Succeeding In Med School Interviews!

[SIMSI]

Hi guys!

Hope you're all well! My name's Hamed and I'm a junior doctor working in South London (trainee GP to be precise). I have sat on the Barts and The London Interview panel for many years, and you may have read my articles in the Student BMJ or Biological Sciences Review on this topic.

Together with a group of other doctors, I help run a non-profit making organisation called S.I.M.S.I (Succeeding In Medical School Interviews). Our speakers have extensive experience as interviewers for various London medical schools.

We are holding a seminar on the morning of Saturday 13th December 2008 at St Georges Hospital Medical School to assist prospective medical students. This will consist of a series of intense interactive sessions covering key topics for the interview. We aim to mobilise the full potential of the pupils and the various activities they have done.

If you're interested in this, contact us as below, or check out our website: Succeeding In Medical School Interviews (SIMSI)

This is a non-profit making scheme, and all the profits go to an orphan sponsorship scheme in bangladesh.

Whatever you do, all the best with your interviews!

tc Hamed
Ring: 07908547324
Email: simsi_seminars@hotmail.co.uk
Website: Succeeding In Medical School Interviews (SIMSI)

[Airtones]

...if its not for profit, why not make it cheaper or free?

[Le Pom]

i dont care if it costs that much, it goes towards a charity.

i want to go

[Baki]

...if its not for profit, why not make it cheaper or free?

They know med students would jump at this kind of chance and so they're using this opportunity to help others in need.

[MattDinnery]

I'd like to point you towards Medical Admissions : Homepage

The site isn't finished yet, and we make no apologies whatsoever - I'm an applicant currently in a sixth form college, Dr Rob is an FY1 doctor in Plymouth, and Dr Gareth is the Head of Anaesthetics in a Bristol hospital.

We aren't yet advertising our interview practice programme, but have already received email enquiries of that nature.
I'll be upfront with you all, in that we charge £2,000 for an interview preparation day for 10 students (so £200 each) - and we are happy to do these anywhere in the UK. This includes lectures and tutorials from consultants, junior doctors, academic doctors and medical students. Each participant also gets a 30 minute interview with feedback of their performance.

So, what does the £2,000 do? No, we don't give it to charities, and we don't send it outside of the UK. All profit from all of the programmes on our website is used to fund our internal bursary programme - we provide the same services to medical applicants who (through no fault of their own) are in financial difficulty and we feel may benefit from being able to use one of our programmes (be that a mock interview, having their personal statement checked, or other programmes we are still planning).

Take a look - and if you're interested, please use the 'Contact us' link at the bottom of every page to drop us an email!

Thanks,

[Airtones]

Wow, some shameless self promotion now.

APPLICANTS: DONT WASTE YOUR MONEY

Getting sharked by doctors just hurts! These events will not get you into medical school, they won't improve your odds and medical schools generally look down on them.

[Airtones]

i dont care if it costs that much, it goes towards a charity.

i want to go

yeah I think it goes towards the "holiday home in spain" charity :S

[MattDinnery]

Too rights it's shameless.

Take a look at the site people - and tell me where it asks you for your money?
As I have personally copied every single file from the test server to the live server, I cannot recall having once seen a single sentence asking people to part with their hard-earned.

In fact, as Webmaster, I'm damn sure we're not asking for money. I'd have had to create the databases and scripts to handle the transaction information. Which I haven't.

So, yes, shameless self-promotion. But no, not asking for money. Providing a service, hoping people can find a use for it.

[Airtones]

Too rights it's shameless.

Take a look at the site people - and tell me where it asks you for your money?
As I have personally copied every single file from the test server to the live server, I cannot recall having once seen a single sentence asking people to part with their hard-earned.

In fact, as Webmaster, I'm damn sure we're not asking for money. I'd have had to create the databases and scripts to handle the transaction information. Which I haven't.

So, yes, shameless self-promotion. But no, not asking for money. Providing a service, hoping people can find a use for it.

You just posted about charging £200 for interview/medlink style courses?! In what way are you not offering services for money. Theres no way you can dress this up as anything other than a buisness with the sole purpose of making money (whatever that reason may be for).

[SIMSI]

hi guys,

RE SIMSI

this is why we charge:

a) if it was free, everyone would sign up, and not care if they didnt turn up. charging is a way of ensuring people who sign up to it do actually attend.

b) we need to make sure we raise enough to pay for the surcharges- photcopying, venue etc.

c) the profits do go to charity. we are proud of helping orphans in bangladesh, and will aspire to help the needy wherever they may be. as doctors, we do not discriminate or differentiate on the basis of nationality, race, and other credal differences.

we have a range of doctors, from student doctors, through to FY1's, ST1's, and consultants, the vast majority of whom have sat on interview panels themselves in medical schools. all of us could easily work for one day as locums, and make far more money than this talk will ever generate. however we believe our experience on the interview panels gives us a better idea of the interviews than our counterparts who lack this.

hope this helps,

SIMSI team (londonsimsi.com)