Friday 18 February 2011

Welcome

Well I suppose the title and description of the blog say it all. I'm currently about to start the second year of a three year nursing degree , while trying to keep my grades as high as possible to help my chances of getting into med school. As a break down, I'll go through what needs to be done in Australia to get into med school.

First of all is your undergraduate degree. It doesn't matter what it is as long as you keep your grades up. GPA's in many of Australia's universities are out of 7 (7 for an A, 6 for a B, et cetera). In general, you won't be considered for medicine with a GPA below 5.5 (around 65% average). For me, in my degree, I seem to have this covered fairly well already as my GPA after my first year is 6.875 (I believe this only accounts for something like 15% of my final GPA, as each year is progressively weighted higher towards the end of the degree).

Second is the Graduate Australian Medical School Admissions Test (GAMSAT). This is a five hour exam that every post-graduate entrant into medical school must sit. It's composed of three parts; a reasoning in humanities section, a written communication section and a reasoning in science section. This first section seems pretty straight forward as long as you can read a passage of writing and accurately intemperate what the writer was trying to convey. The second section is slightly more difficult, it basically consists of writing two essays in an hour. I don't really have a problem with writing essays, but I'm definitely going to have to practice writing about random subjects in short amounts of time. 

The third section seems tricky as well; 40% chemistry, 40% biology and 20% physics. Chemistry I'm pretty mediocre with, I only know as much as I needed to get through my first year of anatomy and physiology, so I'll have to brush up on that. I'm a bit better with biology, as it played a pretty big role in my first year of nursing. However, as far as physics go, I don't have anything more than a general knowledge of household principles. For those reasons, I've taken it upon myself to prepare early for this exam that holds such an important place in my future.

Just last week I enrolled in some extra subjects at a different university to help my with my weak points. Open Universities Australia is a great organisation that lets you study individual subjects or even entire degrees from the convenience of your own home. I enrolled in " Introduction to Chemistry " and " Introduction to Physics " which both go over a single semester. I only wanted to enroll in very basic subjects, and just start out with two, because I'm not sure how I'll handle them as well as doing my normal university work, working and spending time with the fiance. I do have plans however to do more advanced subjects this year and next in preparation for med school.

And finally, the last hurdle I need to overcome to allow me in is the dreaded interview. Almost all medical schools have it and it is generally weighted pretty highly. I haven't looked into it too much, but my understanding is that it basically consists of you sitting and talking to three people for about 30 minutes while they try and interpret your abilities to be a team leader, to make decisions and to stick to your principles and also to make sure you're not just in it for the money.

Well that's enough for now. I congratulate anybody that actually read this entire post. I don't really mind if no one reads it I suppose, I'm actually pretty happy just to have this blog here as a record of my thoughts that I can look back on. My intentions are to update on my progress as far as getting into med school, as well as general everyday things that I may think that my readers (or my future self) may find interesting.

6 comments:

  1. A very interesting read. Good luck :)

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  2. hey man, i also wanna be a med student. Goodluck man. following

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  3. chem and physics... I would go insane haha

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  4. Thanks for the follows guys. Baka, if you're in Australia (I don't know much about international med programs) and want any information about pathways or anything like that, I'd be happy to help.

    I hope I don't go insane! I am worried though because nursing is suppose to be a full time study load, then I've added two extra subjects...

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  5. good luck - just read your post - I'm only doing one subject, working p/t and doing the mum thing and feel at times over whelmed!! again good luck - do as much as you can (sounds like you are) before the family grows and you get too bogged down with mortgages, credit cards and life....

    Kell

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  6. Kell, Thanks for the well wishes. I know you're doing it part time, but at least you're doing it. There's one lady in my class that is 59. I say well done!

    Good luck with your studies as well.

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