Manchester Uni for medicine - don’t want her to take a gap year!

[Cluelessatthisstuff]

DD didn’t get into her first choice - Oxford. Insurance was Manchester which is a very good RG university and I believe has the biggest medical department in UK. Daughter wants to resit a subject in the hope of getting an A* but I’m really uneasy about this, namely because all of her friends are going away for uni so she’ll be at home, alone and working part time in Costa coffee. I just don’t think she’ll be happy.

Does anyone have any experience with Manchester uni? Doesn’t have to be medicine specifically but anything that could help my DD? Thanks

Your dd should definitely take Manchester.
My dd is in year 12 ( about to start year 13)at a highly regarded grammar school.
She said that the most popular university among her peers was Manchester University

I don’t think Oxford has the equivalent prestige with respect to medicine that it does with respect to other subjects.
I’m not knocking it, I studied a humanity there and can’t prais it enough personally, but I think even in the early 90s Edinburgh and some London schools of Medicine were probably regarded as more prestigious, although as others say, once you’ve qualified, I don’t think the institution counts for much.
I think she’d be mad to turn down Manchester.
The Medics at my Oxford college were evident in 0th Week - Freshers, and then disappeared from sight. I think they have a very heavy workload, and has someone else commented, they have to wait a long time to get clinical experience (that might have changed).

She should go to Manchester. All UK medical schools provide the necessary training to become a doctor, and many doctors would argue that Oxbridge do not provide the best training. No-one will care which university she has her medical degree from. Resitting is not going to guarantee a place at Oxbridge.

Just finished reading all of your replies. Thank you! I name changed so she could read them. Will discuss with her tomorrow.

To answer a few questions, she’s interested in the practising side of medicine but is open to research (hence the push for Oxford). We have a call tomorrow with Oxford to discuss options but I really think she’d be making a mistake taking a year out. I was never keen on her applying to Oxbridge because of the pressures (dh was an Oxbridge medicine student and he really disliked it). My DD has issues with perfectionism, her grades were impeccable at GCSE and AS level so I think this came as a bit of a surprise. She chose Manchester as her insurance as she knows the area well (family up there).

We will see what Oxford has to say but she really does need to make a decision and quickly.

Speaking as mum of a medic and of a Manchester student (not the same dc) I agree with PPs. If your dd wants to be a doctor it makes little difference where she studies in the long run. In fact the teaching style at Manchester is probably better preparation for being an NHS doctor than Oxford.

But Manchester is an urban, very lively city with all the associate crime, drugs and seediness that involves. It will be a very different experience for your dd than she imagined herself having. If what she really wants is the whole dreaming spires Brideshead experience then she should take a year out and apply (perhaps to do something else) at Oxford.

I know most medical schools don't accept re-takes. I'm sure Oxford scorns them. Your dd really needs to consider what her priorities are.

If the idea of resitting/reapplying is purely to get into Oxbridge then she's wasting her time, as pp have said. In any case, if the goal is to be a doctor, then I would say she'll get a better training at Manchester anyway. And she'll get over the Oxford thing, wherever she goes. But if she's got cold feet about Manc as a destination since she applied, then I would listen to that. I have a DC at Manchester and it's an excellent uni, but the city itself scares me silly (not that that's likely to be why she's hesitating, I assume).

Another one saying she’d be mad to take a year out. I work in university admissions (admittedly not medicine but in another highly competitive subject) and I’ve seen many people reject an offer, apply to the same course the following year and not get an offer. We only accept 10% of the people who apply to our Faculty and so we don’t look favourably on resits - we have our pick of applicants who get the necessary qualifications the first time around.

If she wants to be a doctor then she should grab the Manchester offer with both hands. I have two friends with excellent qualifications and experience volunteering in clinical settings who didn’t get into any of the medical programmes they applied for.

My sister went to Manchester uni. She took a gap year because she didn't get any offers first time around, due to not having chemistry a level. She didn't take the a level in her gap year though because she would then have been getting only conditional offers contingent on her chemistry grade and it was too risky, she didn't want to miss out on whatever grade she needed and end up doing another gap year. So she did things like a sign language course, worked in care home etc then applied and got an unconditional offer from Manchester.

Manchester is a problem based learning course. You have to do a lot of the research work yourself and don't just sit there in lectures having all the info handed to you. Some people struggle with that but a lot of people believe it sets you up for your long term career. The responsibility is on the student for making sure they see particular things on their placements, ask people for more info on things, and do research independently. I believe at Oxbridge you have 3 years of lectures before going on placements but at Manchester you are on them from the beginning.

From the experience my sister and her friends have had, they've all come out with amazing grades and forgone on to start great careers in medicine from Manchester uni. Your daughter needs to figure out what kind of course she wants to do although I would say taking an extra year to get an A* seems like a huge gamble. Even if she isn't keen on PBL, she will have to do it after the 3 years of lectures anyway.

Good luck I hope she makes the right choice for her.

I am normally very pro people taking gap years as I think they give an element of breathing space, a chance to reflect on the years of education so far and a year without the pressure of exams to readjust and rebalance. However, in this case, I absolutely think she should take Manchester. Medicine places are a tricky beast and a year in this context, or rather resitting, at best adds very little to her options, and at worst actively harms them.

I'd say if she has issues with perfectionism she is probably better off NOT going to Oxford TBH.

Also you can do research at any Medical School or NHS Trust. There is highly prestigious research going on EVERYWHERE. It's not like the humanities or trying to get into Cambridge for Computer Science.

FFS I'm doing unique research off my own bat based on me and my mate in the middle of nowhere after doing nothing for most of my career. Medicine's kind of like that.

Manchester seems massively over-subscribed and it's tough to get a place to read Medicine at the best of times (one of my relatives has just failed to do that and one of their parents is a doctor, studied at Manchester actually!). I really wouldn't throw the place away lightly, as they may not allow her to defer.

She really needs to check with both institutions before making any decisions - good luck, it's a hard decision to make.

This question may be pointless - they simply may not accept resits in this situation. She needs to contact them and find out that first, then she'll know if she even needs to ask herself this question. It may well be Manchester... or Manchester.

I’m a Head of Sixth Form, and while you have had lots of great advice, I just wanted to add that I would be very careful of retakes to get A*s.

Sometimes retakes work, for example if a student completely messes up a paper as they didn’t get understand a large component, or there are mitigating circumstances. But, for every one that improves their grades there are many more retakers who don’t improve, particularly at the top level. I see students who are so committed to improving their grades in August, but by Christmas it is just such a hard slog to carry out the level of practice and revision needed completely independently without lessons, homework or assessments that are structured by a school. This is particularly true at the top level where fine-tuning gaps in knowledge/skills is so hard without being immersed in a school. It is also particularly true of students who were extremely motivated and worked as hard as they could first time round which I’m sure your daughter did given her desire to study medicine at Oxford, and achieve 3 A grades.

I would seriously recommend she goes to Manchester, and honestly would recommend the same for any student at my school.

Good luck to her.

Manchester is one of the biggest centres for scientific research in the country. If that’s her interest, I think it’s be a good fit for her.

Does she know if research is her thing and she goes to Manchester medicine she can intercalate and do a year research Masters at another uni?

Better way of using a year out than working in a Costa (or a care home come to that).

Manchester is a great university experience for medics. My best friend went there. It's a very friendly medical school. Incidentally, for halls lots of the medical students live in hulme hall in Victoria park, close to MRI and a great, close knit hall. It's mostly catered with shared bathrooms but a very active student-run social life with lots of great things on offer (not just alcohol based!).

Manchester doesn't rank very highly for medicine I dont think

Yes it is. Manchester is very highly regarded for all Sciences. I had a superb student with straight A*s not get in. If Manchester have offered then bite their hand off for all the reasons given above.

Manchester Uni is a good uni. And it's a great city to live in. We all so have some of the best hospitals in the country.

She won'y get in to Oxford next year. Manchester is a great alternative.

Your DD must do what makes her happy. But having said that, I completely agree with all the previous posts. Manchester has a great reputation and once she’s qualified nobody will care where the degree came from

I did my medical degree at Manchester and I teach medical students now as part of my job. I have academic and clinical colleagues who went to wide variety of medical schools and it really doesn't come up unless we're reminiscing about student romance.
I think that she should take the place in Manchester. I think that medicine is a degree where it matters much less than (say) law were you do it.

Having read my post above I should add that I've been to a birthday party and I'm quite drunk just now so please don't let my sentence structure put you off Manchester.

Bear in mind that once you've qualified as a doctor, no one cares where you went to university, it's rarely mentioned! She'll probably have a better time at Manchester, Oxford/Cambridge can be very high pressured.

If oxford agree to the resit and she doesn’t get the A* what will she do then?
What if nowhere else gives her a place for medicine because they don’t want a resit.
She runs the risk of no medical school place at all.

I agree with the PPs who are doctors. Nobody cares where you studied once you qualify as a doctor. Even if you want an academic career, the university you read medicine at is immaterial.

If she wants to be a doctor she should take the place at Manchester.

Friends DS going back for second year, he is very happy doing medicine at Manchester, social life good, labs, tutors he has no complaints.