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Ask me anything about UK physio schools


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Hey everyone,

hope everyone is managing their health and wellbeing fine given the difficult times we’re going through.

 

I’m about to finish my Masters program in the uk soon, pending a few more placements as soon as the covid situation has resolved.

 

I initially applied to almost all of the physio schools in the uk and have friends in different schools in the UK at the moment. 

 

This website was a huge help for me years ago so I’m here to answer any questions relating the schools, finances, and etc you may have.

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Hey,
 

hope you're doing well! I was wondering what University you attended in the UK? I applied and have offers to some schools, and I was wondering if you could help sort out which one may be the better choice if you or your friends have any insight on them. I have RGU, GCU, Oxford Brookes and Manchester Met! Would you be able to shed light on the finances, and how much I can expect to pay over the course of the degree? If there are any tips on accommodation costs, and how placements work. Is there a program that you would generally recommend over the others, and what are your experiences with the city you are in, and university as an international student? Sorry for bombarding you with so many questions I'm just a bit lost and any help would be great! 

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1 hour ago, ChaitanyaVazir said:

Hey,
 

hope you're doing well! I was wondering what University you attended in the UK? I applied and have offers to some schools, and I was wondering if you could help sort out which one may be the better choice if you or your friends have any insight on them. I have RGU, GCU, Oxford Brookes and Manchester Met! Would you be able to shed light on the finances, and how much I can expect to pay over the course of the degree? If there are any tips on accommodation costs, and how placements work. Is there a program that you would generally recommend over the others, and what are your experiences with the city you are in, and university as an international student? Sorry for bombarding you with so many questions I'm just a bit lost and any help would be great! 

Hi, no problem at all. I was in your place two years ago and know exactly what you're going through.

I attended MMU. 

I had offers from the schools you mentioned plus birmingham, brighton and a few others. SO basically my selection was based on main criterias, main obe being the cost of the university and the second factor was the population of the city. For example, having a placement in a highly populated city means more hospitals and hence better placement opportunities. You have to keep in mind that whatever school you select they will most likely have a bahclors physiotherapy program with a bunch of students and in well populated cities it is easier to assign everyone to ood placements whereas in less populated cities that can be difficult and you may end up getting 'low quality' placements.

Finances are a bit complicated and you'll have to be more specific. But here's a few things that come to my mind:

Comparing Oxford Brookes and MMU (Manchester Met:

Oxford brookes has a lower tuition fee and city itself feels alive (I lived there for 2 months) and a big student vibe there, almost everyone you see is a student. However, the low tuition fee (15500 I think for the first year only compared with MMU at 18k same for both years) is offset by the cost of transporation to the placements. MMU has scheme that refunds your trasportation to placement fees where as at oxford brookes and likely other univerities you'll have to cover thefee youself which can be quiete high wwith how expensive the train and bus system is in the UK. Oxford brooke, due to its location and being a small city, means that you will probably be travelling to farther distances to attend placement. And I promise you waking up at 5 am every morning and getting back home at 8-9 pm is not fun. The deadlines for assignments at oxford brookes are put back to back together so you may have 4 assignments due in a matter of 4 months (although they change curicculim yearly, and you have advance notice for when the assignment ids due). ALso, at oxford brookes you have classes almost everyday of the week (business days of course). 

MMU is much better imo but keep in mind that I can be a bit biased as it is the university I attended. MMU classes are only 3 days a week from about 9 to 5. the rest of the week you have off to yourself for self studying and completing the weekly study booklet. The assignments are spreadout evenly throughout the year so you won't be overwhelemd with a bunch of assignments at once. As I mentioned before you transportation to placement is covered. Given that MMU is in the center of manchester, there are lots of hpospitals near the university and you are likely to get a better placement. ALso, you are more likely tofind cheaper accomodation in manchester given that it's a big city and there are more options. MMU, like most UK schools, also accepts a lot canadian students everyear so you won't be all alone there. MMU has been know to make small typos in completing your accreditation forms so as long as you are careful and ensure they complete the right things, you will be okay. The website also says 1000 hours for many uk universities but you will have way more than 1025 hours so don't worry about hours. 

Robert gordon and glasgow, I've heard are good universities but I don't know how good their placements are.

The accomodation will cost you approximately 500-600 pounds per month unless you're willing to share your room with others which can bring the price down to somewhere between 350-500 pounds. Food expependiture including going out a few times a month is approxiamtely 40-60 pounds per week. All in all, if you were to travel as well, expect to pay between 800-100k for the whole two years. 

 

One thing to keep in mind is most schools in terms of teaching are similar, yes maybe birmingham has a better teaching program but at the end of the day physio is a practical skill and whichever one offers better placements is th eone you want to choose. Most schools in the uk follow the same guidlines and so their teachings are similar.

 

Your expeirence in any university depends on the classmates you end up having, one classmate can change the dynamic of the whole class. Try to befriend your upper years and specifically the canadian students so you can go out. Overall, living on your own and all the friendships and experiences you build will change you is a very positive way.

 

Hope that helps.

if you need any more help don't hesitate to let me know, I'd be more than happy to help. 

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6 hours ago, omdphysio said:

Hey everyone,

hope everyone is managing their health and wellbeing fine given the difficult times we’re going through.

 

I’m about to finish my Masters program in the uk soon, pending a few more placements as soon as the covid situation has resolved.

 

I initially applied to almost all of the physio schools in the uk and have friends in different schools in the UK at the moment. 

 

This website was a huge help for me years ago so I’m here to answer any questions relating the schools, finances, and etc you may have.

Thanks for doing this! I was accepted at Brunel so there is a chance I will be going there in September, would you happen to know anything about Brunel's program/location/placements? They seem pretty decent and like you mentioned above, the UK curriculum is pretty similar across all schools, but I was hoping to find out a bit more. Also, would you happen to know about the accreditation process when we do want to practice in Canada after grad? Would it be more difficult for oversea-trained physio grads to get licensed and get a decent job in Canada?

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Hey, thanks for the in depth response! I really appreciate it, you shed light on a lot of the questions I had, and ones I didn't even know I had! I would really like a school with placements that are close by, and having the transportation costs covered is also a huge plus! Would you be able to share some details on what kind of placements you got to do throughout your program? also ignore my error message above, I'm a bit new at this forum haha. 

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On 6/1/2020 at 8:40 PM, PikaPikaPTChu said:

Thanks for doing this! I was accepted at Brunel so there is a chance I will be going there in September, would you happen to know anything about Brunel's program/location/placements? They seem pretty decent and like you mentioned above, the UK curriculum is pretty similar across all schools, but I was hoping to find out a bit more. Also, would you happen to know about the accreditation process when we do want to practice in Canada after grad? Would it be more difficult for oversea-trained physio grads to get licensed and get a decent job in Canada?

Brunel is a good but challenging school. You're likely to have better placements but I don't exactly know how far you have to travel to get to your placements. Brunel is close to the heathrow airport I beleive. One thing that stopped me from going to brunel was that one of major curiculums(msk I think) was taught in the second year. Whereas in other schools you're taught msk, neuro and cardio all within the first year and in the second year you do dissertation and placements mostly along with a few other courses. I found the later to be better but I guess brunel's system could be nice too. 

Job wise because there is a relatively good demand for physio's, you won't have an issue getting a job. At the edn of the day its about how good you are at your job, I've seen canadian trained physio's who are not good at all and I've seen internationally trained physios who are amazing at their job. The accreditation process takes about 12 to 18 weeks for international students from the UK. But the lcensing exams are the same for canadians and the uk students. You may have to take a supplementary course when you come back to canada to bring you level with the canadian students so you can pass the exams hopefully on the first attempt.

 

Let me know if you have any other questions. 

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9 hours ago, ChaitanyaVazir said:

Hey, thanks for the in depth response! I really appreciate it, you shed light on a lot of the questions I had, and ones I didn't even know I had! I would really like a school with placements that are close by, and having the transportation costs covered is also a huge plus! Would you be able to share some details on what kind of placements you got to do throughout your program? also ignore my error message above, I'm a bit new at this forum haha. 

No problem!

As mentioned before, although MMU offers transportation fees, you have to keep in mind that they're tuition is higher. Also, make sure to enquire with whatever school you're applying to to see if that policy is still available or not. 

 

You get all types of placements. MSK, Neuro and Cardio will be covered so you can practice in canada but aside from those you will be working mostly in hospitals rather than private clinics. Placements are just everything physio related, cardio-respiratory, muskuloskeletal outpatients or inpatients, working in medical wards, working with stoke patients and so on. 

 

Let me know if you have any other questions!

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On 6/1/2020 at 1:05 PM, ChaitanyaVazir said:

Hey,
 

hope you're doing well! I was wondering what University you attended in the UK? I applied and have offers to some schools, and I was wondering if you could help sort out which one may be the better choice if you or your friends have any insight on them. I have RGU, GCU, Oxford Brookes and Manchester Met! Would you be able to shed light on the finances, and how much I can expect to pay over the course of the degree? If there are any tips on accommodation costs, and how placements work. Is there a program that you would generally recommend over the others, and what are your experiences with the city you are in, and university as an international student? Sorry for bombarding you with so many questions I'm just a bit lost and any help would be great! 

Hi!

How was your interview with GCU? Was it relatively relaxed and more of a chat compared to the MMI that Canadian schools use? I have an interview with them coming up and wanted to go in prepared!

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8 hours ago, PikaPikaPTChu said:

Hi!

How was your interview with GCU? Was it relatively relaxed and more of a chat compared to the MMI that Canadian schools use? I have an interview with them coming up and wanted to go in prepared!

GCU was one of the last schools I did interview for. I had my interview over the phone. The interview was very chill, just the general questions you get asked in everyother physio interview.. e.g. why this school, why physio, your knowledge on different branches of physio and more. Much much more relaxed compared to MMI. if you're doing an skype interivew, I highly suggest you dress up and put on a tie. 

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On 6/3/2020 at 11:45 PM, PikaPikaPTChu said:

Hi!

How was your interview with GCU? Was it relatively relaxed and more of a chat compared to the MMI that Canadian schools use? I have an interview with them coming up and wanted to go in prepared!

Hey so sorry for the delay in response, I hope I'm not too late! It was much more relaxed than Canadian schools in my opinion. It was via Skype and the interviewer really put me at ease. They asked questions like why you want to do PT, what makes good research, what are good qualities for a PT to have, your perceived strengths and weaknesses. (I'm not 100% sure if I wrote these down as definite questions they asked, or if it was what I was told to expect, however still great to cover). 

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15 hours ago, ChaitanyaVazir said:

Hey so sorry for the delay in response, I hope I'm not too late! It was much more relaxed than Canadian schools in my opinion. It was via Skype and the interviewer really put me at ease. They asked questions like why you want to do PT, what makes good research, what are good qualities for a PT to have, your perceived strengths and weaknesses. (I'm not 100% sure if I wrote these down as definite questions they asked, or if it was what I was told to expect, however still great to cover). 

Hey! Not at all you are just in time! Yea it seems like the UK school interviews are much more relaxed and more of a chat. It will be difficult to decide between Brunel and GCU though (if I do get into GCU that is :p)

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  • 4 weeks later...
  • 2 years later...

Hi to anyone who might still be reading this thread. Is anyone headed to the UK for the January 2023 start? I've been accepted to RGU for the MSc PT program and curious about timelines - visa applications, when to actually move there, etc. Any insight to anyone plans or past experiences would be so helpful! 

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  • 3 months later...

Hello everyone, I hope to get some advice about interview format for MMU as mine is coming up in a week time ? I am international student trying to get into MSC physiotherapy pre registration in UK for sept 2023 and MMU is one of the school that offer me an interview ! 
 

Thanks for any advice from anyone. 

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