Quick Questions Thread #2: 2018-2019

[A1]

Yes, any pre-ATAR or estimate ATAR offers from health sc degrees? When is the Offer round for these schools?

You still have not answered *why* haha.

Iirc to get a pre-ATAR early offer you have to put it at 1st pref (otherwise it would be pending the non-early prefs). What you need to do is find out which of the Health Sc schools participate in the pre-ATAR round, put it first, get an offer, accept the offer then move the pref to bottom. I don't think it's advisable to delete the pref to make room for more.

EtA: You have to find out/confirm that the prefs are delocked after the pre-ATAR offer round and you have time to move it to bottom *before* Med interview invites are issued. Failing that you could be locked out of a Med interview.

 

[Michael Wan]

You still have not answered *why* haha.

Iirc to get a pre-ATAR early offer you have to put it at 1st pref (otherwise it would be pending the non-early prefs). What you need to do is find out which of the Health Sc schools participate in the pre-ATAR round, put it first, get an offer, accept the offer then move the pref to bottom. I don't think it's advisable to delete the pref to make room for more.

EtA: You have to find out/confirm that the prefs are delocked after the pre-ATAR offer round and you have time to move it to bottom *before* Med interview invites are issued. Failing that you could be locked out of a Med interview.

Thanks again. I am hoping that a pre-ATAR offer will secure a place in one of the health science degree first while hoping for the Medicine interview. Where could I locate any Unis that offer pre-ATAR rounds? I could not find it on the UAC website.

Also, is my School responsible for sending the estimated ATAR to UAC for all Unis to look at?

 

[A1]

Thanks again. I am hoping that a pre-ATAR offer will secure a place in one of the health science degree first while hoping for the Medicine interview. Where could I locate any Unis that offer pre-ATAR rounds? I could not find it on the UAC website.

Also, is my School responsible for sending the estimated ATAR to UAC for all Unis to look at?

You need to contact each of the Health Sc schools you are interested in, ask whether they participate in pre-ATAR offer rounds. If so how do they want to obtain your predicted ATAR, is it from you with a school's stamp (how WSU Med used to do) or directly from your school (how UNSW Med used to do).

From my pov though, you don't really need to secure a Health Sc offer early. You can place them below your Med prefs and if you don't get any Med it will automatically descend to the Health Sc prefs.

 

[Logic]

Thanks A1 for this clear explanation. I have initially out UNSW Med, WSU Med, JMP Med, UTS Clinical Sc and Macquarie Cl Sc in that order on UAC. Now as my UMAT was not good (S1 50 S2 60), WSU and JMP are most certainly out now, should I put something like Physio or Nursing in the #2 and #3 (keeping UNSW as I might still have a slim chance) replacing WSU and JMP hoping that they might give me an early offer if they look at the estimated ATAR or something? Can I even risk by taking out UNSW Medicine now and put it back right after the ATAR release date before the deadline for UAC preference changes for the Medicine round?

I'm not sure about this, but maybe someone can confirm. Don't the medicine courses have a deadline that you have to have them added on your preferences and after then can not be added. So if you remove one later, you won't be able to add it? (or is this for QTAC)A1 LMG!

Edited by LMG!: A1 answered this above, I believe.

 

[Ruffle]

I'm not sure about this, but maybe someone can confirm. Don't the medicine courses have a deadline that you have to have them added on your preferences and after then can not be added. So if you remove one later, you won't be able to add it? (or is this for QTAC)A1 LMG!

Yep that's right, all med/dent preferences have to be in by the time the TACs close preferences for the first time. (This is because interview offers and some interviews occur between then, and when the TACs open for non-med/dent courses again.)

 

[tod]

Edited by mod (LMG) after moving from incorrect thread:

Is it fine to re-use past written applications. Just a lot of what i plan to write is very similar, I wanted to know whether there is any penalty for reusing previous year's written application verbatim. Thanks

 

[Jaburi]

On the WSU medicine applicants page, it states that offers will be based on the interview and UMAT scores (with more emphasis placed on the interview).

Why is it that we believe once you get an interview, everyone is on an even playing field and UMAT/ATAR seizes to matter when the site states that explicitly? Would it possibly be weighted 66/33 (interview/UMAT), instead?

Thank you!

 

[Mana]

On the WSU medicine applicants page, it states that offers will be based on the interview and UMAT scores (with more emphasis placed on the interview).

Why is it that we believe once you get an interview, everyone is on an even playing field and UMAT/ATAR seizes to matter when the site states that explicitly? Would it possibly be weighted 66/33 (interview/UMAT), instead?

Thank you!

We believe this because the universities have given us ample indication that this is the case.

It's never weighted as you suggested above - if anything the traditional criteria is to use the ATAR/UMAT/interview in equal or close to equal weighting.

The newer thoughts are based somewhat on the principle that 'good enough is good enough' academically but you really really seriously want to be weeding those candidates out that are unsuited to medicine (which supposedly the interview is good at doing). By weighting the interview heavily we ensure that the people who get in are those who don't exhibit unsuitable personality traits.

 

[Crow]

Hi tod, which universities are you applying to? JCU, UNSW, UTas? The requirements for the written application are quite different for each.

 

[BethMark25]

On the WSU medicine applicants page, it states that offers will be based on the interview and UMAT scores (with more emphasis placed on the interview).

Why is it that we believe once you get an interview, everyone is on an even playing field and UMAT/ATAR seizes to matter when the site states that explicitly? Would it possibly be weighted 66/33 (interview/UMAT), instead?

Thank you!

I may be remembering this incorrectly, but I’m pretty sure that at some point during the application process last year they told us outright that place offers are based on the interview, UMAT has minimal involvement but may be used as a tiebreaker.

 

[DrDrLMG!]

I may be remembering this incorrectly, but I’m pretty sure that at some point during the application process last year they told us outright that place offers are based on the interview, UMAT has minimal involvement but may be used as a tiebreaker.

I seem to recall this being the case, too, BethMark25.

 

[Jaburi]

Ok great! Thank you guys very much.

By weighting the interview heavily we ensure that the people who get in are those who don't exhibit unsuitable personality traits.

I’m not sure if this is the wrong place to be asking, but what are some of the personality traits that interviewers don’t/do want?

 

[inatah]

hi i'm from victoria and was wondering what medicine unis required predicted atars?
thanks for the help!

 

[A1]

hi i'm from victoria and was wondering what medicine unis required predicted atars?
thanks for the help!

JCU does, as their interview selection is partly based on ATAR and conducted before its release.
Possibly Curtin even though their interstate interviews are in January. UWA requires but only for WA students iirc.

 

[DrDrLMG!]

Edited by mod (LMG) after moving from incorrect thread:

Is it fine to re-use past written applications. Just a lot of what i plan to write is very similar, I wanted to know whether there is any penalty for reusing previous year's written application verbatim. Thanks

I'd think it would be VERY important to consider why (if this is the case) those written applications did not get you the results you wanted last year. If you applied to JCU and did not get an interview, then I would seriously consider what about your application likely contributed to this and make alterations accordingly. Similarly, if you applied to UTAS and did not get an offer, then consider your responses and make changes accordingly.

I'd think doing exactly the same thing and expecting a different result is a recipe for actually getting exactly the same result.

 

[PeterParkerPen]

I'm a non-standard and was wondering if anyone knew how the unis get our GPA for the entire year? Some interview offers come out before my university's results are released and I'm looking at being able to bump up my GPA with this sem's results. Will they just be ranking me based off of first sem only?

 

[Logic]

I'm a non-standard and was wondering if anyone knew how the unis get our GPA for the entire year? Some interview offers come out before my university's results are released and I'm looking at being able to bump up my GPA with this sem's results. Will they just be ranking me based off of first sem only?

The universities that require your GPA usually give interviews in later rounds e.g. the second round to allow your GPA results to come out so they can see if you're above cut off, while other unis offer interviews based on just UMAT, and then look at your GPA later to see if it meets requirements. Hope that helps

ETA: oops I read that q wrong. Yes usually though TACs

 

[Crow]

I'm a non-standard and was wondering if anyone knew how the unis get our GPA for the entire year?

You apply to each TAC, then the TAC's contact your university to send through your results as they work through each student's application. This is only important for JCU and UNSW though, as WSU and JMP interview prior to actually checking if you meet the GPA cutoff.

 

[DrDrLMG!]

I'm a non-standard and was wondering if anyone knew how the unis get our GPA for the entire year? Some interview offers come out before my university's results are released and I'm looking at being able to bump up my GPA with this sem's results. Will they just be ranking me based off of first sem only?

Further to what has already been mentioned; we occasionally have people asking how they make sure the TACs have the correct GPA. The key here is to make sure your own UNIVERSITY has your correct GPA. What the Uni has is what the TAC will get, which is handy because it is (well, should be!) an easier process to confirm the GPA held by your uni. Mine (UTAS) was available by requesting an online statement of results (perhaps called academic record or academic transcript). Other unis might have different methods, but it can be worth checking early if there’s an issue (which is highly unlikely, in my experience, but also complicated to get addressed on the off chance that it is wrong - if that makes sense!).

 

[PeterParkerPen]

The universities that require your GPA usually give interviews in later rounds e.g. the second round to allow your GPA results to come out so they can see if you're above cut off, while other unis offer interviews based on just UMAT, and then look at your GPA later to see if it meets requirements. Hope that helps

ETA: oops I read that q wrong. Yes usually though TACs

Yep JCU was the one I was looking at because of its 9th November round. Is there any disadvantage in having to be considered in the second invitation batch?