It's me, Kinkerz!

[Kinkerz]

Okay, so re-reading university websites, and looking on Medical School Resit Policies - The Student Room has shown me that there are five possible medical schools that I can apply to (Sheffield is, apparently, not one of them):
* BSMS;
* Keele;
* Liverpool;
* Peninsula;
* So'ton.
Even so, I view my chances - as a re-sitter, and with a relatively poor "on-paper" application - as pretty slim, and I really don't fancy another gap year. I want to get out of the nest and spread my wings, so I'm trying to decide how many of those aforementioned schools to apply to and which ones. At the moment I'm decided on not applying to BSMS (was rejected from them last year for not having a competitive academic record). I shall probably apply to two/three of the schools with the remaining two/thee choices as a combination of biochemistry and physiology.
I'm leaning towards something like:
UCAS '10:
1. Medicine - Keele
2. Medicine - Southampton (very risky!)
3. Physiological science - Bristol
4. Biochemistry with immunology - Newcastle
5. Physiology - Manchester

Physics today was bloody crap! Electric fields are absolutely no fun what-so-ever. The theory and the maths are both very tedious. I suspect I'll feel the same about magnetic fields ... though I'm more optimistic about gravitational fields. The mechanics is pretty good though.

I need to ask one of my teachers for a reference (I'm applying for a couple of jobs and they both need a reference from a member of staff at school). Can't decide which one to ask. The one I'd've liked to ask is now in Australia! She packed up and moved...

[Kinkerz]

I sent an e-mail to Newcastle medical school a few days ago (I was testing the water to see if I was considered as a re-sitter at all medical schools - I'm technically not re-sitting anything, but I would be taking three years to meet the offer - and I thought I may aswell ask my favourite):

https://mbbs.ncl.ac.uk/admissions/do...olicy_2009.doc

The admissions policy states that re-sit candidates are not usually accepted. My query is whether or not I would be classed as a re-sit student.
I achieved the following grades in the academic years 2007-2009:
Biology - A
Chemistry - A
Psychology - C

I am doing A-level physics in one year this year and intend to apply to medical school. Technically, I'm not re-sitting anything, however I am taking three years to meet the AAA conditions. Would I be classed as a re-sit candidate and therefore be unsuccessful?
Any feedback would be greatly appreciated.

This is what came back:

Thank you for your e-mail.

Newcastle University require at A level, grades AAA. Subjects should include Chemistry or Biology at A or AS level. We do not accept General Studies or Critical Thinking as an A level entry qualification. If only one of Biology and/or Chemistry is offered at A or As level, the other should be offered at GCSE grade A (or Dual Award Science grade A).

We do not have any other GCSE requirements or preference for other A level subjects. We do not accept resits and all A level subjects must be achieved within the same two year period.

As long as you achieve an A in Physics, you should be eligible to apply.

Emma Major
Clerical Assistant
Medical Student Office

Given the bolded statements, there appears to be somewhat of a contradiction. Hmm ... I think, perhaps, a phone call is necessary, but that first bolded statement seems pretty clear to me.


If I do badly in the UKCAT again, it basically takes Southampton out of the equation. This leaves Keele and PMS (I've read things about PMS using the UKCAT and grade predictions to shortlist for interview too, so I'll have to read up on that). The chances of me getting an offer at either one seems pretty slim, given my re-sit tag. Even if the UKCAT goes well, Southampton would be very risky indeed; they don't interview and consequently a virtually flawless application all around is required.
So that leaves upto three possible medical schools and may even leave none. I'm going to phone Keele and ask them if I'd be wasting my time re-applying.
2010 wipe out leaves the options of doing another gap year (with the same chance of rejection) or doing a BSc and aiming for GEM, but then what if they raise the tuition fees while I'm doing the degree? There are now so many variables that could go against me, the path has become rather more inclined than it was this time last year. I guess I should 1) do the UKCAT, and 2) see what Keele say before I make any final decisions ... it's just this 2010 entry application feels like a futile attempt.

[Kinkerz]

Physics ... well, AS is really quite easy. A2, however, is rather difficult. At least I'm finding it rather difficult. I mean, it's not impossible, but some of the more mathsy parts really do take some work to get your head around. Just finished circular motion and I thought it was straight forward until the final section, which I really don't get. Support force calculations in circular motion ain't easy when there are two unknowns. Some work is required.

UKCAT on Tuesday. I'm not particularly optimistic. I haven't really done any work for it. Just looked through a few questions. "Why?" you might be thinking. "You should be working like a dog to score highly!". Perhaps I should. It's just at the one medical school I actually have a (realistic) chance - Keele - the UKCAT is barely used, if at all. So there isn't really any driving motivation to revise for a test I find mortally tedious. Should be interesting to see what I come out with. If I get a similar score to last year, my opinion of the validity (in the sense that one should score similarly at each attempt providing similar amounts of effort are put in) of the test will increase. Though, if I get a score similar to last year, it'd be somewhat of a demotivator in the 'intelligence' department...

On a separate note, my friend told me a (factual) story yesterday. Her cousin (or child of a family friend ... I forget) - a young boy, she didn't reveal his age, but I assumed about ten years old - went to Flamingo Land with his mum and dad the other week. He managed to sneak off and lose his mum and dad. Couple of hours later when the distraught parents finally found him, he was soaking wet and grinning ... they asked why and he didn't give a full answer, mentioning falling in a pond or something to that effect. When they got home, mum and dad found it odd that several of the kid's mates turned up one-by-one, asking to see him. After a few had been and gone, they went up to his room to investigate the source of this oddity and discovered that he had actually stolen a baby penguin from the zoo section, put it in his rucksack and, now, had it in his bedroom. He had climbed into the exhibit, concealed the penguin in his rucksack, climbed out of the exhibit and got the penguin home without being caught ... rather ingenious. Parents had to pay £200 for it to be transported back to Flamingo Land. Mad, eh?

[Kinkerz]

Let's start by stating the result from last year:
VR: 540
QR: 650
AR: 520
DA: 440
Average: 537.5
As you can see, last year went pretty badly (though when sitting it I felt it was going OK).

This year:
VR: 660
QR: 700
AR: 610
DA: 700
Average: 667.5
How can I improve by 260 points in DA? I didn't feel as though I was any better at it...

Anyway, I'm pleased with that score and I'm now tempted to chuck an application in at Southampton aswell as Keele.

[Kinkerz]

OK, a few very boring (for you, I would imagine) issues...

First is the damn, blasted, stupid, infuriating farcical that is the personal statement. Since both Keele and Southampton use the personal statement pretty heavily, it's going to be particularly important to produce a good one. I'm not sure how similar to last year I'd be "allowed" to keep it or what to change the bits I'm not happy about to!
Because it transpired I wouldn't be going to Keele in late August, the amount of time to 'build on' last years application has been rather limited, so effectively, I've done nothing new to reflect on other than being alive for an extra year (which, actually, I think has changed be, but it'd sound somewhat melodramatic and false if I wrote about that I suspect). Hence shining my personal statement is difficult given that I haven't got anything to shine it up with! I need to include a paragraph on what I plan to do with my year out ... well, learning to drive, earning some money and recreation are the only things that come to mind. I can't see how this paragraph is going to help the statement very much.
Additionally, I'd like to have it done within a week because I'm not sure I trust my school to send it off rapidly, so ideally I'd like to have sent it to the admin at my school a good five days before the deadline.

Second issue is less pressing, I think. Where to apply and what for. Now, Keele and Southampton are in. Do I apply to another medical school? If I do, the only realistic one left is Peninsula. On the other hand, I want to be left with something to do should this application go pear shaped (fairly likely!) so I don't want to spread myself too thin on the non-medicine application stuff. I really can't face another gap year, so I want to get into university this time. If it's not medicine, then it'll be physiology probably (I'd do that with a view of going onto GEM).

Whether typing all that out helped me or not, I'm not entirely sure...

[Kinkerz]

Well, things have changed ... for the better. For the significantly better!

Keele rang me up this afternoon informing me about someone dropping out of the course. This made me the proverbial vulture, but it also means I'm going to be doing medicine at Keele ... on Monday. Which is rather epically-awesome!
The downside (there's always a downside, no matter what) is that there's no accommodation on campus. Infact, I'm struggling to find any anywhere!

Anyway, I'm a medic.

*immediately discards UKCAT scoresheet, physics stuff and personal statement data*

[Kinkerz]

So, the first day of medical school's done.

First impressions are pretty good. The staff all seem really supportive and helpful (especially the ones who did their best to help me as much as they could over the weekend!), which is always good.

The first PBL session I thought was pretty good. I'm really glad there's a bioscience graduate in our group; I think it's a real advantage. I think it seems like a decent way to learn despite alot of the negative comments some make about it. I think most of the negative comments come from those on non-PBL courses, or courses that include a very small amount of PBL. This means that they haven't got much experience of it and when they come to do it, it doesn't work smoothly. I think courses with a lot of PBL encourage you to think like a doctor and I reckon over time it'll become a solid way to study, when everyone's adjusted from A-levels etc.

The course seems to include a lot of histology. More than I expected. Whether that's positive or negative I'm not sure, I can't tell how much I like it yet!

Tomorrow I need to try and enroll (I'm not officially enrolled yet, and you need a card to get around the building - a card I don't have - so I always need someone to get me through the building! I'm also hoping to high heavens that my loans will come through fairly sharpish once I'm enrolled.

Found some accommodation. Providing I don't find anything better, I move into a house with three other freshers (History and Politics, Foundation Law, Foundation Science) about a ten minute bus journey from the campus. Though people mentioned some halls having rooms free ... I'd prefer to live on campus if I can!

I'm buried in a mountain of paperwork that I need to fill out pronto aswell. Life's going to be rather busy from this day onwards into the forseeable future...

[Kinkerz]

First lecture was today. Everyone seemed to be constantly scribbling away ... I prefer to listen and hence my notes were very unimpressive and not exactly plentiful. Everything he (by he, I mean the lecturer) said I understood, but some of the diagrams he used in the presentation he was teaching with had labels and terminology on that I'm not sure whether we need to know or not. He didn't directly mention much of it, but it was there on the presentation ... hmm. Anatomy seems to be a very dominant feature in the initial section of this course.

All the students at Keele seem to either have a Welsh accent or a Southern one. I swear I'm the only one with a Yorkshire accent. I wish there was some more Yorkshire-folk, I feel a bit weird with my broad accent when everyone else has a nicer one!

I did manage to obtain a Keele card today and hence I can now move around the medical school building without the aid of others. Good times. My paperwork load has now decreased pleasantly too.

[Kinkerz]

Week one is over. It is a timely break. I'm pretty exhausted. I think the week in general went pretty well. Still, my to-do-list is rather long and the course is really into swing now. It's very easy to see that the next five years are going to be bloody hard work...

Move into the house tomorrow. I'm pretty daunted; living with three people, only one of whom I've met. You may not think it's scary, but I do!

All that fuss in obtaining a Keele card and it doesn't even work. There are card shaped rectangles at all the doors leading off the lobby in the medical school that you put your Keele card up against to open the door. A little green light flashes and the door opens. When I do it, however, a red light flashes and the door most certainly doesn't open. I really need to speak to someone about it. Pronto.

It's the heart next week, which should be interesting. I'll keep you posted.

[Kinkerz]

Today was especially draining, but generally informative.

Started off with a couple of lectures; first was about imaging the chest (specifically CXR), the second was about pathophysiology of the heart (specifically electrical disturbances). I found them pretty interesting as they were leaning towards the clinical side rather than the pure science side - man I can't wait to start clinical years (3 onwards).

Then we were informed of how we're assessed. In module one (year one), there are six units: Emergency (1); Infection and Immunity (2); Cancer (3); Ageing (4); Lifestyle (5) and Complex Family (6). Then there's an SSC aswell.

In January we're assessed on units 1-3 with a series of multi-choice questions (MCQs) and some more difficult questions that are similar to multi-choice questions, but have differences, such as in the extended matching (EMQs). In January I think it's a two hour exam. That's just the written one though. There are four skills stations based on using equipment such as mircroscopes. Scary stuff.

The summer is on units 1-6 (so synoptic, but there is some bias towards 4-6). There are two, two hours papers this time but with a similar format to January. Also, there are sixteen skills stations! In addition, there's the SSC; we have to write a review type thing and do an oral presentation to the set you're in (so around fifty people). Nerve wracking! I should probably start thinking about a topic at some stage, but I'm not sure how specific the topic has to be...

There are four grades, satisfactory, borderline, unsatisfactory and fail. You can also get a distinction, but you need to be in something like the top ten of the year, so I doubt I shall be obtaining such a grade - I just want to progress to year two! To progress to year two, you need to get all 'satisfactory's, though you can get away with upto two 'borderline's. Any 'unsatisfactory's or more than two 'borderline's and you have to resit. If you get a 'fail', you have to apply to the head of school for permission to re-sit!
Satisfactory - 53+
Borderline - 47-52
Unsatisfactory - 41-46
Fail - < 41
So the pass grade isn't all that high, but the boundaries are pretty close together! Also, to pass the practical skills station stuff, it's:
Satisfactory - 15/20
Borderline - 14/20
Unsatisfactory - 13/20
Fail - 12/20
So a little bit more tough there, especially as the boundaries are so damn close!
My first exam is in three weeks (it's not official or anything, just a 'mock' to check our own progress) and I'm interested to see how I do. It'll be interesting to see whether or not I need to step it up a gear.

In dissection today we examined the inferior mediastinum and removed the heart, which was pretty cool. The coronary arteries were suprisingly large, I never expected them to be so big. Next week it's the superior mediastinum with the great vessels.

(PS: Any Keele medics reading this who disagree or know differently to what I've posted, PM me and I'll make the change(s), I'm not 100% sure about everything I've written in regard to grade boundaries etc.)