Quick Questions Thread #2: 2018-2019

[Crow]

hey everyone
just curious on how reliable the UAC table that converts GPA to ATAR is?
are we sure that anything above a 6.5 is the same because its seems quite strange that UAC wouldnt discriminate between a gpa of 7 and a gpa of 6.5?
especially for institutions such as unsw where your atar/gpa ranking does matter quite alot?
and is there any way of getting an official UAC rank done, do i need to contact UNSW for that or UAC?
cheers

Hey Josh, A1 is likely a better bet to accurately answer this one, but from memory faysapprentice contacted UAC about this last year and was told that their GPA of 7 for one full year of study would be equated to a 99.5 ATAR. I agree it seems ... unusual to say a perfect 7.0 is equal to a 6.5, which are both valued lower than a perfect ATAR, but that seems to be the way UAC (and thus UNSW) operate.

You'd need to contact UAC to find out your rank, rather than UNSW. I'm not entirely sure whether they offer this service at all, or whether it is free or not - but worth a shot, right?

 

[Crow]

oooh awesome thank you so much crow, also any idea what kind of atar a 6.5 gpa is equivalent to for JCU cause i believe after one fte only gpa is looked at, i was told it be around 99 but not sure about it.

Non-standard applicants are placed in a separate pool to school-leavers, so from my understanding JCU will just look at your GPA directly, not the rank-equivalent that QTAC may calculate for you.

 

[Crow]

Hey,
Quick question... my friend from Auckland got 5.8/9 GPA (NZ GPA) from doing Biomed, what would that convert to out of 7 for Australia?

Your friend will need to calculate the GPA themselves by converting the result from each subject they did onto the 7 point scale, then finding the average result from this conversion to determine their Australian GPA. I believe these are the equivalent grade allocations for NZ results:

A+/A/A- = 7.0
B+ = 6.5
B = 6.0
B- = 5.5
C+ = 5.0
C = 4.5
C- = 4.0

ETA: I don't believe this information is made publicly available by QTAC, so this is just (informed) speculation from my part. I'd recommend your friend contacts QTAC to see if they will provide an official GPA calculation.

Added by A1: The 0.5 steps (6.5, 5.5, 4.5) are only used by Gemsas. For non-Gemsas like QTAC UAC I'm fairly sure they are rounded *down* to 6, 5, 4.

 

[A1]

hey everyone
just curious on how reliable the UAC table that converts GPA to ATAR is?
are we sure that anything above a 6.5 is the same because its seems quite strange that UAC wouldnt discriminate between a gpa of 7 and a gpa of 6.5?
especially for institutions such as unsw where your atar/gpa ranking does matter quite alot?
and is there any way of getting an official UAC rank done, do i need to contact UNSW for that or UAC?
cheers

I found this table included in a publication by a uni (can't remember which) that's part of the UAC consortium. UAC also indicates the unis in the consortium have agreed to a common method of conversion. So it was deduced, with good reasons, it's what UAC uses.

Google UAC QAS if you want an official assessment, it costs $130 though.
(I saw one QAS posted on PD; it gives you a GPA, a GPA-to-ATAR conversion, and also the GPA+ATAR equivalent Rank used by UNSW Med).

 

[mdoug]

I cant seem to find on the WSU website for med but the GPA is unweighted right? As in an average of all individual subjects score instead of higher weight for last year etc.?

 

[Flying Grades]

Hey guys,
I dont meet the Maths B prereq for JCU med at the moment but I did the senior Maths B exam a month back and was told we need sound achievement to meet the prereq. I studied for the exam but there were a few tricky questions so I'm not too sure if I passed. Does anyone know how 'hard' it is to achieve sound achievement? I have to meet the maths B prereq, as I have a JCU interview coming up and I really dont want to mess this chance up.
Thanks

 

[Crow]

I cant seem to find on the WSU website for med but the GPA is unweighted right? As in an average of all individual subjects score instead of higher weight for last year etc.?

Correct, assuming you were enrolled in the same degree during each of the years.

 

[1234med]

Sorry to butt in but why does CSU have to be our first preference? My other preferences are med (offers don't come out until Jan), so I don't see how having CSU as a lower preference will change anything (given that CSU offers come out on 6th Dec)?

 

[Dr Dent]

I think it's because in previous years, people have received early offers only to end up going with another university. I can't confirm this 100% but it was told verbally to me while on the campus tour by one of the dental school staff.

What I know is that if you don't have CSU as your first preference, then you won't get an offer on 6 Dec. The offer on 6 Dec will be conditional on CSU being first preference on your UAC application.

 

[DrDrLMG!]

I suspect it’s similar to the way WSU give out offers to rural applicants ahead of the main round. To be eligible for an early offer, you have to have WSU as your first preference. If you don’t have WSU as first preference, you won’t get an offer until Jan as you might be eligible for your higher preference. It doesn’t disadvantage you in any way to NOT have WSU as first preference (if you’re eligible for an offer, and in Jan you don’t get your higher preference, you will still get the WSU offer, but in Jan, not Dec). But if you want to receive an early offer, the only way is to preference the course that has these (of which there aren’t many).

You can change preferences after the fact (ie. early Jan), which is what I did. Just need to be mindful of UAC dates and lock out periods.

 

[NecroTed]

I suspect it’s similar to the way WSU give out offers to rural applicants ahead of the main round. To be eligible for an early offer, you have to have WSU as your first preference. If you don’t have WSU as first preference, you won’t get an offer until Jan as you might be eligible for your higher preference. It doesn’t disadvantage you in any way to NOT have WSU as first preference (if you’re eligible for an offer, and in Jan you don’t get your higher preference, you will still get the WSU offer, but in Jan, not Dec). But if you want to receive an early offer, the only way is to preference the course that has these (of which there aren’t many).

You can change preferences after the fact (ie. early Jan), which is what I did. Just need to be mindful of UAC dates and lock out periods.

Is this only for rural students? Will non-rurals get an offer in Dec if they have WSU as their first preference?

 

[1234med]

Thank you both, makes sense now. Will change CSU to Pref #1.
Lmg what do you mean by lock out periods? Do I change CSU to Pref #1 now, then if I somehow get an offer, accept CSU and move it back to my desired preference order?

 

[A1]

Thank you both, makes sense now. Will change CSU to Pref #1.
Lmg what do you mean by lock out periods? Do I change CSU to Pref #1 now, then if I somehow get an offer, accept CSU and move it back to my desired preference order?

The change-preference system often gets locked a few days, could be a week, before an official release round, you need to get your changes in before the lock-out period. Be careful with CSU saying you need to keep it pref #1 until late Dec (don't know why so, I thought we could change anytime after accepting/enrolling in CSU; perhaps they don't allow enrolling until late Dec?) as that brings you close to the January offer round's lock-out.

 

[DrDrLMG!]

Is this only for rural students? Will non-rurals get an offer in Dec if they have WSU as their first preference?

Yes, this is only for rural students. No, non-rural students will not get Dec offers, regardless of preferences.

Thank you both, makes sense now. Will change CSU to Pref #1.
Lmg what do you mean by lock out periods? Do I change CSU to Pref #1 now, then if I somehow get an offer, accept CSU and move it back to my desired preference order?

I got WSU offer last year on about the 21st of Dec. I still had plenty of time to accept and change preferences for the Jan round of UAC. Double check, but I don’t think the lock out was until early Jan (like the 4th or something).

 

[DrDrLMG!]

Hey so got my final year GPA results
Improved from 6.5 (Sem 1) to a 6.63 (overall) was wondering whether this would change much for my chances at unsw, JMP and JCU.
Rural for only 5 years at rrma4 / ra2
Cheers everyone

It definitely won't change your chances at JMP as GPA is a hurdle requirement only and 6.5 is already well above. It will slightly improve your rank score combination at UNSW where GPA is 1/6 of the requirement (50/50 with ATAR to make 1/3, so a bit but only very marginally - though obviously better than a move in the other direction, so, yay!). JCU is more of an unknown.

 

[Med3]

Hey!

Does anyone know when WSU offers come out, is it the December round on UAC or the January round?
I hate not knowing how long i have to wait to find out things

 

[DrDrLMG!]

Hey!

Does anyone know when WSU offers come out, is it the December round on UAC or the January round?
I hate not knowing how long i have to wait to find out things

Dec if you’re rural with WSU as first preference. Otherwise, Jan.

 

[Potater]

Thanks Yamster!


So when you walked in, they asked you whether you were from Orange. If you said no, then they gave you a bag with some tourist info. In that bag was also a sheet about CSU dent and on the first page it says that offers are released on 6 December. The guy from my tour also confirmed it. In saying that though, you have to have CSU as your first preference and the offers are apparently conditional on you keeping CSU as your first preference on UAC until late December.

In saying that though, on the UAC website, it has somewhat different information regarding offer dates.

So do we need to keep CSU dent as our first preference for dec 6 offers?

Not sure how reliable the info is but I called up CSU and the lady on the phone told me there would be offers released on the 6th of Dec. for all applicants and that we didn't need to put CSU as our first preference.

 

[DrDrLMG!]

So do we need to keep CSU dent as our first preference for dec 6 offers?

Not sure how reliable the info is but I called up CSU and the lady on the phone told me there would be offers released on the 6th of Dec. for all applicants and that we didn't need to put CSU as our first preference.

Was the person you spoke to from Dent admissions specifically? Or general admissions? I don’t know a great deal about CSU, but generally speaking, to get even close to accurate admissions info from Universities, you really need to check in with Med/Dent specifically, because those two courses often have unique features that not all general admissions staff seem to be aware of.

 

[Potater]

Was the person you spoke to from Dent admissions specifically? Or general admissions? I don’t know a great deal about CSU, but generally speaking, to get even close to accurate admissions info from Universities, you really need to check in with Med/Dent specifically, because those two courses often have unique features that not all general admissions staff seem to be aware of.

I think she was from general admissions, yeah fair enough. It might be best just to put it as first preference just incase. Thanks!