Are you InterviewReady?

Hot off the press – GEMSAS interview offers are being released!  Congratulations to everyone who has successfully passed the GAMSAT exam and already received theirs!

This blog post will outline the key dates left in the admission process, discuss the difference between the panel and MMI format, and help you identify which InterviewReady course is the right one for you!   

Key dates

• August 24  – GEMSAS interview offers (and UQ offers of a place) released.  Note: this process may take several days for some medical schools.
• Late August/early September – Flinders offers of a place released.
• Early September - USyd offers of a place released.
• September – InterviewReady course held in Brisbane, Sydney, Melbourne and Perth.
• September – GEMSAS interviews held.
• Early November – Offers!

 

How the GEMSAS interview offers are made

Once the GEMSAS matching system has ranked all applicants and determined whether they qualify for an interview (based on each university’s selection criteria), the lists are sent to each university.  Universities then make interview offers directly to students, so if you qualify for an interview at one of your preferenced universities, you will receive an email from the university inviting you to attend an interview.  Depending on the university, you may be offered an interview slot automatically, or you may have a chance to select a time slot through a booking system.  The process of releasing interview offers can take a few days, so it’s worth keeping an eye on the website/twitter/facebook to see if your preferenced universities have made all their interview offers (which therefore gives you an idea of whether you’re still in the running for an interview at that university, or you’ve been passed down to another one).

If you do not qualify for an interview at any of your preferenced universities, GEMSAS will notify you via email.  This usually happens fairly early on in the piece, and they also normally update their website to indicate when all rejection emails have been sent – so after that point it’s a case of no news is good news.
 

InterviewReady preparation courses
To coincide with interview offers GradReady are holding InterviewReady courses throughout September.  This year, to cater for increasing demand, we are running two different courses that run over two days (one weekend apart) – the Comprehensive course and the Essentials course.  Day 1 (the workshop) is identical for both courses, but Day 2 (the practice MMI) is different, with the Comprehensive course being a full length mock MMI with 1:1 feedback, whereas the Essentials course is a tutor facilitated peer-run MMI (similar to the courses run by other providers).
 

Which InterviewReady course is right for me
MMI vs. Panel interview (or UWA vs. the rest of the world)

Every GEMSAS school (with the exception of UWA) use the MMI format for medical school interviews.  And although the InterviewReady course is designed with the MMI in mind, it’s still incredibly valuable preparation for the UWA panel interview (and indeed the one UWA applicant at the Sydney IR course last year was successful in gaining a place at UWA).  The reason being that the questions asked in the panel and MMI format are the same, and the rationale behind the change to MMIs was simply to remove any potential bias that arises from spending the entire interview with the same panel of interviewers (a recent example is UNDA – MMIs were introduced for the first time in 2014 but the actual content was largely the same as the year before).  As such, the MMI is essentially a panel interview, only with different stations and different interviewers for each question. Check out our other blog article to learn more about How the MMI differs between Australian medical schools. 

Comprehensive vs. Essentials

As noted above, the comprehensive and essentials courses only differ in the way day 2 (the interview practise) is run.  Despite the success of our Comprehensive course, it is expensive to run due to the costs associated with having so many amazing medical students on hand to interview and so many rooms to book.  So in order to cater for varying budgets, the Essentials course has been designed to give you the same practise at MMI scenarios, but in a more collaborative environment – students will take turns being the interviewer, the interviewee and the marker, and groups will be facilitated by an experienced tutor.  Compared to the comprehensive course the stations will largely be the same, however there will be less individualised attention.
 

For more information about the medical school admissions process, check out our guide on Australian Graduate Medical Schools - Admission Requirements.