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UBC selection process is so screwed up!


Guest Thewonderer

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Guest brandonite

Liana - Thewonderer is being completely serious, at least most of the time. I have gone over this before him on SDN.

 

As have a bunch of us other Canadians who have turned to the US by the somewhat arbitrary Canadian med school admissions committee. I think I'll decide to stay in Canada for med school, but there are many people leaving because they can't get in in Canada, and are accepted by top 10/top 20 schools in the US. That tells me that something is very wrong.

 

Just very quickly to touch on something somebody else said... The Queens/UWO/etc. policy of using MCATs as a cutoff and nothing else is a horrible idea, as far as I'm concerned. Say a person with a 40 MCAT and 4.0 GPA ranks one spot behind a person with a 30 MCAT/3.5 GPA in the interviews/essays/letters combination, and that person doesn't get in. Does that sound fair? Of course not. MCATs are one of the very few non-subjective criteria interviewers have to look at. They shouldn't be discarded right at the very beginning.

 

Again, I don't think interviews should be valued as high as they are. Not because I don't think that interpersonal qualities aren't important for doctors - on the contrary, I think they are about the most important for clinical physicians. But just because it makes little to no sense to base a HUGE chunk of the final decision on a person based on a 45 minute discussion with them. Especially when you have very different interview panels, often. It just seems like there's a tremendous amount of random luck involved! Which really shouldn't be a way of deciding the very future of an applicant...

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Guest Ian Wong

<!--EZCODE QUOTE START--><blockquote>Quote:<hr> I think I'll decide to stay in Canada for med school, but there are many people leaving because they can't get in in Canada, and are accepted by top 10/top 20 schools in the US. That tells me that something is very wrong.<hr></blockquote><!--EZCODE QUOTE END--> Nope. Not very wrong, just different criteria. Whether you agree with the criteria here versus a US school is up to you. Different schools are looking for different people, and when you toss in some inherent randomness in the process, along with a gross disproportionment between the number of applicants and available seats, some people are going to go away unhappy.

 

As far as making the MCAT a greater proportion of your application, I think we'll just have to agree to disagree. I would however like to see if you still feel the same way after a few years of med school. :)

 

Ian

UBC, Med 3

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Guest hugs2all

Hi!

 

I definitely do not think that the MCAT should count for everything in the admissions process, but I do think that it should count for more than UBC gives it credit for. I don't know how well the MCAT scores correlate to achievement in preclinical courses in Canadian medical schools, but I do know that the MCAT scores have correlated very well with achievement in American medical school preclinical grades, as well as with American board scores. Surely, a high MCAT score doesn't necessarily mean you're bright and are willing to work hard to obtain your career. And, admittedly, an MCAT score of 30 may be above the average for all MCAT takers...but, personally, I would be quite worried if my doctor tried hard to do well on the MCAT, and scored lower than a 30...after all, it is only testing your knowledge of basic science, right? And, if he didn't try hard at all to do well on the MCAT...well, that's another problem.

 

Interpersonal skills are definitely as, if not more, important than a high MCAT score in making a good clinician. However, we really have no good way to measure how personable someone is. The interview IS the best way to do it, but it is still not a very good tool. So, why place so much weight on the measurement from such an inaccurate tool? (Notice, I'm not saying don't include interviews at all, but placing too much emphasis on the interviews is a problem). I actually did well enough on the interviews the second time I applied to UBC med (a 25 percentile improvement from the year before) to make it on the wait-list, but by this point, I was accepted by 3 top five American med schools (all of which required 2 or more interviews) and withdrew from the UBC list.

 

My point in bringing up the "Olympic team" was not to suggest that it was impossible to fulfill the medical school admission requirements, but that the admissions committee at UBC was not very encouraging to someone who expected to reapply to UBC again the next year. Much like thewonderer's friend, I was also told that I did not have enough of a career to impress the admissions committee. When asked to extrapolate on what the administrator meant by "career", the only response I got was "You don't know what some of the applicants have done." I would have asked her to clarify this comment too, but I was getting quite exasperated by this point. Again, this statement was not encouraging, and did not give me much information on what I could feasibly do to improve my application. I got the jist of what she wanted, but the way she put it was not encouraging at all. I would have appreciated some more useful feedback from my meeting with this administrator...after all, I felt that my extracurriculars were not too bad....for example, I've been consistently volunteering in multiple institutions since grade 10!

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Guest jennifer y

What is the range of GPAs of people who were accepted? Does the UBC admission stats show that people with very high GPAs, high MCAt usually get low interview scores? Anybody know?

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Guest Kirsteen

Hi people,

 

Quite the discussion we've got brewing here. ...and the UBC board was so quiet for a wee while!

 

Just a few comments in response to a number of items:

 

Regarding the selection process at UBC, at this point in the year, the selection of those who will receive the seats comes down to a score based 50% on interview, and the rest on academics (including MCAT) and extracurriculars. Don't forget, however, that prior to this point in the selection process, the academics, MCAT and extracurriculars counted for 100% of the selection criteria and the interview played none. In essence, UBC employs a set of filters or criteria by which they reduce a pool of ~800 applicants to ~300 whom they feel, upon initial examination of MCAT scores, academics and extracurriculars, look like decent candidates. Therefore, the selection process at UBC is just that--a process of sequential steps, and with each step, one step closer to finding a pool of 128 fitting medical school candidates. So, overall, yes, interviews are very important at this point in the process, but academics are also important, if not more, in determining who is ultimately successful--all the way to its end.

 

On interviewing itself, and the weight of it in determining who gets in and who doesn't, it wasn't that long ago when academics counted for the vast majority of the admissions score at many schools. The schools have been there, done that, and many of them are choosing to do that no longer. Some schools still value academics highly, but in general, there has been a shift in importance to the non-academic part of the application, and for many schools, (including UT, UWO, Queen's), not just UBC.

 

This may be, in part, due to a paradigm shift in the idea of what makes a good and effective contemporary physician; yes, of course it takes someone who has a certain intelligence--a point that few would argue--but it has been recognized that medicine is, and increasingly so, a social profession. Doctors not only have to work effectively with other medical personnel (where interpersonal communication is crucial), but they also have the role that includes the unbelievably challenging job of conveying some of the most sensitive pieces of information to other members of society. I contend that MOST of us have not yet experienced equivalent social situations on a regular basis that many doctors face on a daily basis. Sure, we may have been close, but to be the person who has to consistently take that step towards a distraught individual coming to grips with severe news regarding their own or a loved one's health and to do it effectively, takes an unusual set of experiences and concomitant talents. Sure, medical school will help to teach you how to handle the rigors of the job, but if an applicant comes to medical school with their eyes open to the reality of medicine, and with a hint of those experiences and talents, then they're hitting the ground running. ...and some do.

 

Coming back to interviewing, yes, of course it can be a stressful experience. It can also be a challenging experience. It is an experience where, much more than the MCAT, the quickness of your thought processes are tested and within a situation of certain strain. Largely, the questions that are thrown at you are infinite in type and difficult to anticipate. Overall, the interview presents an opportunity for the selection committee to see how you face such stresses and challenges, both intellectual and social, and also, maybe gain a little bit of insight as to your personality, to boot. Being that the job of doctor is potentially many times more stressful and challenging, I would hope that a good medical school student and future doctor could handle themselves beautifully in an interview, no matter who the interviewer and no matter what the question.

 

Regarding selection trends, in the coming years, I feel that it's going to become tougher to successfully gain a spot within medical school. Everyone's lives, backgrounds, and hence, extracurricular activities are not the same. Sure, if you follow a typical, "pre-med" path, some of these backgrounds may appear strikingly similar; however, as applicants, we don't see even a fraction of the other 799 people that we're up against. From my own experience however, I've managed to talk off-line with a few co-applicants, and let me tell you, they're pretty amazing, protean people: seemingly very sharp with unpredictable, diverse backgrounds and pretty wild experiences that do not fit those of what you may think would be in the background of the "typical" applicant. Funnily enough, strikingly similar in description to those classmates that a few of our moderators talk about here. This leads me to believe that those amazing individuals described by some admissions officers are out there, that they are not freaks or rarities, and that perhaps this selection process is not some arbitrary and frightening roll of the dice for all of us applying; that some medical school admissions committees are actually doing an effective job.

 

Cheers,

Kirsteen

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I agree with all the previous posts who complain about UBC's interviewing process. It's subjective. It's unrealistic (in the sense of judging the potential of a candidate to be a future doctor in 1 hour.) But aren't those the inherent characteristics of an interview?

 

As said above, once you pass a certain academic mark (which is debateable in itself), you've shown the committee that you have the academic prowness to do well in medical school. What's left are the qualities that Ian refers to that make a good clinician. That's what you get from an interview. So even with good academics, if you haven't proven yourself with extra-curriculars and displaying the qualities that they want, you won't get an interview. But even if you do get an interview, I think the adcom ultimately tries to see if this is someone I would go to if I was sick.

 

As to one person's posts about this happening at only UBC... I disagree. People with A+'s not getting in happens at many medical schools. Many of my classmates at UBC have told me that they have smarter friends who did not get in. The reason why it may seem that more asian do not get in is beause there are more asian applicants at UBC. I'm sure that U of S doesn't get that many asian applicants so you won't here the story of "I know many asians who didn't get in." Lastly, I know a few ivy leagers who applied to ubc med and did not get in. I think there are a lot of assumptions going around... I don't think anyone is in the position to state whether or not somebody should have gotten in until they read their friends "entire" application... recommendations and essay included. Those could have made all the difference.

 

Again, it's not just numbers once the interviews begin...

 

seno

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Guest BrainDrain

Thewonderer,

Do you have an e-mail address that I can write you at? It sounds like you have some expertise regarding application to American schools.

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Guest Thewonderer

"Don't forget, however, that prior to this point in the selection process, the academics, MCAT and extracurriculars counted for 100% of the selection criteria and the interview played none."

 

In reply to Kirsteen's comment, if the stage before interview is PURELY academic, then the MCAT score difference between rejectee and acceptees would not be merely 0.28 per section. If they indeed only look at MCAT and GPA and only interview those top 30% academically, then no, the difference would not be that small. Instead, they already put some weight into your EC's and actually VERY subjectively say, "oh this person's EC's is BETTER than the others so even if person A's GPA is lower than person B's, let's still interview person A." Or else, how can you explain about anon who got rejected at UBC PRE-interview but yet has 3.7 and 30+ MCAT).

 

"yes, interviews are very important at this point in the process, but academics are also important, if not more, in determining who is ultimately successful--all the way to its end."

 

My conspiracy theory about UBC admissions committee just purely pulling numbers out of the hat for interview percentile after seeing an applicant's academic percentile is serious. I mean, if an A+ applicant already has a leg up on the academic score (weight of 50%), he or she has to MAJORLY screw up to blow that lead over a B+ applicant. I mean, come on, any decent human being, soul out there can appear nice and smile in the beginning of an interview (whether you have A+ average or B+ average). On top of that, my five friends (all five) have literally toured the interview circuit (Ontario, Alberta, USA) ahead of time. Unless, somebody is out there to screw them, I don't see how they cannot get in.

And their interview percentile not only do not get up above 50 percentile, they are actually in the 30's and 20's and even 5.

 

Another thing. You all give on harping on the fact that once you get above certain GPA's and MCAT's, academics don't matter. The same is about interview. Unless you are super dumb and go into the interview in pissy mood and decide to insult the interviewers, people in general do the same. People go in there, smile, shake the hands, and try to settle down. Once in a while, some interviewers really click with you and then you fire on all cylinders but that's rare...

 

You guys are really set on the idea that people with A+ and A average are socially inept who go in interviews, laugh inappropriately and snigger at fellow applicants on top of the interviewers and get their a$$es kicked by more well-rounded B+ students who smile innocently, shake the interviewers' hands firmly, do not tremor one bit when an ethical question comes down on them, dispel all nervousness out of the window and has charisma drifting out of every orfice.

 

Now, of course I have exaggerated. Both the A+ and the B+ students are probably not as extreme as above. They are all probably somewhere in the middle. Nice people, don't stammer and don't shake their legs throughout the interviews but get nervous when hard questions come up. Then PLEASE tell me how B+ students kick ass on interview so much that they MORE THAN make up the disadvantage they suffer in the academic score over these A+ students? That is really beyond my imagination.

 

As for MCAT scores, I believe that Ian did mention in a previous post about high MCAT also means that a student has studied hard and memorized the fact (maybe I mis-cited Ian). But getting 35+ on MCAT does requires both intelligence and hard-work. I know people who work hard and still only pull off 30. And the verbal reasoning does test your analytical skills. Same as the MCAT sciences passages. Some passages already contain the answers, if you have the analytical skills to pull them out of the questions.

 

I don't think it is far-fetched to say MCAT score would correlate with board score. It is also not far-fetched that I would think a person with 35 MCAT would do better than a person with 30 MCAT in preclinical years. And I am on clinical rotations and I know that I certainly do not learn more in my psych rotation as some other gunners who can sit down after every single day of seeing patients and look up all the facts about their illnesses and learn them that day. That's another fact. On a pure knowledge base, they are better. And they will do kick my a$$ on the end-of-rotation exams. And if they do not go out and mess with patient's and attending's heads and are willing to be on-call or stay later in the hospital than usual, then they will get higher grades than me, another fact.

 

My e-mail is cupholder_2000@yahoo.com Obviously, I like my anonymous identify and like to keep it that way (hence the yahoo account), although I have given some hints about my background (esp. my dear highschool!).

 

I really don't see a problem why Ian can't share his or his friends' EC's (of course with their permissions) with us since he totally lacks any anonymosity (well, he pretty runs the board singlehandedly, which is a very tough feat.). But since I like being anonymous, I am in no position to push him to say anything he does not want to share with others.

 

Well, it seems people cannot see eye-to-eye on many issues. But at least we can get all our thoughts out! The list of different schools that my friends apply to probably total to more than 45+ and I believe what I see with my eyes.

 

Let the catharsis (or anger or frustration or gratitude or whatever there is associated with UBC med or other schools) begin =)

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Guest Jennifer Y

Thewonderer: Interesting read, reasonable thoughts.

 

Does anyone know if UBC have some med students with 70-75% academic averages as their entering scores. Are these the lowest entering academic scores across Canada. How are these med students keeping up in med school? Do they find that med school is manageable?

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Guest Ian Wong

Shrug. You have either forgotten, or chosen to ignore that UBC's admissions process, like everywhere else, is not completely formulaic, and that when you put in variables like thresholds and flags, that a 4.0 GPA and 35+ MCAT is not necessarily more advantageous than a 3.8 GPA and 30 MCAT. Getting a 4.0 GPA and 35+ MCAT doesn't mean that you can suck more than the 3.8 GPA and 30 MCAT on your interviews and still gain admittance over that second person. That's the way our admissions process works, it's done that way by design, and quite frankly it seems to work well as we have a very strong match rate and put out excellent residents who are in demand across Canada to fill those available residency spots.

 

With the MCAT scores being used as a flag, it's no surprise that the MCAT scores of accepteds and rejecteds don't differ widely. By design, the MCAT score is a flag, and with that comes the reality that if the rest of your application isn't what the admissions committee is looking for, that your 35 MCAT can be rejected just as easily as a 30 MCAT. By design, doing extremely well on a flag doesn't significantly advance your application. You've already seen that in the statistics you quote.

 

On your rotations, perhaps you are coming across different skill sets than I am. As in the pre-clinical years, the clinical years see the people who log the most hours as being the ones walking away with the best grades. The photographic memory guys in our classes are few and far between. The strongest students are the ones who work the hardest. If you take a look at the gunners in your class, I believe you will find that they tend to be the people who put in the most hours studying, run the most scutwork, relate the best to their patients.

 

They are NOT necessarily the people who can tell you that Ewart's sign is a physical finding of pleural effusion. That means that they are probably out their in the real world on the wards spending their extra time seeing more patients, feeling more abdomens, listening to more hearts, getting more exposure to procedures, whatever, rather than using it to memorize clinically-irrelevant trivia. And in my experience, these are NOT always the same people who came in with sky-high GPA's and MCAT's.

 

Likewise, the best residents I have worked with are NOT the ones who have photographic memories, but rather are the ones who get into the trenches, do their admissions thoroughly and efficiently, answer their pages immediately, don't miss obvious history and physical findings, hang around post-call to help out the team with rounding and finishing post-call scut. Perhaps you have different experiences on your rotations, but these ones are mine.

 

Here at UBC, your clinical evaluations by your residents and attendings count for a very significant part of your marks. In the last three rotations I've been on, written exams have counted for roughly one-third, oral exams/OSCE's another third, and ward evaluations for the final third of our overall mark. The people who score best don't necessarily know the most factoids and medicine minutiae, but rather have an organized and efficient clinical approach (learned by putting in long hours working with residents who are using that approach) to ace the orals/OSCE, and who get their ward stuff done with a minimum of hassle and resident supervision to ace the ward evaluation.

 

As you can see, we don't stress written exams a huge deal in UBC med, at either the pre-clinical level where everyone is Honours/Pass/Fail, nor do we in our rotations where performance on the wards is equal or likely more important than being book-smart. And yet we turn out excellent doctors each year, which tells me that UBC admissions is doing its job well.

 

jennifer y,

 

The two people in my class who came in with low-mid 70's averages that I know of are completely indistinguishable from everyone else in the class as far as their clinical performance has been on the wards. They'll make fine doctors.

 

Ian

UBC, Med 3

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Guest Kirsteen

Hi Thewonderer,

 

Just a couple of quick points in response to a couple of things mentioned:

 

This may help to shed some light on the mystery of interview scoring, as one of my UBC interviewers mentioned that all interviewees would receive an interview score relative to the other applicants. So, by hook or by crook, it doesn't appear a possibility that the whole group of interviewees receive around the same interview mark; rather, the interviewers have to somehow determine how everyone fits on that (presumably) normal distribution. I agree with you in that, at this point, it's highly subjective and a little scary, but hey, that's the nature of the beast here. Bear in mind though, that given the type of the scoring system used, the quality of the interviewee pool can vary from year to year and influence scoring, which may help to explain why interview scores (similar to MCAT marks from multiple MCAT writings) may fluctuate in tandem.

 

Second, I respectfully disagree with you on your point that, only once in a while, will you find an applicant who clicks with the interviewer and does incredibly well on the interview. Again, it all boils down to being able to see the skills of your fellow applicants on display. Most of us don't have that view, so it's difficult to make those assumptions. However from my point of view, in preparing for the interview, I didn't approach the process underestimating the interviewing skills of my co-applicants. I certainly waxed conservatively and assumed that everyone else would be firing on all cylinders, giving it their all and setting pretty high bars, while displaying their feathers and achieving great interview scores, just as I imagine they may approach any other endeavour. (After all, it's a grotesquely long and arduous process--it would be a shame to let up just before the red tape.) As such, I hope to be surrounded by a unique group of brilliant, talented and diverse people come August; and as I've been told by a fair number people who have already been through or who are currently undergoing the process, that's exactly what is to be found--not only in UBC, mind, in most med schools across the country.

 

Cheers,

Kirsteen

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Guest Liana

Thewonderer,

 

Just because one does a lot of interviews does not make one a good interviewer.

 

Obviously, no one is claiming that your friends are socially inept. However, there are so many well-qualified applicants that you have to have a strong social presence in order to make the final cut. If someone has limited extracurricular activities, this might get them to the interview, but give them little to talk about when they get there. Or, they may present generically impersonal opinions about any moral or political questions brought up during the interview.

 

Every school looks for something different. Some schools (especially in the States) tend to work on the old-fashioned system where marks mean everything. Other schools barely look at marks. But beyond this, some schools and some interviewers tend to have certain things they're looking for in an applicant. Those schools with pressure interviews are specifically seeking out applicants who are able to maintain a level head under a stressful environment. Some interviewers want to find applicants who are able to stand by an opinion no matter what, while others might seek out someone able to compromise.

 

The point is that an interview tells you much more than whether you're able to smile and be polite. Otherwise, why would every Canadian medical school invest the time and energy into the interview process, and why would they place so much weight on this portion of the application? Medical schools aren't just trying to determine who is articulate and capable of answering questions; they care about HOW you answer those questions. Yes, the interview process is subjective, but that's why most medical schools have 2 or 3 interviewers independently scoring each applicant. Yes, someone may have a good or bad day going into that interview, but how does that differ from marks or MCAT? Marks are still subjective by instructor, by program (especially in arts courses), and may be influenced by previous events beyond your control or previous attitudes toward school that have since changed. MCAT is only partly indicative of your skill; there's probably a +-5 mark radius in which any applicant could have fluctuated based on whether they had money to invest in old tests, review books, training courses, or the spare time to spend studying. There are other factors impairing the MCAT: I had a invilgator interrupt me twice midway through my MCAT essay because I had stupidly forgotten to sign in after lunch; you can't say that two 3 minute interruptions in a 30 minute essay segment wouldn't have any impact on score.

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UBC's interviews are stressful from what I've heard. Are the interviewer trying to break them down? What is the point of that? I have been on many interviews and not at one school was the interview stressful.

 

As for me getting a pre-interview rejection and a non-academic score below the 10th percentile, that blows my mind. As I said, my GPA and MCATs are BELOW avg at some prestigious schools I've interviewed at. I'm guessing that there's something else with my application that other schools found that they liked, whether it was my essay (and I used the same essay), my EC's, or my work experience. To not get an interview with my home school tells me that UBC admissions has other political motives on its mind.

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Guest Coyote

Just want to show my support for you by posting a message. I remember I participated in a discussion similar to this last year on this forum. Of course after tons of posts some people still didn't get what people like us are trying to say, but I want to tell you that there are people out there who would totally agree with what you're saying. It doesn't matter whether we can convince all those who frequent this forum to believe in your conspiracy theory (I DO!), but there are indeed people out there (besides your friends) that are in the same situations: 99 percentile in academics, 3 in interview. So your friends are not really the exceptions in this dark UBC admission game.

 

Like you, I also believe in what my eyes can see, and what makes sense. If something happens and it doesn't even make sense after you have taken into account all the possible factors, then we know something is wrong. It's as simple as that, and I won't accept things that also don't make sense as explanations for that:

e.g. "going to more interviews will not improve your interview skills, or make your interview better" (what???? From what I can recall, every book who teaches people how to improve their interview skills has the golden rule of "participating in more interviews will definitely help you improve". Doesn't make sense to me)

 

e.g. "someone who's qualified enough to enter ivy league schools can't even get into UBC, but we shouldn't compare them cos' they use different criteria" (What "different criteria"? What's so different about UBC? And does that "difference" lead to physicians that're even better-trained and more knowledgeable than those from Harvard????)

 

e.g. instead of using objective data like GPA to evaluate their applicants, UBC prefer to rely on something called an "interview", which, to those who have enough statistical knowledge, has a VALIDITY COEFFICIENT OF 0.2 OR LOWER (1 being the highest; 0.2 means that what you get from an interview is inaccurate and prone to error and CANNOT BE USED AS A BASIS FOR GOOD PREDICTIONS SUCH AS WHETHER ONE IS A GOOD DOCTOR), yet some people still think that the decisions UBC make based on this subjective AND INACCURATE method are good and it's the rule of the game to ACCEPT this wrong method? Doesn't make sense.

 

btw, I also support what you said about people with 4.0 GPA.

1. They're definitely not social inept and I don't think they'll be so much worse than those who have 3.8 GPA (come on, I'm talking abt a 3 percentile in interview. The difference is GREAT!)

 

2. Some failed to recognize that getting a 4.0 GPA is not only abt intelligence; IT REQUIRES HARD WORK TOO (and it's mostly about hard work). If what Ian said is correct ("in medical school, people who do the best are those who work the hardest"), WHO is MORE LIKELY TO WORK HARD? A person with 4.0 GPA who's sooooo used to working hard in his / her undergrad? Or a person with 3.8 GPA (or even lower, like 70%)? And you're telling me that after a certain threshold of grades, EVERYBODY CAN SUCCEED IN MEDICAL SCHOOL AND IS EQUALLY CAPABLE OF DOING MEDICAL WORK????? Again, doesn't make sense.

 

3. Some also failed to recognize good grades are usually correlated to some personality traits, such as good emotion control, good discipline, determination etc. (If you don't agree with me, imagine what you need to do to get 90% on every subject when you face piles and piles of work......yeah, just like med school). Aren't these qualities desirable? Do the adcom ppl really think that during an interview (or 2), these personality traits can emerge? One's EC may not necessarily reflect these qualities too. IMO, these qualities are equally, if not more, important than qualities like being socialable (which will definitely give ppl advantage in an interview), being good at impression management (again, advantage), good at communication......in a physician. In a matter of life and death (literally), isn't a physician who's knowledgeable, disciplined, determined, and has good control over things better?

 

Good luck Thewonderer!!!

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Guest Jennifer Y

coyote:

My first interview was at UBC, and I did get better and better as I interviewed (4) across the country. I have GPA 3.99 and I have very good MCAT scores, my EC is decent but nothing spectacular. Yes, getting that GPA does require hard work, especially trying to get that A+ in the higher English courses. I found my first interviewer to be stressful, and the second interviewer at UBC to be OK. The interviews from outside the provinces were not stressful at all, in fact some were very encouraging with their smiles and nice comments. Whether I did well in them I do not know, but the interviewers were mostly friendly or at less not giving any stress signals and some were just so personable!

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I forgot to add that UBC's reputation is getting severely tarnished, both here and in the US. I have met several fellow Canadians at US interviews and the first thing they say when I tell them I'm from BC is the "little crooked medical school on the west coast eh?" I met one fellow applicant (the same applicant) at two different top-20 schools, one time in November, and once in February, who mentioned to me that he found UBC admissions staff and dean to be some of the rudest people he has ever met. If you want to be all jolly and pretend nothing's the matter with UBC, you are sadly mistaken. I don't think I have ever encountered any other medical school in North America that is quickly garnishing the horrible reputation UBC is garnishing.

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Guest Kirsteen

Hi guys,

 

It's pretty amazing, the different types of impressions that people generate and receive. With respect to the UBC Admissions Office staff, for example, I've found them to be quite helpful and very congenial both, as a rejected applicant, and now as one who is waiting for the next stage. Many things can influence these types of experiences and I know you've all got some fertile imaginations there, able to conjure up the many underlying possibilities.

 

In all, it's tough to say what goes on behind closed doors at any medical school. I guess, from my side, with no solid evidence to the contrary, I just like to try to think positively and give the benefit of the doubt that everyone has the best intentions both, within and without.

 

Good luck all,

Kirsteen

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Guest Ian Wong

I've worked with many of those people on a regular basis in the last few years for work unrelated to admissions and found them to be extremely helpful. I was personally interviewed by Dr. Bates, Dean of Admissions and had a very pleasant time, and she was extraordinarily helpful in giving me aid for a rural medicine outreach project that I started a year ago.

 

From my perspective during the interview process and as a med student, I've found them to be quite friendly. I'll give the most friendly nod to the staff in Calgary, but I think UBC has done quite well in this regard too.

 

If you think that UBC's reputation is being besmirched based on comments you hear on the interview trail, then that's all well and good, and I won't bother to try to refute them. I happen to think it's an excellent school, and believe that it's preparing me well for my future residency. Residency directors across Canada apparently think we're doing a good job too. I think I've covered pretty much everything I've wanted to say here; we're just spinning our wheels at this point.

 

Bottom line, med schools are not all looking for the same applicants. If that was the case, you could apply to any single med school in Canada, and have equal odds at entering it compared with any other, and that just isn't the case (in province vs OOP notwithstanding). The vast majority of people don't get into every med school that they apply to, simply because each school uses different criteria to arrive at their ideal med student. If you want to maximise your application's success, you need to maximise the number of applications you make. If you believe that there's a conspiracy afoot, then I wish you the best of luck in proving it.

 

Ian

UBC, Med 3

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Guest P Diddy

Some of the posts on this thread are pretty pathetic. People calling UBC stupid because they had great grades and MCATs but didn't get interviews there, but they got interviews at top 20 schools in the states, blah blah blah.

 

Of course you'll get an interview in the states with great grades/MCAT, all they care about is grades and MCATs! So what if UBC want to stress extra-curricular and other non-academic attributes, those things are probably more important than stellar academic performace. Remember, doctors should be neat people - not Beakerheads and Bookworms like most 4.0/40+/T people are. Also, good GPAs and MCATs are often indicative of money (i.e. easy to get good grades and MCATs if you can afford to not worry about working to pay for rent, food, etc.).

 

Sometimes it seems like the competition of med school has gotten the best of you. Evaluate yourself and see if its what you really want to do or if its just another competition that you can't turn down.

 

And quit posting stupid complaints and worries and boasts on this site, get off the computer and get a life!

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Guest anon2

Wow, quite a discussion going on here. I just want to add a bit of my experience with UBC admissions here to say that I was also interviewed by the Dean of Admissions and found her not so personable. She was twenty minutes late in interviewing me, then gave me only about twenty minutes of her time. Maybe I just rubbed her the wrong way, but what really shocked me was when I asked her to tell me a little be of what she thought about the UBC curriculum. Her answer to me was that she will not talk about that during the interview because I will find out about the UBC curriculum in a seminar one month later. She didn't even say that politely/with a smile!

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Guest Liana

Coyote

 

Remember when they told you "Practice makes perfect"? Has no one ever told you the corrected version, "Perfect practice makes perfect"?

 

If you practice doing something, you will improve only if you are aware of the areas in which you need improvement. If you practice something incorrectly, you're not going to improve.

 

Simple as that.

 

Want mathematical proof?

 

Practice telling yourself 3+3=8.

 

Keep doing it.

 

Does that make it true? No.

 

If you can't see why it's wrong, you'll just practice that until the wrong solution sticks in your head. So practice does not necessarily mean you will improve. Feedback on practice is what helps you improve.

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Guest Jennifer Y

I did not think that I needed someone to tell me what I did wrong during my interviews. I somehow knew what I did wrong and what I should improve on for my next interview. I think I was able to get better and better as I went along across the country doing interviews. Most people would find that practice does make better b/c I think that most med applicants are able to constructively self-criticize. Also, the five schools that I interviewed at, I know a number of the same applicants are being interviewed there too. Are these the same 600 people or so being interviewed from school to school?

Just a thought.

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Guest Coyote

Liana,

 

I agree that keep practising wrong things will not necessarily lead to improvement......but I don't think we should underestimate people's ability in reflecting on their experiences and realizing the weaknesses that they need to improve on (same as we shouldn't underestimate people's mathematical ability, their likelihood of having a complete set of 10 fingers, and their ability to verify the "proof" by counting their fingers to learn that 3+3 does not equal 8.....unless they're all being brainwashed into believing that 3+3=8) . We're talking about a group of undergrads who're qualified enough to be interviewed at something as competitive as medical schools (and in Thewonderer's case, people who're qualified enough to be interviewed by Ivy League schools), and so it's very likely that they will not be blind to the fault of your 3+3=8 proof, and they certainly have the ability to evaluate whether they have done a good job in an interview.

 

As far as "feedback on practice" is concerned, I'm also sure that people, before going into an interview, are not just practising in their heads and imagining what they're doing is flawless.....ever heard of something called "mock interviews"? Many interviewees do have the support of their families / friends / colleagues / profs / supervisors who're glad to donate their time to give these interviewees feedback. Even for some who're not blessed with these resources, their undergrad institutes often has career counselling office or the like which have qualified professionals to teach them the skills and also to give them feedback. It's a matter of taking initiative in seeking help, resources and support (which are often readily out there). So in reality, it's really unlikely that all the applicants will go into an interview without knowing something is wrong, OR, FOR THOSE WHO CAN GET MULTIPLE INTERVIEWS, will leave an interview without even having the ability to evaluate whether there are areas that they can improve on......simple as that.

 

(if in reality, someone is really doing what Liana suggests i.e. practising without evaluating / ongoing monitoring of one's performance, or without seeking feedback from others, he / she shouldn't be admitted after all......cos' they're simply not fit to become a physician.)

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Guest Coyote

Just found that in my previous post, my '= 8' phrase becomes =8......good to have fun here! So that phrase in my previous post should be "3+3 = 8"......

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Guest Thewonderer

I was sadden today when I logged on and saw that another thread was newer than this one! =( Is the popularity of this thread going down the toilet???

 

Ok, now seriously.....

 

I don't have much to say. I agree with coyote pretty well.

 

1) I believe my own eyes

 

2) doing more interviews = better future interviews

We are hear to argue what is more likely... We are not here to argue for the truth. I.e. doing more interviews USUALLY means doing better in future interviews. This is common sense. End of discussion.

 

3) having higher MCAT and GPA means that one is MORE LIKELY to have a good workethic which also means that one is MORE LIKELY to work harder and see more patients in the hopsital and are willing to stay later in the hospital (whether the incentive is to learn more or get better grades by sucking up!). Maybe there aren't enough gunners at UBC med but I see plenty of gunners around doing just that. All the power to them. When I was on surgery and had to be here from 4:30am to 8pm and being on call every third day until 12am, when resident tells me to go home, I GO! I pack my stuff and run out of the hospital. But there are always some students eager to walk into an emergency surgery at 10pm (with the implicit understanding that they won't be able to scrub out until 2am). Well, good for them because I really ain't going to do that.

 

Again, we are here to argue what is more likely. We are not here to say that every student with 4.0 and 40 MCAT has better work ethic than every student with 3.5 and 30. Again, this is common sense and use of logic.

(i.e. better MCAT/GPA = better work ethics = more WILLING to impress residents + attendings during med school).

 

Also, these gunners still manage to find time to study their a$$ off for end-of-rotation exam (whether it counts for 1/2 on surgery and ob-gyn or it counts for 1/3 on psych).

 

4) I am not saying that people with 3.5 and 29 MCAT will make BAD physicians. Nobody needs 3.8 and 35 to memorize the facts. But at the same time, I have a hard time believing that more than 1/2 of the people with A's and A+'s are socially inept and get rejected from UBC med.

 

5) Numbers do not function as RED flags, as Ian likes to put it. UBC med makes the academic score 50% of the weight and my friends do get 95 percentile (and I would imagine someone with 3.7 and 33 MCAT might have a lower percentile). Then of course, maybe UBC med lied. UBC might really just use numbers as red flags. They just gave my friends their 95 percentile academic score to make them feel good. Then they tell them that academic score weighs 50% while interview/nonacademic score weighs 50%, but in fact, they just turn around and look at the nonacademic/interview score and screw them. Yeah, that must be it.

 

5) People still have not answered a key questions. How do B+/A- students routinely wipe A+/A students bottoms in interview to OVERCOME their lower academic score (which supposedly count 50% of the weight) and leapfrog them? Yeah, those A+/A students must be socially inept.

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