UNSW Med Sci 08: ROLL CALL! (1 Viewer)

[TheMelissa]

Good morning, Med Sci UNSW!

I'm going to go ahead and assume that 97% of the people in this course are all in the same, desperate boat-- we all want MBBS and this is our last resort!

We've been suckered in by the Med Sci entry stream into the MBBS and decided that we'll risk it in lieu of the USyd course. If this is a marketing ploy by our alma mata to attract more Med Sci students, by golly it's worked! Our cutoff is the highest in NSW and our places are precious!

In light of these insurmountable odds, we're all here and we're all going toe-to-toe for those fifteen places-- places which the uni may withhold at their discretion! We're the poor saps that have decided to take the hardest pathway in. The Med faculty is territorial and skeptical towards us-- but damnit, we want in!

So lets rejoice in our rather abysmal situation and make the best of it! Some of us may transfer out, some may see it through to the end and do MBBS postgraduate-- either way, we're the lot that are still chasing our scalpel-filled dreams!

I hate to be crude, but let's whip some Med Sci butt.

ROLL CALL! Name, alias and wherefore dost thou graduate from?!

 

[partelephant]

I "lol" epically.
What happens if you never make it into med? Are you actually willing to do medical research as a career? Cos from what I've heard/assume it ain't easy to get good marks in Med Sci...

Personally I would have never gone via that pathway, but luckily I don't have to =)

 

[TheMelissa]

EDIT: MBBS @ UNSW? I applaud you.

 

[Survivor39]

lol. please don't try assume 97% of MedSc students wants to do Med.

For those who are are desperate like TheMelissa, I hope you get what you want...

Also, for the first time the cut-off for MedSc at UNSW is higher than that of Usyd. Way to go!

 

[skip89]

If I didn't get into MBBS I would've done mechanical (biomed) eng at usyd. It has an extremely good rate of students moving into graduate medical degrees when they finish.

 

[angmor]

lol yeah whats going to happen if you dont get in?
i realised after half a year of doing med sci that i would probably never make it into med, so i transferred out.

 

[TheMelissa]

lol yeah whats going to happen if you dont get in?
i realised after half a year of doing med sci that i would probably never make it into med, so i transferred out.

What's this massive MedSci-is-a-failure-path-to-MBBS?

I'm skeptical as hell... Honestly speaking, I haven't even accepted my Med Sci spot and I've put Adv Sci (UNSW & USyd) and Sci/Arts (UNSW & USyd) down as late round preferences. I'm being told that it's much wiser to use a Ba Sci (adv) degree for postgraduate degrees, encouraged by the fact that it's supposedly very difficult to maintain a GPA > 6 and a 90+ WAM in Med Sci...

Maybe I should've made a UNSW Adv Sci roll call instead... *headdesk*

 

[Survivor39]

It makes no difference to do MedSc or Adv Science. You will do the SAME subjects except for 1 or 2 subject differences. All of you need to do Biology, chemistry, maths in the first year. The difficulty of maintaining the same mark in both degree is the same.

The advantage of doing MedSc is you have an alternative pathway to Med entry, which Adv Science doesn't offer.

 

[TheMelissa]

The advantage of doing MedSc is you have an alternative pathway to Med entry, which Adv Science doesn't offer.

I've heard so many stories regarding that Grad stream entry scheme offered to Med Sci students. Those fifteen provisional places are holy grails, aren't they? I'm willing to bet that they're just as elusive.

---> Waffle hereon in:
I'm snickering at the thought of the influx of first years all the unis will be facing. Teenagers with heads too big to be supported by their fresh-out-of-highschool necks, a false sense of security instilled into them by institutionalised education systems and inflated UAIs that become wildly redundant upon fulfilling their initial roles as ice breakers and pick up lines...

"I'm a 99.95, cupcake. Howzabout Friday night, after Fundamentals of Physics, then?"

Hah. Someone let me eat processed sugar far too late at night.

 

[partelephant]

I just thought I'd bring up something someone mentioned something on another forum or another thread (I forget now) about Med Sci basically being like High School all over again except with smarter people.

And the more you think about it, the more it's true - it's basically a whole bunch of people working their asses off (social life = ?) competing for a few spots at the end.

 

[Survivor39]

I've heard so many stories regarding that Grad stream entry scheme offered to Med Sci students. Those fifteen provisional places are holy grails, aren't they? I'm willing to bet that they're just as elusive.

Think of it this way, if you were to enrol in the Advanced Sceince program, there won't be 15 admission places to begin with. And since Adv science = MedSc, you might as well increase your chances of getting into Med by taking MedSc over Adv Sc.

 

[katie_tully]

We've been suckered in by the Med Sci entry stream into the MBBS

Gosh. MedSc isn't that bad. You might find you'll enjoy it.

 

[Survivor39]

I just thought I'd bring up something someone mentioned something on another forum or another thread (I forget now) about Med Sci basically being like High School all over again except with smarter people.

And the more you think about it, the more it's true - it's basically a whole bunch of people working their asses off (social life = ?) competing for a few spots at the end.

It's not true at all - I've graduated from MedSc and not once I feel like everyone is competing with everyone. Yes, the goal of a proportion of students in MedSc (and Science, Advanced Science) is to get into Medicine, but you also have to consider that the other major proportion of students are there to get a research-based degree, who wish to go on and get their Ph.Ds and become a scientist.

The fact that you won't be doing your subjects with just Medical Science people, you won't feel like a competition. This is because all the subjects are filled with people from all degrees. E.g. First year biology consists of people from environmental science, Science, advanced science, psychology, even people from the Arts or Law programs.

Believe it or not, almost all of the University Medallists graduated from Medical Science are not interested in a Med degree.

 

[katie_tully]

What happens if you never make it into med? Are you actually willing to do medical research as a career? Cos from what I've heard/assume it ain't easy to get good marks in Med Sci...

MedSc is challenging. I am continually perplexed by the attitudes on here of, 'gee, i'll do an easy year of med sc and then i can get into medicine!'

Also MedSc doesnt = research for the rest of your life, there are plenty of clinical opportunities with MedSc

 

[KFunk]

Believe it or not, almost all of the University Medallists graduated from Medical Science are not interested in a Med degree.

... even some university medallists within medicine end up staying within medical science (thinking of at least one academic physiologist at UNSW) or somewhere other than medicine 'proper'. I've also been told that another past medicine medallist only studied medicine because she thought that it would assist with her alternative medicine practice (herbal remedies, etc).

 

[mzduxx2006]

i applied for unsw but i got into sydney instead. aw well i didnt get into med science either. i got into radiation science. bah. same shyt

 

[Survivor39]

Not too worry. You can always transfer next year. It's unfortunately for you that the cut-off jumped from 89 to 92 this year.

 

[kloudsurfer]

I got an offer for UNSW Med Sci!

But im deferring this yr so wont actually start till 2009...

And im also thinking of changing my preferences...

 

[nadine06]

ive accepted my offer for med sc at unsw and like a few others im looking at medicine in the future. ive been reading up on the med sc degree (what a nerd i know!!) and it sounds very interesting

im a bit confused on the electives and subjects but, so im going to enrol after the advisory day. any help will be much appreciated!!

 

[loser101]

98% of medsci students want to get into MBBS but 98% of MedSci wont make it into MBBS

Good luck