Variation in medical school graduates

[nd1008]

Oh and seeing how we're all very pedantic on this forum, I'll amend saying that I agree with "half of Simran's argument" to "half of the primary premise in Simran's argument"

[Singh.Simran]

Dear Mr 08, your argument is sound, apart from one fatal flaw; it assumes both a smaller, and more closed system than that which exists.

Yes in one given school with one given home environment the slightly poorer student is encouraged, as far as possible, to equalise with the better. Though admittedly that is what the target and aim is, not necessarily the situation on the ground..

But my argument centred on the idea that people are put, at each stage of selection, into layers, whereby the only slightly worse falling just into the B-grade is getting the same provision as someone barely above C, when really they are not that much removed from an A-grade (or grammar school) student.

Therefore the resources and teaching are not the same, and they only equalise WITHIN their "layer". This drags the barely-worse student down, and means that at the next level of selection they are more likely to stay in the lower layers, or even move down further. Thus maintaining and amplifying the small difference at the initial selection, to the final result which i set out in my earlier post.

And nah, i'm just naturally an argumentative git.

I do however apologise to all for my horrendous spelling. I do seek your merciful forgivenesses.

[Dr Noodle]

I'm sure there are quite a few students who did brilliantly at their GCSEs, went through a girls/boys/both phase, did woefully at their A-levels, took a year or two out to repeat, matured in that time, and enter university back on top form.

[nd1008]

Yep, I did completely forget about the "set" system which occurs in most schools, so your argument is valid. I would still like to disagree with your conclusion - even if this equalisation process does occur between echelons rather than as a whole, it does not really support the conclusion that there is a disproportionate divergence in success in the future - although you are right in saying that some who are slightly worse, will have a disproportionately lower success rate than those slightly better, if you consider the converse (assuming this equalisation DOES occur) those who just about make it into a particular set (i.e worst in that layer) will have a disproportionate "advantage", due to the equalisation. I concede that your example, thus the former, will be more defined than the latter but in a way, it seems as if they average out, rather than diverging.

I think that there are so many different extraneous pressures adnd variations within the intricate meshwork of "success in relation to education", that it is very difficult to argue a particular case without it being either destabilised or completely refuted by a different example. Also there is the attribute of change, as Dr. Noodle showed, which I disregarded in my arguments. I just think we can safely say that there are many factors which associate with success in the future, e.g. financing, intelligence, grades, however we definitely cannot say formulaically, whether or not a particular individual will be successful, primarily due to the crucial element of luck. It's all very uncertain, so I think the adage "Getting good grades does not mean you will be a good doctor" will definitely stick for a while.

Gandhi said "Forgiveness is the attribute of the strong", so I guess I have no choice but to forgive you

[Singh.Simran]

"Setting"

No no no you're still getting the wrong end of the stick my friend.

I'm talking about the difference between bog-standard comp/grammar selection at Y11, then good/poor 6th form selection, then good/poor unis (or more likely, a competitive course like law or medicine or a rubbishy one/not uni at all).

Look at the bigger picture!

[lupin]

I only skimmed the paper by McManus et al so I may have missed something here. Did they take any account of where graduates did their post-graduate training?
Was there something about house officer posts (as they were in the 80's and 90's) in different Deaneries which gave advantages to some and disadvantages to others? And did people from say Liverpool or Dundee mostly gravitate towards the less nurturing areas?