Maintaining a High GPA for MD

[paulsterio]

OK, so one of my friends, who is intending to do a Science degree at Melbourne next year and then the MD posed an interesting question to me, which I thought I should ask here, because if it's true, there might be a slight loophole in the system.

So there are certain subjects which are "hard" and certain subjects which are clearly "easier".

For example, I doubt that anybody would argue against me if I say that "Calculus 2" is easier than "Accelerated Mathematics". There are also other subjects (designed to be bridging subjects I think) such as "Fundamentals of Chemistry" or "Fundamentals of Physics" which will essentially be piss easy for students who did well in those respective areas in Year 12 (because they are just a repeat of the Year 12 course).

Hence, my posed question is that - wouldn't it be advantageous to choose these easy subjects because it will reward us with a higher GPA?

[Mr. Study]

Wouldn't that disadvantage you for the GAMSAT? (I'm a COMPLETE noob at this)

[ligands]

if you do year 12 chem (example) you wont get any credit for doing fundamental chem

[jmosh002]

I am not very familiar with the uni scoring system, but may i just ask, are HDs, Ds,etc - which contribute to your GPA, a percentile of your class? or just a mark, as in all of the class could potentially get HDs?

thanks

[DisaFear]

...such as "Fundamentals of Chemistry" or "Fundamentals of Physics" which will essentially be piss easy for students who did well in those respective areas in Year 12 (because they are just a repeat of the Year 12 course).

Are you even allowed to do those uni subjects if you did the year 12 equivalents? I wouldn't think so, I got a message from the office handling this stuff when I put in my subjects, I didn't want to do the main Physics, forgotten the rest of the details

Hence, my posed question is that - wouldn't it be advantageous to choose these easy subjects because it will reward us with a higher GPA?

It may help *just a tad*, in my opinion.

*First year counts the least towards your GPA thingy (right?)
*By second-year, there aren't any 'extremely easy' subjects - I'm doing Astronomy now, which just requires Year 10 science, or something, very easy indeed, but you need Math/Physics to continue it in further years

But surely, anyone aiming for a high GPA to do something awesome will prepare wisely, even in first year. Science isn't hard to do well in

[kenhung123]

I am not very familiar with the uni scoring system, but may i just ask, are HDs, Ds,etc - which contribute to your GPA, a percentile of your class? or just a mark, as in all of the class could potentially get HDs?

thanks

Just a mark
Not really a loophole, I think lots of people try to find easy breadth subjects to boost their GPA.
As with your main subjects you would want to satisfy the prerequisites for MD and also choose more chemistry and physics related courses for GAMSAT purposes.

[kensan]

I was thinking the exact same thing but for DDS at Melbourne. Would be more tactical to do easier maths subjects and score higher in them and get a better GPA? Or are there these restrictions on these maths subjects as well..

*First year counts the least towards your GPA thingy (right?)

Fairly certain it does, I think it's weighted so that third year counts the most, then second then first year

[paulsterio]

Are you even allowed to do those uni subjects if you did the year 12 equivalents? I wouldn't think so, I got a message from the office handling this stuff when I put in my subjects, I didn't want to do the main Physics, forgotten the rest of the details

Hmm at the UoM, apparently you actually are - have a friend who's doing Fundamentals of Chemistry although they did Chemistry in Year 12 (with a decent score in it as well).

[thushan]

I was thinking the exact same thing but for DDS at Melbourne. Would be more tactical to do easier maths subjects and score higher in them and get a better GPA? Or are there these restrictions on these maths subjects as well..

*First year counts the least towards your GPA thingy (right?)

Fairly certain it does, I think it's weighted so that third year counts the most, then second then first year

Watch out for the Melbourne Adjusted Grade Point Average. Trialled this year I believe. It's meant to take into account variations in difficulty of subject. It's basically VCE scaling all over again.

[jinny1]

You can't do fundamentals if you get higher than 30 raw study score and UoM is introducing MGPA to combat all these people trying to boost their GPA.

First year only counts less than 17% of your GPA.

...such as "Fundamentals of Chemistry" or "Fundamentals of Physics" which will essentially be piss easy for students who did well in those respective areas in Year 12 (because they are just a repeat of the Year 12 course).

Are you even allowed to do those uni subjects if you did the year 12 equivalents? I wouldn't think so, I got a message from the office handling this stuff when I put in my subjects, I didn't want to do the main Physics, forgotten the rest of the details

Hence, my posed question is that - wouldn't it be advantageous to choose these easy subjects because it will reward us with a higher GPA?

- I'm doing Astronomy now

Ooh what's the astronomy subject called??

[Russ]

If MAGPA affects medicine entry in the next 3 years I will eat my hat. The MD GPA and entry is administered by a completely separate organization and I can't see how the university are going to impose different sets of rules on GPA for their students vs. other universities.

Also scaling is terrible and I don't want it at my university

re GPA boosting, it really doesn't matter that much. You have to do your major and your prereqs and you can't do more than 10 first year subjects, so there aren't that many opportunities to get away with it.

[Tomw2]

If MAGPA affects medicine entry in the next 3 years I will eat my hat. The MD GPA and entry is administered by a completely separate organization and I can't see how the university are going to impose different sets of rules on GPA for their students vs. other universities.

This.

It would effectively be another restrictive criterion purely for UoM students. And in any case, how could they possibly give different weighting according to subject 'ease', while simultaneoulsly applying chronological weighting? Messy.

[jasrulz63]

There are also other subjects (designed to be bridging subjects I think) such as "Fundamentals of Chemistry" or "Fundamentals of Physics" which will essentially be piss easy for students who did well in those respective areas in Year 12 (because they are just a repeat of the Year 12 course).

If you do Fundamentals of Chemistry, you need to either do Chemistry 1 the next semester then Chemistry 2 over summer, or skip Chemistry 1 and go straight to Chemistry 2 (provided you get a good enough score). After doing Fundamentals myself and seeing what friends did for Chemistry 1, I think Chemistry 1 offers a better lead-up to Chemistry 2 than Fundamentals does. I sort of regret not doing Chemistry 1 after not going as well as I should've in Chemistry 2.

I also highly doubt we'll see MAGPA anytime soon, I remember that being floated around since I started uni (2.5 years ago). At least not for medicine anyway.

[simpak]

If you're going MD from a BSci why the hell would you take Calculus 2 or Accelerated Mathematics?
Why would you be taking Fundamentals if you want to do Med, when you clearly need Chemistry to do most shit in biological sciences (ie you need Chem 2, ie, you'd be adding a summer subject).

Honestly, I think any subject you take at Melbourne is going to be pretty hard but some of the obviously mark really lightly. Like anatomy, I just wrote down key words with fluff in between for some questions and had already lost like 3% by the time I went into the exam, not possible that I still came out with a 94 without light marking or scaling.  So it probably doesn't always matter how 'hard' it is. TAKE SHIT YOU ENJOY SERIOUSLY. I'm so sick of people treating their undergraduate degree as a simple bridge from high school to postgrad with no thought to how they could be learning something wonderful and exploring their interests.  Undergrad isn't just about getting into med, you have to enjoy it - who cares if what you're doing is easy or hard as long as you enjoy it! And yes, you can enjoy hard subjects.

MAGPA is too similar to magpie and I had magpies.

[thushan]

If you're going MD from a BSci why the hell would you take Calculus 2 or Accelerated Mathematics?
Why would you be taking Fundamentals if you want to do Med, when you clearly need Chemistry to do most shit in biological sciences (ie you need Chem 2, ie, you'd be adding a summer subject).

Honestly, I think any subject you take at Melbourne is going to be pretty hard but some of the obviously mark really lightly. Like anatomy, I just wrote down key words with fluff in between for some questions and had already lost like 3% by the time I went into the exam, not possible that I still came out with a 94 without light marking or scaling.  So it probably doesn't always matter how 'hard' it is. TAKE SHIT YOU ENJOY SERIOUSLY. I'm so sick of people treating their undergraduate degree as a simple bridge from high school to postgrad with no thought to how they could be learning something wonderful and exploring their interests.  Undergrad isn't just about getting into med, you have to enjoy it - who cares if what you're doing is easy or hard as long as you enjoy it! And yes, you can enjoy hard subjects.

MAGPA is too similar to magpie and I had magpies.

MAGPA is a short step from Collingwood. Don't need to say anything else.