Ask an Admissions Tutor IV, 7 July - 27 July 2014

My brother is interested in applying for Medicine, has >90% A* at GCSE but could he be disadvantaged by his subjects?
He is studying Biology, Chemistry, Physics and French AS and has heard that very very few successful applicants don't have Maths to at least AS.
Will he be considered less favourably? Would it be worth him trying to self-teach Maths AS in Yr13 ( he wouldn't be able to pick it up at school due to timetabling)?

Sir how do evaluate students who are private candidates but live in a poor area?

Both these things provide context but only that, we don;t make decisions based on these facors alone. It doesn't mean that just because someone has been educated privately that they have received a fantastic education or, conversely, just because someone lives in a poor area that they have been educated poorly.

On your AP scenario, I don't think it is parrticularly helpful to comment without knowing how strong the A* was and what the rest of the application looked like.

Hi there,

first, if you apply this year no college will have access to your STEP script as they will all have been destroyed by October.

If you achieve S,2 or 1,2 and applied to Christ's, we would probably ask you to sit STEP III again if this were possible to try and get a 1. We might, however, waive this and would be more likely to do so if you got an S in Step II and/or were very close to the 1 boundary in STEP III. This would also depend on other aspects of the application, especially UMS and the interview.

Sorry not to be more definite, but it is hard to be certain without seeing the whole of the application and the rest of the application field. We have, however, taken people who have achieved S,2 and 1,2.

Other colleges may have a slightly different attitude to whether they would ask you to resit STEP III and, as you will know, different colleges have diffferent attitudes towards GAP years for Maths. This is detailed here. Our Maths DoS is quite happy to accept those taking GAP years. I hope this is of some help.

Sorry if I did not state it clearly, I meant as in private candidates not private school applicants, like those who self-study the material and self-teach it and do not attend school.

I understand sir. Are Cambridge inquistive as to the UMS of the A2 modules? Is it better in your opinion for someone to have the 5 or not?

Ok thank you very much for finding that out for me. If all goes well and i did make the standard offer STEP grades and actually got S,1 would i then receive an unconditional offer (that is if i was made an offer of course)

Just to note, if I am invited to interview, would more be expected of me than the other offer-holders as i will essentially be a year ahead of them i.e. will i have to perform 'better' than i would have needed to if say i had applied as a year 12 candidate? Moreover, would questions be based on more advanced material perhaps or is everyone tested on the same problems.

And finally what does the Christ's maths DoS recommend i spend my gap year on, mathematically speaking. I intend to work part-time throughout the year. However, obviously i also want to spend a lot of my time learning new maths. Is it a bad or good idea to work through a few modules from first year (Part IA) as i would probably like to start on some uni calculus and probability as i have been enjoying the more advanced work on those topics that i have covered recently. Is it advisable to do none, little or a lot?

I understand you may have to contact the DoS in maths so please dont worry about responding hastily.

Hello. I want to study medicine in the UK, therefore I will sit the BMAT this year. Coming from another country, my biology, physics and chemistry curriculum(especially the last two) are nowhere near as complex as in the UK(despite the fact that I study nature sciences at my highschool). So I'm thinking to get some GCSE/A level coursebooks in these three sciences in order to be as prepared as I can be. The problem is, I don't know which ones are the best and most complete. I have three options(so far): the Cambridge International AS and A Level, the Edexcel International GCSE and the Cambridge IGCSE coursebooks. I will need at least three, one for each subject, and maybe some additional ones for exercising. Can you please tell me which student/course books would be the most helpful for me? And if there are others, can you please recommend them to me? I know I'm quite late, but I was waiting for my CPE result in order to decide whether I should apply or not and it came last week. I'm confident that with the right materials I can prepare and do well at the BMAT. I really appreciate any support and piece of advice. Thank you

Thanks! Also, I've been wondering if there are any other exams I need for medicine besides the BMAT and a language certificate(which I have already, CPE with grade A). From what I know the baccalaureate that I have in my country is accepted, oftenly universities give student in my country an offer(after the interview) which is based on the mark they will be required to get. Also, I have done a lot of volunteer work, can I put it in the work section on UCAS? I've done some volunteering in the field of medicine and some outside and I'm wondering how is volunteering for a film festival, for a sporting event for people with disabilities and for an annual national english teachers meeting seen?

Hi there, if you get S,1 then, assuming we made an offer, then it would be unconditional. Someone with S,1 already achieved would be in a very strong position.

The interview would largely be the same, we have our students sit a test just before one o the interviews and that forms the basis of that interview, while the other one is mainly solving problems. The DoS has a number of potential problems and when you solve one, he moves on to a harder one and so on. Different candidates advanced at different rates through the interview.

Your plan for your GAP year sounds like a good one, it would certainly do you no harm to look at 1st-year material. Some students on GAP years will get involved with their old school doing tutoring of Maths students in Years 12 and 13 and this can be a helpful way of keeping A Level material fresh in your mind. Essentially, we don't mind how you keep your Maths sharp, we just want to see soe evidence that you are doing/planning to do this.

Good luck in your STEP.

Ok yeah i already do tutor people for alevel maths and intend keep that up. Thanks for the helpful replies

You're welcome! Good luck with your exam results.

One last thing (i promise!):

Is there an example test online, like Trinity have put up a few, so that i can gauge the difficulty of it?

Hi there!

I'm an international applicant from Australia and read somewhere that when applying I may be asked to send in my grade transcripts? If this is the case, should I bother putting any of my semester or term results on UCAS? Sorry if this doesn't make much sense!

As promised, here is the fourth instalment of my 'Ask an Admissions Tutor' threads. If you went to the Cambridge University Open Days last week and forgot to ask a crucial question or if you weren't able to go but have questions you would like to ask, or, indeed, if you just have questions about Cambridge Admissions, please ask it here and I will answer as soon as I can. This thread will run for three weeks and then a further thread will run after the A Level and AS Level results come out.

As promised, here is the fourth instalment of my 'Ask an Admissions Tutor' threads. If you went to the Cambridge University Open Days last week and forgot to ask a crucial question or if you weren't able to go but have questions you would like to ask, or, indeed, if you just have questions about Cambridge Admissions, please ask it here and I will answer as soon as I can. This thread will run for three weeks and then a further thread will run after the A Level and AS Level results come out.