hhhart Posted December 1, 2017 Report Share Posted December 1, 2017 While it *may* be common in the States, this surprised me to hear it may be happening in Canada as well: essentially bribing your way into the program... Overheard a 3rd or 4th year medical student/resident at a family practice telling someone that her daughter's chances of getting into ubc med were really low if she was White and then made the statement that her dad (the med student/resident's) had donated over $100k to UBC MED and she cited that as a strong reason she was accepted. That and not being White... Is this a thing in Canada? Are we doomed if we are White and our parents don't donate $$$?? Is there a racial component to the applications as there is in the States? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
la marzocco Posted December 1, 2017 Report Share Posted December 1, 2017 15 minutes ago, hhhart said: While it *may* be common in the States, this surprised me to hear it may be happening in Canada as well: essentially bribing your way into the program... Overheard a 3rd or 4th year medical student/resident at a family practice telling someone that her daughter's chances of getting into ubc med were really low if she was White and then made the statement that her dad (the med student/resident's) had donated over $100k to UBC MED and she cited that as a strong reason she was accepted. That and not being White... Is this a thing in Canada? Are we doomed if we are White and our parents don't donate $$$?? Is there a racial component to the applications as there is in the States? This stuff is all anecdotal - I would take it with a grain of salt. It would be a blatant contravention to the laws and regulations in place prohibiting positive and negative discriminatory policies. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Meridian Posted December 1, 2017 Report Share Posted December 1, 2017 I suggest most of those comments are crap. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JohnGrisham Posted December 1, 2017 Report Share Posted December 1, 2017 Definitely very unlikely and just talking nonsense. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mdapp Posted December 1, 2017 Report Share Posted December 1, 2017 Not sure if the bribing part is true but I wouldn't be surprised if race matters for med admissions. It's important to accept med applicants and train physicians who will be predominantly seeing patients who are of visible minority (black, native...etc). This is why race is a big part in the US and should continue to be so. That being said, Asians applicants have it so much harder than their white counterparts so at least be grateful of that. But again, i'm not entirely sure if UBC does this race thing (perhaps they looked into cultural background instead of your superficial skin color). As far as I remember, they did not ask about the applicant's race in the applications. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MDLaval Posted December 1, 2017 Report Share Posted December 1, 2017 I don't think it's true. 1st = all the ethical issues about this make it hard to believe. 2nd = even if it were true, why would the person admit it and even pass the word on? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
hhhart Posted December 3, 2017 Author Report Share Posted December 3, 2017 On 01/12/2017 at 10:48 AM, MDLaval2017 said: I don't think it's true. 1st = all the ethical issues about this make it hard to believe. 2nd = even if it were true, why would the person admit it and even pass the word on? Those are my thoughts too. And, especially as this med student/resident was either in their rotation position or at work, it was also unprofessional in my opinion. I'm tempted to find out who they are and report them, but what would be the point really. But yes, I agree. The whole idea seems too full of ethical landmines and what good does bragging your dad had to buy your spot in medschool do? I didnt quite understand that part myself. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Torntoiletpaper Posted December 5, 2017 Report Share Posted December 5, 2017 On 2017-12-01 at 10:17 AM, mdapp said: Not sure if the bribing part is true but I wouldn't be surprised if race matters for med admissions. It's important to accept med applicants and train physicians who will be predominantly seeing patients who are of visible minority (black, native...etc). This is why race is a big part in the US and should continue to be so. That being said, Asians applicants have it so much harder than their white counterparts so at least be grateful of that. But again, i'm not entirely sure if UBC does this race thing (perhaps they looked into cultural background instead of your superficial skin color). As far as I remember, they did not ask about the applicant's race in the applications. Yeah, I'm unsure of the bribing part. Maybe it's happened sometime or another somewhere (hard to imagine that it's never happened before), but isn't very likely for anyone to get accepted in that manner. However, race does matter. Like others mentioned, it's important to train physicians of all cultures. It's always been an elephant in the room and I don't think anybody is arguing otherwise. However, in Canada, it's more Indigenous Canadians rather than blacks. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
OwnerOfTheTARDIS Posted December 5, 2017 Report Share Posted December 5, 2017 On 12/1/2017 at 6:20 AM, hhhart said: While it *may* be common in the States, this surprised me to hear it may be happening in Canada as well: essentially bribing your way into the program... Overheard a 3rd or 4th year medical student/resident at a family practice telling someone that her daughter's chances of getting into ubc med were really low if she was White and then made the statement that her dad (the med student/resident's) had donated over $100k to UBC MED and she cited that as a strong reason she was accepted. That and not being White... Is this a thing in Canada? Are we doomed if we are White and our parents don't donate $$$?? Is there a racial component to the applications as there is in the States? My 2 cents is that most of what this resident was saying is bullshit. If her dad did donate money, it probably had little or no impact on her getting into medical school. The reasons are: There are many, many people on the admissions board. No one person (not even the Dean) has much influence on whether one person is admitted over another. Significant parts of the admission process are blinded (i.e. when they mark your NAQ score they can't see your AQ; when you interview, both interviewers and the staff who calculate a score afterwards can't see the rest of your application). I have heard that when doing holistic review, even a person's name is removed from their file! $100K really isn't that much money to a medical school. Their yearly budget is about $220 million according to recent UBC budget reports. "Funding awarded by the provinces to universities for the training of one medical student for one year ranges between $45,000 and $73,500" - Overview of the Cost of Training Health Professionals, 2008. The ACMC put that number at an average of $65,000. One of the main initiatives of UBC medical school is to make studying medicine more accessible for lower SES applicants. This type of behaviour is counter to one of their main goals. Only aboriginal applicants face different admission criteria. There are usually ~15 seats exclusively reserved for aboriginal students and their applications are looked at separately by the Aboriginal Admissions sub-committee. For everyone else, there is no distinction between applicants of different races. That information isn't even collected. I wouldn't worry about it Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
nice Posted December 7, 2017 Report Share Posted December 7, 2017 . Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Pippa756 Posted December 7, 2017 Report Share Posted December 7, 2017 I don't think being "white" brings much disadvantage and, as a "white" person, many, many advantages. Perceptions like those you overheard are usually without substance, they are just that perceptions :-( Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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