JCU JCU Medicine: Interview Discussion

[woodsy]

I just got back after an interview yesterday. I only found out about this thread the day before but it was pretty useful.

My panel was an a doctor, academic at the uni and music teacher (member of the community). The music teacher and academic were lovely but the doctor did not smile the entire time and had a bit of a sour look on his face, unless that was just his resting face.

I waffled about on questions and they really seem to want you to get to the point so I would say if you have prepared for an MMI don't use the same method of answering questions. Often I would describe the perspective of both sides and be interrupted describing the second side by the questioner asking "But what would you do". I would say a better way would be just to directly answer the question and deal with the rebuttals later based on my experience alone.

The format was basically the same as other years like why med, group experiences etc... so the original thread still stands. Then there were two scenarios they had pre-picked and you have to tell them what you would do in that situation. Then you get to choose a topic from 3 options, there are some repeats and some new things that are topical from things happening in society in the past years.

So to prepare I would say, ask yourself questions about why you want to do it, what kind of qualities you have that are food for med and doctors, think about some past scenarios in working in groups and teams, it involves a bit of introspection.

When you answer questions be to the point and elaborate if need be. I was a bit sleep deprived due to some other things I had going on and I really didn't prepare so I reckon I crashed an burned.

I didn't sign any confidentiality agreement, considering they have the same format every year and scenarios seem to be switched for every person there is probably very little utility in knowing the exact scenarios asked in the interview anyway.

I definitely signed a condfidentiality agreement...isn't this post giving others an advantage? Maybe just wait with this sort of thing until JCU interviews are over?

I'm not sure though, maybe a mod can check it though.

 

[Benjamin]

I definitely signed a condfidentiality agreement...isn't this post giving others an advantage? Maybe just wait with this sort of thing until JCU interviews are over?

I'm not sure though, maybe a mod can check it though.

I'm comfortable with the post above. There is no actual questions disclosed & it simply serves to reinforce that this original threads advice is valid & current. Nothing in that post is new information, but I have edited it a little to make it slightly more general.

 

[Kim Yumi]

Hi i just completed my A levels and currently waiting for an offer from JCU for the second round of interviews. Does anyone have some good points to answer Why choose JCU to study medicine? Thanks

 

[Cookie]

Hi i just completed my A levels and currently waiting for an offer from JCU for the second round of interviews. Does anyone have some good points to answer Why choose JCU to study medicine? Thanks

Look at their website and their promotional Youtube videos. Your answer should be there

 

[Kim Yumi]

Look at their website and their promotional Youtube videos. Your answer should be there

ok thankyou

 

[Crow]

Hi monkey magic could you please let me know the questions they asked at your interview thanks

Is this a serious request? This is unethical - why do you deserve an advantage over any other applicant? Why should they disadvantage themselves? Would you feel like you earned it if you got a med offer after knowing all of the questions they were going to ask you beforehand?

 

[monkey magic]

I definitely signed a condfidentiality agreement...isn't this post giving others an advantage? Maybe just wait with this sort of thing until JCU interviews are over?

I'm not sure though, maybe a mod can check it though.

Hi Annabell I remember signing something in the morning but it was just an attendance sheet maybe I missed something or it was in the initial interview offer.

In any case I thought the purpose of the thread was to discuss experiences and not any particular current questions, as I feel this thread was very helpful I thought it would be nice to acknowledge that it helped me and the material remains useful but I did not want to reveal specific information to disadvantage anyone else.

Also my experience may be different to others and it may have been my panel wanted straight answers, however I'm sure others have had far more relaxed interviews. My advice to stick to the point may not work in other interviews but if I were to critique myself I feel this would be where I fell down because I was not really well prepared.

Sorry I'm not going to release any questions as I don't think it would be a nice thing to do to other applicants, but also as I said knowing the specific questions will likely not help you as the panel has a number of scenarios and they change it up a bit.

Best of luck if you have an upcoming interview and remember to be yourself.

 

[woodsy]

Hi Annabell I remember signing something in the morning but it was just an attendance sheet maybe I missed something or it was in the initial interview offer.

In any case I thought the purpose of the thread was to discuss experiences and not any particular current questions, as I feel this thread was very helpful I thought it would be nice to acknowledge that it helped me and the material remains useful but I did not want to reveal specific information to disadvantage anyone else.

Also my experience may be different to others and it may have been my panel wanted straight answers, however I'm sure others have had far more relaxed interviews. My advice to stick to the point may not work in other interviews but if I were to critique myself I feel this would be where I fell down because I was not really well prepared.

Sorry I'm not going to release any questions as I don't think it would be a nice thing to do to other applicants, but also as I said knowing the specific questions will likely not help you as the panel has a number of scenarios and they change it up a bit.

Best of luck if you have an upcoming interview and remember to be yourself.

Yeah of course, I totally understand what you are saying! I had my JCU interview last week too so I know what you are saying, I just wasn't sure if you were revealing too much to potentially give someone an advantage.

All good though! Ben said it was fine and after reading it again what you posted was pretty safe. Congrats though for getting an interview offer and maybe we will see each other in Townsville next year!

 

[monkey magic]

Thanks Annabelle good luck to you too hope you get some good news when the results come out

 

[Bisque]

PLEASE SEND ME YOUR QUESTIONS AFTER YOUR INTERVIEW, YOU WILL GET A SMILEY FACE AND MY GRATITUDE IN RETURN!​

Hello everyone!

This thread is a preparation thread for JCU Interviews and also a place where I'm happy to answer general questions as much as I can. For some background: I'm a 5th year JCU student that spent 3 years in Townsville living at Uni Hall and then moved to Cairns for 4th, 5th and next year. Despite the fact that I'm written up as a "Staff Member" I gain absolutely nothing from writing these threads and only hold that title so that I can delete spam threads etc.

Previously I offered a fair bit of subjective information about On-Campus Colleges/Accomodation but I'm not so sure that I'm happy to do this anymore as it's been some time since I lived there and things have changed significantly - I will however be happy to provide some general information if asked.

This thread is built on previous contributions from students who went to the JCU interviews and sent me PM's with their reflections/interview questions/ethical topics - if you send me this I promise I will not distribute anything until this time next year. Without this help the thread will quickly become out of date and useless to everyone.

PLEASE SEND ME YOUR QUESTIONS AFTER YOUR INTERVIEW, YOU WILL GET A SMILEY FACE AND MY GRATITUDE IN RETURN!​

This thread will be split up into a number of sections: my personal interview reflection from 2010 (some time ago, I know!), a clear framework of the interview & a list of past JCU questions, general information about the JCU MBBS course (slightly out of date) & some information about rural+indigenous medicine. I will continue to add to it as I write replies or as I come up with more useful information.

Ben's 2010 Interview Reflection

First of all, everyone at the JCU interview – i.e. staff and medical students that were there to help – were phenomenal. Almost everyone was as excited as I was and they really had a great attitude towards interviewees. The interview panel itself was very engaging, though it seemed to be a response to singular people when it came to questioning. What I mean is, the first two questions were asked by the academic from the uni, whilst the other two panel members completely ignored and avoided any eye contact. They then passed the question over to the next interviewer and the other two avoided eye contact. For me, there was nothing that could be done to engage the other two interviewers that were not asking the question. Saying that though, the interviewer that was asking the questions seemed at all times entirely focused on me and didn’t hesitate to weigh in their opinion on things or ask further questions. It was very much like a legitimate discussion where the interviewers were clearly interested in what I had to say.
My interviewers were an academic from the university or the area, a physiotherapist and a GP who was by far the most engaging.

The JCU interview was very informal compared to other universities (Monash, UNCLE, UNSW etc), I actually tried to stop halfway through my first question to try and get into a more formal mindset but when I asked for a moment to collect myself one of the interviewers just started talking about cricket with me. So here's me, in my mind thinking "God damnit must be more formal, must not be so relaxed, must think about what I say more" and he pipes up, "So do you watch the ashes? We're getting slaughtered, it's terrible" and then the whole panel joined in and we spoke about cricket for about 3 minutes. It was honestly the most confusing situation of my life.

Interview Questions I had:
1. What is it about you that would make a good medical practitioner?
2. What do you know about the course? I just made mention that it was all integrated, had an emphasis on rural health that was meshed in with the stock-standard medical course. They asked me to clarify what I knew about a normal medical course and whether I knew about placements and what I had to do after I graduated etc.
3. Got passed over to the GP here, who asked me to give him an example of when I’d worked in a team.
4. Thus, he asked me a follow-up question about when teamwork had gone badly for me and how I coped with it.

Scenario 1:
“You are the captain of a successful sporting team that has just won their finals. Everyone in the team works together really really really well. After winning your finals, the whole team goes out for celebratory drinks and at the end of the night, two people get into a car and drive home. The driver crashes the car and suffers minimal injuries, but the passenger and other team-mate is severely injured.

Following the incident, the team ceases to stop working together well and begins to fight over seemingly unrelated or irrelevant issues. The driver of the car is noticeably more distraught and possibly depressed.
As the captain of the team, what do you do?” I spoke to people after the interview and some of them simply got “A team of 4 is not working well together, you are the leader, what do you do?”

6. Next, I got passed onto the Physiotherapist who asked me to describe when I’d been in a new situation and how I’d dealt with it. There wasn’t much clarification as to what they meant by a new situation. Very vague.
7. She then followed that up with how I cope being away from family/independence etc and asked for an example.

Scenario 2:
“You are on a 4 week rural placement as part of your medical degree. You have been on placement for a week and don’t know many people; the doctors in the hospital are not very friendly. Some of the nurses are but you haven’t made any friends yet.

You live in a small flat behind the hospital on your own, you have no car and your mobile phone does not work. After a week of placement you are beginning to feel that you cannot stand the place any longer.
What do you do?” Keep in mind that this is a very, very real situation.. You may well be faced with this exact situation at the end of second year on your 4 week rural placement.

9. I’m sure there was another question, but I have no idea what it was.

Debating
We then got onto the debating, which strangely was still a single interviewer on interviewee thing, as opposed to a discussion between me and the three interviewers. I got passed back to the GP again.
My topics: Gay Marriage, a self-abortion case that occurred in Cairns where the couple was acquitted in court, and the mining of coal in Australia to export internationally(somehow related to global warming).
Other debating topics:
Euthanasia, Schoolies, Nuclear power instead of coal, Opt in or Opt out organ donation, Wikileaks and the ethics behind it, drink driving.

Interview Overview
The JCU interview starts with typical medicine interview questions (why do you want to be a Doctor/study medicine/what do you know about the course) then shifting through assessing your experience with rural areas and health, independence & team work through scenario situations and finally debating topics to determine how well you respond to pressure and logical argument strategies.

Potential Interview Questions:
General Questions:
-Why do you want to be a doctor?
-Why do you want to study at a uni with rural health as the main focus?
-Why do you want to study at JCU?
-What activities have you done to show your motivation to study med here?
-What qualities should a good doctor have?
-What are the most important of these qualities?
-Give an example of when you worked in a team & what you enjoyed about it?
-Give an example of a conflict in the team & how you worked it out? Did it work & if not, what did you learn from it.
-Have you ever been away from your family & what was hard about it?
-How did you cope with staying away from family?
-How do you think you will cope with the course?
-How did you cope with staying away from family?
-How do you think you will cope with the course?
-This is an integrated course, how do you study & how do you plan to change it in uni?

Questions about your goals:
-How would you describe yourself?
-Tell us a bit about yourself?
-How would a stranger describe you?
-How would your friends describe you?
-What is your purpose in life?
-what things do you value most?
-What qualities do you value in others?

Questions about your achievements/influences:
-What have you learnt from extra-curricular activities.
-What sort of sportsmanship do you have, competitive, giving up, gracious, backing away?
-If you were head of health what would be your priorities & what problems might you encounter?
-What strategies do you use to deal with stress?
-What is your most valued achievement & why?
-What kind of achievements do you take pride in?
- Tell us one event in your life that shaped you?
- What people have influenced you & how.

Questions about self-reflection:
-What are your strengths & weaknesses & when are they most apparent?
-What would you like to improve about yourself & why?
-What do you think you will get out of the medical course?
-If you got into the course What would you change about yourself?
-How do you handle criticism?
-Describe a time that you had to make an important decision & how did you go about it?
-Give a time when you had to make a quick decision based on incomplete information?
-Toughest decision ever?
-Can you tell when you are stressed?
-Is there anything in medicine you think you will have trouble with?
-Describe a difficult time in your life?
-Have you had any disappointments & how did you cope?
-Any failures & how did you cope?
-What is the worst thing that ever happened to you & how did you deal?

Questions about teamwork:
-What qualities do you need to be a good worker & to be a good leader?
-Which role do you usually take in a group?
-Do you like working in a team or alone?
-What would you do if some one was not pulling their weight.
-How do you bring the best out of people in a team situation?

I had my JCU interview last week and it had the same structure. I didn't need to know anything do to with health or anything you'd have a disadvantage in if you didn't do human bio. Would recommend keeping up to date with big events from the news. They really emphasise that it's just a casual conversation, so just make sure you maintain eye contact and keep them engaged. Best of luck to the next lot of interviewees

 

[Bisque]

Hey guys! Just wondering if anyone knows which accomodation is closet to the med buildings??

 

[Benjamin]

Hey guys! Just wondering if anyone knows which accomodation is closet to the med buildings??

University Hall & John Flynn are the closest, but it honestly isn't that much of a difference. Parking has always been a nightmare at JCU so everyone that lives on college walks across - from Uni Hall it's about a 5-10 minute walk (depends how fast you are) & George Roberts which is the furthest college away is probably only a 15 minute walk.

In the summer months it's a bit of a hassle especially if it is raining but personally I feel the distance isn't that significantly different to influence where I would choose to live.

 

[Bisque]

University Hall & John Flynn are the closest, but it honestly isn't that much of a difference. Parking has always been a nightmare at JCU so everyone that lives on college walks across - from Uni Hall it's about a 5-10 minute walk (depends how fast you are) & George Roberts which is the furthest college away is probably only a 15 minute walk.

In the summer months it's a bit of a hassle especially if it is raining but personally I feel the distance isn't that significantly different to influence where I would choose to live.

Thanks so much!

 

[James Robinson]

Turns out JCU has started releasing early med offers. Anyone here got one so far?

 

[Cookie]

Turns out JCU has started releasing early med offers. Anyone here got one so far?

What? Since when?? How do you know this?

 

[James Robinson]

What? Since when?? How do you know this?

Saw some people mention that they had received an early offer on a Facebook discussion page today.

 

[RRRR]

Don't think JCU Med does Early offer rounds, their timeline certainly doesn't say that they do

 

[James Robinson]

Don't think JCU Med does Early offer rounds, their timeline certainly doesn't say that they do

I've seen some people mention that they got a text this morning from QTAC. Don't know how legit this is because I've never heard of them doing this before.

 

[RRRR]

I've seen some people mention that they got a text this morning from QTAC. Don't know how legit this is because I've never heard of them doing this before.

Im with you on that one, IB people haven't got their results yet and 2nd round interviews are from 4-5 Jan still. Plus, most med (if not all)course s dont do early offer rounds.

The bottom line is that we'd just have to wait to see what happens during the major offer round

 

[Crow]

I've seen some people mention that they got a text this morning from QTAC. Don't know how legit this is because I've never heard of them doing this before.

It would be extremely unusual for JCU to make offers considering a) They have another round of interviews to come b) They have never done this before and c) Their timeline (as well as QTAC) suggests that the offers will be made through QTAC's January 16 offer round

My guess is that these people are either trolls or received an offer for a different course through QTAC, but I'm interested to hear otherwise.