HPAT Results and Dashed Dreams.
Today, June 22nd, is a day almost every Medicine hopeful had marked off in their calendars as The Most Important Day Ever.
I say almost every Med-Head, because I rang a friend of mine this morning, about 3 hours after I’d looked at my own results, to see how he’d fared, and he didn’t even realise they were being sent out…
I explained to him that I cried when I first saw my results. Nobody understands emotional wrecks these days.
I feel better since the immediate shock, but maybe only a little.
Anyway, it’s a day that I’d very much been dreading for the last few months. Thousands of us sat our HPATs last February, with little idea of how we actually got on. It was a vague, wishy-washy, stressful exam which makes me physically ill when I so much as think of it, and I had absolutely no idea how exactly I got on.
I remember very few details about it (Mental Blockage, you see) but the blog I wrote about the exam at the time reminded me how depressing the whole day was.
That day was nowhere near as depressing as today, however.
The night after the HPAT exams I went out to my favourite club and got rather drunk with a few good friends.
Today is a Monday. The option just isn’t there.
One of my very best friends is moving to France for a year. Tomorrow. And she more than likely won’t be able to come home for visits, even at Christmas.
Another of my best friends (Who I’m heavily dependent on) has been in Germany all Summer.
I recently got a bad haircut.
I was already fragile. Already an emotional wreck. Now this has been very much so heightened.
I couldn’t sleep at all last night, I was tossing and turning until about 4am. I was tempted to pull an all nighter, refreshing my inbox every 5 seconds approximately, waiting for ACER to send me out that all important email which would reveal my results.
I eventually decided it’d be a tad ridiculous, a tad excessive, and succumbed to sleep, but I was up at 8.30am, bounding towards my computer, adamant to see the dreaded Results email. They’d been sent out at 5.52am (A somewhat odd time, yes.)
I wish I’d stayed in bed.
Without further ado, my results are as follows:
Points (Out of a total of 300): 173
Percentile Ranking: 84
Now, I know these results aren’t as drastic as I’m making out, but for me, this has come as quite an awful blow.
I’d been hoping to get within the top, maybe, 10 percentile of candidates to try and secure myself a place in Medicine in Trinity.
I only landed into the top 16.
Hope is not lost, no no no, but it’s definitely diluted somewhat.
On one hand, I know that I’m more suited to Medicine, apparently, than 84% of medicine applicants- but it’s that pesky 16% who would, apparently, be better than me who are the problem.
I say “apparently” because I don’t think a, frankly tenuous, multiple choice exam can truly determine someone’s capability as a Doctor, Surgeon, Psychiatrist or what have you.
Heck, there’s no easy way of doing it- but because of SHEER determination alone I feel as though I’d proved myself somewhat able to study the damn course next year.
I cannot describe how much I want to study Medicine, and I feel as though I’ve given it my all. I know I’d be good at it. I know it’s the only career I’d truly enjoy, and work well at.
But my HPAT results haven’t reflected this all too well.
On the CAO website, it’s possible to get a breakdown of your results Section by Section- I excelled in Section 1- So it seems I’m pretty logical and can solve problems pretty nicely, then.
Section 2- Interpersonal Relationships- wasn’t great. I’d honestly assumed this was my forte- I’d always done best here in the sample tests- but it was only mediocre on the day.
Section 3, however, is where I really got dragged down. I didn’t even score 50 points here. I’ve come up with an excuse though, of course,- I’m a girl.
It’s not much of an excuse, but I’m blaming the sexist nature of the paper- Girls suck at that kind of thing, generally speaking, compared to boys. Seriously, FACT. We were raised playing with our Barbies- they had their lego and K’nex and what have you. We learned nothing, only how to be subservient and fashionable, they developed spacial awareness.
Yeah. So I’m blaming bad parenting, then.
I thought I’d be able to tell if I got into Medicine or not today, but it’s impossible to do so, really.
Combining my Leaving Cert points from last year as an indication with my HPAT results, I get as follows:
550 + 173 = 723.
723 out of 860, seems a bit awful, right? Does anyone understand why I cried, just a little?
However, I’ve since discovered that nobody seems to have got more than around and about 207-210. That, of course, means the very maximum could be, what, 560+ 210= 770?
I’m a good 60 or 50 points off the top candidates, but I’m still a hell of a lot higher than some of the average or weaker students.
Most people seem to have gotten 150 or thereabouts in the HPATs, and I wouldn’t go as far as saying hope is lost for any of them, or for me, merely diluted.
Because all the HPAT results seem to be over such a narrow range, the Leaving Cert results are still of fundamental importance.
Anyone who thinks they’ll get into Medicine with 480 points is horribly deluded- but there’s hope for people who break well into the 500s, especially if their HPAT results were even alright.
Sigh. I don’t know.
I can’t wait for August 12th. But, more importantly, I can’t wait for August 17th- the day of CAO offers.
I’ll take Medicine anywhere in Ireland. If Trinity’s out than I’ll gladly head to Galway. I’d even take the plunge and accept CORK if I had to- even though I hate the city (nothing personal, guys) and would really hate to end up there.
For now though, I’m going to just try and forget about it and enjoy my Summer.
I’ll return in August to let you all know how I get on! Keep your fingers crossed for me, please.
EDIT: This article from the Irish Times is wonderfully informative.
Comments are closed.
also remember that while there are 16% ahead if you, there is no way in hell that all of them are gonna get high points! in the same way that some “600pointers” got in the lower percentiles, there will be those in the higher percentiles that will struggle to break 500. so i guess we’ll all see in the 17th of august!!
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im about to go in to final year medicine in UCC and stumbled on this blog while trying to get my head around the new hpat entry system. i think it’s ridiculous/hilarious that ye seem to have something against med in UCC. i got 600 in my leaving and put cork down first choice, with absolutely no regrets to date. im sure that the qualification you get is much the same in all the irish universities, and i know for a fact that UCC graduates are held in very high esteem internationally, as im sure TCD graduates probably are too. one of the added benefits of medicine in cork is that hospitals are much more accessible to students as the city is smaller and this is a major advantage when you factor in the huge time constraints placed on you in your clinical years. in other words you are likely to get more teaching and it’s easier to immerse yourself in your hospital rotations when necessary. UCC is 10 mins walk from cork university hospital, 10 mins walk from mercy university hospital, 2 mins walk from bon secours hospital, 20 mins walk from south infirmary university hospital… the list goes on. i spoke to trinity students during the summer who told me they had to spend over an hour commuting to and from the hospital every day! other advantages are that you are actually pretty much on campus for med in UCC in first and second year (not at all true for TCD) so you have a better college life in pre-clinical years. just think it’s funny that ye would have something against cork when clearly ye don’t know much about the medical course here. there are advantages to looking beyond the pale you know!
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James, I have no problems with UCC whatsoever. It’s a brilliant university, I agree…
I have researched the course there, quite well.
I never said anything against UCC! An awful lot of my friends go there, about half my year went there last year! In fact, my grandfather even went there back in the day! – I just said I dislike Cork CITY. I also said I’d gladly go there if offered a place, because medicine is medicine.
Also, just to clear this up I don’t live within the Pale. I went to school in Waterford.
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”I love the athmosphere, the location, the people”
How can you love the ‘athmosphere’ of a university you must have visited, what, once or twice on an open day?? How can you profess to love the people? Save, of course your couple of friends who might have started there last year. I hate when leaving cert students spout that cliched old line about loving the ‘people’ and the ‘ethos’ when all they’ve done is visited it once on an open-day when said university was crammed with other leaving cert students. Stupid, stupid, naive.
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unwarranted abuse at Laura Brady?? The girl’s blog was a thinly veiled attempt to boast about her fabulous wealth and intelligence.
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This is actually getting beyond redick.
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Fight after school.
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Dead next GAA feen. Lol
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aha, my bad – trust a UCC student to get all defensive about UCC! (although i should really start a defensive rant about cork city now…!) anyhoo hope results went well for all concerned today. might see a few of ye in UCC in september…ha!!
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Hi there Jennie
Just a quick question,
In your list of preferences why do you have RCSI below NUIG?
Cheers,
John
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John, I have Galway before RCSI as, quite simply, I’d rather go to NUIG!
Galway’s great, and I’d probably have it even higher up if it wasn’t so inconvenient to where I live.
I’ll gladly accept Medicine in RCSI, but I’m not that mad about the place- it’s so small etc. There’s many more people in NUIG and a much woder demographic also. I tend to get on really well with Arts “wasters”
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Ah, so much love for Galway. Regret not putting it #1. So many hippies in that city…
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hey jenni how did u do this year in the l.c?
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Well? Did you get in after all that?
a yes/no answer will suffice instead of an essay
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Yep! Got Medicine in the bag.
Blog later. Haven’t slept yet..
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Jennie I go back to my input right up at the top _ Number 2!!!
Think you are right and Leaving Certificate Marks will still be VERY important.In hpat only 1% or 35 people got above 200. Realistically maximum score for top 35 places will be 560+200=760 assuming the same people who get top 1% get 600 points (now counted as 560)in leaving.
So your 723 is not nearly as bad as you think! And there are still at least 365 places in medicine still left!
Dont despair just yet and remember you could do health science in Trinity and repeat hpat next year and you can now get into medicine as a graduate. If determined you will succeed-good luck!
So I hope you did well in your LC and got your place in Medicine- Good Luck
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Who was it said you could get a breakdown of your results? How do you do that?
On the CAO website or something? I got 200 in Hpat but I do Alevels so my grades have to be converted into points. I was really surprised (and pleased) because the day of the Hpat I flew in from boston at 6am on my own and was really jet-lagged.
It was a horrible exam.
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If drrkpd wasnt so retarded he could have glanced at the post above his and saved himself 5 minutes of his life
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wow…. you’ve made me cry… you really are a bunch ……
anyway I’m going to go run off my tears now….
thanks for the optimism guys…..
now I really know Im snigged!!!
Jeannie (sorry if I remembered your name wrong) your blog is excellent, you’re a great writer! even if it is the truth.. it’s hard to put in words
I think waiting on these results is a test in itself!!! Test of mental toughness!!
grrrr lifes a bitch and then we die… as they say:(
repeating LC
….. you can’t really do that the third time can you?
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whoops jennie… sorry!!!
yay you got in!
cool
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did ya get trinity jennie?? i got ucc which was my first choice, had overall score of 734!
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