[update] back after semester 1 midsemester break (MD2)

Today I am back at the clinical school after the midsemester break. It was nice to be able to use the proper common room at our clinical school, and I got to try some table tennis. But I was quite shocked at how much my skills have deteriorated through lack of practice! Ah well... I have time to get it back up again.

I had a Basic Life Support assessment today (pass/fail) which I passed. I think most people would have passed though.

[update] MD2 Semester 1 midsemester break

I am now on my midsemester break for semester 1 this year, due to Good Friday being a public holiday.

This will be a good time to rest, although there are a lot of lectures to revise. I still have to submit two more de-identified patient cases as part of a pass/fail hurdle we have to clear (total 24 in the year).

After the break, we'll move back into the "proper" clinical school which was undergoing renovations. I'm looking forward to playing some table tennis on the breaks.

The university still has not told us specifically when we are allocated to go on our rural placement though. Australian CSP students need to do at least 4 weeks of rural placement. We were supposed to do it in our third or fourth year, and they initially planned to inform us when at the start of the year, but we still haven't been told. Ah well, I guess it's still a while to go anyway. I hope I don't have to go during my scholarly selective though... that may be a bit problematic; especially with only 6 months to do some sort of research project.

For everyone who did the GAMSAT last Saturday, and especially my students, I hope you went well.

[update] Back after midsem break (semester 2 MD1)

Today I'm back to uni after the one week midsemester break for semester 2. This will be the last block of studying for first year before the exams at the end of the year.

Like I said before, there won't be much time to study for the end of year exams, because there is less than a week from the last day of class to the first end of year exam. Right now I'm thinking that I should start to go through all the lecture notes from the start straight after our last MST, but even then there would not be much time to go through 36 teaching weeks of information...

Meanwhile, undergraduates at Melbourne have also returned from their midsem break and GEMSAS medicine offers are expected to be released at the end of this month...

[update] Midsemester break, sem 1 2012

Right now, we have the midsemester break of semester 1, 2012. This means that about a quarter of first year has been completed.

This break is an opportunity to catch up on rest, and also to revise any material from class.

The first test for first year medicine at Melbourne will be in the second week after the break, worth 5% of Foundations of Biomedical Science, covering the foundation, cardiovascular, and respiratory blocks.

[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.

[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...

[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] Midsemester break! GAMSAT results wait 50% complete!

Today is the first day of the midsemester break, which lasts for one week. It is nice to have a break once in a while, due to the fast paced nature of university, although I'd be too bored if a break was too long. I don't think I'd ever be able to take a gap year!

I just received all my midsemester test results. I'm relatively happy with how they went; all 80%+ by varying degrees, but less than 90%. I just hope I can repeat that in the exam. One of the tests had a class average of 75% though (the multiple choice one) and that was the one I did best in, so I don't think the exam would be that easy. However, the other two had class averages of 50% and 56%, so maybe they were better indicators. If the exam was hard though and no scaling, it would affect the academic record. Of course, that is just speculation, but differences in grading standards and subject difficulty is one reason why GPA is not entirely fair when comparing different courses, although it is the best predictor of medical school performance in the Australian environment, due to the GAMSAT being suboptimal (slight digression there I guess from my original topic).

After the break though, I'll have another midsemester test (again worth 20%). Then there will be exams.

Anyway, so about half the wait for GAMSAT results is over. 50%! So it's all downhill from here. To wait the same amount of time from the GAMSAT until now again, and the results will be out. Of course though, I'd like my results as soon as possible.

So that's about it for the update for now. Happy Easter!

[update] Going to apply to USyd!

So today I just found out that the University of Sydney is conducting its medical school interviews on 4-8 July this year (intersemester/midyear break) instead of in the midsemester break of semester 2 like most unis (USyd pulled out of the ACER system this year and now require direct application). After my parents said they don't mind paying the extra cost, I decided it would be good interview practice to have before a Melbourne interview. Also, it opens up another option to study if I do get in.

Now I'm a bit nervous having an interview for medical school so early though! I only expected to have one interview this year, in the midsemester break of semester 2. Add to that, this interview is worth 50% instead of 33% for Melbourne! USyd seems to ask pretty tricky scenarios sometimes too, so I'll have to somehow work out good responses to them. But more practice can only be a good thing. If I get into USyd it will be quite a confidence boost, but if not, I know I'll have to work harder on interview skills before Melbourne's interview. Well, that was assuming offers come out before other unis' interviews, although the medicine offer date for USyd is yet to be decided.

It's been more than 10 years since I've been to Sydney. When I'm there I'll have to visit the Reserve Bank of Australia like my introductory macroeconomics lecturer told everyone to do, since he used to work there. That's the place which controls our interest rates in Australia, in order to control inflation (and to reduce output gaps in economic downturns).

[update] 2 weeks of waiting down! And 2 midsems down.

It's been two weeks since the GAMSAT, so now about 25% of the wait for results is over! One quarter of the way there!

Meanwhile, I've just completed two midsemester tests in the past week. One of them I thought went relatively well (all multiple choice) although I did get a few wrong I figured after discussing questions. Another one had me writing non-stop throughout the entire tests, having no multiple choice, and having five essay-type response questions in 45 minutes! No time to recheck that one, although I did "finish" writing down something for each question by the end. However, I was planning to refine explanations and add diagrams at the end if I had time, which I did not get to do.

Personally, I think multiple choice exams are more valid than essays to some extent, since they are able to assess a higher range of the subject material in the same amount of time, thus reducing the effect of chance/question variability. This is despite the effect of being able to get questions right with a probability of 1/4 or 1/5 and some variance by guessing. However, the questions should be asked properly, and especially the answer choices should not be too ambiguous.

Anyway, one more midsem next week, and then one after the midsemester break. Then the GAMSAT results come out and it will be time to apply for medical school...