ucat 3130 b2 + 3A*1A

+ my IGCSEs are 9A*s + i'm an international student. my current list of med schs are Bristol, King's and UCL, but i'm unsure of my 4th option. would Oxbridge / Imperial be worth a try?

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Reply 1

Fisherman98

Original post by creepycrepes

+ my IGCSEs are 9A*s + i'm an international student. my current list of med schs are Bristol, King's and UCL, but i'm unsure of my 4th option. would Oxbridge / Imperial be worth a try?

Great score!
defo go for oxbridge - youve already applied for 2 london ones (kings and ucl) so you might as well choose one of oxbridge over imperial

Reply 2

creepycrepes

Original post by Fisherman98

Great score!
defo go for oxbridge - youve already applied for 2 london ones (kings and ucl) so you might as well choose one of oxbridge over imperial

Thank you for the insight! Between Oxbridge, any advice on which to choose? I understand Oxford admissions are more academic-based while Cambridge focuses on the interviews.

Reply 3

olivemaster

Original post by creepycrepes

Thank you for the insight! Between Oxbridge, any advice on which to choose? I understand Oxford admissions are more academic-based while Cambridge focuses on the interviews.

Would deffo recommend imperial over kcl. Kcl admin is a nightmare

Reply 4

creepycrepes

Original post by olivemaster

Would deffo recommend imperial over kcl. Kcl admin is a nightmare

oh dang really? i heard the imperial cut off for BMAT was quite high tho, would my score be sufficient? and also what are other factors imperial looks at for selection criteria?

Reply 5

olivemaster

Original post by creepycrepes

oh dang really? i heard the imperial cut off for BMAT was quite high tho, would my score be sufficient? and also what are other factors imperial looks at for selection criteria?

Aren’t they getting rid of bmat from 2025 entry onwards?

Reply 6

creepycrepes

Original post by olivemaster

Aren’t they getting rid of bmat from 2025 entry onwards?

yep, i'm assuming their UCAT cut-off would be high as well, so i'm not too sure whether mine is sufficient

Reply 7

olivemaster

Original post by creepycrepes

yep, i'm assuming their UCAT cut-off would be high as well, so i'm not too sure whether mine is sufficient

International bmat cut off is higher so I get the worry. I would still apply imperial over kcl personally. I go to imperial and love it and have heard bad things from friends at kcl

Reply 8

creepycrepes

Original post by olivemaster

International bmat cut off is higher so I get the worry. I would still apply imperial over kcl personally. I go to imperial and love it and have heard bad things from friends at kcl

that's great, thank u for the insight. for imperial do they look at extracurriculars? or more on supercurriculars

Reply 9

Fisherman98

Original post by creepycrepes

Thank you for the insight! Between Oxbridge, any advice on which to choose? I understand Oxford admissions are more academic-based while Cambridge focuses on the interviews.

your gcse's are excellent with 9A* so i dont really see a weakness with u. Between the two its your own choice which one u like more coz both are pretty much equally as competitive. Maybe consider other factors like which one u like more, location, accomodation, cost...?

Reply 10

$hadow

Original post by creepycrepes

+ my IGCSEs are 9A*s + i'm an international student. my current list of med schs are Bristol, King's and UCL, but i'm unsure of my 4th option. would Oxbridge / Imperial be worth a try?

With that UCAT and depending what your A levels are in... I would definitely try.

(edited 8 months ago)

Reply 11

Fisherman98

Original post by creepycrepes

oh dang really? i heard the imperial cut off for BMAT was quite high tho, would my score be sufficient? and also what are other factors imperial looks at for selection criteria?

your score is high, it depends on how much of a risk you want to take since if u apply to oxbridge, ucl and imperial they are all very competitive and in my school in particular we are greatly discouraged from applying to 3 of them. Kcl on the other hand is a very good uni as well but a bit less competitive and much safer than imperial.

Reply 12

Frizzle16523

Original post by creepycrepes

+ my IGCSEs are 9A*s + i'm an international student. my current list of med schs are Bristol, King's and UCL, but i'm unsure of my 4th option. would Oxbridge / Imperial be worth a try?

Hmmm if you really want oxbridge why don’t you swap UCL for imperial and then apply oxbridge? With your score I’m sure you can get interviews for all of them.

Reply 13

creepycrepes

Original post by Frizzle16523

Hmmm if you really want oxbridge why don’t you swap UCL for imperial and then apply oxbridge? With your score I’m sure you can get interviews for all of them.

hm not a bad idea. what are the differences between oxford and cambridge's selection criteria?

Reply 14

Frizzle16523

Original post by Frizzle16523

Hmmm if you really want oxbridge why don’t you swap UCL for imperial and then apply oxbridge? With your score I’m sure you can get interviews for all of them.

Pretty sure than Oxford look heavily at GCSEs? Cambridge though are more holistic and they interview most applicants so rely heavily on interviews.

Reply 15

olivemaster

Original post by creepycrepes

that's great, thank u for the insight. for imperial do they look at extracurriculars? or more on supercurriculars

They don’t look at personal statement. It just depends on what they ask at interview the only questions they would ask about extracurricular is ‘how would you de stress’ and ‘why do you want to go to imperial’ (where you can talk about societies and your hobbies). As long as you have something for each your fine tbh

Reply 16

Frizzle16523

Original post by creepycrepes

hm not a bad idea. what are the differences between oxford and cambridge's selection criteria?

Sorry, for my above post I was meant to reply to this message

Reply 17

gk2210

Original post by creepycrepes

+ my IGCSEs are 9A*s + i'm an international student. my current list of med schs are Bristol, King's and UCL, but i'm unsure of my 4th option. would Oxbridge / Imperial be worth a try?

Great Stats…. Do Oxford rate GCSE at old grades or latest numerical grades? Is 8 in numerical grade equivalent to A*?

Reply 18

creepycrepes

Original post by gk2210

Great Stats…. Do Oxford rate GCSE at old grades or latest numerical grades? Is 8 in numerical grade equivalent to A*?

A* would be either an 9 or 8, this new system depends on grade boundaries tho so i'm unsure what mine is

Reply 19

fy21

Original post by creepycrepes

+ my IGCSEs are 9A*s + i'm an international student. my current list of med schs are Bristol, King's and UCL, but i'm unsure of my 4th option. would Oxbridge / Imperial be worth a try?

I'm a graduate international student applying for med this year and I went to imperial, base on what anecdotal information I've gathered from my friends that does medicine I would skip imperial, take this advice with a grain of salt though.

Also I strongly suggest having at least an insurance pick, since all of the universities you've mentioned are very competitive. Just to give you an idea, the average UCAT score for uni of edinburgh international offer holders was 3100 last year, and for other UCAT unis were around 3000. This year the 90th percentile UCAT score is also 100 higher than 2023 based on preliminary data (2990 vs 2890), and so I expect unis like imperial, UCL and oxbridge to look for an average UCAT score of at least ~3200 for international students this year.

Your grades and UCAT score is very good indeed, but you're certainly not guaranteed a place out of the universities you're choosing from, considering each uni only has 20-30 places for international students. I would recommend going for 2 out of oxbridge/UCL/Imperial, 1 out of other mid-high range universities and 1 insurance pick.