Veterinary Medicine 2015 hopefuls!

Ah! I see that's good we don't need to do both! So I take PS is more for competitive courses like vetmed/med/dent etc. Higher English may come in handy.... Do they? Oh well then you better do that aha! Good luck with it though, I'm sure they will notice your outstanding achievements

No for once autocorrect hasn't failed me Admin is short for Administration like business studies/education, I don't know your equivalent, minus the accounting I hate it though, it's pretty easy but rubbish. So is BS like the level below AS I take it? I wish I could steal your subjects haha

Just for this range, the Little Canine Tail Chasing Vet is a fantastic name for the label! That works perfectly LCTCV brings to you "À la campagne", Autumn 2013.

No, I'm pretty sure that all courses use a PS rather than a CV . Different courses and different establishments just use it differently.

I see We have business studies here, but personally I don't take it because it was an option rather than compulsory. I meant BS as an abbreviation of bull$hit ! Below AS would just be GCSE

We should start scouting for models

Long time, no speak

I am in a massive confusion with it at the moment. I contacted one in strathaven (don't want to say the name on here - feel free to google) who replied saying they'd be happy to have me for a week or two over the summer and asked which departments. I replied saying preferable large but experience in small too would be great (it's a mixed) and then they never replied That was in April and two days ago I sent a new email stating that it may have been an email malfunction and resent the original but still no reply... I am going to wait until Monday or Tuesday where I will probably just call up again and see if I can directly talk to the one in charge

I haven't contacted the one in Lanark, I know who you mean though. Good luck with them! I have contacted the weipers centre in Glasgow (the ones that are part of the vet school) and they say they only take 18+ students.. Not exactly helpful. LA vets are a right b*tch round here for vet hopefuls, always EMS but never wex

How's the exams btw


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My PS is probably the part of my app that I'm dreading most, to be honest. I think the PS helpers are going to have a hard time with me!

My fault, I apologise Why can't the UK just stick to one education system, eh?

I'll see if I can recruit everyone from my farm for the show . I can see this being the next best thing, everyone will be talking about us .

Same for me, it will either be your dreamboat to heaven or your downfall. It scares me a little Im sure they will have a lot to talk about between them come 2015 haha!

Haha I wish! it's bloody confusing trying to interpret everyone's point of view on exams, do you lot have different types of gcse? Because I've heard the likes of edexcel and igcse, I'm afraid I don't know the difference It's all the same exam over here plus since there's hardly anyone in Scotland, we all sit it at once and can discuss it on TSR straight away Is the English education system changing with exams in a few years? I heard a few things on the news a while ago.

I will do the same. I'm sure in 50 years time, all the art scholars will be talking about this day and how fashion changed forever

My personal statement was such a pain when I wrote it.. Many drafts later it was okay... It was so cliche when I started it off. It makes me cringe to read old drafts

I had a similar experience with a zoo. They replied saying they'd be happy to take me, but when I asked about working hrs and what should I wear, they never replied...
I only have 1,5 weeks of wex, so I desperately need to get something quickly.

Maths exam was amazing! (Int 2) I've never seen anything easier in my life. I had 93% in my prelim, so it would be nice to get something similar this time too Biology was ok too, although it had way too many PS question in it...
I still have 3 exams to do, Geography on the 30th and Chemistry and ESOL on the 31st.

How are yours exams going? .

Oh gosh . Basically GCSEs are looking pretty mucked up at the moment. I'll try to explain as best I can...

Firstly exam boards (such as Edexcel, OCR, AQA, WJEC etc) are a bit different to IGCSEs. The exam boards make the exams, which is why course content can vary from school to school. Different boards have different assessment methods, for example coursework or exams may be weighted differently. There are also different rules, for example I'm on WJEC for English which means we're not allowed blank copies of texts in exams. We have to memorise quotes etc, but I think other people on other boards get clean copies in front of them.

IGCSEs are a bit different. They are like GCSEs, but are recognised globally (the I stands for international). As far as I'm aware there are only two exam boards for IGCSE, Edexcel and Cambridge International Examinations (CIE, which is what I'm on). IGCSEs are generally considered to be harder than standard GCSEs, and apparently they prepare students better for A-Level. IGCSEs have no coursework, you only get marked on exams. I'm not sure for other subjects, but in science there are three exams per subject. Multiple choice (40 marks) covers the core syllabus. Alternative to practical (40-60 marks) assesses practical skills (using given formulas, reading scales, planning investigations etc). Paper 3 (80 marks) covers all material and can pretty much include anything from the syllabus.

So, on to the changes. Basically the fact that schools can choose which exam board to pick has apparently led to 'downwards inflation'. At the end of the day, all exam boards are companies out to make a profit. Creating easy exams encourages schools to choose a certain exam board over another in order for more students to achieve good grades. Understandably, the government wanted to put a stop to this by proposing single exam boards and bringing back 'O-Level' exams to replace GCSEs. A lot of people opposed the plans and I think they have been scrapped now, but people still aren't happy. The government have discredited the CIE IGCSE Double Science award for an unknown reason (well, my phys teacher maintains that its because the government want to keep IGCSEs in private schools so that pupils from state schools have less chance of getting into Oxbridge, but that's another story )

Basically, Michael Gove is a massive tw@t and nobody likes him There was a story a couple of weeks ago about how an 11 year old was challenging him for inconsistencies in SATs exams (tests sat by pupils in year 6).

Hope that made a bit of sense!

My personal statement was such a pain when I wrote it.. Many drafts later it was okay... It was so cliche when I started it off. It makes me cringe to read old drafts

I'm exactly the same when reading over old cover letters . I sometimes get them out for inspiration, but now I see them as a perfect example of what NOT to write!

It's annoying isn't it? Don't worry you'll find some eventually just keep trying you've got all of summer, the October week and Christmas holidays to do so plus weekends etc.

That's good! Maths went pretty well for me so did biology but there were a few that stumped me. Do you have two exams in the one day?! Plus geography before it!! What's the ESOL exam like? Is it similar to the normal English one? Anyway good luck with them

I've done 7/8 of them just geography on the 30th too. But the rest have went okay English was a bit iffy but I'm glad it's done. Good luck with getting the LA vet


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Yep, two exams in one day Esol in the morning, Chem in the Afternoon.

Esol is more like a Spanish or French exam. There is Reading, Listening, Writing and Speaking. Although I'd say it's a little bit harder since they expect us to know English fluently already + we're not allowed to use dictionaries in the exam. We are required to know something about politics and current affairs since the task in the writing section always require us to give our opinion on something. They also use a lot of different accents in the Listening (English and Scottish are the most common ones but they recently started to use some eastern accents like Russian for example).

Some of the questions can be tricky but generally it's a very easy exam. The grade boundaries are low too (69% for an A), so I would be raging if I didn't get an A.

Good luck with Geography! Did you choose it for higher?

Ah sorry about that but thankyou very much for enlightening me!

We just have the one board the SQA -scottish qualifications authority. They exist for the schools there is a higher board who deals with all qualifications like BVMS for example but I don't know the name all I know is you get SCQF points for all your exams. I think SG credit is level 5; higher is level 6; adv higher is 7 but that's going off topic

I had heard about the whole controversy with him but I didn't really know what to make of it I know we used to do O-grades before SG but now SG are going too with it being replaced by national 4s and 5s.

Thank you for explaining it all.

I'm exactly the same: cringe-worthy indeed! I wonder how I got WEx haha

Yep, two exams in one day Esol in the morning, Chem in the Afternoon.

Sitting watching Cats and Dogs with Rinny rat on my shoulder . I made them some scrambled eggs earlier, I don't spoil my pets, honest!

No problem

I think we have something similar, our raw mark in an exam is converted into UMS (unified mark scale) so that papers can be compared across exam boards. For example, if someone sat an easy paper and got full marks, they might get the same number of UMS as a person who sat a hard paper but got a few wrong. UMS are then used to decide the grade boundaries.

I didn't at first! . I was told that all of the spaces had been filled (only for them to give a space to a friend who applied after me ) I asked them again a year later and got a place; it was scheduled for this year but they had to move it so I'm down for summer 2014 now!

What does Esol stand for? I'm guessing English as a Second Language or something along those lines?

Good luck in all your exams!

Aw that's so cute! I love that film, I haven't seen it in years too! Rin's probably sitting watching it like "HA! Amateurs!"

Yeah that's quite similar but since we only have the one paper we don't have the conversion of grades for harder/easier papers. It should all be unified the UKQA

I remember you saying that, was that the fainter? Does she still want to be a vet? That's good you've got it now, if they are ever bad to you at least you have some dirt off them. Ko ooft that's a wait and a half! Have fun then anyway :L

English for speakers of other languages, the dux of my school had done it last year that's why I remembered sorry for stealing your question Nessie

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Hmm that does sound kind of tricky if it isn't your first language but I'm sure you'll do fine, you seem perfectly fluent in English - I thought it was your first until you stated it was ESOL you were doing if you don't mind me asking what is your first

The accents bit sounds hard I suppose it is a widespread language but it must be pretty tricky!

And thankyou! I'm a bit frightened and yeah I did How is higher geography from SG, is it a great jump?


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What does Esol stand for? I'm guessing English as a Second Language or something along those lines?
Good luck in all your exams!

Polish is my first

I hadn't seen it for a while, but it was on earlier and I recorded it because I am secretly eight years old. I think she liked the bit at the end where the cat gives the mice Australia and a lifetime supply of cheese .

Yep, that was her . I think she mentioned applying for human medicine now. Without meaning to sound rude, I think she'd be better suited for human med as I don't think she enjoyed her WEx much/took it very seriously (she apparently had 4 hour lunch breaks ). I have no doubt that she'll go on to achieve whatever she wants to do though, she's one of the best scientists in the school.

Ah, that makes sense. I think we have something similar here, not sure what it's called though.

Polish is my first
Higher is very similar to SG actually...
There are a few new topics like Atmosphere, Biosphere etc. but most of the paper 1 consist of the usual SG questions (Population, Finding features on the map, describing the formation of a corrie, ox-bow lake, the CBD stuff etc.), the major difference is that the questions are worth 10-25 marks instead of 6. So you just need to remember more.

Moja mama jest z Polski, ale ja się urodziłam w Anglii. Bardzo dobrze piszesz po angielsku Myślę, ze chyba jest łatwiej się dostać na weterynarie w Polsce, nie ma takiego przesiewu jak w Anglii... tez złożysz papiery na Polskie uniwersytety?



[For those of you who don't know I can also speak Polish as half of my family are from there]

Is it did you originally live there?

What?! How much explaining is there haha. At least there are some shared similarities in that respect but the amount of marks per question has blooming increased! Aha my teacher told me there was no enquiry skills at higher is that true? Because I am better at KU over ES. Ahah I'm quite looking forward to higher geo