Prof. S.O.Chan (on the left) - Professor of Anatomy & one of my interviewers; he seems to be a very nice guy! He's been awarded "the best lecturer" title multiple times.It's October already and the next application cycle for 2008 entry is just around the corner. By now you should be busy filling in your application forms and preparing your application essay. In my last post on this topic, I forgot to mention about the number of non-JUPAS applicants I saw on the day as well as the approximate number of non-JUPAS students accepted into CU med school each year. From the best of my knowledge, the figures change from time to time depending on government fundings and various other factors. Please note that what I've quoted here is only true for the year I applied (2005).
When I attended my interview, the setup was like this: there were 5 interviewing rooms, with 2 interviewers in each. On any given day, each pair of interviewers interviewed 10 applicants (5 in the morning, 5 in the afternoon); that makes for a total of 50 applicants interviewed per day.
I was interviewed in June and was told by the facilitator (a CU med student herself) there were 3 days of interviews in that month, with the same happening in July and August. Therefore, in June alone, they interviewed 150 applicants (assuming the number of interviewees remains the same throughout the 3 days)! That was quite a massive number, considering the fact that they only take roughly 10-15 non-JUPAS applicants into their course. Keep in mind that there are applicants being interviewed in July and August as well, and it's probably safe to assume that the total number of interviewees may well exceed 200.
From common sense, any medical school normally wouldn't invite more than 50% of the applicants for interviews. Thinking along this line, the MINIMUM number of non-JUPAS applicants would have been at least 400. 10 divided by 400 gives you a chance of 2.5% of being accepted. This is a rather optimistic assumption.
The conclusion is, if you view CUHK medical school as a backup school, you're probably setting yourself up for misery. Judging from numbers alone, CUHK is harder to get in for a non-JUPAS applicant than the majority of the American/Canadian medical schools. For example, the acceptance rate in Ontario (Canada) is roughly 10%. In America, the acceptance rate is slightly over 40% (I stand to be corrected on this last point).
I hope the figures above do not discourage you from applying, but rather motivate you to try your very best to prepare for the application and to impress the interview panel. Yes, getting in CUHK medicine as a non-JUPAS candidate is extremely tough, but it's still worth trying. The fact is, the more schools to which you apply, the higher your chance of getting in one of them. Don't limit yourself to just one or two medical schools; in fact, don't limit yourself to just schools in your home country! Getting in a legitimate medical school anywhere in the world is tough, and you should give yourself the best advantage by applying to as many schools as you can afford. Med school applicants rarely get to choose their desired schools; more often than not, it's the other way around. If you've done your research, you'll realise there're top-notch medical schools in the UK, Ireland, Australia, Singapore, etc. that accept international students. Returning home to practise after your studies is a separate topic that you'll need to think about, but in short, it's doable.
If you have further queries, please do not hesitate to leave your comments and I'll try my best to answer them when time allows.
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