Hey all
Haven't been on mso for a week...
skyglow - I think all the points you made in your last post were fair. I don't completely agree with all of them, but I am happy to concede that if you are judging a system on how well it'll prepare a borderline student trying out for otago medicine through HSFY then cambridge would have to come out on top, and that in that sense it is better for many people. I think we can all lay this matter to rest for now, or at least until some CIE student starts mindlessly dismissing HSFY on this forum (as has unfortunately happened far too many times). On another point - interesting comment about correlating HSFY paper marks with performance in medicine. Through certain "insider knowledge" I can say that research into this is currently occuring (along with similar tests for UMAT). I'm hoping that I'll be able to see some of the results when they emerge and it might be possible that they are made publicly available which'd be pretty cool. At the least I think it's good to know that the med school does take the validity of the admissions process seriously.
SASOL - yep, I've just about finished my studentship. It's been pretty cool, though a little boring at times (but that's to be expected - if the research project was too exciting the university staff would want to do it themselves rather than leave it to a student!). Pretty sure I'm not allowed to attach any findings but I can give you the gist of it. Basically, I have data obtained on the concentration of LH in the immediate environment of gonadotrophs exposed to pulses of GnRH, with and without oxytocin or neuropeptide Y also present, as time progresses. It was obtained in a controlled in vitro laboratory setup. Anyway, there is a hypothesis that the intracellular signalling pathways involved have certain key characteristics, and that the oxytocin and neuropeptide Y interact with the pathways in certain ways. I have been working at the maths department of the university of canterbury to formulate something called a model - this is a series of equations and rules that describe the basic characteristics of a curve that would fit the data obtained if this hypothesis is true. I have written computer programs to look at the model and data and try to find optimal parameter values for accordance between the two (a parameter = a fixed number required by the model for it to deliver quantifiable outcomes), and to carry out various tests into the validity of this. Basically we are finding out things like "the model can explain the data well given the correct parameters, therefore the proposed mechanism could explain the data" and "oxytocin modifies the parameter values with statistical significance in the way expected". So yeah, kind of interesting applying maths to biomedical sciences, and a cool way of drawing conclusions from data. I have to give a presentation in one of the lecture theatres to an audience consisting of university staff, 3rd-5th year medical students, research sponsors and judges (amongst others) in a couple of weeks though so that's kind of scary. Thankfully it's only 5 minutes, and in the middle of 45 other presentations!
lock_on - they're not going to kick you out of medicine for registering late! Admissions and enrolment haven't even updated my status past "awaiting confirmation from the relevant admissions committee" yet. They'll probably just charge the late fee ($82 - a pain, but not a shattering amount).
ChickenPie - just sent you a pm
Haven't been on mso for a week...
skyglow - I think all the points you made in your last post were fair. I don't completely agree with all of them, but I am happy to concede that if you are judging a system on how well it'll prepare a borderline student trying out for otago medicine through HSFY then cambridge would have to come out on top, and that in that sense it is better for many people. I think we can all lay this matter to rest for now, or at least until some CIE student starts mindlessly dismissing HSFY on this forum (as has unfortunately happened far too many times). On another point - interesting comment about correlating HSFY paper marks with performance in medicine. Through certain "insider knowledge" I can say that research into this is currently occuring (along with similar tests for UMAT). I'm hoping that I'll be able to see some of the results when they emerge and it might be possible that they are made publicly available which'd be pretty cool. At the least I think it's good to know that the med school does take the validity of the admissions process seriously.
SASOL - yep, I've just about finished my studentship. It's been pretty cool, though a little boring at times (but that's to be expected - if the research project was too exciting the university staff would want to do it themselves rather than leave it to a student!). Pretty sure I'm not allowed to attach any findings but I can give you the gist of it. Basically, I have data obtained on the concentration of LH in the immediate environment of gonadotrophs exposed to pulses of GnRH, with and without oxytocin or neuropeptide Y also present, as time progresses. It was obtained in a controlled in vitro laboratory setup. Anyway, there is a hypothesis that the intracellular signalling pathways involved have certain key characteristics, and that the oxytocin and neuropeptide Y interact with the pathways in certain ways. I have been working at the maths department of the university of canterbury to formulate something called a model - this is a series of equations and rules that describe the basic characteristics of a curve that would fit the data obtained if this hypothesis is true. I have written computer programs to look at the model and data and try to find optimal parameter values for accordance between the two (a parameter = a fixed number required by the model for it to deliver quantifiable outcomes), and to carry out various tests into the validity of this. Basically we are finding out things like "the model can explain the data well given the correct parameters, therefore the proposed mechanism could explain the data" and "oxytocin modifies the parameter values with statistical significance in the way expected". So yeah, kind of interesting applying maths to biomedical sciences, and a cool way of drawing conclusions from data. I have to give a presentation in one of the lecture theatres to an audience consisting of university staff, 3rd-5th year medical students, research sponsors and judges (amongst others) in a couple of weeks though so that's kind of scary. Thankfully it's only 5 minutes, and in the middle of 45 other presentations!
lock_on - they're not going to kick you out of medicine for registering late! Admissions and enrolment haven't even updated my status past "awaiting confirmation from the relevant admissions committee" yet. They'll probably just charge the late fee ($82 - a pain, but not a shattering amount).
ChickenPie - just sent you a pm
