively, you could redo some IB subjects at your current school (not many schools in South Australia offer the IB program) to improve your score to a 44 (99.85) or a 45 (99.95).
REGULAR JOE
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UES subject bonuses don't apply. What Crow meant was going to a school that was listed in the UES scheme.no!! thank you for your honest opinion. I did think so, that in taking a gap year, if i even did ucat well the second time round (and i doubt i will improve, i felt super nervous with how high the stakes were first time round), it would only guarantee me only an interview, and i'm not amazing at interviews (butchered the one at jcu). Guess it must have been wishful thinking because I'm afraid to move out
Also, from another thread, i thought that the University language, literacy and math schemes for UES bonus points don't apply for the flinders med?
Just to pitch in my own opinion and experience, I had a 22%ile in the 2018 UMAT, took a year off and improved it to 76%ile for the 2019 UCAT. It is possible to do and taking a year off to save money/travel is not a waste of time at all. It’s up to you at the end of the day. This time last year I was completely against taking a year off and was about to start physio, now I’m sitting here after having had 4 different medical schools give me offers and I don’t regret it at all. Just a thought...no!! thank you for your honest opinion. I did think so, that in taking a gap year, if i even did ucat well the second time round (and i doubt i will improve, i felt super nervous with how high the stakes were first time round), it would only guarantee me only an interview, and i'm not amazing at interviews (butchered the one at jcu). Guess it must have been wishful thinking because I'm afraid to move out
Also, from another thread, i thought that the University language, literacy and math schemes for UES bonus points don't apply for the flinders med?
Hi, I was just wondering what everyone's opinion is on my situation:
I currently have a bonded place at UQ however I would have preferred to stay in NSW and ideally get UNSW, but had no interview due to my low UCAT of 88. It is realistic/worth it for me to defer UQ and resit the UCAT this year, or are the chances still pretty slim and I should just take UQ this year and not add another year to already long degree. I have no special consideration and my atar is 99.7. I certainly prepared for the UCAT last year for a few months, it clearly wasnt my day and I was obviously juggling HSC as well. Thankyou!!
I currently have a bonded place at UQ however I would have preferred to stay in NSW and ideally get UNSW, but had no interview due to my low UCAT of 88. It is realistic/worth it for me to defer UQ and resit the UCAT this year, or are the chances still pretty slim and I should just take UQ this year and not add another year to already long degree. I have no special consideration and my atar is 99.7. I certainly prepared for the UCAT last year for a few months, it clearly wasnt my day and I was obviously juggling HSC as well. Thankyou!!
Your rurality gives you a big boost in terms of competitiveness, unfortunately yoooo doesn't have anything of the sort, so anything short of a percentile in the 90s won't be of much help (provided ATAR remains 99.60).
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It’s honestly up to you. Because you have a guaranteed medicine offer regardless, the stakes aren’t as high so this wouldn’t be completely unreasonable. However, if you spent a few months preparing for UCAT last year, I think that is a strong indicator that improving your score to a competitive enough level for the NSW schools (particularly UNSW and WSU) is quite unlikely.
If you’re willing to move interstate, I’d suggest starting your undergrad at UQ with the provisional entry to land back on, resit UCAT next year (and perhaps the two years after) and compete for non-standard entry at the NSW schools. Additionally, in your second and third years of undergrad you can sit GAMSAT and attempt to gain an offer at UNDS or USYD via graduate entry.
Because all of the NSW schools will still be open to you if you commence tertiary study, I think it’s probably a better course of action to get started with your studies at UQ.
Good luck with the decision regardless
I agree with ucatboy. While your turnaround in results is impressive (huge congratulations on all your offers btw - what an amazing outcome!) I don’t think rural vs non-rural entry can be easily compared here. Additionally, as this was the first year where UCAT was used, there’s not enough data to make adequate comparisons between UMAT and UCAT results - perhaps UCAT was a more suited exam to you rather than UMAT and this accounted for a lot of your score increase.
oh right!! but I don't think there are any ib schools in sa that have the ues scheme (even if there is it'll be private and cost too much). and also i seriously don't think i can improve in the subject that cost me the two points anyways. I think i also forgot to consider that there is also the very highly likely possibility the ib to atar conversion will lower yet again, so better to just stick with my offer and move out
IB English A: literature amirite?oh right!! but I don't think there are any ib schools in sa that have the ues scheme (even if there is it'll be private and cost too much). and also i seriously don't think i can improve in the subject that cost me the two points anyways. I think i also forgot to consider that there is also the very highly likely possibility the ib to atar conversion will lower yet again, so better to just stick with my offer and move out
too true :') my school doesn't offer lang and lit which is a bummerIB English A: literature amirite?
Do you know you can go to Griffith?
I understand.
Yeah thats true, I’ll accept defeat on this one
Hey, I recently got an offer for the UQ provisional program and am in a very similar situation to esprioas in the sense that I'd like to stay in NSW (as it's a loooong time to be seperated from friends/family). I got an atar of 98.8 this year, and a ucat of 89% with ~a week of studying. I just wanted to ask 2 thing:
1) I know that some medical programs have a policy of not accepting an applicant that is already in a program. Would this mean that I can't resit the UCAT/do the GAMSAT whilst at UQ in hopes of being accepted into a NSW program?
2) Would a gap year be worth it in order to resit UCAT/work/travel/shadow a doctor to make sure I really want to spend the next 10+ years training to become one
Any advice is appreciated thanks!
1) I know that some medical programs have a policy of not accepting an applicant that is already in a program. Would this mean that I can't resit the UCAT/do the GAMSAT whilst at UQ in hopes of being accepted into a NSW program?
2) Would a gap year be worth it in order to resit UCAT/work/travel/shadow a doctor to make sure I really want to spend the next 10+ years training to become one
Any advice is appreciated thanks!
1. I believe you would still be able to transfer into an NSW program even though you have UQ provisional. This is because you are doing a bachelor of science (probably) for the first 3 years, which isn't technically a medical program. The medical program only really starts when you sign the BMP at the end of the 3rd year. You might want to email WSU for clarification on this matter however, to make sure you are definitely in the clear.
2. Doing a gap year for the sake of resitting UCAT is a poor decision on your part. Not only have the UQ cutoffs been the lowest they have ever been (and are only slated to increase), your ATAR as good or not as you think it is, is not actually that competitive in terms of getting into UNSW, ruling it out and leaving on WSU and JMP as your only two tertiary transfer options. While these place heavy emphasis on interview performance, the fact is that you can't quantify it because you aren't an interviewer, so you are essentially betting on the fact that you might be good at interviews in other people's eyes. Travelling or working or shadowing a doctor are other ideas that you might want to pursue in a gap year however, as they can still be good for your personal wellbeing.
Here's an idea - why not defer?
I agree with TKAO that doing a gap year primarily in the hope of achieving a better UCAT result isn't the best move, even if you are planning on also working, travelling and gaining healthcare experience in that time. Essentially you are staking an entire year on the outcome of a two-hour test, without even the guarantee that you will in fact achieve a better mark this year. In addition to TKAO's excellent advice, you might want to take a look at these threads if you haven't already:
[Undergrad] - Discussion: Pros and Cons of Taking a Gap Year
Hi I didn't do that well on the UMAT, so goodbye to chances for next year. I'm wondering on peoples thoughts on taking next year off doing a few extra school subjects to boost enter and study for UMAT? I didn't really study for UMAT except attend a prep course and did a prac exam many...
medstudentsonline.com.au
Common pitfalls to avoid for year 12 school leavers and other medicine applicants
Alternate title: "Ways to screw yourself over as a medical school applicant that you didn't know about" Hi everyone, As I suspect my activity on the site is likely to decrease a whole lot starting next year, I thought I would put together a whole lot of what I believe are a lot of important...
medstudentsonline.com.au
