Medicine 2020

[EightToSixer]

Ok, so I know it's super early, but I've been hovering at the medicine 18 and 19 threads. DD is keen to apply for medicine in 2020. Is anyone else in the same boat?
I thought it would be useful to share info and stories, it's all a very steep learning curve because despite me now having a PhD and working in a RG university I was late to learning and not a patch on my DD who is very driven and organised.
Hopefully people will find this group and we can share the rollercoaster of the next two years.

My daughter is in year 12 and looking to apply for Sept 2021 entry. The information and support on this board is staggering, so thank you everyone who contributes. Good luck to all the DCs who have, or who are just about to hand in their UCAS forms.

One question I have is how much research into the application process and various opportunities have you, as parents, done rather than your DCs? My DH appears to think that is should all be down to DD but she is so busy with school work and sport that she doesn't have as much time as I do look at the different options.

The second question I have is do you know of any Medical Schools who won't make an offer if you've not been to an open day prior to application? I know in an ideal world we would go and visit everywhere DD is interested in, but because of her sporting commitments on weekends it will be difficult to get to many, especially next June/July. DD says she will be happy to go wherever will take her!

No medical schools will discriminate against people who have not been able to get to open days but you do pick up useful tips and get a feel for places. Obviously medics will have to visit the places for interviews anyway.

In terms of who does the research, of course it should be the DC, and some make a great job of it, but others struggle to navigate their way through this very complex path.

My DS did a certain amount of research, but did not do enough interview prep so got 4 interviews but no offers. He is accepting more support this year, one of the issues quite a few of them have is that they have glided along as the top achievers in their schools and are a bit complacent.

Another one who thinks GANFYD gives awesome advice on the student room 👍
Lion fish I would say dd has done 99% of it on her own. I wasn't sure this was right for her but she has matured a lot this last year (August baby so just turned 17) and she has come out of every work experience happy and positive and having throughly enjoyed herself. She's been quite alarmed by my recent interest in fact checking for her 😱 and has asked me to chill back out 😂 but she has enjoyed having company for the open days.

@lionfish I think it is really important that applicants research for themselves. It teaches independent research and thinking and means they are invested in the whole process. As to whether I would trust them to do the whole thing by themselves? I guess that depends on the child. Mine were certainly too lazy to read all the websites and make the spreadsheets I advise and see some of the applicants doing - they would just have applied to wherever their friends were going. So that is how I got started - fact checking, researching and information gathering so I could let DS1 (who had less than stellar results at the time) choose from a list of med schools he actually had a chance of getting in at! DS2 was easier, as on paper he was a strong applicant, but shy, nervous and definitely not worldly wise! Luckily, despite fighting me every inch of their lives in every other aspect, they were happy to listen and actually did not attend a single Open Day as did not want to like somewhere they were not going to have a chance of a place. When offers came in, we had interviews and tours done and were able to e-visit any they were unsure about. School got so irritated with them and gave such bad advice, I have declined to offer my knowledge base through them, instead my DCs bring those keen on medicine to me and together we make sure they have enough info to challenge school. This is a top flight Grammar School and their lack of knowledge is part of what keeps me online offering advice - if a medical, motivated parent struggles to find the relevant facts and a high-performing school cannot offer any support, how are the children who have neither of these expected to find these things out?!
@Monkey2001 will tell you how frustrated I get at the lack of an applicants ability to check a website or do a Google search, though!!

And thanks to you all for the warm welcome

one of the issues quite a few of them have is that they have glided along as the top achievers in their schools and are a bit complacent.

This can become a real issue if they do get in. Students who have always been top of their year at school can have major difficulty coping when they come 100th in the year in their first medical school exams. Some of them find it hard to grasp that everyone else around them was top of their year at school, too. More troublingly, some are terrified of having to tell their parents they are in the middle of the cohort rather than right at the top.

@GANFYD and @speedyhedgehog, thanks for your advice. DD is doing her own research and up until now I've left her to it. She organised 5 days of work experience at a hospital over the summer and has created an Excel spreadsheet that she's populating by going through the uni websites. However, she has missed the deadline to apply for the Access to Medicine at Bristol University (a course for year 12 pupils) because she knew applications were opening in the Autumn term, checked last weekend and realised the closing date was last Friday. I'm just wondering if I should have been more proactive on her behalf really?

Whilst trawling Twitter this week I have also found a scheme which allows students to complete 3 days of work experience at a GP surgery and a session at a medical conference for prospective medical students. She's wasn't aware of either of these schemes and school haven't mentioned them either even though there are many students looking at Medicine. She's at a state comprehensive that is successful in getting students to medical school most years. Part of me thinks that it's up to her to do this research, but at the same time she is busy and doesn't even use Twitter!

As far as Uni choices go, she's happy to go wherever will have her (!) so will apply tactically based on her GCSEs (9A stars and 5A), predicted grades and UCAT score. As we won't have this info until late next summer/early September she doesn't want to miss sporting commitments over the summer to visit places that may not be options anyway. We'll try and do a couple next September but am worried she'd be looked at less favourably if she hasn't attended their Open Day.

Thanks for the advice. I'll continue to let her drive the research but will prod her with any additional information I find!

how much research into the application process and various opportunities have you, as parents, done rather than your DCs

Lots but it was probably ~85% wasted. DD absorbed & acted almost only on info she found herself -- or from school advice.. She likes asking me questions. I work in a medical school, I've fielded questions at open days & interviewed a few 100 candidates! DD is a control freak, wanted to do it herself, and only she she was ready. Had no patience for spreadsheets.

I'm important as a sounding board & sometimes with practical stuff like helping her figure out how to print out a bank statement so she could get DBS on her nursing home placement.

The other useful thing I did was get her a work experience placement (2 days in a GP surgery, summer right after yr11 finished). Favour from a colleague at work. It's the only clinical placement DD got.

ps: I also found out about & sent DD to this <a class="break-all" href="https://www.rsm.ac.uk/events/schools/2018-19/smm02/www.rsm.ac.uk/events/schools/2018-19/smm02/" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">1 day (annual) event. She seemed to enjoy it.

Just been to the Edinburgh open day and DS loved the city but was utterly underwhelmed by the course talk. As they only have 59 RUK places he thinks it is not worth a slightly risky application, so he is dropping it for (probably) Leicester. Maybe it is because they know they are so popular that the guy giving the talk gave about 15 mins of very generic stuff which really did not inspire.

Edinburgh is lovely. It isn’t risky with the right stats.

Does anyone have any idea when the final UCAT deciles are published? I’ve looked but can’t find a date for this year

Ignore me - just found it. Tomorrow!

Ooh I had forgotten about those. Tomorrow it is.
I thought it was strange that the universities don't get the UCAT scores with the applications. The students know their scores already but the universities don't?
BMAT Prep is underway here. Can anyone give a breakdown of scores etc like we had above for ucat for us all?

They have to wait for everyone to have sat their BMAT before deciles etc can be put out.
I suppose how good one has to do at the BMAT is largely dependent on the university applied to. I know if DD applies to Leeds, she could score 0 on the BMAT and still get an interview. Oxford generally likes scores approaching 6. As per their website. On the Cambridge assessment website, they break down how many students get each score !

@Cleopatrai Can you explain your statement regarding Leeds? Looking at the Leeds website, they don't appear to give any hard and fast criteria as to how they assess the applications (just saying "they consider"). What are the other criteria that are good enough for Leeds that would mean you could get a zero score on BMAT and still get an interview?

I am afraid Cleopatrai is mistaken about Leeds. For 2019 entry, the cut off to get an interview was 37/40 so somebody with perfect academics still needed 2/5 for BMAT.

The Leeds system is to score out of:
27 points for GCSEs or AS levels,
8 points for A levels and
5 points for BMAT

The GCSEs are 3 for an A*, 2 for A, 1 for B, including sciences, English Lang and Maths. Alternatively you can get 27/27 if you have 3 As at AS level.

A level - get 8/8 for AAA predicted/achieved, not worth considering applying without AAA; although technically you can, you lose too many points.

BMAT - they band the scores of the applicants and top 20% get 5/5, next 20% 4/5 etc. Last year 5,5,3A was enough for 5/5. They will not disclose exactly how they calculate the score, but they have told people that they do not score the letter in the section 3 score and that S1 and S2 have twice the weighting of S3.

This year there will be many more people with perfect academic scores as there are a lot of 8/9s around compared to A*s, so I would be amazed if the cut off went down, and not surprised if it went up to 38.

It can't really go higher than 38 because only 40% can score 4 or 5 for BMAT unless that 40% with 4/5 also have perfect academics, they have to interview at least some people with a score of 38.

(Last year there were 2,500 applicants and 1,000 interviewed, so 40%)

Stats have been released

www.ucat.ac.uk/media/1329/2019-test-statistics-oct-2019.pdf

Can you believe 29,375 took it this year!

The percentile tool is really handy too!

Yes @speedyhedgehog the percentile tool is really helpful isn't it. DD (who is very fed up with BMAT revision at the moment) just got a massive boost from her exact percentile. It looks likely that this, combined with her gcses, A-Level predictions and personal statement where scored, should get her interviews in her 3 UCAT institutions. Oxford is still a wildcard, but it always will be for everyone I imagine.
Maybe DD will give herself a night off the BMAT prep in celebration (not counting on it though!)

They have a lower cut-off for contextual students.

Morning!

So if 27,000 people took the ucat how many med places are there?

The odds are looking tough...

Correction! 29k!

I think I read somewhere it's 7700! Gulp!

Not all 29,000 people who take the test will be applying for medicine. Some will be applying for dentistry; some will be applying next year and are taking the test as practice; some will run training courses/write books and are only sitting the test to memorize questions.

Also, I'm not sure whether the number is students taking the test in the UK or if it also includes those taking it for entry to medical schools in Australia, New Zealand, Italy, Poland, Iraqi Kurdistan and Grenada.