Medicine 2022 entry

[Monkey2001]

Support thread for aspiring medics.

We want all our DCs to succeed, whatever their school type. We share knowledge to help them to achieve their goals, celebrate success and support if things don't go well.

As we press the "send and pay" buttons on UCAS, we wish all our DC the best of luck in this tough year with so much uncertainty.

@ClarasZoo I think it gets much easier the more you practice and don't be put off if she finds it really tricky when she first does it. My friend's DD found it so difficult to start with but by the time she did her interviews, it felt like second nature.

@NoNotHimTheOtherOne your description was so much better than mine!

One did they get an offer

It was a mock. But no, he wouldn't have got an offer if I'd been interviewing him. I did make clear in the feedback that you won't get a place on a course that is largely funded by the NHS if you express beliefs that are directly contrary to the values of the NHS.

@NoNotHimTheOtherOne 😂 my favourite was the student who said they wanted to be a surgeon. Asked why they said other doctors were not so good and surgeons were the pinnacle. The person interviewing them was a Obstetrician. Went down like a v heavy lead balloon.

Medics are asked to do dexterity tasks too.

That's interesting. I've seen it in mocks but I haven't heard of it happening in actual interviews. The GMC is very hot on avoiding disability discrimination, so I'm quite surprised that medical schools are getting away with this. I remember having to persuade a former head of our medical school that we couldn't justify assessing manual dexterity in interviews. Perhaps they weren't the only one suggesting it.

It's different for dentists as they are all surgeons by definition, like vets.

@mumsneedwine - I usually end up making all students watch this:

BTW for help with interview prep, after initially bugging me like crazy to keep interviewing him (it was exhausting for me) DS suddenly stopped and it turned out that he had found and joined a Discord channel made up of medical applicants (a few medical students I think as well) and they had been interviewing each other. He said it was much better practice than TSR (last year there was a thread discussing interview like questions), as there you were writing, and here you were actually talking - and I thought how sensible this was, as it meant that not only did he get practice, but he got to be on the other side of the table and have to look at it from the perspective of an interviewer, which surely will have helped give a level of insight that is otherwise not available. Below is the old link - it may be out of date, but I am pretty sure there is likely to be something similar (if you know something about social media like Discord, which I don't):

"Discord invite to Medical Applicants server: discord.gg/BHr8vPFjhy
To those who are new to discord and may not know how things work you need to visit the #roles channel and select the right emoji to be able to see and message the rest of the server"

They interviewed one another over zoom.

@NoNotHimTheOtherOne 😂 I've sent it to DD (4th year). She likes anaesthetists as they let them do lots of stuff.

So, DD has just put her UCAS application into school, paid the fee. I think school are going to add predicted grades and the reference and then submit it. Presumably DD will receive an acknowledgment from UCAS once they have got it? I have no idea. School are not very good at communicating, and the last time I saw a UCAS form it was pen and paper

Until recently DD was adamant that she would choose a medicine course based on course content, teaching style etc but in the end chose one aspirational uni, two that are ok (normally, based on stats) and one that is ‘safe’ (if there is such a thing in medicine), saying that it wasn’t important anymore, she’d rather get an offer(s)

Interestingly one of the factors determining the choices was how easy it was to get home by train!

Ease of travel was one the main thing when Dd was considering her medical university. She is in 3rd year now ( can't believe it )
She ended up in London, rarely comes home even if she can as she absolutely loves the city and is thoroughly enjoying her student life.

As a matter of interest what are the prospects of students who are studying medicine at places like Sunderland and Edge Hill? This won’t apply to my dc but some of their friends have chosen these places.

@Hdhdjejdj exactly the same as for any medical student. F1 positions are given blind to their Uni and done on place in cohort and SJT.

That’s interesting. I should say that it won’t apply to my dc because sciences aren’t their thing. I hear these places are more accessible so it’s great they are going to be judged equally.

@Hdhdjejdj they are not more accessible ! Especially this year. All medical schools are tough to get into and the newer ones have v small intakes. Needed UCAT might be lower but that means more people will apply so therefore less overall chance of an offer. Medicine is tough.

I didn’t know that. I should be relieved mine have no interest in medicine. I know Edge Hill have a great reputation for Nursing so I imagine their Medicine degree would be good too.

Edge Hill have 15 places! Mind you, Aberdeen and Dundee both sub 20 for RUK applicants.

Somebody asked about communications from UCAS. Yes you get a Track notification when your application is submitted by the school. DS said our school leave it late in case anybody needs to change anything, which is harder when submitted.

Had first offers this week for our 5th choices. Kids loved seeing them - none intend to take them up but helps them feel they are good enough for Uni (most are first in family to apply so this is important).

DD had an email from Barts this morning and her heart raced, but it was only a ‘Thank you for applying to us’!

@KingscoteStaff -DD got acknowledgments from Oxford and Newcastle and was very pleased!

DD has submitted her application, then swapped Manchester out for Birmingham. She emailed B’ham checking the entry requirements for UKWPMed and had a swift ‘delighted you are considering us, let me know if / when you’ve applied and I’ll keep an eye out for it’ email reply which has boosted her.

Good luck to all of the DC who have just applied. I remember that it was quite exciting when the acknowledgments arrived as that was when it started to feel real. It's quite a pleasant little lull now before the interview invites start trickling out next month....and the obsessive phone checking phase starts!

Found this great thread a bit late, given UCAS needs to go in this week!

What are your thoughts on these choices given the below, in particular coming from an independent school?

Choosing 4 from:
Birmingham (the aspirational one, low chance)
Newcastle
Leicester
Cardiff
Liverpool

(Really loved Nottingham, Bristol and Exeter, but ruled them all out as too risky)

UCAT 2815
SJT Band 3 (rushed the answers in the test and disappointed)

A A A * - A level predictions for Maths, Chem, Bio

Nine 9s and two 8s grades at GSCE

Volunteering in Healthcare and Educational settings

Participates in a very high commitment sport

Independent school

I have been mulling over what the planned grade inflation means for us.

I think the winners are the applicants in schools which have managed Covid teaching well who would have been heading for high Bs/low As, as they are less likely to miss their offers than in a normal year.

But surely all the medical schools will make fewer offers because fewer will miss their offers? Newcastle Admissions are wording their answers carefully "we usually make around 700 offers" and denying that the number of offers will be going down, but DH and DS were told by the MBBS Programme Director that they only expected to make around 460 offers this year, which makes sense. If I was trying to get the numbers right, I would cut offer numbers right back and use waiting lists, knowing that there will be even more great applicants without offers than usual this year.

Exeter have now said they are only interviewing 350 applicants this year (2019/20 over 700), so I think they will have a very good offer to interview rate if you can secure an interview. I think they should be the top "safe" option for 3A* applicants with a top 10% UCAT.

In general I think the losers will be the applicants with achieved grades and the more academic DC who would have been confident of AAA but don't interview as well as others. They will be hit by the low offer to interview rates.

In a couple of weeks UCAS will publish the early entry stats, it will be interesting (but probably depressing) to see just how many re-applicants there are.

@MN164 2815 is not a possible score unless something strange happened! Can you double check that?