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HSFY 2020

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mideasyrole

Member
I think so, I wish I put more effort into these sem 1 grades tho because the 5% really boosts them and it would’ve been nicer to use the 8th paper to cover poph or something. Otherwise I’m tossing between Stat115 and Maor102. Wby?

Yeah same I was kinda relying on the 8th paper to replace POPH. I'll probably go for MAOR102 as I keep hearing it's not too hard.
 
It will be surprising to see how everyone does at the end of the year, surprisingly, I thought that because of online exams it would be easier?. Last year, first round offer was 93.48%. With lowest known wait list to get off (92.8%).

Obviously this year with the 5% boost, this can be higher or lower.

Just out of curiosity, was the exam harder? since traditional CHEM191 was MCQ and SAQ (not just MCQ), and HUBS191 had 3 mini essays.

My grades were
CELS:100
CHEM:100
HUBS:98
PHSI:98

Personally I found CHEM to be easier with all MCQ's (module 1 and 2 MCQ's were a lot harder than previous progress tests) and HUBS to be harder without essays lol (I studied the most for HUBS and least for physics)
 

aimn

Lurker
Just after some insight into the 2 popular options for the 8th paper which seem to be stat115 and maori102. Does anyone know the structure of how assessments work for these papers? For example if there’s essay components, assignments etc. aside from the final exam? Thanks team!
 

mideasyrole

Member
Just after some insight into the 2 popular options for the 8th paper which seem to be stat115 and maori102. Does anyone know the structure of how assessments work for these papers? For example if there’s essay components, assignments etc. aside from the final exam? Thanks team!

Just to add on, does anyone know if these 8th papers are recorded?
 

Fili

Dentist 🦷
Moderator
The assessments system change every year but you can google a bit about them. Stats had terms tests but with plussage incase you don't do well in the tests. Back in the day maor102 had an essay and final exam but I think they may have changed it to a terms test + essay + final in the past few years.

I believe the 8th papers are recorded.
 

Bootleg

Regular Member
STATS115 has weekly assignments, alongside every 2 weeks there is a lab test. But again, there is plussage. For STATS the lectures were all recorded.
 
Does anyone have last year's UCAT thresholds for medicine? Does Otago release them or is it all speculated?

Medicine UCAT threshold were released by the admissions office as 20th percentile (510) in Verbal Reasoning, and above 10th percentile (495) in Situation Judgement (sourced by Cathay on another thread - this was officially released by the Uni though).
 

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Cathay

🚂Train Driver🚆
Emeritus Staff
Does Otago release them or is it all speculated?
The Health Sciences Admissions Office gave out that information in 2019 to HSFYers who emailed them and asked.

Time for a quick MSO plug. Last year some of our HSFYers here happened to ask the admissions office, and, to our surprise, were given the UCAT thresholds; in other years gone by, we've had to collect/collate information from our members to calculate the various thresholds and cutoffs (we try to avoid baseless speculation here). All the information we (the collective knowledge of MSO) know have been contributed by our members, so your contributions towards the MSO knowledge pool is encouraged and appreciated.

In the UMAT days, when there was a ranking score (1/3 weighted UMAT score, 2/3 HSFY average), we've used the annual HSFY Ranking Scores and Offers threads to collect results from HSFYers as well as their application outcomes (when they become available), in order to narrow down where the cutoff lies. Although we're on a UCAT threshold system now, the threshold itself, as well as the eventual HSFY average grade cutoff, are things we still have to narrow down (sometimes with unexpected help, when a current HSFYer obtains such information from the admissions office and shares it).

One day, we will be calling on all of you guys to share your results and application outcomes, either by posting directly (we'll have a 2020 thread for it when the time comes), or sending a Private Message (PM) to one of the NZ regulars or forum staff, to be shared on your behalf; that information will then help the future HSFYers, as the information from past HSFYers are helping you right now. When that day comes, please remember all the times past HSFYers' information and experience on MSO have helped you, and contribute so that MSO can help future HSFYers.
 
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mideasyrole

Member
Medicine UCAT threshold were released by the admissions office as 20th percentile (510) in Verbal Reasoning, and above 10th percentile (495) in Situation Judgement (sourced by Cathay on another thread - this was officially released by the Uni though).

So does this mean you just need to reach the thresholds for VR and SJ and anything beyond will not improve your chances to get into medicine? Once the threshold is reached, is it only your HSFY grades that matter?
 

Cathay

🚂Train Driver🚆
Emeritus Staff
So does this mean you just need to reach the thresholds for VR and SJ and anything beyond will not improve your chances to get into medicine? Once the threshold is reached, is it only your HSFY grades that matter?
I've mentioned this before, but the threshold itself is not fixed. 2019's thresholds were very low and in two sections only, we can't guarantee that 2020 thresholds will be those same two sections only, but it is likely to continue being conservative rather than competitive (i.e. the threshold is likely to be relatively low).

Yes, you are correct, once you reach the fairly low UCAT threshold (whatever it may be this year), it is only your HSFY grades that matter. (This is quite different to how it used to be with UMAT.)

I've quoted my post from 11 days ago (on page 10 of this thread) below:
The thresholds are NOT fixed from year to year. They are determined annually by the admissions committee, which means this year's threshold will be different.

The threshold we give out here is the 2019 threshold, courtesy of a 2019 HSFYer who emailed the admissions office to ask, and were told the threshold (in something like late November).

The bottom line is: try your best in UCAT, do some practice tests, and make sure on the day of your test that you've had enough sleep, not too much caffeine, and been to the toilet before starting your session ("sharp minds and empty bladders"). Give it your best, but for Otago HSFY entry, don't stress too much about exactly what you get, and I wouldn't go spending hundreds of dollars (or dozens of hours) on prep courses or anything like that since it's a threshold and a conservative one at that.

EDIT: If you are looking at dentistry as well, do note that their threshold is higher. I think something in the realm of 50th percentile but you'll wanna check last year's HSFY thread for that.
 

mideasyrole

Member
Can someone who recently took MAOR102 please give me a general overview of the paper?
I was wondering what the 60% internal assessment consists of as I saw people mentioning there were a couple of essays but that was in 2013 so I'm not sure if thats still relevant.
 

tamati5555

Lurker
Yeah it was really low for med entry but I would recommend trying to get above 55 percentile for all sections just incase they change the thresholds to the same level as dentistry. Personally, I only prepared for 3 weeks last year just before my test and that was enough.
Where is this info from and how accurate is it?
 

Fili

Dentist 🦷
Moderator
Where is this info from and how accurate is it?

The medicine threshold last year was very accurate since the Uni released it themselves. The dent one not so much since I just hypothesized it using the scores multiple people had last year.

I can't remember which thresholds stood out for me that was definitely accurate. It might have been VR 530 and DM 630 for dent anyways. The other sections I'm not so sure since most users did well in them.
 

Cathay

🚂Train Driver🚆
Emeritus Staff
Where is this info from and how accurate is it?
It's from the HSFY 2019 thread, the med threshold was shared by a member who happened to email the Health Sciences Admissions Office (the part of the uni that deals with professional programme applications) and got told what the threshold was. The dent one was deduced from multiple members sharing their scores and whether they met the threshold. Feel free to browse through the HSFY 2019 thread if you want to see the original information yourself.
 
Can someone who recently took MAOR102 please give me a general overview of the paper?
I was wondering what the 60% internal assessment consists of as I saw people mentioning there were a couple of essays but that was in 2013 so I'm not sure if thats still relevant.
I took MAOR last year and our structure was based around lectures and weekly tutorials. The assessments were:
  1. 60% Internal Assessments, with one multichoice test worth 25% that tests roughly the first third of the paper, and an essay worth 20% about a topic you're expected to do independent research on. The other 15% is from being marked present at 6 tutorials (out of around 10ish tutorials if I remember correctly).
  2. 40% Final multichoice exam which tests your knowledge of the remaining lectures (not including the ones tested in the first multichoice), and a few articles which you're given before and during the exam (almost like an open-book multichoice)
Last year, the first multichoice exam was done by the lecturers projecting each question in the lecture halls one by one and you had around half a minute or so to answer it (this is plenty of time once you actually sit it). They projected these questions in two rounds so you have two opportunities to answer each q.
The final multichoice exam is done like most exams where you have one paper for the answers and the other as a resource booklet.

MAOR is one of those papers where you can easily cram for the final exam. The essay meanwhile is something you might want to start working on as soon as you're expected to because it can be quite a shift from the kind of work in sem 1. This is a great paper to take if you want a somewhat easy grade bump whilst learning relevant and relatively straight forward information about Maori culture. To a lesser extent than stats, you'll find it tying into what you learn in the POPH paper.
 

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mideasyrole

Member
I took MAOR last year and our structure was based around lectures and weekly tutorials. The assessments were:
  1. 60% Internal Assessments, with one multichoice test worth 25% that tests roughly the first third of the paper, and an essay worth 20% about a topic you're expected to do independent research on. The other 15% is from being marked present at 6 tutorials (out of around 10ish tutorials if I remember correctly).
  2. 40% Final multichoice exam which tests your knowledge of the remaining lectures (not including the ones tested in the first multichoice), and a few articles which you're given before and during the exam (almost like an open-book multichoice)
Last year, the first multichoice exam was done by the lecturers projecting each question in the lecture halls one by one and you had around half a minute or so to answer it (this is plenty of time once you actually sit it). They projected these questions in two rounds so you have two opportunities to answer each q.
The final multichoice exam is done like most exams where you have one paper for the answers and the other as a resource booklet.

MAOR is one of those papers where you can easily cram for the final exam. The essay meanwhile is something you might want to start working on as soon as you're expected to because it can be quite a shift from the kind of work in sem 1. This is a great paper to take if you want a somewhat easy grade bump whilst learning relevant and relatively straight forward information about Maori culture. To a lesser extent than stats, you'll find it tying into what you learn in the POPH paper.

Thanks for this!
Can I ask what the tutorials are like? Are they like lectures or group work?
 
Thanks for this!
Can I ask what the tutorials are like? Are they like lectures or group work?
Very laid back group work. There'll be one tutor that goes through the previous week's lectures, and they'll give worksheets for people to fill out in groups. You can go in unprepared and refer to the lecture notes to fill these out. Tutors may give you hints as to what's going to be asked in the exams so keep an ear out.
 

Soldier67

Lurker
Hi guys. I just did the UCAT and I'm kinda disappointed :// I got 700+ in DM, QR, AR and 653 in SJT but my VR was only 510. I somehow did better in VR last year than this year. My average from semester one was also 98 (without the +5) so I'm just very worried. Any tips/
 
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