Registered  members with 100+ posts do not see Ads

Adelaide UAdel Dentistry: Interview Prep

dentistry electives?

be it dentistry or medicine, adeliade has a reputation (of being mispelt by me, sorry) for wanting their students to have a GREAT knowledge of their course. from my post interrview surveying, these were some of the questions they asked.

What subjects will you be studying in the first year?
What elective do you think you will choose?
Tell us a bit about our university? (ignore the "bit")
Why do you want to study at our university?
What makes our university course different to others?
What aspect about our course do you find most exciting?

Hi,

I greatly appreciate all the postings here. Very informative! Thanks everyone :)

But anyway, one of the questions asked was 'What elective do you think you will choose?'. I am wondering what electives do they offer? I tried searching online but to no avail.

Can someone help?

Thanks :)
 

miss_universe

muse.
Emeritus Staff
Hi,

I greatly appreciate all the postings here. Very informative! Thanks everyone :)

But anyway, one of the questions asked was 'What elective do you think you will choose?'. I am wondering what electives do they offer? I tried searching online but to no avail.

Can someone help?

Thanks :)

There are a wide range of electives you can choose from, endodontics, forensic dentistry it goes on. I doubt this is a question that it asked usually though.
 

sirasscuss2

Regular Member
There are a wide range of electives you can choose from, endodontics, forensic dentistry it goes on. I doubt this is a question that it asked usually though.

You're right - it seems like a rare question but I have seen people who have had been asked this - had you been asked this too yennibenny?
 

miss_universe

muse.
Emeritus Staff
my interview's tmr!

right... so by electives, they mean specialities?

No, electives are areas you can study more deeply in university. They usually follow the different specialities. Its like a subject you can choose in your later years
 

miss_universe

muse.
Emeritus Staff
Oic. You get to choose in Year 4?

Btw, I must dress formally for my interview, right? Like a white blouse and black skirt?

You choose some of your electives in 4th year bt mostly 5th year. And yes, wear formal gear but not too formal. Like what you see dentist wearing (without the coat haha)
 

Registered  members with 100+ posts do not see Ads

miss_universe

muse.
Emeritus Staff
Hi everyone.

I found sirasscuss2's old posts from his dent interview last year (2010) and I remember they were quite useful and I have decided to copy them again so everyone can have a look. The posts are from this thread, so you can go back and read around so see what other people have said as well.
Sirasscuss was fortunate enough to get into Monash MBBS (well done!) but his experiences are very true of the interview and may be very useful.
Any questions on UADEL BDS interviews prep can be asked here. I hope it helps.

Thanks,
muse.
 
Last edited:

miss_universe

muse.
Emeritus Staff
1st post:

Ok guys i finished my interview and thanks SOO much for your help. i think i did pretty well in comparison to some of the other interviewees (we discuseed responses with the other students in teh waiting rooms after the interviews).

two days before the interview i had NO clue WHATSOEVER, and thanks to you guys i managed to get a load of information on dentistry through which i managed my interview.

before i talk more about the interview i must add that i was EXTREMELY dissapointed with the competition......
most of the applicants there were just arrogant med students who are just lazily doing their dent interviews because they have a high enough UMAT to do so. out of the 20-30 people i met, only 3 actually wanted to do dentistry.....

yes, although i too am a hopeful med student, i did take the interview quite seriously, (forgive me for my language) and i was shocked to see lazy idiots there who thought the Adelaide BDS course lasted 6 years instead of 5 .... and they said that in their interview.....

thats the first thing i noticed about the interviews.

be it dentistry or medicine, adeliade has a reputation (of being mispelt by me, sorry) for wanting their students to have a GREAT knowledge of their course. from my post interrview surveying, these were some of the questions they asked.

What subjects will you be studying in the first year?
What elective do you think you will choose?
Tell us a bit about our university? (ignore the "bit")
Why do you want to study at our university?
What makes our university course different to others?
What aspect about our course do you find most exciting?

EXAMPLE. one applicant i met told me about her response... here is how it went....

when asked what she knew about the course, she said "5 years, get a BDS degree thingy, on campus, lots of contact hours"

and then the interviews apparently replied "is that all you know?" --- ouch, serves her right though.


As you can see, if you want to prepare for the adeliade interview, do a lot of research on their website. Here are the main things to know.
(please correct me if i am wrong) :S

they start learning about clinical competency in the first year - which includes teaching of communication skills.
they learn about study skills etc --- a good thing to mention when they ask you "how do u cope with stress etc etc",
they learn about general human biology within the first year
they start clinical placements within the first year ----- important
in the first year the students can perform scaling on each other ---- i included this as an interesting fact and added a joked (something along the lines of performing extractions on fellow dent students, i forgot how it went. it was funny though:))

there is a lot more information about their course. everything i mentioned above i managed to mention in my actual interview and i also talked a bit more about other aspects of the university and the course as well.

IMPORTANT

do not baffle on about superficial details such as

"5 years"
"on campus etc" <---- this is not even 100% true
" BDS course"

.... those answers are not only lame, but also applicable for most dent courses. Talk about what makes the adeliade course unique and interesting. mention how you get to perform dental procedures on fellow students etc

for a 20 minute interview, this question ALONE will take about 25% of your time and weight. do a lot of research.

IMPORTANT

if there is anything u missed out on mentioning, mention it again at the end of the interview when they ask you "is there anything you want to add". that is a GREAT opportunity to remention some of the other aspects about their course that u did not mention and REINFORCE why you reaaallllyyy want to study at adlediade and talk about other things.

its also a great place to add a bit of humour. i mentioned how i managed to look around most of the university as i got lost and could not find the damn place etc ( dent school is on FROME st, which is segmented from the rest of the campus, ergo may be hard to find). remention some key details about teh course that appeal to you and so on.

Good Luck!!! I REALLY hope that you dentistry hopefuls out there will do well in your interview and outperform those arrogant (and somewhat pathetic) med students. And for the record the INTERVIEW is A LOT MORE IMPORTANT than the UMAT. the UMAT is only countback.... the interview is the primiary source of selection.

GOOOOD LLLUCCCKK!!!!

P.S and if you are a wannabe med student like me, take the interview seriously as it is a very fun experience and u can learn a lot about the dentistry course. who knows maybe you will change your mind. :p
 

miss_universe

muse.
Emeritus Staff
2nd post:
OK here is a list which contains questions which either i got asked, or some of the other students on the day got asked.

Why do you want to study dentistry
why do you want to become a dentist (yes they are somewhat different)
Where do you see yourself in 5/10/15 years?
How do you manage stress and pressure?
What do you think is the biggest change facing dentistry today?*
* i talked about proposed denti-care plan, i was surprised about this question
my friend (also a hopeful med student) talked about the discovery of gulansucrase. the enzyme which is responsible for plaque. the discovery was made ONLY 12 days prior to our interview and he talked about the exciting prospects is would have.

Tell us a bit about our university. etc

There is one scenario question. They will hand you a laminated piece of cardboard which reads along the lines of this:

"you and a group of students are working on a team project. The deadline is fast approaching. One of the students is not contributing."

thats all....

the MOST DAUNTING THING with adeliade scenarios is this... they DO NOT ask you a follow on question. so be prepared. once you have finished reading the placard, YOU must start the discussion. they will not even say a word. YOU must start talking about the situation and what you would do in that instance.

some of the other students got asked this...
"what do you think"
"can u summaries the situation for us?"
" talk to us about the situation"

after your initial discussion, THEN and ONLY THEN they will ask questions such as.
"i think you handled that situation pretty well, but what would you do"

-"if the student was not talking at all?"
-" if the student was not interested?"
-"if the student did not know much?"
-"if the student was too apprehensive?"


so for the scenario there are TWO phases.
the initial DISCUSSION PHASE:

you must start the conversation here immediately after you read the placard and share your findings about the situation and what you think you will do.

the POST discussion phase:

after you share your approach, the interviewers will then ask some "probing" questions by slightly changing or making slight additions to the scenario. here you will wait and ANSWER the asked questions.



My scenario was sort of epic fail for the interviewers, because in my discussion phase, i already considered all the reasons.

i said how perhaps he/she was not interested? and then resolved that
perhaps he/she was too shy? - and resolved that
perhaos he/she did not know much? - and resloved that

then the interviewers said this "i guess you already answered our FIRST TWO questions"

hence i could surmise that after the discussion phase, they will ask you along the lines of the questions i listed above. :)... oh and i also talked to the other students :)


good luck!!!!
 

kotone

Member
- What do you understand about PBL?
- If your classmate during PBL was not pulling his/her weight, where they are constantly reserved and late when attending the sessions, how would you approach this problem?

Can someone please tell what PBL is and how it relates to dentistry? Thank you!!
 

miss_universe

muse.
Emeritus Staff
An easy found question kotone have another look around. But in short PBL stands for Problem Based Learning. It's the preferred method of teaching health professional courses as it is based around actual cases and the students learn the relevant material.

Even googling PBL will give you a huge diversity of answers.
 
Well, what is the major difference between problem based learning and case based learning? I think I had mixed PBL and CPL up during my interview (I am an international so I had already finished my interview)...:wacko: I know they are quite similar...not sure...
 

miss_universe

muse.
Emeritus Staff
They are the same. :)
 

Registered  members with 100+ posts do not see Ads

They are the same. :)

Wow...Thanks~
I thought there were different...I had PBL lecture on science before and I found it very interesting as it is really a student-directed learning.
But I heard that Adelaide changes from PBL to CBL approach this year ?? Or just a little bit change of syllabus ?

Really Thanks for answer my post-interview question ~
 

miss_universe

muse.
Emeritus Staff
For dentistry, it's all PBL, however they don't use that terminology. It's the idea of integration that is important for the UADEL dent course.
 
Really thanks [MENTION=5617]miss_universe[/MENTION] :)

Oh....I just keep mentioning PBL and CBL in my interview...forget the idea of integration...

BTW, is dental experience important ?? When the interview ask me, I said I don't have any dental working experience as I am under the age of 18 (get rejected in job application in dental clinic) but I did worked at eldery day-care centre and children education centre, and I had regular dental check-up and talk with my dentist...
 

Registered  members with 100+ posts do not see Ads

Top