to Kewpee

[Guest applicant]

Kewpee, What item(s) on your profile do you think got you the interview with teh 3.21?

[Guest Ashley Michaluk]

Congratulations Kewpee, I think its great that you got accpeted, but I do have to voice my confusion.

 

 

I have seen on this board people who have done things like two degrees ie. Bsc then Bsc Physiotherapy with high A averages, have worked extensively with patients and get rejected. I have seen Phd's with tons of volunteer work and stellar marks get turned away 2 years in row. Then somebody first time applying, 3.21 GPA 3rd year undergrad, BC resident (who UBC wouldn't even interview) gets accepted at Mac when no other school in the World (literally) outside of the Carribbien would even interview. I dont understand the reasoning, I really dont.

Because someone has the resources to travel all over the world doesn't make them a better candidate than one who has busted their ass working in the health care profession, or during the summers etc.

 

Secondly, I really feel that Ontario, given the supposed code red shortage of doctors in Ontario should really introduce a limit of OOP spots. Why do all the other provinces protect their own residents while Ontario makes it so hard for its own. As an Ontario resident we are disadvantaged from all angles and beat down time and time again. We can't compete for spots in other provinces (limited to 2-3 spots), and at home we have no protection from other candidates from the rest of Canada who will go back to their own province anyways, while our provincial taxpayers educate them.

 

All I ask is for a level playing field for Ontario residents. I also wouln't mind Mac really disclosing (honestly) how applicants are judged. Are they looked at by how entertaining they are to talk to about their exotic travels, or are they considered on the things that would make them great doctors.

 

What about the GPA, obviously if people are getting in with a 3.21, that 50% GPA weight is a complete lie. 3.21 wont even get you accepted into many community college post university lab technician diploma programs.

 

What gives???, This is just heartbreaking

 

Sincerely

Ashley Michaluk

Burlington Ontario

[Guest macmed]

I understand your frustration, Ashley, but give Kewpee (and others like him/her) a break. Mac really, really tries to look at the whole person - writing ability, experiences, maturity, verbal expression, emotional intelligence, ability to work in groups, under pressure, in an extremely fake situation... etc. By that logic marks shouldn't be everything or even 50% of everything. And surely you would agree that super high marks don't equal amazing doctor. That's what frustrates me... the "other" med schools base SO much of their admissions process on marks (GPA and MCAT), and here Mac is trying to pick out the real gems, and people complain b/c they have high marks but didn't get in! That's not what Mac is about. And that's what makes it unique.

[Guest Ashley Michaluk]

Your right marks aren't everything but as you say the whole person is. A person who has had several years of experience dealing with patients and working in health care are being turned away because of people who have no real knowledge of working with people are like, but are able to perform in some obscure (and even you called it)extremely artificial environment

 

My friends dad who is a faculty member at Mac told me there were people in yr 1 complaining of the workload. In short they couldn't hack it, why they didn't have the brain power to do the work. My friends dad advised the commitee to which these people complained to reopen their file and in his words "find out why and who the hell let them in, this is medical school not clown school and if they want to complain about level of difficulty,remove them!, we turned down too many applicants who would have been very happy to handle the material!"

 

 

So you see Macmed its great that Mac lets in people with ridiculously low GPA's but their artificially grounded, totally irrelevant interview hoops are not good indicators of who will make great doctors.

 

Its just really unfair on top of the fact that OOP people take spots from people that are from Ontario, who is going to look after Ontario residents and protect our interests.

 

Its so unfair, all I can do is cry

[Guest Kewpees Merits]

Acceptance into medical school is often an extremely subjective process.

 

I've heard that choosing students for the 1st year class is like "throwing darts on a wall" - although exaggerated, there is some validity in that statement.

 

Why? There are so many factors - perhaps McMaster weighted the GPA less heavily this year. Selection committees never FULLY release the mechanisms by which applicants are selected for interviews, and ultimately admission.

 

In addition, the interview is a CRITICAL component of the application process. And inevitably (and perhaps unfairly), the most subjective component. I think you have to realistically ask yourself how you performed in ALL areas of the application process. Yes, you may think that Kewpee may have been lacking in the academic department, but perhaps her volunteering, reference letters, and communication skills in the interview more than compensated for any academic merits she failed to achieve.

[Guest BC guy]

I think that Kewpee had a lot of luck and the fact that she (?) did missionary work 3X might have contributed greatly to her acceptance. Missionary work in Paris, sounds like fun.

I do agree with you that marks are fairly important but if only a couple of the med schools are not putting much emphasis on GPAs then it is really not too big a deal; it is not as if all the med schools are doing this. Reputation is something that others give us, so I would think that the adcom and the deanery had taken all this into consideration when they set the policy for admitting their new med students. I am sure the adcom are not doing anyone a favour by admitting people that can not handle the workload; and I can see where your friend's dad is coming from....it must be frustrating. I heard one faculty member commenting on the very same thing you mentioned.

BC is beautiful, green and the weather is so mild. In the couple of hospitals where I had worked at, there are doctors practicing there from all over the country, including the province of Ontario.

[Guest BC guy]

PS: I am from BC and I did not apply to Mac at all

[Guest Carolyn]

As far as I understand, they have not found a correlation between those who find the workload difficult and do poorly on future exams and their undergrad GPA.

 

If there was a high coorelation, I'm sure there would be a higher weighting for GPA. I'm pretty sure Dr. Nahmias (admissions chair) said something to that effect at the last Admissions info meeting where I spoke - does anyone remember anything to that effect?

 

I can only speak from anecdotes in this situation. The couple of people I know that came in with lower GPAs that I've worked with closely are flourishing here.

 

I also get frustrated when someone starts complaining about the workload -- we are in med school so of course it is heavy! One thing I've learned about people in life is that if there is something they can complain about they will, and unfortunately those people are in all medical schools.

[Guest macmed]

Personally I've never heard a fellow classmate (I'm in first year) complain about the workload! I can't imagine how anyone could! I agree, whoever complained about the workload to your "friend's Dad" is being a bit of a wuss! But here at Mac we are taught to look at the evidence, and your story is hardly evidence of anything. I know you are frustrated, and I'm not going to engage in yet another debate about how "unfair" Mac's admissions process is... I don't see any point because unless you have been involved in it from the inside (which I have, this past year), you really can't say much about it (except complain when you don't get in). All I will say is consider yourself lucky that there are other med schools in Canada that are more than happy to judge you on your grades and give you a workload worthy of complaining about.

[Guest Beaver]

I just wanted to say that what Andrea is saying is true, there have been a group of students that have complained about workload. My Dad is on staff (Radiologist) there and has a research lab (4thfloor) and teaches as well. Andrea do you know my dad????

He was talking to me about the situation and said that the faculty wanted a review of the students' qualifications and ask them to withdraw immediately. I'm not sure what happened to those people, but this whole thing was several months go and I remember my Dad was pissed as hell screamining with most of faculty for higher admission standards.

 

Andrea I can understand your frustration, and I was talking to my parents about it (both are staff doctors at Mac). In all honesty, as my Dad put it, in essence Mac is a uniquely dresses women, but once you look past the swanky different outfits and ask her what she is looking for, it's basically the same as all the other conservative women (med schools) out there. We like a solid life science background, we prefer people with higher grades, Faculty wants to see research involvements, pubs etc. Volunteering, involvement in school groups etc. He used to interview a few years ago, but now particpates by reading the 30 essays he gets every year.

 

When he used to interview he remembered that they used to ask people if they applied anywhere else, if the applicants said "nowhere because I couldn't", they got a little decentized as if Mac was just the school of choice out of bear necessity not strict preference.

 

So you see Andrea, yes there are anamolies such as Kewpee but even a quick review of the admission stats will show you that the huge majourity of applicants are Life science people with high grades and typical backgrounds that could gain admission to any medical school.

 

Good luck and dont hold a grudge towards Mac.

[Guest Ian Wong]

Beaver,<!--EZCODE QUOTE START--><blockquote>Quote:<hr> anamolies such as Kewpee...<hr></blockquote><!--EZCODE QUOTE END-->Dude, this is a pretty harsh statement to make. The bottom line here is that this medical school saw something in Kewpee and his/her application that made them select him/her over thousands of other applicants. I would agree with you that med school applications are not a completely objective experience, (how can discriminating between two people ever really be objective?), but when you get to med school I think raw tenacity and not necessarily innate brilliance is enough to get you through everything you'll face.

 

Ian

UBC, Med 3

[Guest Beaver]

Ian

 

Anomaly is not an suggestive insult by any means. It simply means that it's a rare case. Andrea was under the impression that Mac's medschool class is comprised entirely of low GPA's. I was pointing out that Mac's admission policies are reflected in the class profile, where the majourity of the class fit the profile of med students in all the other schools. Anomoly means outlier or the exception. Obviously for these people to be admitted they must have really been exceptional in other ways, however there are only a small number of applicants based on the class profile that can compensate enough with "other" qualities to gain admission. Again not an insult by any means just stating the fact that just because you have a low GPA does not mean you can waltz in to Mac, the stats show that the minority of people who did get in with lower GPA's must have been tremendous in other areas, therefore there is no reason to look down on them.

 

I personally dont believe that GPA can correlate neatly with one's ability to successfully practice medicine. I actually posted sometime ago about a candidate that had a 3.0 GPA in my tutorial group and how she had more compassion in one finger than all of the other candidates put together. I still stand by that statement (if your out there Kelly, how did things go???), but unfortunately most schools emphasize numbers, so students go out and bust their ass for A+'s and when they are rejected and someone with a lower GPA gets admitted, it perhaps stings a bit as the process has programmed applicants to believe that the one with the most A's, most MCAT marks, most clubs, most pubs, most volunteering, most gold medals wins. When other intangible qualities such as maturity, personality, stability and suitability for medicine are examined more carefully irrespective of the points for "the most of everything else", it generates resentment. Resentment towards people who made it despite not having the "the most". I was just trying to explain that people such as Kewpee, and Kelly had these intangible qualities that allowed them to demonstrate their suitability for medicine. They are rare exceptions and there is no reason to look down upon them

 

 

Webster's Definition Anomaly: Deviation from the rule

[Guest Carolyn]

Sounds like you guys are both talking about either one person or a small group of people and some specific incident surrounding complaining about workload... Not sure exactly what the deal was - a lot of people complain about being busy and tired at all medical schools -- I don't really understand what could have happened that would cause a radiologist to scream and ask for a file to be reopened... that sounds like a much more involved incident and I'm sure it isn't reflective of the majority of the class. Hopefully you guys aren't generalizing from the one incident/person...

 

While your father and perhaps some of his peers may have preference for those with Life science backgrounds (and yes there are a lot of students with life science backgrounds), the statistics from the past couple of years show that there are still a large number of people who get admitted with non-traditional stats/educational backgrounds. It just goes to show that with so many people involved in an admissions process there isn't really an answer for what Mac looks for exactly.

 

I think this is probably true for the subjective part of admissions at all schools. There is an element of luck at all schools and it sucks when it works against you...

[Guest Red Fox]

This thread of bitterness was dangling like a juicy morsel for the debating carnivore in me earlier this week. I resisted, but now want to respond with my point of view to the following:

 

"Secondly, I really feel that Ontario, given the supposed

code red shortage of doctors in Ontario should really

introduce a limit of OOP spots. Why do all the other

provinces protect their own residents while Ontario makes

it so hard for its own. As an Ontario resident we are

disadvantaged from all angles and beat down time and

time again. We can't compete for spots in other provinces

(limited to 2-3 spots), and at home we have no

protection from other candidates from the rest of Canada

who will go back to their own province anyways, while our

provincial taxpayers educate them".

 

I come from a medium sized city with 7 Universities, with a few more near by with outstanding national reputations. Many fine folks from Ontario and the rest of Canada and beyond have sucked at the teat of Nova Scotia's finest educational institutions (therefore, the milk of NS taxpayers) forever. It has never occurred to me that we should protect ourselves from insatiable outsiders. A lot of them fall in love with the way of life here and stay, pay it all back and understand that the best University education includes the benefits of a heterogeneous mix of people from different walks of life. We edjamacated types even make a point of getting over the rampant small town NS anti Upper Canada sentiment which is only fueled by comments like yours above to welcome the too cool T.O. types and make Keith's Beer commercials about you. I always thought learning is more fun when not everyone knows all the words to Cape Breton sea shanties. As the old saying goes, some of my best friends are from Ontario.

 

There is a code red doctor shortage across the land, my friend. West, East and in between. I'd like to think that this attitude towards me as a CFA (come from away) is not widely held. We need good, smart, compassionate and socially savy docs now. Since when did Ontario medwannabes as a group really think they were was getting the short end of the stick compared to other regions? I am just not seeing clearly the extent of your Ontario oppression.

 

Mac invites 10% of interviewees from Out of Province. About 40 people out of 3000 applicants. I am excited and very grateful to be one of so few "Outlanders" chosen to go to the amazing McMaster. I'll trade you my designated "Maritimers" spot at Dalhousie if you want it. Some everloving patron will buy you a beer and sing Stan Rogers songs at the Lower Deck in Halifax. Stan was from southern Ontario even though he's made Nova Scotia famous with his music. And that same patron will get you to check his prostate in five years even if you've CFA. He'll call you Doctor with great respect even if in ten years time you've bought up another hunk of his ancestor's precious coastline along with "them" Americans and Germans for your summer cottage on our ocean playground. Oops, its a slippery slope, this regionalism!

 

Any how, I guess I was spurned on by my wanting to stick up for people getting dissed here. A, Please go easy on Kewpee from BC. And then cry me a river about something that makes better sense than one of the richest provinces in Canada not protecting its learned citizens from ungrateful outsiders.

 

Better luck next time getting what you hoped for and surely worked hard for A. When I read how you knock others down like you have here, it gives me some relief that we won't be paired up in some Orientation week getting to know you game. Who's going into the class of 2005 from the Golden Horseshoe who wants to show Kewpee and the Red Fox how to have a good time in big bad ol' Ontario?

 

Red Fox

[Guest dubliner]

I've had better times in both B.C. and Nova Scotia/NFld than I've found out here for the last four years in the gool ol' horseshoe...hell I'd change spots with you for sure (except I'm on the waitlist... ; ) ... boiling fresh snow crab over a driftwood fire up in Meat Cove while the minkes played in the surf 100 ft below ranked high on the list...

 

cheers

dc

[Guest UWOMED2005]

As one of those guys who "have sucked at the teat of Nova Scotia's finest educational institutions" I can attest to the fact that what most of the Red Fox said is true. Though I do think the Split Crow is a finer establishment than the Lower Deck, but not by much (I've seen Signal Hill at the latter place many a time.)

 

If you want to come up and sing some good shanty tunes (Stan Rogers, Wild Rover, Farewell to Nova Scotia, Wrecker's den, whatever) come up to London some weekend next year. The guy who does the best imitation of NS in all of Southern Ontario plays at one of the local pubs on Saturday night.

[Guest TimmyMax]

Sweet- which one?

[Guest UWOMED2005]

The Brass Door. . . "Handsome" Jim McGinley plays there, and he does a wicked job on most of the tunes, though I think he's a bit off tempo on "Barrett's Privateers." Still, he's a lot better than the guys who play at Molly Bloom's who add a kokomo beat to all of the shanty tunes they play. . . that just massacres the songs.

[Guest R]

Molly Blooms is tough for the sheer volume the band plays at (me bleeding ears!)