The first term of Medical Society has been off to a wonderful start, from new Year 12 students joining us and our Year 13s coming back from a long summer break. This term will be very busy for Year 13s sending in their applications for early entry on 15th October. We had some fantastic success stories from students in Medical Society last year. A total of eleven students were successful in gaining places at Medical Schools across the country. Birmingham, Exeter, Nottingham, Plymouth, Queen Mary, St Georges, KMMS, Cambridge, Lincoln, UEA. As well as Medicine, we had fantastic offers for Pharmacy, Radiography, Physio and Physio with a Foundation Year, Sports Therapy, Paramedic Science, Speech & Language Therapy. Good luck to everyone starting new courses or submitting competitive applications!
What has the Society been up to this term?
Our first session was an introduction for those that had just joined to understand what happens in the Society, what can be expected for the rest of the year, a small introduction from our lead roles and an icebreaker session to allow everyone to get to know one another.
Medical/Dentistry Debate Session: We took part in two really engaging debates: abortion and water fluoridation. We split into groups, prepared our arguments, and then presented them before opening up the floor for questions and discussion. In the abortion debate, the ‘pro’ side focused on women’s rights, autonomy, and protecting health and wellbeing, while the ‘con’ side raised ethical concerns about the rights of the foetus and the moral implications of termination. For the water fluoridation debate, the ‘pro’ side highlighted its role in reducing tooth decay and promoting fairness in dental health, while the ‘con’ side questioned consent, possible health risks, and the ethics of treating whole populations in this way. We finished with an open exchange of questions and counterpoints, where everyone had the chance to challenge ideas and share their thoughts. This made the session lively, engaging, and a great opportunity to connect medical ethics with real-world healthcare dilemmas.
Session on Strategic applications: We had a visit from Omar, an former student and one of our previous MedSoc Leads, who has just started at Cambridge studying Medicine. He came and led a session to the Society on how to make strategic applications to university, whatever subject you are applying for and discussed the best ways to apply as a Med applicant. Discussions detailed ensuring that you applied to universities most likely to accept your stats, making sure that you applied to places you strive to go to while ensuring applications were not being sent to universities out of prestige alone. During conversations we also went through different pathways of getting into medicine such as a 5th choice or taking a gap year after completing your A levels, completely breaking myths such as ‘’If you don’t get AAA at A-Level, you have to do a different degree and try for graduate entry’’, which is not true at all. The conversation was very progressive and also allowed us time to discuss some social ethical topics surrounding the NHS and current health topics.
Session about interview preparation: This term, we had a wonderful talk from Mrs MacMahon on interview preparation as many of us are submitting or have submitted our UCAS applications and are preparing for the next stage of the application process. We talked about the importance of reflection. Reflecting is not just what you’ve done, but…
• Why you did it
• What you learned
• What you gained (i.e. skills or insights)
• And most importantly, how it makes you qualified to enter the field
By reflecting effectively, you can add value to your experiences