Medicine 2021

[Millylovespuddles]

Hi all
It looks like there’s no medicine 2021 entry thread yet, so it might be an idea to get the ball rolling.
My DD is getting stuck into her A level course, doing well so far, but I’m guessing we parents could do with some mutual support and advice from parents who’ve been here before.

Yes I agree @LaLaFlottes that is a worry - considering we'll probably have some students who choose to defer this year as they don't relish the thought of doing their first year with all lectures online...

Anybody know how this online proctoring works? DS is a bit worried about having to take the test in a mask if he goes to an online centre. He finds masks make him feel a bit breathless (I have this too, but then I have diagnosed asthma). Presumably if he took it from home he wouldn't have to wear the mask. I hear the worry about broadband though.

@Bimkom if you look on the GAMSAT website there is some info about it as that test was sat in this way.
This video might help too:
m.youtube.com/watch?v=EiehIf14Zkg&feature=youtu.be

There's also this link to the Pearson service on the UCAT link -

My usually happy-go-lucky DD has been really rocked with the whole ucat/bmat changes. I’m guessing, like a lot of students planning on doing both, she planned to do ucat in early/mid July, and then the early bmat.

She’s about 80/20 in favour of applying to Oxbridge, but is now wavering. I’ve tried to tell her that everyone will be feeling the same, and could even be to her advantage as a lot of potential applicants might not now ‘have a go’

She still doesn’t know if she will drop the 4th A-level, she should have music exam in November, and thinks it will be too much to throw in bmat too.

She’s already panicking about her PS as her planned hospital work experience was cancelled just as soon as it was due to start. She’s done the virtual one through Brighton and Sussex, has work experience in a special school and a few days in a care home - but not what she feels is necessary to stand out. This isn’t helped by the fact that one of her classmates, who has a consultant as a father, has watched surgeries and had lots of experience although he hadn’t gone through the official route.
She still has lots of positives to draw on, through school extra-curriculars and has pt job in a bakery.

Maybe it’s a lesson in resilience? It’s tough on them.

@Millylovespuddles I’m sorry to hear your DD is feeling like this. Mine is the same, I can tell she’s trying to put on a brave face but it’s weighing on her quite heavily at the moment.

It’s tough now with BMAT as DD more than likely would have sat if - unless her UCAT was particularly good in which case she may not have, but she liked having it as a back up in case UCAT goes horribly wrong.

Now it’s still a back up but they’d be applying blind - unless the UCAS deadline date changes I guess.

Re work experience and personal statements, I think a part time job and volunteering is really useful and there may be some time to reschedule some work experience before any interviews so they’d still be able to talk about their experiences, even if they can’t go on the PS. From what I’ve read so many Unis don’t use the PS as much now, to determine who gets an interview.

It must be tough having a friend who has such easy access to work experience however I’d think it would be obvious that he had some kind contacts And he will be the exception rather than the norm.

For now, DD is concentrating on UCAT and taking it from there I think. Lots of further reading etc too.

It’s really tough though - I feel for them all so much.

Thanks all. I did say to DS that if he wants to do medicine, he had better get used to operating in a mask (not to mention full PPE), but he did think sitting a computer test in one is different to working in one.
@millylovespuddles presumably your DD was thinking about Cambridge, rather than Oxford. Oxford makes them do the November BMAT anyway. Wonder if this will make more people apply for Oxford over Cambridge, as the advantage of choosing Cambridge and being able to do the BMAT early has gone. People applying to Oxford always had to apply without knowing their BMAT score (because you can only do one, and Oxford required the later one), so I imagine those who were set on Oxford might even be pleased, as it somewhat levels the playing field for them. Not that DS was, he has abandoned Oxbridge as a goal, and is really not sure whether to do the BMAT at all, if his UCAT is not disasterous. But like your DD, somehow the changes feel a bit rattling.

Another question for those who know something about university admissions. DS always hoped to defer, but ideally would prefer to defer with a deferred place, rather than applying next year, and having to do UCATs and BMATs next year, not to mention be in the country for interviews.
We have heard rumours that certain medical schools either don't take defered applicants, or even if they say they do, in practice you have to be from the best of the best to be offered a deferred place. The one name that has definitely come up in that regard is Edinburgh (which DS wasn't interested in anyway).

Does anybody know or should I say, does anybody have any handle on the rumour mill on this?

Obviously this year is likely to be different, and in fact they might welcome students who want to defer, so they can give places to this year's A level students who missed their grades, and are retaking in September.
This was one of the questions we were going to ask specifically at the open days, because the impression we have been given is that a lot of the medical schools are not as upfront about their deferral policy as they might be (that could be wrong, just rumour mill), so we were going to ask some (hopefully statistical) questions. But as it looks like there will be no real open days this year (not sure that the online ones are going to compensate adequately for the feel of being there), we feel that we are likely to be choosing medical schools almost blind. Current shortlist (based on very little, really) is Sheffield, Bristol, Birmingham, Nottingham, Leeds (but it is a BMAT uni), Manchester, Liverpool, maybe Cardiff.

@Bimkom my DS applied to study medicine this year with deferred entry. He got offers from Nottingham, UEA and Leicester, all with deferred entry to start September 2021.

@Millylovespuddles I agree, ds had planned on similar timings to your dd and also has a music exam that he could have taken this term but as ABRSM are only making their adapted (remote) exams available for year 13s that is also going to have to move into next academic year...feels like everything is piling up.

@LaLaFlottes From today's papers:
"Richard Lochhead, the Scottish education minister, said he had commissioned the Scottish Funding Council to review the funding, provision and delivery of teaching and research across the higher and further education sectors.

He said the SFC, the government agency that funds and polices the country’s colleges and universities, had forecast operating deficits of between £383m and £651m in the next academic year due to the lost income from overseas students, rental and research income and the costs of providing socially-distanced teaching.

University executives had already expected the SFC to review of the affordability and size of Scotland’s higher and further education sectors, before the pandemic shattered their funding model, with guarantees free tuition for Scottish and EU citizens.

The SFC does not fully fund the costs of Scottish and EU places, and expects universities and colleges to cross-subsidise those costs by attracting increasing numbers of overseas and rest of the UK students who are charged full tuition.

That overseas market is expected to collapse because of the coronavirus, while the UK government has announced it plans to cap the number of English students allowed to go to Scottish, Welsh and Northern Irish universities. UK ministers have also rejected pleas for a multi-billion pound bail-out of universities, intensifying their financial problems."

So not sure that adds anything, really? Scottish med schools may be looking to take more RUK students, but Government will cap numbers of English students allowed to go to devolved country unis!

@Hattifatteners Where did he decide to go? Were there others he decided not to apply to as they did not seem so welcoming for deferred students?

@Bimkom it may be a Scottish thing - St Andrews don't allow deferrals either. Sheffield and Cambridge do, fairly sure Bristol do too.

Re competition from people who miss their grades for a 2020 offer and have the offer extended to 2021; every year people with offers miss their offers, re-sit and re-apply. As they have already been successful at interview, they are very likely to be successful again, so actually there are always a number of gap year applicants taking places and the fact that they don't have to go through the interview process again probably makes no difference to the other applicants.

@LaLaFlottes and @GANFYD SFC released their 2020 numbers in March (www.sfc.ac.uk/web/FILES/announcements_sfcan042020/Intake_Targets_for_Medicine_AY_2020-21.pdf )

Assuming all the WP and "extra" places are for scots it looks like:
Aberdeen - 21
Dundee - 15
Edinburgh - 59
Glasgow - 38
St Andrews - 39

It is not clear whether the cut in SFC funding will outweigh the strategic priority to increase the number of Scottish students trained in Scotland on the basis that they are more likely to stay there after graduating. I think that guidance said that they would be cutting RUK places again in 2021.

@Monkey2001 Such a shame, we really like the Scottish Med Schools and my applicant for 2021 entry is still keen on applying to at least 1 - look like the long-list has been made for him......
I have always found it weird that the Scottish Government releases its intake target for 2020 entry in March, after the med schools have interviewed and offered, as when they cut numbers like this, it may leave them a bit high and dry!

Thank you so much for the information. It’s a shame as DD would love to apply to at least one Scottish Uni but I think that would maybe be risky - or maybe just one would be ok. Perhaps St Andrews and then the English route? Maybe that would give her more chance?

Has anyone any experience or thoughts on Queens in Belfast? DD has noticed that they are going to treat a grade 9 GCSE differently from a grade 8 so she’s been taking a closer look and seems to like the look of it!

It hadn’t really been on my radar previously but maybe should be?

@GANFYD as you said, there are RUK places, so someone has to get them!

@LaLaFlottes St Andrews has had really good offer to interview ratios over the last few years (over 80%) so it is a very good option if your DD is happy with the traditional teaching low face-to-face patient interactions in the first 3 years and does well in UCAT. DS dismissed it in his first application round - said he was not interested in moving mid course. After visiting the university and hearing the talks he realised that it was one of his favourites and that the 3 year Batchelor of Medicine followed by 3 clinical years gives the students the opportunity for a "normal" student experience for the first 3 years with intense academic focus during term time and the same long holidays as other students, after which the clinical years are like a transition to a job with more of a working life feel.

Obviously 2020 will be nothing like a "normal" year anywhere, but the St Andrews approach will be less affected by COVID than most medical schools as most of the content can be done on line if necessary.

@monkey2001 you’re right someone has to get the places!! DD would be keen on St Andrews, if her profile fits and she does ok in UCAT. Maybe it’s worth a shot! In some ways I think her preference would be a bit more patient interaction early, however she’s really quite taken with the idea of 3 years there and then moving on for the next 3 years. Like you say, I think it would give them a nice university experience.

St Andrews came to DD’s college and she spoke to them and got a good feel and we did the virtual open day and it all sounded great. She’s been to St Andrews and as soon as we are allowed we could pop back.

She’s also saying she wants to see Belfast ASAP too!

@Bimkom He firmed UEA and chose Leicester as his insurance. I don’t think he particularly investigated the universities’ keenness for deferrals. He had a list of other factors he wanted to take into account; not being in London (we live here), not being too far away, wanted to do full body dissection and so on. He was also keen to see how he felt about each uni after open day and we visited five during last summer and September. I do appreciate that this is not an option at the moment.

Thanks @Hattifatteners Ditto about not wanting to be in London for the same reasons. But being London born and bred and with family overseas we really don't know the rest of the country. In fact, my secret plan for this six months was to tag along for DS's open days and get to see a bit of England/Wales. And online open days are unlikely to cut it in terms of giving anone a feel for what it is like to live in a place. DS is talking to people he knows who are a few years ahead of him (but I don't think any of them are medics) and his shortlist is somewhat being drawn up based on what they say. As in, the children of good friends are at Bristol, Leeds, Sheffield and Birmingham - but they are not medics, and I worry that, without being able to see these places for himself, he is going to be too influenced by the people we happen to know. Still, I keep saying that given the plan to defer, assuming the country is open again next year, we can always do the open days next year and reapply if necessary.
In some ways it would be really nice, though, if those of your DS's cohort (any other mums of current offer holders and current student medics on here?) could give us a run down of why they picked the universities they picked (both if they were lucky enough to get more than one offer, but even more so at this stage, why they picked the four they put on their shortlist, presumably any one of which would have been acceptable if only one offer had been forthcoming). We would love to read a list of - well UAE was the best as a combination of feel (and if that could be better articulated, that would be great - obviously what is important to one, might not be important to someone else. Great social life might be key to one, and lots of green spaces to another) and has full body dissection and so on.

Similar to Hatti DS, my DS wanted to be outside London on a course as traditional as possible with dissection. He applied to Cambridge, Sheffield, Newcastle, Leeds first time round and Cambridge, Sheffield, St Andrews and Leicester second time. No offers first time, offers from Sheffield, St A and Leicester second time.

Leeds - we thought they did dissection, but actually I think it was prosection. Main reason he did not re-apply there was that they interview 1,000 and only make about 450 offers which is one of the lowest offer to interview ratios making it risky if you are not great at interviews.

Newcastle - he liked it, although not keen on newer student accommodation. His interview was bad first time round - I think it was a mistake to travel up on the day of the interview, he was probably too tired to do as well as he could, could not answer a question about when he had been resilient!

Sheffield - great student city, he really enjoyed the talk by Julian, the wonderful Admissions Tutor and we know several happy medics there. Student support has been great for one friend who has had some wobbles and was allowed a couple of gap years. He would have loved to go there, but in the end decided that he liked the St Andrews course better.

St Andrews - very traditional, small, same sort of scale as university was when we were students. Feels like Oxbridge-light, including old buildings and chapel choir. He loved the feel of it.

Leicester - a hidden gem, full dissection, great flexibility on intercalation. He was not expecting to like it, but went there a week after an open day at Edinburgh and said it was SO much more engaging (he really did not like the Edinburgh talk, found them a bit "up themselves"). Would have been happy to go there if he had not had the other offers.

Bristol - would have applied if we did not live in Bristol!

Plymouth - I have a friend who teaches the medics there and it seems to be a great place to study. They do very well on "preparedness".

Exeter - another friend's DD has graduated this year in medicine. It has been very good for her but DS was not interested as it is very PBL. The friend liked that as it enabled her to fit her work around a busy student life.

The main thing is to see which ones he can be confident of getting an interview at. Then do pros and cons, including the offer to interview ratio if your DC is not super confident interacting with adults.

Thanks @Monkey2001 That is great.

Where he can get an interview would seem at this point to be dependent upon his UCAT score, which we don't know yet. The GCSEs were good (he drops two points in the Birmingham calculation because of English Literature, which was only a 7, but otherwise he is fine wherever they ask for GCSE scores). At this point he is not sure whether to take the BMAT (only Leeds on his current shortlist is a BMAT university, although he has thought about taking it so he could be in the running for Brighton & Sussex (which rumour suggests might sometimes be in clearing, if he got not offers elsewhere).
We think interviewing ought to be one of his strengths. He is a very people person and has generally done well in public speaking, as well as the few interviews he has ever done. In fact he has spent his school career encountering the opposite problem. Being one of the most articulate and forthcoming kids in the class, and super confident interacting with adults has tended to set up expectations of his academic work that results in disappointment. He has always had to work exceptionally hard to do well (which he knows, and does), but people (including teachers) often tend to assume that it comes easily to him, and it really doesn't.
One of the reasons he would prefer a less traditional course is because he feels, almost certainly correctly, that he will learn better in a more hands on, patient focussed context. I suspect he might do very well in a PBL context, but without any sense of how it works, at this point, he thinks he is looking for the middle way between traditional and PBL.
And while if it was me, I would love the thought of a more traditional university experience (and he might regret never having it later), at the moment he is very focussed on wanting to help patients as soon as possible.
But thanks so much, because it does give a lot of insight into the universities your DS chose. We hadn't thought about Exeter,as we don't know anybody who goes there. What do you mean by Plymouth and "preparedness"? He might like that, part of feeling he has to live up to expectations and work harder than everybody else means he often does tend to be very prepared. Again, not (yet) on our radar.

@Bimkom We went to see Brighton and Sussex and DS liked it, but due to getting a reasonable UCAT score he decided not to sit BMAT. UEA course is PBL, the others somewhere in between. DS specifically wanted hands on course and would have never considered applying on traditional courses. He was swayed towards UEA by the incredibly friendly people we met, great campus (bit of 70s concrete) and well organised interview. On the other hand, he thought that Nottingham’s interview wasn’t very well planned and executed. Having got offers from all the unis that interviewed him, I believe DS went with a gut feeling and chose the one he believed he would enjoy the most.

If loads of people defer this year, this will certainly reduce the number of places for the 2021 cohort surely? Is it not going to be extra competitive now?

I don't think there are that many medics changing plans to defer. Next year's numbers may be more affected by people who miss the grades in teacher assessments having their places held for next year, but those people would have applied and got offers next year anyway.