UCAT Results Discussion 2019

[A1]

Hi - was also wondering if I could get realistic chances for a UNSW interview invite/offer based on a 3020 UCAT (97th percentile) and 98.6 ATAR, then for a 99.00 ATAR? Thanks

97%ile + 99.0 should get a UNSW interview with 20-30% offer chance.
98.6 is kinda borderline for interview, if you get one it's like 10-15% offer chance.

 

[serendipity]

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[kpsmms]

I have a 96% ucat, but I'm going to get a pretty low atar, maybe around 93/94. Is there any chance of getting into any unis beside JMP? I'm not rural.

 

[Misa]

Hi A1, would you be able to guesstimate my chances of landing a UNSW offer with a 99.40 atar (my EAS would make it 99.95 though) and a 2950 (95%ile) UCAT? I'm RA 2

Just out of speculation, these marks look more than sufficient for a rural place, will let A1 make that call though

 

[Misa]

I have a 96% ucat, but I'm going to get a pretty low atar, maybe around 93/94. Is there any chance of getting into any unis beside JMP? I'm not rural.

If you're GWS then maybe UWS

 

[bigyikes]

Just out of speculation, these marks look more than sufficient for a rural place, will let A1 make that call though

Shouldn't this person have already got the UNSW interview invite? I was under the impression UNSW already sent out invites for rural students.

 

[CatzDreaming]

Shouldn't this person have already got the UNSW interview invite? I was under the impression UNSW already sent out invites for rural students.

They're referring to a place offer not interview invite.

 

[DrDrLMG!]

My friend has got an interview to Adelaide with UCAT in low 60's. She is from VIC, currently living non rural, but was in rural 5 - 6 years ago.

Yeah, that would do it. You don't have to be currently living rurally to be an eligible rural candidate.

I have a 96% ucat, but I'm going to get a pretty low atar, maybe around 93/94. Is there any chance of getting into any unis beside JMP? I'm not rural.

JMP will be your only option, best of luck!

 

[Crow]

Hi A1, would you be able to guesstimate my chances of landing a UNSW offer with a 99.40 atar (my EAS would make it 99.95 though) and a 2950 (95%ile) UCAT? I'm RA 2

Be aware that UNSW doesn't use the RA system for rural classification (they use the RRMA system), so being RA-2 might not translate into an RRMA-3 or higher. You can check what your address is classified as here: Health Workforce Locator

 

[serendipity]

Be aware that UNSW doesn't use the RA system for rural classification (they use the RRMA system), so being RA-2 might not translate into an RRMA-3 or higher. You can check what your address is classified as here: Health Workforce Locator

Thanks for the replies guys I'm rrma 3

I heard that for rurals there are 55 places out of 150 interviewees. Does this mean that I need to place in the top 55? How would a 99.40 atar / 99.95 selection rank and a 95%ile and rrma of 3 factor in?

 

[A1]

Hi A1, would you be able to guesstimate my chances of landing a UNSW offer with a 99.40 atar (my EAS would make it 99.95 though) and a 2950 (95%ile) UCAT? I'm RRMA 3

You are another case that I wonder if you'd be better off in the general pool rather than rural. With both pools having the same 1 in 3 offer ratio

- in the general pool I estimate your 99.95 + 95%ile is around 70% offer chance
- in the rural pool, since UNSW adds a rurality rating to the calculation and RRMA3 is the lowest, it COULD drag down your ATAR+UCAT advantage.

Hypothetically if UNSW treat all rural applicants as equally rural your offer chance in the rural pool is like 90%. But dragged down by RRMA3 vs others RRMA 4-7 I don't know. It's a difficult call.

 

[serendipity]

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[DrDrLMG!]

Thanks A1. Do you know by any chance roughly the distribution of the rrma scale? Like are there more 5-6's than 3'4's? I guess it would be hard to tell.

Also, does UNSW rank each individual per section and then average your ranks? I heard that they don't allow for outlier results though.

As with all rural/remote locations in Australia, as you move from inner city to very remote the population decreases. There would be less RRMA 5 and 6 applicants than RRMA 3 and 4 applicants by virtue of the fact that less people live in those locations to start with.

ETA: predicting your chances if you were ‘more’ rural is literally pointless and irrelevant to your situation because you’re not and it’s not something you can change.

 

[A1]

Also, does UNSW rank each individual per section and then average your ranks? I heard that they don't allow for outlier results though.

Having consulted with other mods we believe you are still better off in the rural pool despite RRMA3. Your offer chance is around 85-90%.

Before 2018 UNSW used to standardise the three components ATAR UMAT Interview by z-score. With this method my UMAT for example was 6 standard deviations above mean whereas a 99%ile was around 2 SDs above. I mean a 99%ile has quite an advantage over 90ish, mine was three times that again. This obviously skewed the final ranking calculations.

UNSW now say they don't allow outlier scores to average out low scores. One possible method is by ranks, where a 100%ile is one/a few ranks not three times better than 99%ile. It's a speculation, we don't know exactly how UNSW do.

 

[ucatboy]

Having consulted with other mods we believe you are still better off in the rural pool despite RRMA3. Your offer chance is around 85-90%.

Before 2018 UNSW used to standardise the three components ATAR UMAT Interview by z-score. With this method my UMAT for example was 6 standard deviations above mean whereas a 99%ile was around 2 SDs above. I mean a 99%ile has quite an advantage over 90ish, mine was three times that again. This obviously skewed the final ranking calculations.

UNSW now say they don't allow outlier scores to average out low scores. One possible method is by ranks, where a 100%ile is one/a few ranks not three times better than 99%ile. It's a speculation, we don't know exactly how UNSW do.

1 standard deviation, if I recall correctly was ~25. How high was your UMAT score??

My totally unverified and absolutely baseless theory is that UNSW will scrape off the bottom 10-15% of interviewees regardless of their scores in the other two components.

As in: "3600 UCAT? 99.95 ATAR? That's great but you still need to achieve a minimum of 10/15th percentile in the interview to retain your "guaranteed" spot."

 

[DrDrLMG!]

1 standard deviation, if I recall correctly was ~25. How high was your UMAT score??

Haha, lol... wait for it...

 

[ucatman]

Just out of curiousity, how many seats are there for graduate entry in UQ? Is it similar to the provisional entry or would it be greater?

 

[Retired Member]

1 standard deviation, if I recall correctly was ~25. How high was your UMAT score??

My totally unverified and absolutely baseless theory is that UNSW will scrape off the bottom 10-15% of interviewees regardless of their scores in the other two components.

As in: "3600 UCAT? 99.95 ATAR? That's great but you still need to achieve a minimum of 10/15th percentile in the interview to retain your "guaranteed""spot.

 

[A1]

1 standard deviation, if I recall correctly was ~25. How high was your UMAT score??

The z-scores are calculated on the applicants in contention, its standard deviation is much tighter than 25.
To illustrate, 95%ile was 190, 99%ile starts from 200, mine was 235. Whatever the SD was I was 3 times better over 99th compared to 99th over 95th.

Similarly with FunTimes' 3540, 3 times better over a 3000 (97th?) compared to 3000 over 2840 (90th) which would put FT at 120th not 99th %ile in linear-algebra terms.

My totally unverified and absolutely baseless theory is that UNSW will scrape off the bottom 10-15% of interviewees regardless of their scores in the other two components.

As in: "3600 UCAT? 99.95 ATAR? That's great but you still need to achieve a minimum of 10/15th percentile in the interview to retain your "guaranteed""spot.

Very possible, by ranks is just one of the possible methods.

 

[A1]

6 standard deviations is 99.9999998026825%tile or 1 in 500 000 000. In otherwise, impossible

That^ is based on a normal distribution population. Med applicants are abnormal