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.

Thank you @speedyhedgehog and @monkey2001

I will take a look at the press release. That’s good to know re St Andrews - we are planning to go to their next open day to see what DD thinks. I did think “no preference” might well be the way to go, and to be honest DD really wouldn’t have a preference!!

I agree about Medic Mentor information. It was definitely out of date in parts!

Thanks again. So much research to do!

If you look at total "core" numbers and deduct the ones reserved for Scottish students, for 2019 entry you are left with
Aberdeen - 25
Dundee - 14
Edinburgh - 76
Glasgow - 46
St Andrew's - 44

There were also 30 "extra" places each for Aberdeen and Glasgow with no indication of allocation. When I find the report about shifting towards more Scottish students, you will see that there was a plan for a tapered move towards more ring-fencing, so it is likely that the RUK numbers will be lower when they release them for 2020 entry.

Dundee at the open day said 16 for rUK

It seems that the SFC issue numbers in March for the following September, so I think that must be a estimate. Will be interesting to see what it is when they release approved numbers for 2020 start.

The medical schools have a difficult juggling act, trying to work out which offers will be firmed and which insured, then who will get grades. Last year Aberdeen made lots of offers to Scottish offer-holders unconditional between taking Highers and results day.

Wow - thanks you @emummy and @Monkey2001 - it’s a bit of an eye opener!

I’m now starting to wonder if putting down a Scottish university is a bad idea. I wonder if figures are released showing how many RUK applications there are for each place in previous years....

That’s interesting about Aberdeen! Did they do that to make sure they filled their places? I guess with highers they at least know some grades that have already been achieved so have more to go on than A Levels?

You can search SFC for prior years and there is loads of information on whatdotheyknow. My son decided not to apply for Aberdeen or Dundee due to the low number of places, but actually as Aberdeen use your academic score as half your post interview score, that might have been a mistake.

In past years St A have had amazing offer/interview rates, around 80%, which might be the highest, so it remains a good option with a strong UCAT score.

The press release for 2019/20 intake is called IntakeTargetsforMedicineAY_2019 but I can't make my phone copy the link

www.sfc.ac.uk/publications-statistics/announcements/2019/SFCAN062019.aspx

Ah marching frogs thats where I remembered it from. But its 59 not 49 places for RUK/EU at Edinburgh this year. It does seem risky but DD loved it so gave it a shot
Should know in the next couple of weeks what the outcome is 😱

But its 59 not 49 places for RUK/EU at Edinburgh this year.

I read it as total places 190, minimum Scottish 114 - so that means up to 76 for RUK?

There's the international student allocation? If thats not included all the better!

It says

Scottish domiciled, rest of UK, and rest of EU - 190

Of which a minimum must be Scottish domiciled and rest of EU - 114

If you add the 10 widening access or the 17 internationals you get the total of 217

Thats good then! I think i just subtracted the internationals too because 49/59 was defintely what i had in mind from when she was looking into applying. Just looked again at the page referenced and did the exact same thing! Duh! Good thing it wasn't me facing those calculation stations 😳 76 sounds much better but still will be on tenterhooks for the next couple of weeks waiting to hear the outcome. Mini monkey did St Andrews not Edinburgh am i correct?

Yes, St Andrew's - I am fully expecting he will be in the 15% rejected....

No!!! He has an entire message thread here rooting for him!!! Any indication given of when decisions will start coming through or just waiting patiently (or otherwise)?

Awww, thanks Speedy! Feb for Sheffield, March for St Andrew's and Leicester. He is reconciled to Biomed as he is fully expecting 3 more rejections, but would be delighted to be wrong!

We are all cheering him on monkey and there will be many ways to use that brain to help people 🙌

Hi all,

Just wanted to wish everyone's DCs all the success they deserve after so much hard work and stress. We were there this time last year. Fingers crossed for them all - and esp to old friends Monkey and Ladsmum juniors [wave].

DD is now extremely happily studying at St Andrews (no preference on application, was given English route, as I believe most/all of the no preference RUK applicants were). She'll almost certainly do the 2nd half of her studies at Manchester, as only a very few end up at Barts (usually those with high final grades - and high family budgets for accommodation!) If anyone wants specific answers about studying at St A, I'm happy to find out for you.

On accommodation at Barts - 1st year halls are quite basic and reasonably priced. After that a lot of students live East where shared accommodation is affordable. However if you want to stay up in the City......

Very quiet on thread.... DD had last interview yesterday. Not sure it went well enough but very relieved to be done & dusted with interviews.

Has anyone heard of haggling about offers? DD has an AAA offer, so what if any other offer she gets = AAA. And nothing lower. There won't be a difference, no such thing as 'insurance offer', unless she can talk one of the medschools into slightly revising the offer down. I don't think DD would be willing to haggle, but I did wonder if it ever works.

Haggling happens around results day, for now the offer grades are set for general and for widening participation. Apparently UCL took a lot with AAA for 2019 entry and Leeds took around 60 with AAB - linear A levels are making it all less certain. You can check the FOIs to see whether the one which has offered A*AA has revealed how much flexibility they have shown in previous years.

The wait for decision feels interminable!

Ahhhhh.... Thanks.
if it helps anyone else, I spent long time on whatdotheyknow. It's a struggle to find any firm statistics on how many actual admissions where applicants missed their A-level grade offers by 1 or 2, wrt MBBS courses. But I found 2 mentions of it happening, for Imperial and Kings CL.

ps: there are so many badly phrased FOI requests on W-D-T-K. Feel amazed by how bad.

There is still time to put FOI requests in to the med schools your DD is considering to find out how many people were allowed in with missed grades before she has to decide which to firm and insure.

Searching whatdotheyknow is an art! Can be better to do the search through Google. I searched A100 missed grades and got several, including this very interesting one for Nottingham 2018 entry - www.whatdotheyknow.com/request/a100_medicine_missed_grades

The responses:

1. Missed their offer by one grade (AAB) and were accepted onto the course. 21

1. Were students rejected with AAB? Yes, 2 students

1. Of those students who missed their grades and were accepted onto the course, how many held Nottingham as their firm choice. 33 – this is the number who missed their grades and were accepted (this included those who may have missed their grades by more than one grade and those who may have the equivalent of their offer but not achieved the subject specific grades). This is why the number is larger than the answer in question 1. Out of the 21 in the answer to question 1, 19 had selected Nottingham as their firm choice.

Very encouraging for Nottingham offer holders worried about achieving grades!

Hand holding here for you all and keeping every crossable limb and digit tightly crossed!
@Medschoolrat....at Sheff DD was offered AAA. On results day she got AAB (one percent shy on the B)....her place was auto offered without discussion. In the meantime, the B got remarked and 3% was added to AAA. So yes, flexibility there but probably this must depend upon the spread of results within any given cohort.

Hope all holding on ok. Found this was the worst part, the waiting. Especially as everyone else seems to have all their offers and know where they are hoping to go. Thinking of you all.

Tinkobell - how long to remarks take for a levels? I wonder how often students do get their places after a remark?