Indicative interview cutoffs for GEMSAS unis have been released

I'm not sure how long this has been around, but I only noticed just now. GEMSAS has published the indicative scores for 2012 entry for some unis but not others.

It seems like for Melbourne, for those successful in getting an interview, the average GPA was 6.6 and GAMSAT (presumably Melbourne equal section weighted) was 65. For Monash, the cutoff (GPA hurdle 5.0) was 65 GAMSAT for urban applicants and 59 for rural. For comparison, the 2011 entry cutoff scores are here and 2010 entry cutoff are here.

It seems like UWA, Monash and both UNDS and UNDF have risen in GAMSAT cutoff (Monash) or average GPA and GAMSAT (UWA, UNDS and UNDF). Other unis haven't seem to have published averages for both years. This increase in scores has also been noted on the Paging Dr Forum, together with increases for other unis too.

There are a few possible factors in the increase. One is the GEMSAS system itself meaning relatively strong applicants did not fall through the cracks; where they would have been eligible for interview at preference 2 if they put it first in the past (for example Monash), but may not have gotten an interview after being passed on.

Another factor (especially for Melbourne, Monash and Deakin) is that there were a lot more Melbourne Biomedicine students graduating this year than last year. The number is approximately 367 this year and about 215 last year. There were also more science students at Melbourne graduating this year than last year. This increase in demand for places at Melbourne in particular without a corresponding increase in places at Melbourne, and also an increased demand for Monash and Deakin (in Victoria) as a flow on effect and a bit less so in other unis interstate, has driven up scores.

For Flinders in particular, it has been noted that provisional entry people who will enter in 2012 (prior to this there were no provisional entry people entering Flinders) has driven up scores there, due to reduced supply available to non-provisionals.


In the past, it was said that graduate entry medicine had a lot less competition than undergraduate entry medicine. I remember being told during year 11 or 12 that if I didn't get into undergraduate medicine (which I didn't), then graduate entry had a much higher success rate. Perhaps with Melbourne, an arguably prestigious uni, switching to graduate entry only (Melbourne model), and UWA following, more and more people will be persuaded to try for graduate entry medicine after initially not getting into undergraduate medicine, rather than giving up. Also it seems like more and more people know of the graduate entry path. Maybe there will be a time in the future when the success rate of graduate entry will diminish to be similar to undergraduate entry.

Christmas break

Today is Christmas Day. Around this time, the MDHS of Melbourne, who have worked hard to give offers to all the 335 people who got into MD plus topping up rejections, are also on a break. If anyone's missed it, from the facebook page of MDHS of Melbourne, this post says that if you don't have your enrollment pack yet, it will be sent next year. The deadline for enrollment is 5 February 2012, so there is plenty of time.

I hope everyone is having a safe and enjoyable Christmas break.

[update] Biomedicine degree conferred!

Today, I officially graduated with the Bachelor of Biomedicine. It was quite a formal occasion. After all the opening speeches, first the doctorate graduates got their degrees, then one master graduate, then the bachelor degrees. Interestingly though, the honors graduates got their degrees after the other bachelor degree graduates.

Since it was my first time graduating, it was quite an experience. It was interesting wearing those clothes, and taking photos from professional photographers and others with friends.

It looks like I'll probably be back there again in another four years, with a medical degree. But there will be a lot of work before that.

GEMSAS first round of top up offers released

Some of the first top up offers (ie second round offers) have started to be released. From the twitter account of Lyndal Parker-Newlyn, Associate Professor of Medical Education at the University of Wollongong (who also posts on Paging Dr), it seems like Wollongong has made 5 top up offers. Other unis should also send them out soon. Good luck if you're waiting for one.

UQ admission irregularity

Recently it has been in the news that a relative of Vice Chancellor Paul Greenfield was accepted into a program without satisfying the same requirements of other applicants. On the 9th of December, UQ released a memorandum detailing the offers of undergraduate-entry MBBS applicants (which I read from Paging Dr), and it included talk of the irregularity. http://www.uq.edu.au/about/planning-docs/2011-mbbs-program-admissions/

Regarding the irregularity itself, it seems like the Vice Chancellor and his deputy have both paid the price and stood down. Then there is debate on whether the relative who was given the irregular offer should keep their place or not. Personally, I don't have a very strong view on this.

In that memorandum, there was also noticeably a mention of people with Vice Chancellor scholarships (by achieving an ATAR of 99.95; the highest possible rank) who did not do well on the UMAT but still got irregular offers. This has never been the official policy of UQ to give such offers in such circumstances, but it should be noted that this is very similar to what is done in Melbourne (needing 99.90 and above) and USyd (needing 99.95). The main difference between Melb and USyd compared to UQ is just that UQ didn't interview for this, but UQ doesn't interview anyone except ATSI applicants anyway. It does raise eyebrows when UQ does things not in their official policy though, and it seems like they won't be doing such a thing next year. I think they could be justified if they made giving medicine places to people with Vice Chancellor scholarships regardless of UMAT official policy though.

This raises another issue. Is using UMAT a good system to select applicants? I personally do not think so, and so far the evidence seems to suggest that UMAT doesn't predict medical school performance well at all, although others have criticized the study because it possibly has "ceiling effects" there. I don't think that UMAT is any better than still using academic achievement (ATAR) even at the high levels, although I have some issues with English being compulsory primary 4 in ATAR calculations in Victoria and NSW (but not some other states; in some it is not even compulsory in year 12), without Math being compulsory at all in some states (including VIC and NSW), let alone primary 4.

Similar criticisms are sometimes applied to the GAMSAT, and I don't think the GAMSAT is as optimal as it can be either, however it does test science unlike UMAT, and that section has some modest predictive value. The MCAT in North America seems to have more solid evidence behind it though, so perhaps if we modify the GAMSAT to be more of that style then it can probably predict medical school performance better. However, it will probably also disadvantage non-science background students, so if unis here think that that type of diversity is important, then such a change in the test probably can't happen. I think a standardized test like the MCAT or GAMSAT with some science is justified in selecting med school applicants for graduate entry, especially because for GPA there hardly any scaling for differentiating between subjects which are easier or harder to score highly in, between different unis and within them.

On the other hand, for ATAR, at least in most states, there is scaling to take into account differences in difficulty between subjects, and in most cases standardized exams for most of the marks going towards a subject. So there is less need for a standardized test including a science section; it would seem to just duplicate whatever assessment is done at school, especially if chemistry is a prerequisite (as it is in some unis for medicine including Monash but not all. Funnily, biology is not a required prerequisite anywhere in Australia for undergraduate entry, and I didn't do year 12 level bio in high school, but that's a discussion for another day).

It has been argued that ATAR discriminates against people of lower socioeconomic status. This may be true, but it is also true that UMAT preparation courses are expensive, and it is hard for people of low socioeconomic status to afford those too. I think if we want to get people of low socioeconomic status into medicine and other uni courses, then we should have some sort of affirmative action instead of using some dubious selection tools which may add more noise into the selection process and being not very useful predictors.

[update] Biomed graduation eligibility confirmed.

This evening, I received the email that I am confirmed to be eligible to graduate on 20 December. Well, it's as expected, but it's always good to have the confirmation. I felt it was possible but unlikely that they might have stuffed up my graduation, because the study plan it's not 100% accurate according to the new breadth subject rules (up until 2010 under the Melbourne Model, you needed 6 breadth subjects for biomed at Melbourne including at least one at third year level, but from this year you are allowed to do 4-6, and there is no need to do one at third year level), and if some admin person was silly they might have thought I didn't complete my degree correctly according to the rules.

Anyway, it's good to see that such a mistake on the admin side has not happened. I'm yet to receive confirmation of turning the MD conditional offer into a firm offer though.

UQ makes further adjustments to cutoffs displayed on website

Again from the Paging Dr forum, I was notified that UQ made further adjustments to the cutoffs displayed on the website. http://www2.som.uq.edu.au/SOM/FUTURESTUDENTS/MBBS/ADMISSIONS/DOMESTICSTUDENTS/Pages/DomesticStudents.aspx

The non-rural cutoffs displayed have reverted to what was shown just after UQ's initial offer round (73 CSP, 66* BMP). However, the rural cutoffs have stayed the same as just after the post-interview (of other unis) round for BMP; 64*. The CSP cutoff for rurals has decreased even more to 71.

I really don't know how to analyze this now. It would appear that the first revision of the website just after the post-interview GEMSAS round of offers (UQ's first top up round) was incorrect. But now because of that, I have doubts that the initial scores posted just after UQ's main round of offers were correct. I could analyze assuming that the initial scores posted were correct, then the first revision was incorrect and these scores now were correct, but that would be pure speculation.

Unlike the earlier two score lists though, this score list displays rural students having a lower requirement than non-rural students. Since this is the case usually, I guess this list is more plausible.

GEMSAS second round offers: 12-14 December

Just in case anyone's missed it, I've read from the Paging Dr Forum that the GEMSAS "first round of top-up offers" is expected on 12-14 December. This is shown in the GEMSAS website too, which is listed under my "official websites" links.

Good luck for second round offers if you haven't received one yet. It seems like some people have declined GEMSAS offers for USyd (and also the other way around), and there has been two-way declining between med and dent too.

Exam day (poem)

I get off at Parliament today,
Not MC* like for uni,
Today's more important than usual;
The test of our ability.

All the hard work is remembered as
I walk up the longer escalator**,
Lactic acid building up in my legs,
But I press on; I will rest later.

I finally reach the end and walk,
I hear the Myki*** reader beep,
Then go outside, and see more stairs,
Two steps at a time, I leap.

The street ahead is different today,
The RACS on the left I pass,
"Will I join them in the future?"
Is something I always ask.

The sun is very bright today
As I head to the REB****,
Then I see my classmates there
Revising under a tree.

I later put away my bag
in some storage facility.
Invigilator calls us in;
The crowd goes in quickly.

Inside there, I'm on my own
I try to work efficiently,
After two hours, the deed is done,
And I leave the facility.

A few weeks pass then I will know,
Whether to cry or jump in glee.
N, P, or H2B
H2A, H1, or H3*****?



Yes, it's the first poem I have written on this blog. Not very high quality though, but there it is.

*Melbourne Central railway station; closest railway station to UniMelb
**Parliament station escalators are longer than ones in Melbourne Central.
***Electronic ticketing system (smart card) used in Melbourne public transport.
****Royal Exhibition Building, where a lot of UniMelb exams are held; closest to Parliament railway station.
*****Melbourne Grading System  (alternate link; original link may be broken. Bands for each grade also shown in GEMSAS guide for GPA calculation)

[update] Final biomed semester results

Today, all my results for semester two were unofficially released through the Study Plan. (Note: in Melbourne, results are released when finalized, rather than on one specific day, and they are often out through the Study Plan a day earlier than the "results service" page. This year, all results should be released by 9 December. Also, for Melbourne students, a tip to note if you don't want to keep clicking on the Study Plan to check if a result is up and let it take its time to load, the results being put up on the study plan coincides with the subject coming off the list on the portal home page or admin tab, so you only need to check when a subject disappears off the enrolled subject list).

Anyway, I got two H1 and one H2A. I expected more than that H2A to be honest (it was a bare H2A too; 75), but ah well. Essays are subjective I guess. It probably doesn't help that I write in pencil for all of them either, where they don't specify what to use, and my handwriting being not that neat. I think I'll try using pen next year. It probably also didn't help that I was a bit lazy revising throughout the semester, an excuse being the interviews, but then again I only had three subjects this semester. So I have finished my biomed with a weighted GPA of 6.79, and an unweighted GPA of 6.75, on the GEMSA scale.

It seems like I have passed well, and barring administrative errors, I should be eligible to graduate. I just ordered the rental for the academic gown today. I think my performance in this semester should be enough to satisfy the "maintain current academic standard" criteria for turning the conditional MD offer into a firm offer, so I'll be waiting for that in a week or two probably.

UQ (lower preference) issue appears to be resolved + GEMSAS critique

On the paging dr forum, a member (naskies) posted that UQ has updated the cut off scores for domestic students for 2012 entry. Whereas it was previously 73 for CSP and 66* for BMP, it now displays as 72 for CSP and 64* for BMP.

From that, I think two things can explain this:

The first (less likely) reason is that maybe UQ reserved some places for offers in the offer round after the GEMSAS offers in case people were not successful in higher preferenced universities and got passed onto UQ by the computer.

The second (I think more likely) reason is that enough people who received places from both USyd (who pulled out of the GEMSAS consortium) and UQ declined their UQ offer for USyd, so this was more than enough to compensate for the number of people who got passed onto UQ from higher preferenced unis and above UQ's initial cutoff score.

Either way, the issue of not getting a place from UQ as a lower preference, even if your GAMSAT would have met the cutoff if you preferenced them first, now seems to have disappeared. This is a good outcome.


I feel that the GEMSAS system is a definite improvement over the old system. There are two possible improvements though, which I see some others have noted too.

One of them is if you can fine tune the preference list so you can put a CSP from a lower preferenced uni higher than a BMP for a higher preferenced university, for example; especially a CSP or BMP from one lower preferenced uni above a FFP from a higher up one on the preference list. I know someone who had the scores for a UQ CSP but got a FFP at Melbourne.

The second one is that if someone (person A) pulls out of their offer at a given university, someone else (person B) should be able to take it, regardless of whether or not they already have a place at a lower preferenced university. Although it would be more hassle for the unis, it's not really fair for an applicant who had a lower combined score (person C) to get a place at that particular university just because he didn't already have a place, ahead of someone (person B) who happened to be offered a place at another university lower on their preference list. People should be able to receive second round offers higher up than their initial one if they are eligible and competitive, like they do in VTAC, UAC, TISC etc.


There's also another argument about how interviews are not entirely the same everywhere, so perhaps the whole thing about standardizing interview scores might be frowned upon, although if we want to get around this, then we have to let everyone go and sit interviews at all unis they preference and have competitive scores before interviews for. So it depends on what people think the balance between inconvenience and cost, compared to having the "right interview format", should be.

GPA... GAMSAT... Interview...: One year on

It's been one year since I made my first post on my blog, back in 24 November 2010. And it has really been quite an interesting year since then.

At the end of last year, I visited Malaysia and Singapore, as noted a few blog posts back. This was my first visit ever to Asia, and Malaysia was the first developing country that I have ever visited. It was an interesting experience to have.

After that holiday and about half a month break, I started uni again for my final year of biomed; earlier than most other people because I enrolled in a summer semester of linear algebra. I decided to do this because I felt it might be beneficial to have a lighter workload in semester two so I could prepare for the Melbourne interview if necessary. The subject wasn't that intense, and it still felt like a break (technically it was a half workload too anyway; you can usually take up to two subjects in summer).

After that came the start of the standard Semester 1. A full load this semester, like most other uni semesters. Within the semester, there was the GAMSAT. I already sat it last year and did reasonably well, but I wanted to improve my score if possible still. After sitting it and waiting almost eight weeks for results, I was pleased that I improved on my old results, from 77 overall (70 Melbourne) to 83 overall (77 Melbourne); while maintaining a 100 in the science section. Waiting for those results took most of the semester.

Meanwhile, it was known that USyd was conducting interviews during the midyear break. Because it was before the Melbourne interview, I felt it would be good to have a go and have a practice. It would also have been a good backup if I didn't get into Melbourne. It was also my first time visiting Sydney in over ten years. However, I didn't prepare enough before the interview, and I didn't get a CSP offer at USyd.

Anyway, so there was Semester 2, with a lighter workload due to taking Linear Algebra in summer. I got a Melbourne interview, as I thought I would, and this time I did a lot more preparation. I felt more confident out of the interview, and after six to seven weeks of waiting for GEMSAS, I received my MD CSP provisional offer from Melbourne. Then I finished all my exams for biomed, and this is where things stand today; waiting for exam results for semester two.

During this one year since I started this blog, I've noticed that the number of blog views have increased over time. In November and December 2010, there were hardly any hits. In January 2011, the number of hits went up noticeably to 150, and stayed around there for a while. There was a noticeable spike at May when the GAMSAT results were released, and it's stayed around that mark until this month where views rose dramatically due to the GEMSAS offers being released and the suspense leading up to it, with @deakinblog publishing a few links to some of my posts. I expect the view count to ease off next month though, since there is not going to be anything as big as the GEMSAS offers then, or any time soon.

I'd like to thank all the readers of my blog for their interest in what I have to say, especially those who have posted constructive comments which have led to good discussions about any issues I have raised. I hope you all continue to enjoy reading my blog into the future.

[update] Biomed exams over!

Today I finished my final exam for biomed. As noted before, this was a 100% essay exam. Well not completely, because I did draw quite a few diagrams, but it was an extended response exam. I felt I did reasonably well, but spent quite significant time drawing up some of my diagrams (and sometimes perhaps going into more detail than necessary when explaining drug mechanisms), and had to rush at the end. No paracetamol question there though, if you were wondering.

So for Melbourne, results should come out by 9 December this year; about two weeks. Meanwhile, it's break time, and complete some immunizations and do paperwork for medicine.

Acetaminophen/paracetamol mechanism discovered!

The science journal Nature has just published a study demonstrating the mechanism of action of paracetamol. This is of interest to people of a pharmacology background, like myself, since we are always told in lectures that the mechanism has not been described.


http://www.nature.com/ncomms/journal/v2/n11/full/ncomms1559.html

It seems like there is activation of TRPA1 channels by some of the metabolites of paracetamol, which causes a reduction of voltage-gated calcium and sodium currents in primary sensory neurons.

I wonder if I can incorporate it into an essay question in tomorrow's exam; a pharmacology exam. It's unlikely that they'll ask a question specifically about paracetamol though.

[update] One more exam for biomed

In the past week, I completed two of my three exams this semester. The coming Thursday, I have my final exam for biomed.

The past two exams I think went reasonably well, despite being 100% essay type questions (the biomed compulsory subject this semester had about 50% of the questions being knowledge of pharmacology, so that was good for grades for me due to my major, but not really good for learning new things). The next exam will be 100% essay questions too. I wonder why the pharmacology department likes essay type questions for third year subjects, while the second year pharmacology subject had 50% essays, 50% multiple choice.

Anyway, I'm about half way going through the lecture notes now for this last subject, and when I'm finished with that, I'll start doing some past exams. This subject, along with the other subjects this semester, thankfully has full past exams released.

But my hand gets sore around exam time when I have to write all these essays. Typing, or coloring in MC bubbles, is a lot easier.

A tale of two interviews

If you read my older posts, you would know that I failed the USyd interview quite badly. Even with my GAMSAT score of 83, my interview score was 84/180, so even if I applied to BMP I wouldn't get in. However, I did get into Melbourne, even though I was disadvantaged due to the Melbourne weighting of GAMSAT sections (down to 77) and my GPA was not perfect (about 6.8; unlike USyd, GPA is not just a hurdle at Melbourne). I got a CSP non-bonded place, and in the clinical allocation I wanted.

There were quite a few different reasons for the different outcome:

1. Because the Melbourne interview is weighted less, so maybe I needed less score in Melbourne to get a CSP, but my ranking before interview would have been better in USyd due to the normal GAMSAT weighting and not using GPA to rank.

2. For the USyd one, my preparation effort mainly was one week of going in an interview practice group and working out answers to all questions. However, I had no practice in actually answering them face to face, and because I booked an interview on the first Monday, I had no time to memorize the answers. For Melbourne, I started in a group (often with just one other person, but sometimes a few people) and worked out answers throughout most of the semester before the interview. I had time to memorize all the answers we came up with, and 100% of the questions for Melbourne this year in the interview were repeats. I recited some of my answers in front of the mirror to try to make it more fluent. I had real talking practice during the week just before the interviews. I also had practice with Des O'Neill (I decided that $150 wasn't too much compared to missing out on Melbourne, although I don't know whether it added that much really compared to memorizing answers for Melbourne and practicing with friends, because Melbourne didn't change questions).

3. I'm not sure how much this helped, but before the Melbourne interview in the semester, I made special effort to give people eye contact when I was talking to them, even if normally I wouldn't bother. I also decided to try to increase my attention span by staying awake more than normal during lectures, and looking at lecturer's eyes during lectures just for practice to get used to it (I don't try to fall asleep during lectures, but sometimes I'm a bit tired).

4. I was more serious in general for Melbourne. I went on a road trip with 2 other family members to USyd and booked on the first day when I had a choice, even though I knew it probably wouldn't help my performance, since it was a practice round (although I would take a USyd CSP if I got that and didn't get any other offers). We booked some cheap hotel in Sydney, which actually stuffed up our accommodation and it was very stressful, especially because we didn't really arrive early in Sydney in the first place.

5. As with all interviews, there was luck involved. In USyd, the first few interviewers didn't shake my hand, and while I didn't really know why, I was nervous for the first few stations. Then one shook my hand, and I was much more at ease at that station, and then I thought the others not shaking my hand contributed to my nervousness. A few interviewers were antagonistic. There was also a "personal station" in USyd which not everyone got but I got, and I didn't prepare for it for USyd. In contrast, in Melbourne, all my interviewers I had were very friendly and the one who I had twice seemed to agree with everything I said.

So that's a list of reasons why I got into Melbourne in an unbonded CSP but not USyd first round.

[update] Melbourne offer! CSP Metro 1!

This evening, I received my provisional offer from the University of Melbourne! It was a CSP Metro 1 too; the best possible outcome for me.

Monash, Deakin, UWA and Griffith have also sent out offers today, as well as GEMSAS sending out an "e-mail of death" (or coma as the new vocabulary is).

Anyway, this is good for me. I'm happy with the outcome. I will write another post this evening detailing more about my experience with the interviews and the admissions process.

I hope those who applied and are reading this got offers. If not, I wish you all the best for the next round of offers, or in trying again next year if you're still determined to get into medicine.

[update] GEMSAS simulation round 19 becomes main round offer list!

Just tonight, all the unis from GEMSAS agreed with the results of the 19th simulation round of the GEMSAS. The University of Wollongong has released all their offers tonight, and successful applicants from some other unis can expect to receive them tomorrow.

It's nice to see that they can stick to their deadline. Hopefully the process can be sped up next year with a code already in place.

I'll be waiting for tomorrow in anticipation. I wonder if I got into Melbourne. We shall see soon enough!


On another note, for the first half of this month, I've received page views greater than the total for any other month in my blog's history. After some investigation looking at my blog stats, it seems like @deakinblog on twitter posted a link to my previous post about the 17th GEMSAS simulation, and as a result I've been receiving a lot of hits through that. Apart from that, I've received the usual results through Paging Dr which have increased recently due to the imminent release of GEMSAS offers.

Anyway, to all the people who are seeing this blog for the first time, welcome. I hope to provide good reading for you into the future.

[update] 17 GEMSAS simulations later...

... and it seems like most schools are happy with the offer list, but one school is still not 100% satisfied with the list of people they were suggested to offer to by GEMSAS. Ah well, now we should hope for a release of offers soon after the weekend.

Technically, they are still not "late", since they specified that offers will be released 9-16 November. However, this is quite late compared to last year's offers for a few unis including Melbourne. That said, this year is the first year with the new computer matching system of GEMSAS, so they are starting almost from scratch. I hoped they would get offers out earlier though.

Anyway. It seems like tomorrow will be that K-Pop festival in Sydney, which I said I wouldn't attend because of my exams (and to answer a question in the comments, it seems like SNSD will arrive in Sydney before the GEMSAS offers comes out). Interestingly, it seems like tickets are still available for VIP standing, silver seating and bronze seating options, while allocation is exhausted for VIP seating and gold seating. It's interesting because in Korea, the seat allocation of SNSD's first concert in the first Asia tour sold in 3 minutes. More recently, for SNSD's second Asia tour, in Singapore the tickets for their scheduled concert sold out within four hours so they decided to hold a second concert the next day. As it happens, I was in Singapore last year (during the Australian summer holidays), exactly one year before the schedule date of this concert there this year.

Maybe it's because there isn't as much Asian population percent here compared to Singapore. The other reason might be that the distances here are quite far, compared to Singapore or Korea. Australia is a big country and Melbourne and Sydney, the two biggest cities, are quite far apart (about 900 km), so it's not very convenient to travel from one city to another, especially without a high speed rail network. It's even further from Brisbane (the next biggest) to Sydney. It's also an inconvenient time for people going to school or university, since it is right during the exam period for a lot of unis and VCE exams, or during the school term of earlier years. So perhaps that contributes to lower demand too.

In any case, with respect to exam preparation, I did a past exam paper today for one of my subjects, then I cleared up a few gaps in my knowledge that were found. I'll probably do one or two tomorrow. Despite the GEMSAS uncertainty, life goes on...

[update] Melbourne offers in 2-8 days...

The University of Melbourne MDHS on their facebook page just released a notice:

To all our MD applicants, a quick update on selection. We are still on track for offers to be issued between the 9 and 16 November, but we can confirm that it will definitely not be tomorrow.

For any MD applicants wondering about the process over the next few days, all the universities are reviewing the lists generated by GEMSAS to ensure there are no errors. Once every university is happy, each one will start creating offers. Unfortunately, Melbourne may take a day or two longer than other universities as we also have to allocate students to clinical zones prior to sending out offers, and this can take some time due to the number of students we take into the course. Once the clinical zones have been finalised we will compile it all into an offer letter, and offers will be emailed out, with hard copy letters following shortly after.

For the DDS applicants, offers will also be released in the same time period.

We’ll be keeping you updated throughout the process so you have some idea of where we’re at. Best of luck to all of you!

So with that in mind, and MD offers not being tomorrow because of clinical allocations and the number of students, it means the Melbourne offer emails will probably be in 2-8 days.

If it's like the international students' situation though, those studying at UniMelb at the time seemed to get notification of being accepted into MD or DDS through the student portal before getting the email. So it might be good to check the portal too.

No more calculators in GAMSAT...

It seems like there's no more calculators allowed in the GAMSAT anymore! That's quite a change. http://gamsat.acer.edu.au/sit/prohibited-items/

This brings the GAMSAT more in line with the MCAT; MCAT doesn't allow calculators. It also means that what I've said in my blog earlier about figuring out stuff on the calculator for logs can't be done; they either have to give you easy numbers, or they have to give you options in multiple choice which are spaced apart enough so that only one of them is plausible.

(ie, from my previous example, if you can use non-calculator methods to narrow down to a certain range, even though you can't figure out things to a few decimal points without tables or memorizing values. For instance, we can still say that 1/10 of a substance is left somewhere between 3 half lives (1/2^3=1/8) and before 4 half lives (1/2^4=1/16) because 1/8>1/10>1/16 and work from there, without knowing what the decimals are after the 3).

It also means that the whole e^loge type decay formula which I don't memorize is pretty useless now, without a calculator or log tables, because the only advantage it used to confer is not needing to memorize as many log laws (apart from the most fundamental one; a^x=y means logay=x. One of my friends said his tutor called this the "sock rule" because if you draw a bubble looking like a sock around a and x in the log form, the orientation is just like a^x with x as the power, and a as the base. Then y, which is outside of the sock, is on the other side of the = sign). And now you can't be expected to calculate things accurately in decay anyway, unless it's a "good number" (ie, whole number of half lives).

I think actually they already space the numbers far apart enough in multiple choice for these types of questions so you don't need to figure it out accurately, but I preferred to figure them out exactly anyway for these types of problems sometimes.

I wonder how much the format of questions will change because of this ban on calculators. Maybe there doesn't actually need to be any change, but it will increase constraints on time. In any case, I do think it'd be good for med students to be able to do more basic sums and multiplication without calculators.

Oh! - 소녀시대

It's five more days until the start of the expected period of GEMSAS offers! Because of that, I will share with you a song:

Oh! - 소녀시대

 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TGbwL8kSpEk

Why? In Sino-Korean numbers*, 오/五/o means five. So sometimes the number five reminds me of this song.

There is also sort of a cheer-leading concept in the song. SNSD will cheer for you until the results come out.

5-12 days now... Ah! Now 5-12 reminds me of the 5-12-13 Pythagorean triad too.


*In Korean, there's 2 main sets of numerals; native Korean and Sino-Korean.

[update] GEMSAS offers in one week? or two weeks?

After almost five weeks since Melbourne interviews, we're almost there now! GEMSAS offers are expected in 9-16 November, which is in 7-14 days; 1-2 weeks!

I hope that I will receive a CSP offer from Melbourne. This is what all the effort was put in for. Melbourne is my first preference and UQ is my second. If UQ was my first preference, then I should not have bothered to repeat the GAMSAT (although a few people in my biomed cohort sometimes enjoy talking about and comparing marks including GAMSAT and I don't mind joining in too). I also would not need to do all this interview preparation, or apply to USyd for any backup or interview preparation.

There would also be less pressure on grades, and although I now feel that I should study well in the core subjects regardless, because it will be beneficial for medicine in the future. However, if I applied to a GPA hurdle uni as first preference, maybe I could dedicate my breadth subjects to subjects I always thought were good to learn like Chinese rather than playing it safe with my strengths. It would probably not be possible to use a "science GPA" in Australia like they sometimes do in the US though, even if it's a better predictor of med school achievement than normal GPA or non-science GPA, because in Australia not everyone does science subjects in their degree.

Anyway. I've started revising some lecture notes now, in preparation for the exams. The exams, as I said before, will be after the first round offers for GEMSAS... hopefully I get the good news before them.

sin(x+y) does not equal sin(x)+sin(y)

Following on from my physics talk about vector quantities, it reminded me of what my Real Analysis (second year math subject) lecturer told our class during a lecture. I already knew it, but it does seem to be a mistake some people make. I paraphrase slightly:

f(x+y) does not always equal f(x)+f(y). An example is, sin(x+y) does not equal sin(x)+sin(y). Some people sometimes write it on exams, and it's not correct. Actually, sin(x+y)=sin(x)cos(y)+sin(y)cos(x).

[note: the angle expansion formula is not required for the GAMSAT, so don't worry about memorizing it if you aren't doing math subjects or subjects which require significant math, but you should know that sin(x)+sin(y) doesn't equal sin(x+y), in case you have to solve some algebra and think you've found a neat shortcut which doesn't exist]

I think some people get confused because a(b+c)=ab+ac, so they think sin(x+y)=sin(x)+sin(y), but it's not like that. a(b+c) means a times (b+c), but sin(x+y) doesn't mean sin times (x+y).

How does this relate to the GAMSAT? I think sometimes you might have to manipulate logs in certain questions. No, I don't mean logs you find from trees, even if I say "natural log". I mean logarithms. In radioactive decay or other types of decay with half-lives, you might need logarithms to find out stuff. The "log" also pops up in the decibel formula. There's a whole set of log laws, which can be thought of as the reverse of exponent laws.

In particular, loga(x)+loga(y)=loga(x*y), provided that x and y are positive, and a is positive (which is required for the logarithm to exist). Don't think that loga(x)+loga(y)=loga(x+y), because it's not.

Also, loga(x^n)=n*loga(x) is a law you might need.

Anyway, perhaps I'll finish with an example. Simple one, but one with bad numbers, so you can't guess whole numbers easily.


"A radioactive compound initially is 1000 grams. After 60 hours, there is 100 g of the original compound remaining. What is the half life?"

Actually, before I'll begin, I'll mention that there is some weird formula for calculating this type of stuff with a e^(logex) type thing in it which I haven't bothered to memorize. The advantage is that you don't have to remember your log laws when using it, but the disadvantage is that it's not that easy to remember. Personally, I like to remember the formula more logically, even if it means I have to remember the log laws to solve something on the calculator.

Basically, after every half life, the amount of original compound remaining is halved. So after one half life there's half remaining, and after the second half life there's 1/2 * 1/2=(1/2)^2=1/4 remaining; after the next one it's 1/4*1/2=(1/2)^3 remaining. See the pattern? But in the question, we have 1/10 remaining, and 10 is not a multiple of 2, so we can't exactly just work it out the easy way.

Anyway, from the discussion above (there's more rigorous ways to prove it though, but for our purposes an illustration is OK), the proportion remaining of the original compound is (1/2)^n, where n=number of half lives.

Then to convert that into an actual amount, multiply by the original amount.

So, N=N0(1/2)^n, where N=amount remaining, N0=initial amount of compound. To me, knowing this formula is simpler than memorizing a whole formula with e^loge etc. However, to use it backwards you need to know your log laws, unlike the other way where you don't need to know so much.

Anyway, back to the question.

N=1000, N0=100.

100=1000(1/2)^n
1/10=(1/2)^n

now if you use this formula, this is where we get logs into play. Take the log of both sides (it doesn't matter which base, but your calculator has two logs; base 10 (the button "log") or base e (the button "ln"), so it has to be one of these. It would be simpler if there was a log base 2 for this particular question, but it doesn't exist on your calculator. So if we don't have a log base 2 on the calculator, we need a work-around.

log (1/10)=log (1/2)^n

Now use the log law: loga(x)^n=n*loga(x) on the RHS of the equation:

log (1/10)=n*log (1/2)
n=log(1/10)/log(1/2) (put this onto your calculator)
=3.3219

Now this is the number of half lives. We wanted to know the half life. Now, we know from the question that the time taken was 60 hours, so:

60 hours=3.3219 half lives

What's one half life? Divide 60 by 3.3219.

Answer is 18.06

So half life is 18 hours. That is the answer.

As I said before, there's another formula which is more complex to remember that some people use for it, but which means you don't need to know your log laws. Personally, because I do remember my log laws, I find this way simpler because I don't really have to remember a more complex formula for exponential decay involving half lives.

Hope this helps. I don't really plan to turn this blog into a GAMSAT blog, but I might still mention a few things here and there.

November: The month of GEMSAS offers! (and exams)

It's November now. This is the month of the GEMSAS offers for the main round. So in 8-15 days (9-16 November), applicants to GEMSAS will know if they got a first round offer or not.

It also happens to be Melbourne Cup Day today; a public holiday in Melbourne. However, I don't really take too much interest in the Melbourne Cup.

Anyway, after the offers, my first exam is on the 17th. I've been reading some of my Pharmacology textbook, and might start revising lecture notes soon. My last exam is on the 24th.

Well, all in all, it seems like it will be an interesting month ahead.

Physics review: Vector quantities

OK... I decided to write up something for any potential GAMSAT sitters reading this site.

Quite commonly when someone begins learning physics, and doing problems, they sub numbers into formulas to get the answer. Yes, that's what you're supposed to do for numerical answers to get the solution, although sometimes there may be a few steps involved rather than just one step.

However, a common elementary mistake is to forget about directions. When we are dealing with vector quantities, we must keep in mind not only the magnitude, but also the direction. Otherwise, your answers will come out weird. Just as an illustration, if I'm facing south and initially travelling south at 3 m/s then turn around and travelling north at 6 m/s, it's different from if I was initially travelling north at 3 m/s and just sped up to 6 m/s. In the first instance, my change in velocity was 9 m/s north (i.e. 6-(-3), or 6+3), but in the second instance it was only 3 m/s north (i.e. 6-3).

In two or three dimensions, there are a few ways to approach vector problems. You can draw vectors and add them "head to tail", etc, and/or separate into orthogonal components and deal with each component separately. For one dimension, the main thing required is just to assign one direction as positive and label the signs of all variables accordingly (ie, opposite direction means that the variable's value is negative).

I'll just finish with an example now. Perhaps I'll just use the same example as I started off with.

"A person was travelling south at 3 m/s initially. He slows down, then turns around and then runs north, reaching 6 m/s. He does all this in 3 seconds. What is his average acceleration?"

Well, in this case, I'll assign north to be positive.

His initial velocity is south 3 m/s, and since north is positive, south is the opposite direction and is negative. So u=-3 m/s. (u=initial velocity)

He is finally travelling north, which was assigned as positive. So v=+6 m/s.

"Time" is 3 seconds; t=3 s (time is actually a scalar quantity, so usually it should be positive)

Anyway, so a=(v-u)/t=(+6-(-3))/3
=9/3
=3 m/s²

Since this is positive, and we assigned north as positive, this means that the acceleration's direction is north. Technically the acceleration needs both a magnitude and a direction; so just saying it's 3 m/s² isn't enough. Anyway, so from that, acceleration is 3 m/s² north.


Now, actually it still works if we assigned south as positive; you don't have to worry about which direction to assign as positive in two directions too much, although it's good to choose one where you don't have too many negatives, since it makes things easier.

Anyway, if I assigned south as positive instead (just to be different),

initial velocity=u=3 m/s south=+3 m/s (since south is positive)
final velocity=v=6 m/s north=-6 m/s (since north is opposite to south, where south is positive)

time=3 s

a=(v-u)/t
=(-6-3)/3
=-3 m/s²

However, since south is positive, and the answer is negative, that means acceleration is 3 m/s² north (ie, since south is positive, north is negative in this instance; and we have a negative answer). Same as before, 3 m/s² north, as long as you interpret the sign correctly by the constraints you gave initially.

A common mistake might be to just use magnitudes; forgetting that directions are important. Doing this:
u=3 m/s
v=6 m/s
t=3 s

a=(v-u)/t=(6-3)/3=1 m/s²; different from the correct answer of 3 m/s² north!

Plugging in magnitudes without thinking about directions only gives the correct answer usually when the direction is unchanged; ie if the person was initially going 3 m/s north and accelerated to 6 m/s north, or initially 3 m/s south and accelerated to 6 m/s south in 3 seconds, then the acceleration's magnitude would be 1 m/s². Not for the question given above though!

So... when doing physics and plugging numbers into formulas, remember to take into account directions! In 1D, this means assigning a positive direction, and figuring out whether a value takes a positive or negative sign, before solving the algebra for the answer. Otherwise, if you've got a few quantities in different directions, your answer is probably going to turn out wrong.

UniMelb MD 2012 handbook entry released

I read on a forum that the 2012 handbook for UniMelb has been released. This includes how they'll assess various subjects in MD next year, and more info about the second year of MD (as it was a new course, and it wasn't run this year for second year yet).
https://handbook.unimelb.edu.au/view/2012/MC-DMED

I notice they changed around the first year main subject slightly. Noticeably, now the one essay assignment is only worth 5% and not 10% anymore.
https://handbook.unimelb.edu.au/view/2012/MEDS90001

Yay! That makes me more happy and want to go to Melbourne more now. I hope I can get in.

[update] Last day of undergraduate classes for biomed!

Today was the last day for undergraduate classes at biomed for me, if all things go to plan. It has been a great experience at the University of Melbourne studying biomed here and meeting new friends.

After today, there is a "cram period" to follow; ie swotvac. For me, my exams are quite late, so I have more than two weeks before my first exam.

Although I would like to be able to finish my degree off for biomed, I want to continue on studying, and continue at Melbourne if possible. I hope I can get a medicine place here for next year. So since the release of offers should be 9-16 November, I should know whether or not I have a place in 12-19 days.

But until then, it's time to study for exams. I'll know whether or not I have an offer (major round) before my first exam. I hope I can get an offer from Melbourne in the middle of my exam study period!

[update] About 3 weeks until GEMSAS offers, 50% waiting over!

It is now about three weeks left until GEMSAS offers; a bit each way depending on whether it's closer to 9th or 12th of November. This means if you interviewed at Melbourne, about 50% of our waiting time after interviews is over!

During the past week, I handed in (online) what will hopefully be my last assignment for my undergrad course, and I completed an online test today. Now after there are no more assessments left until the exams. Just one more week of classes left this semester.

So... last week of learning biomed next week, if all goes to plan. I hope I can get this degree completed well. But I don't feel like leaving university just yet. Hopefully I get to stay studying at uni for the next four years after this year in medicine, and I hope to do that at Melbourne. It has been nice studying here for the past three years. Three weeks left to find out.

[update] About 4 weeks until GEMSAS offers...

About four weeks to go now. So about 1/3 of the wait for GEMSAS offers for unimelb interview people is over. It is a bit frustrating knowing that last year by this time people would already have received offers from some of the consortium unis with interviews including UniMelb. However, that said, the GEMSAS is a fairer system than last year. I hope those next year don't have to wait so long, due to them not having to put too much new coding for their software etc. Leaving offers this late gives applicants little time to arrange things like honors or applying into other courses next year if unsuccessful.

Anyway. My last assignment for this year is due on the coming Friday. Then after that there is no significant assessment until the exams. I don't particularly like assignments, and it is quite relieving to see that the only assignment in the first year MD course in UniMelb, if they don't change it next year, from the main subject is worth only 10% and no more.

[update] About 5 weeks to GEMSAS place offers

There's about five more weeks until GEMSAS med school offers now. It's getting closer and closer, but if it was last year before the GEMSAS system then it would only need one or two more weeks of waiting. I suspect they really want to do a lot of double checking with the new GEMSAS system being in place just to make sure everything is right. Hopefully those applying next year don't have to wait so long.

Anyway, I also got my exam timetable. This time, all my exams are in the second half of the exam period for my university; late second week and third week.

[update] UQ officially releases cutoffs for 2012 entry.

Within the past few days (or today?) UQ has released their cutoffs for 2012 entry. http://www2.som.uq.edu.au/som/FutureStudents/MBBS/Admissions/DomesticStudents/Pages/DomesticStudents.aspx

It seems like the unbonded cutoff is a GAMSAT of 73; which I've alluded to before in comments. Before I predicted it to be 74-75 on the assumption that there were going to be 25 unbonded places, but it seems like there were in fact 40 (this number is derived from the "GEMSAS letter of death", by subtracting the number of total UQ offers by the number of MRBS and BMP places). So that explains why my prediction was slightly inaccurate.

Interestingly though, there was no cutoff given for unbonded rural applicants. It seems too that the cutoff for rural and non-rural BMPs were both the same (66*, meaning everyone with 67 GAMSAT got a BMP if they put UQ first, but if they got 66 they were ranked by GPA and those with lower GPAs missed out). Maybe this means that even with the 25% or more rural quota in place, there were enough high quality rural applicants so that at least 25% of them were already above the non-rural cutoff, so there was no need for a lower rural cutoff. I wonder if this will be repeated next year.

So that's that. I thought it was interesting information, so I blogged about it. I think my Melbourne interview went reasonably, although I can't be 100% sure (and other people probably did well because of the repeat qs too), but if it didn't then I hope there is still a UQ unbonded place left for me from someone withdrawing. Ah the UQ (lower preference) issue...

[update] back to uni tomorrow, final 4 weeks (sem 2, 2011).

Tomorrow, I'm back at uni for what will be the final four weeks of undergrad coursework if all goes to plan. I just finished one of my assignments worth 5% too, and made an online submission. Now there's only one assignment left, which is worth 15%.

Meanwhile, I'll have to do quite a bit of catching up with course content before the end of semester exams. Thankfully, I only have three subjects.

BMP: Bad Movie Physics

Tonight during dinner, some random TV program was playing. Through watching it, I noticed quite a few physically impossible events. It reminded me of some advice that my year 12 physics teacher told our class during orientation, before the end of year break of year 11. I don't remember the exact words, so I'll paraphrase:

"When you watch movies [during the break], watch out for bad movie physics."

It's probably a good exercise to do. My year 11 physics teacher and year 12 specialist math teacher also mentioned some movies having instances of bad physics as well, although they didn't tell my classes to look out for them as an exercise. There's quite a few instances of them, and just now I searched Google and came across a site called Intuitor Insultingly Stupid Movie Physics, which has a list. Sometimes it's deliberate like Harry Potter, although some other times it seems like they are oversights. To list a few:

Outerspace Explosions: Since there's no atmosphere in outer space, unless there is any conducting piece of solid or liquid connecting the exploding object to your spacecraft, there's no way you'll hear the explosion.

Superman: Even if he could fly, by catching the people being saved in the air, there is hardly any time for the speed of the person to slow down, so there will be a very big force. Funny he hasn't injured anyone.

Shuttle in space slowing down without brakes (and not against gravity either): There's no air resistance if there's no atmosphere, so the shuttle should just keep going.


Anyway, have fun spotting them out yourselves in whatever movies you watch.


(Note: In the medicine admissions context, BMP means Bonded Medical Place)

[update] About six weeks to GEMSAS offers...

The offers from the GEMSAS consortium are expected to be released 9-16 November. In six weeks, it will be 12 November, so there will be about six weeks until the offers are released.

This is a long wait. Last year, applicants only needed to wait about two or three weeks for a Melbourne offer after their interview. It seems like they delayed the Melbourne DDS offers too for some reason, although I didn't apply. I wonder why they predict that GEMSAS will take that long to process interview scores though.

Anyway. It seems like I've fallen behind in terms of studying, due to practicing for interviews instead. After the assignment is done, it's going to be catch up time. Uni starts again in two days, and it seems like today is the last day of "standard time" too... daylight saving starts tomorrow in Victoria and New South Wales.

[update] UniMelb interview complete!

The interviews for UniMelb and a few other unis are now complete. I wonder why GEMSAS require us to wait until 9-16 November for offers though. Ah well, that's how the system is. Now we just wait.

I thought that I went reasonably well; a lot better than USyd. Of course though, I can't be 100% sure. 100% of the questions I was asked were repeated from previous years at UniMelb though, and I was more prepared, confident and taking this interview more seriously than USyd's one in general, as I really do want to go to UniMelb. It was also good that the interviews were less long than USyd because I don't talk much, and there was no scenario overload unlike USyd.

Since all the questions were repeats though, I wonder how many people have practiced the exact same questions before just like I did. Ah well. I feel I did reasonably well, but I wonder if the interviewers felt I was too rehearsed and deducted marks because of that. I felt that five minutes was a good time though; I finished quite a few just before or on the mark. Not much surplus time waiting unlike USyd.

Anyway. Now it's up to catching up with assignments again, and catching back up with course work. Thankfully I only have three subjects. It's back to uni for a final four weeks on Monday.

[update] Midsemester break! (2011 semester 2)

Today is the start of the midsemester break for semester 2, 2011. In UniMelb, this break is two weeks long.

Anyway, this means that there are no more university classes until the interviews. The interviews are on the second week of the break. I've prepared some more during the semester, but I can always do more. My skills still are not the best, although I think they have improved a bit. Also, Unimelb's interviews are a bit different to USyd's ones. They have more variety, instead of just scenarios.

I'm not sure which situation was better though. With USyd, my GAMSAT score was 83 and they apparently made GAMSAT 50% and interview 50% (although they used raw percentages to rank instead of some z-score calc, so in fact the interview explained more variance of the rank list score than GAMSAT scores under the USyd method, unlike if they used z-scores). With Unimelb, I'm not sure what they use to rank in terms of z-scores, percentages or adding up ranks on rank lists, but broadly it's 1/3 GPA, 1/3 GAMSAT (but equal weighted) and 1/3 interview.

Anyway, on face value, I have an above average GPA and GAMSAT, but my GPA isn't 7 (it is about 6.8) and my GAMSAT mark is brought down significantly due to the Melbourne's GAMSAT equal weighting instead of weighting S3 doubly (down to 77 from 83). It would seem that it's common for scores to go down after using Melbourne's GAMSAT weighting, because most people applying to med school (and especially Melbourne because of the prerequisites) have a science background. However, they probably won't go down as much as mine usually. In any case, I feel my rank before the interview is lower with Melb's entry criteria compared to USyd, although it is still very good for Melb, and the interview isn't weighted as much for Melb. So I'm not that sure which one I'd need a lower interview score to get into an unbonded place.

Ah well. The best option is just to keep working on interview skills and do as well as I can on the day. And the aim shouldn't just to scrape in an unbonded place either, it should be to get a place in my preferred clinical zone. Anyway, it seems like my interview is in about one and a half to two weeks. Closing in...

Definitions and Context page added

Today I decided to add a huge list of definitions of abbreviations I may use in my blog, both on the side of the blog, and on an additional page (which may be easier to read). Within the definitions, I've also aimed to provide context for a lot of what I'm talking about, which can be a bit confusing without knowing background material; especially if you don't read my blog start to finish.

Now maybe I should get ready for a surge of hits through search engines...


In other news, it seems like my 5% prac writeup submission date is extended until after the midsem break, so I won't have to worry too much if I don't want to until after the interview.

EDIT: Now I've also created a few other pages too. The "about me and this blog" has a bit more detail than my standard introduction at the top of the homepage. The other pages are mainly for convenience if you don't like scrolling down on my homepage and reading a small section to the side.

소녀시대 (Girls' Generation) in K-Pop festival in Sydney; 12 November

I've known for a while that there will be a K-Pop festival in Australia on 12 November this year. Nice to see the website with SNSD's "Run Devil Run" as the promotional song in the video. Apart from Girls' Generation, there's also a lot of other groups there performing.

Unfortunately, this is right during the exam period, and it's not in Melbourne (it's in Sydney), so I've decided not to attend. If one of those factors was different, especially if it was during the holidays, I would have liked to have gone.

Ah well. I hope one day Girls' Generation visits Melbourne. And hopefully not during the exam period too. I've also got quite a bit of stuff for them to sign if they ever have a signing event nearby.

That's what you get for not living in the biggest city in Australia I suppose... the largest "market share" for a one-off event in Australia would usually be in Sydney... Ah well, overall I feel that Melbourne is a good place.

[update] midsem result relased (sem 2, 2011)

I got my midsem result for that multiple choice test. The result was around what I expected. In some coincidence, it was one mark more than 80% on the test, just like my result for the two pharmacology subject midsems last semester.

While it was pretty solid, I would have liked to have done better. In any case, it seems like I'm keeping up OK. I wonder how the class did though; if the class did well, they might have an hard exam to compensate. It did feel easier than the pharmacology theory sub last semester where the class average was just 50% to me, because the time constraints were not as much, but I can't always trust my intuition. If I had to judge things myself, I would think that specialist maths in VCE was much easier than English, and that the GAMSAT section 3 was much easier than first year biology exams...

Anyway. I'm relieved to have done reasonably well. Meanwhile, the interviews are creeping closer and closer...

Braindead

Lately my brain seems "dead" perhaps more regularly than usual towards the end of the day. Or maybe I'm just noticing it more lately. In any case, it's not something that is very desirable. Maybe because I like being able to think.

I've also noticed recently that whenever I had to do a math computation with numbers, I've been quite slow. It's not often that I need to, but I feel like I'm not as fast as I used to be anymore.

Looking deeper, I realize that right now all my subjects are biology-related, where I just try to memorize everything important on the slides. Yes, I know that you're not supposed to "just memorize" stuff even for biology, but I've felt that memorization was probably the "rate-limiting" step in learning most biosciences. But for the past semesters before this one, I've always either had a math subject or an economics subject to do, which has worked my analytical abilities somewhat. Some semesters had physics subjects too, and one semester (first year, semester 2) had a physics, stats and an economics subject in it; it was my best semester (apart from summer semester with only "linear algebra") as far as grades went (although of course it should be mentioned that first year level subjects are usually easier than second or third year level ones).

Anyway, I've decided it is probably a good time to play around with the DS "training" games again (I haven't touched them for quite a while), like "math training" or "brain training". I'm not 100% sure that they work to significantly improve function outside the games (I feel that they probably do but some news articles criticize them although I haven't read the actual journal articles), but training definitely won't do harm.

[update] Midsemester test done (semester 2, 2011)

I've completed my midsemester test today. I already know I got some wrong. I think I did reasonably OK, but it was not a very comfortable test, although it doesn't feel too dissimilar to a lot of bioscience tests I've done in the past in terms of how hard it felt during the test. I hope the results come soon, especially because it was all multiple choice so it shouldn't take too long to mark.

Anyway, it looks like for that subject with the test, there is no more assessment before the midsemester break (when interviews are held). For one other subject, there seems to be a "workshop question" assessment of 2.5% (almost nothing) and for the other one (biomed core) there are 2 assignments worth 5% each; a group assignment and a prac report.


I mention before that I handed in my clinical school preferences already. Initially I put down a GAMSAT ID number on the form where it said "GMAC ID" but I wondered if I put down last year's one instead of this year's, so then I emailed them once to confirm this year's one in case I wrote it down wrong. But then it seems like the GMAC ID is separate, and refers to the so called "transaction ID" in the GMAC application confirmation email... so... I emailed them again. I haven't received a reply yet, but I guess they're probably sifting through a lot of email with the interview offer release.

EDIT: it seems like some people have been told that GAMSAT ID was supposed to be put in the place where it said GMAC ID... so maybe I did the right thing after all...

[update] Clinical school preference list submitted. Midsemester test tomorrow.

Today I submitted the clinical school preference list for the MD program. In order, I put: Metro 1, Metro 2, Rural. This was primarily due to the distance away from home. Metro 1 also has the research precinct around it, and it's the closest to the university. For the other options, I said I was willing to take up an ERC place if I didn't get a normal unbonded CSP, but not a BMP or MRBS place.

I also did an online test today, in the same subject where I got 75% for one of them before in another test. This time I looked up a lot of the things I wasn't 100% sure about on wikipedia and got 100%, although a lot (or all) I would have gotten right without looking up. That subject didn't have a midsemester test though, and because there are more important pressing issues (interview), I haven't been studying for it well.

However, another subject of mine has a midsemester test tomorrow. It's a relief that it's a multiple choice test though. My preferred exam format, although my preferred exam is of course GAMSAT section 3.

Speaking of the GAMSAT, in light of these interview cutoff rises, I wonder if I should have done more to prepare for the GAMSAT this year. I could have used the MCAT 101 passages in verbal reasoning for example (my section 1 hardly improved this year compared to last; 3 points), and I could have written more essays, rather than having a somewhat lazy preparation effort of <10 essays. I know it would not matter if my interview performance is good enough, but despite my GAMSAT being "high", I wonder if improving it more than I did would have been higher yield than improving the interview techniques. Ah well, that's nothing I can change now.

[update] UniMelb interview offers released! (Also UQ offers and other GEMSAS interview offers)

I just got a UniMelb interview offer, as would have been expected. It seems like the cutoff has jumped this year too, as expected, due to the increase in biomed students and science students from unimelb compared to last year.

Now I have to do well on this. I don't want a repeat from USyd, and I've been doing some preparation, but not as much as I could have. I have a midsem next week though, as I mentioned before, and assignment due soon, and a prac writeup due for a prac probably too.

UQ offers also were released today. It seems like the cutoff for an unbonded CSP is either 73 or 74 from reading forums (there hasn't been anyone with 73 who has posted yet, but someone with 74 got unbonded CSP and someone with 72 got BMP). If it's 74, then it's as I predicted; 74 to 75. As expected, I would have received a place with my score from last year. I hope the UQ (lower preference) issue is resolved so that I can get a place at UQ if I happen to get knocked back from unimelb after the interview (which isn't that far fetched due to USyd).

Anyway, that's how things are at the moment. I did an online test for one of my subjects today though, and it was very easy and I got full marks for it. Only worth 3.333% of that subject though. Or 2.5%? Not sure if there were 3 tests or 4 hmm... I thought it was 3 though.

Seize the opportunity

Today I just missed my train to the city in the morning. I started later today, and this was not in the peak hours, so the trains ran at every 15 minutes instead of more regularly.

I was a bit upset because it meant I had to wait quite a while for the next train (although I wasn't late for class, I could have spent that time reading the newspaper at uni when I got there). I sat down on a metal chair and put on the music. I was wondering what I should do for the next 15 minutes as it didn't seem productive; I didn't feel that I needed a rest in that time.

Then the thought crossed my mind. I should exercise. I'm not really into exercising a lot, although often I do Taekwondo patterns in the morning if I wake up early enough and uni doesn't start until much later, and I ride my bike on weekends. I also often walk to the train station after uni instead of catching a tram, since I'm not in a rush for time. It's not much though, so doing more is better.

The first thought would be to just walk up and down the platform, although I didn't feel that it would be very good exercise. But then I realized that I could do stepups on the chair that I was sitting on (not many people were around). I haven't done them for a long time, and it uses considerable energy and force, so I decided it would be a good way to use up my time until the train came.

So I did my stepups. After a while I got a bit tired, and did some stretching. Then the train came. I felt that this waiting time was not wasted at all; this time it was used well. Maybe next time I have to wait >10 minutes for a train, and if I don't feel tired, I should do some stepups again, and not be upset of having to wait. That was an opportunity found out of what would usually be considered wasted time.


As for med school admission, some schools including Monash and UWA sent their interview offers today. Melbourne hasn't as yet. However, my scores were greater than some who got offers for Monash interview, so it seems like barring any administrative errors, I probably got an interview offer from Melbourne or a place at UQ.

[update] Midsemester test next week, and assignment due too.

There is a midsemester test next week for one of my major subjects. There is also an assignment due too for another subject (the same one where the draft was due last week), and there is a prac this week for that subject too (which is the only prac this semester), and I have to write up a prac report. So there are quite a few things which need to be done in the next two weeks.

Anyway, today I surveyed the level 7 medical building at unimelb, since apparently some interviews have been held there. I felt that maybe I should get a feel of how the place is like, so I could be less nervous on the day. I had been there in first year once when I had nothing to do and decided to explore all the levels of the medical building, but I didn't spend that much time analyzing any particular level.

I also finished my volunteering commitment for the Student Appeal today. The Student Appeal raises money for students who live on campus and are finding it difficult to pay their bills and living expenses, and donations of $5 or more are matched by the university. It felt nice to be part the team raising money for a good cause. I also have something to say now for volunteering questions during future interviews or if I have to submit a CV, apart from saying that I have helped people in person and online with their VCE studies and GAMSAT practice questions without asking for money.

It seems like GAMSAT interview offers and UQ offers are going to be out soon. 2-8 days. I'm interested in what the UQ cutoffs will be, and also the interview cutoffs of the other unis.

Reunification (統一)

As a result of conflicts between communist and capitalist forces in the late 1940s and early 1950s, both China and Korea are divided into two parts. Both have been divided for about 60 years now. It's been a long time.

One day I hope there will be reunification of China. However, there are a lot of challenges. There are political challenges, due to the different types of government. And there are economic challenges, since the mainland communist China has a much lower GDP per capita than Taiwan. However, the mainland is catching up very rapidly, with an average of about 9% growth in real GDP per year ever since Deng Xiaoping took over as the de facto leader.

Historically though, this was not the first time that China has been divided. But I hope this situation will be resolved well during my lifetime.

[update] Not the best week...

The past week hasn't been the best. At the start, I had the draft of an assignment due, and then there was an online test for another subject worth 7.5% of it (not big, but not a small amount). I didn't do as well as I'd have liked; 75%.

Then the offers for USyd dent came out. It wasn't that surprising, but I didn't get an offer. Who knows, I might still get one in later rounds though. Logically it shouldn't have affected me too much, but sometimes I do wonder if I should have applied to UniMelb DDS and spend the extra $100... Especially with this uncertainty surrounding UQ, whether or not people who didn't preference them first would get a place, despite the supposed streamlining with the GEMSAS implementation. On the other hand, maybe that's the motivation I need to do well on the Melbourne interview...

Then I hear that the interview ratio of the Melbourne Medical course has been increased from 1.25 (125%) to 1.5 (150%). This seems to be not proven incorrect due to the interview ratio of 125% been taken off the unimelb website. Now it's better to know than not to know, but this news isn't good. I assume they might have been trying to compensate for USyd pulling out of the consortium, but USyd med people already have their offers so I wonder if it was actually necessary. That makes the ratio without FFPs 1.5*320/280=1.71, which is not low at all! And if only unbonded CSPs are included (I only put down accepting unbonded CSPs; logically I'd rather apply the next year and put UQ first than accept a bonded CSP), then 1.5*320/202=2.38, before accounting for all the guaranteed entry people...

Ah well. I wouldn't be surprised if I look back on this week in the future and it is just a small bump after all. But I do have to put it behind me, practice more for the interview, and keep up more with the study... I wish I could just focus on studies, seriously.

[update] Almost missed the draft submission date for an assignment... oops

This weekend, like I said earlier, had some time spent catching up on past lectures. So I am a bit more up to date, but not completely. Ah well.

I was totally unaware that a draft copy of an assignment was going to be due on Tuesday (16 August). I only found out that there might be an assignment due soon from someone's facebook update saying they had to look up a lot of articles for some assignment. Then I checked the online blackboard/learning management system and saw that it was due on Tuesday!

It's not so bad though since the draft is only marked as pass/fail (20% of the assignment mark), but I might have started it earlier if I knew the draft was going to be due this soon. The reason I did not know though was that I can't be bothered reading the messages on the online blackboard/LMS and I think the assignment was not discussed in lectures. Looking back at my emails, it seems like I didn't receive a notice about the assignment either. I should have read the LMS properly though, but usually when I use it I just go straight to the lecture notes to print them off without reading any of the news.

Anyway, I'm about 3/4 complete as far as the minimum word count is concerned now, and I'll probably finish the rest tomorrow. Lucky I happened to read facebook though; otherwise 3% of my overall mark for that subject could be gone just like that. Usually I don't like assignments and I prefer exams as assessment, but this assignment seems to be about searching up articles in journals, so I guess it's a bit hard to make it into an exam.

[update] GEMSAS interview offers in about two weeks. UQ offers soon.

Trying to put the USyd interview experience behind me, but learn from it at the same time, I've done some practice with questions in a group for the past few weeks. I've done a little talking into the mirror too, although not very much yet. But that said, I've been neglecting the study a bit. I'll try to catch up on the weekend.

According to the GMAC guide, UQ offers are released this month. I expect that I would have received an unbonded CSP from UQ if I preferenced UQ first, since they just use GPA as a hurdle (which I pass quite easily) and rank only with GAMSAT, without having an interview. There seems to be some controversy with the number of provisionals, notably a lack of an upper bound on the number of provisionals displayed in the GMAC guide or online, but I doubt the cutoff would be >83 (my guess is around 74 or 75; I think my score from last year of 77 would be enough).

However, due to the UQ (lower preference) issue, I wonder if I will get a place there if I happen to get passed on from Melbourne, if I would have received a place there initially by preferencing it first. I would have liked to have been able to apply to UQ directly to sidestep this issue like we could with USyd; with UQ pulling out actually making more sense as a non-interview uni with a different admission calendar. Otherwise, and perhaps this other option would be better to save application fees, it would be nice if they could have guaranteed that there would be spots reserved for second round offers.


Anyway, the GEMSAS interview offers, also according to the GMAC guide, will be released from 25-31 August, which is in about two weeks. I think that I will get one from Melbourne, but I am quite interested in what the cutoffs will be. I'm quite sure they will rise from last year though, due mainly to the big increase in the biomed and science cohorts this year.

Happy fourth anniversary, Girls' Generation (소녀시대)!

Yesterday, August 5, was the anniversary of Girls' Generation's (소녀시대, SNSD) debut performance, 다시 만난 세계 (Into the new world), on August 5, 2007. At the same time though, I was a bit disheartened by the enormity of the task ahead of me to improve my interview performance because USyd decided to release the MMI scores; to be honest, my performance was very bad. But I guess I am better off with that information; it does tell me how much I need to improve.

I was sad that because of my poor interview result affecting me, I couldn't feel the excitement of the anniversary of SNSD's debut like I would have hoped at the same time. But today now that I think of Girls' Generation's debut, I remember all the hard work they needed to do; about six years of intense training before the debut, followed with a lot of ongoing work to perfect their skills. From starting at a humble beginning, to now being very dominant in K-pop, it is inspiring how they have come a long way.

I might just reflect on that for a while, and try to draw inspiration from them. I've come so far down the path of medical school admission due to the GAMSAT score, but for me there is still quite some distance to go (unless I put UQ first). The road is not always easy, but if I keep making improvements, I can keep going further. One step at a time.


To SNSD, happy anniversary. I hope that it will be Girls' Generation for a long time.

Right now it's Girls' Generation! From now on it's Girls' Generation! Forever, Girls' Generation!

지금은 소녀시대! 앞으로도 소녀시대! 영원히 소녀시대!

소녀시대 짱! 소녀시대 파이팅!

[update] USyd releases interview scores.

Today, unexpectedly, USyd released the interview scores of medical school applicants. My score was very low, 84/180 (46.7%). That means that I have a lot of improvement to do with my interviewing ability.

It's interesting to note that the email suggests that the rank list is generated by adding up the interview percentage (out of 100%) with the GAMSAT overall score (out of 100). This is instead of adding up "standard scores" (aka z-scores), and since the interview scores have a higher standard deviation than GAMSAT overall scores, means that the rank list weights the interview more highly than a standard score approach.

Anyway, it seems like I have to improve my interview ability quite significantly (it was about 15% more for me to get an unbonded CSP this year in USyd). Thankfully, I only have three subjects this semester to worry about.

Review of decisions of the past year

Today I've been thinking of the various decisions that I have made with respect to medical school admission in the past year. While ultimately I will get a clearer picture at the end of the year, here are my thoughts right now:

Firstly, it was the correct decision to repeat the GAMSAT, despite my score last year being "high". My mark improved by 6 on the "normal" weighted scale, and 7 on the weird "equal weighting" used by UniMelb. I do predict that the Melbourne cutoff will rise this year because of the increase in biomed graduates, and any higher score is useful. Furthermore, the USyd experience has shown that my interview ability is rather weak like I thought it was, so a higher GAMSAT would be a very useful buffer in the selection overall score, especially for UniMelb where they don't have a minimum interview score required unlike USyd.

Secondly, it was the correct decision to apply to USyd. Although it hasn't offered me a safety net like I hoped it might, applying there required me to think about some MMI questions. I also got some real MMI experience too and have identified some things to work on for next time. This can only help for a possible Melbourne interview.

As for the other decisions, it is impossible to tell if I made the right decision right now. If the UQ issue has been resolved, then the GEMSAS preference list that I drew up is the correct one. However, if it has not been resolved, and if I also happen to not get into UniMelb, then it may not have been the right one (although it also means that I should have tried harder for practicing for the interview for Melbourne).

Apart from that, if both the UQ issue is not resolved, and I did not get into Melbourne, then it may mean that I should have applied to dentistry in Melbourne (no interview). To be honest, it was only during this year when I seriously considered dentistry, sparked by the lecture that the dentistry guy gave during the DPhysio/MD/DDS info session (he was pretty funny and perhaps his speech was rather unconventional). I have become more and more interested about the OMS (oral/maxillofacial surgery) specialization which requires both medicine and dentistry this year, partially because I like being at uni (and without wasting time either), and partially because both medicine and dentistry seem interesting. But if I do get into medicine, then not applying would have been the right decision, since then I wouldn't need to pay $100 in application fees this year.

I guess I'll just have to wait and see. Or rather not. I guess I'll have to practice for the interview. That is best thing that I can do now.

USyd interviews: what went wrong. Points to improve for Melbourne.

I am not talkative in real life. Also, I am younger than most other people applying for graduate entry med (and male, so perhaps less mature than females the same age), and have not been in a job with lots of teamwork involved, so have not had many experiences with difficult interpersonal situations. So I haven't had much experience for those scenarios similar to some interview questions. Also, I score significantly above the average on the autism spectrum test, although not enough for a diagnosis. I also scored less than 50 in section two of the UMAT back in year 12; the "Understanding People" section. All these factors, and maybe more which I can't think of right now, make interviews difficult for me.

However, that does not mean that I cannot perform well in interviews given enough practice. Maybe I need a lot more practice than usual people though. There is also a list of things which I could have done differently for USyd if I was more serious (instead of it being a backup for Melbourne). I could have refused to turn it into a holiday with more than one other family member, and just focused on the interview and come back. I could have taken a plane instead of go by car, so I had more time to learn the answers that the interview practice group I was in came up with, and had more of a rest. Also, I could have told family members not to book cheap accommodation, where the place incidentally stuffed up our booking and made things stressful in the night before the interview. I could also have booked the interview on any day other than the first day of interviews to give myself a bit more time to learn the answers. And of course, as stated in an earlier post, I could act more confident.

Of these things, a lot of them (to do with traveling) are not applicable to the Melbourne interview, since I live in Melbourne. However, I do need to practice speaking confidently and looking in peoples' eyes (and not looking at the "silent observer" either but only the interviewer in front of me, although I do pay attention to the need to do that already), especially since apparently there is more nonverbal than verbal communication, although personally I find text communication or voice communication perfectly OK apart from when I have to draw diagrams or use math formulas which are hard to type or say, and I need to spend time to memorize answers. Also, maybe I shouldn't book for the first day of interviews if I have a choice.

Ah well. The main thing for Melbourne is more practice I guess. Notwithstanding the starting disadvantage that I may have, enough practice should be able to make up for it. If my improvement in section two of the GAMSAT (written communication) by 18 points was anything to go by (although a lot of it was luck), there is definitely hope for improvement of the interview...

[update] No USyd offer. Have to practice more for Melbourne.

The USyd medicine offers were released a lot earlier than expected today. Unfortunately, I didn't get one. I didn't apply for BMP though, only unbonded CSP. That said, there has been no mention of anyone who was on a "waitlist" on the forums, so it is possible that people will get offers after rejection in the future as people decline USyd offers for some on the GEMSAS consortium.

Anyway, I wasn't that confident out of the interview, so that wasn't too unexpected. I guess I'll have to work more on skills before Melbourne though. That interview offer may come out in a few weeks. It's good that I have had practice, although the bad thing is that I have not much of a safety net anymore, if the UQ issue is not resolved. Ah well, I did not really expect to have this experience anyway in the first place, and Melbourne has always been the aim. So I'll just let this experience guide me hopefully to a stronger performance in a Melbourne interview.

[update] Semester two has begun. Getting back into the uni routine.

As you would know from reading, this is my first week back at uni for semester two. The first one or two weeks in a semester involve getting back into a routine, and knowing roughly where and when each class is. The train was late on my first day back though (Monday), as is often the case in Melbourne, so I was late for my first class.

It is now three weeks to mid-August, when the USyd offers come out. Unlike what I said before though, the other unis' interview offers seem to be from 25-31 August according to the GMAC admission guide instead of mid-August. So they are one to two weeks after USyd offers.

Historically, UQ offers have been released before other unis' interview offers in the consortium. If I don't get an offer when UQ releases their main round offers, and if my GAMSAT score was higher than cutoff, then that would be an early indication that it is likely that Melbourne has given me an interview offer, since UQ is my second preference.

I guess that's about all I have to say for now.

[update] Semester two in three days

Semester two starts in three days. I only have three subjects this semester since I did a subject in summer semester. This was a deliberate plan on my part, because I wanted extra time for interview preparation just before a hypothetical Melbourne or other consortium uni interview. There would be extra time for practice with fewer subjects to worry about.

I also hope to actually get time to read my textbook. In the past for subjects in uni, I did read the textbook a bit for some of the biological type subjects, but often for less than half the covered material in class. The notes in uni usually cover most of the things to learn, and unlike VCE, the uni textbooks have a lot of unexaminable content there since they are not specifically designed for the subject (I hear of a major subject in some other people doing my course where the material taught in lectures is just all of a textbook, but that is unfortunately the exception rather than the rule). I also couldn't be bothered finding up the page reference numbers for what to read, unlike in VCE where I simply read the physics and chem books from start to finish; all of the chem book and the physics book for the distinct chapters which covered the core content and the detailed study we were taught to do.

That said, I think reading the textbook is good at third year level. It seems that often the same textbooks were prescribed for second and third year level, and only a bit of it was used in second year and a lot more was used in third year. So I'll try to do that this semester. Hopefully that will integrate knowledge better.

Apart from that... interviews... one month to find out the result from USyd and see if I get a Melbourne interview. It would have been more comforting if I knew for sure that the UQ issue is resolved, but I don't know that. That said, the plan A has always been to get into the Melbourne Medicine course.

Anyway, so semester two. It's the final semester of biomed if all things go to plan. It is likely to be the semester where I go to an interview for UniMelb medicine. It is also during then that I'll know whether or not I have received medical school offers for USyd and UniMelb medicine, setting the path for the next four years ahead. And it will begin in three days. I hope for a good outcome.

Let the games begin!

Support concession public transport travel for postgraduate and international students

Some of you who read this blog may have noticed that I have recently put links on the right hand side of my blog. Today, I added two extra links about concession travel on public transport.

How does it relate to my blog? Well, since the University of Melbourne gives an MD for medicine, which is classified as a masters level degree, instead of a MBBS like other unis in Australia, medicine students (and students of other professional degrees) at the University of Melbourne under the Melbourne Model are not eligible for concession travel, even though those at Monash and Deakin (for example) are eligible. Even before the worthy arguments about how "traditional" postgraduate degree students should have concession travel have taken place (which they do in most non-Victorian states), the current discrepancy between professional degrees of the same function in UniMelb and Monash for example, simply because Melbourne calls them "master level degrees", should rightly be addressed. (see http://www.capa.edu.au/transportconcessions)

Now... what can you do about it? I'm not sure how much this will help, but you can help by signing the Council of Australian Postgraduate Associations Incorporated petition. You can also contact the transport minister in Victoria, Terry Mulder, through a contact form here. Or you can contact your local MP. That said, the issue has been around for quite some time now, but has not yet been resolved. We can always hope that this worthwhile issue gets attention in the future though.

Thank you for your support.

[update] One month until mid-August: USyd offers and GEMSAS interview offers

In about one month, it will be mid-August. That is when the USyd the main round of domestic medicine and dentistry offers are released, and when the GEMSAS/ACER interview offers will be released. Of course, I am hoping to get an offer at USyd, and I would be a bit disappointed if I didn't, but after all my first preference was always Melbourne. Either way, it will give me an indication of how much I must practice before the Melbourne interview which may turn up.

Anyway, semester two is just around the corner in a week an a half. Mid-August therefore lies in the fourth week of the semester, although if things are a bit early we may get the USyd offers and GEMSAS interview offers late in the third week.

That wasn't much of a break really. It was filled with interruptions due to interview practice and having to go to Sydney to interview. That said, it was an experience that I think was invaluable. On the other hand, if the break was too long, I might have become bored with not much to do, which has happened in the past.

Ah well. One and a half weeks to semester two, and about a month until USyd offers and GEMSAS interview offers, which hopefully will be a University of Melbourne one. After one and a half weeks, there's going to be study and interview practice ahead!