All your education questions answered by Brian Mooney.
I am a college graduate and wish to use my degree to get into the new fast-track, four-year graduate entry programme for medicine. I have heard a lot about the Gamsat, what exactly is it and is it required for all graduate entry programmes?
The Graduate Medical School Admission Test or Gamsat was specifically designed to assess a student's ability to undertake high-level studies on a medical, dental or veterinary course. The role of Gamsat is to assist in the selection of students who are applying to these courses using their third-level degree rather than second-level qualifications as academic credentials.
In general you can sit the Gamsat if you have completed or are in your final year of an undergraduate honours degree. Some universities require science-based degrees, while others are more lenient in their requirements.
The Gamsat is required for entry into all Irish universities offering the four-year graduate entry programme, currently the Royal College of Surgeons and the University of Limerick.
The Gamsat is taken in March in Ireland. You can register at www.gamsat-ie.orgIf you are considering studying in the UK, the Gamsat is currently required in four of the UK universities offering the four-year graduate entry programme. The date for registration for entry to these courses in 2008 has already passed, but details can be found at www.gamsat.co.uk
Divided into three parts - reasoning in humanities and social science, written communication, reasoning in biological and physical sciences - the Gamsat consists predominantly of multiple-choice questions, with two essays being required in the written communication section. While the Gamsat exam is a difficult exam, it is does not follow general exam format. The purpose of the Gamsat exam is not to test your ability to rehash facts and figures as in the Leaving Cert or many college exams, instead it aims to test your ability to understand and analyse material, to think critically and, in the case of the written communications section, to organise your ideas and personal opinions in a logical and structured fashion. The Gamsat rewards lateral thinking and a thinking "outside of the box" approach.
The Gamsat is a tough exam, lasting for a full day under a strictly-controlled time frame. While it is does not follow conventional exam style, it can still be studied for and should be well prepared for.
Since problem-based learning techniques are central to most graduate entry medical programmes, Gamsat is constructed with a major focus on the assessment of problem-solving ability. The reasoning and humanities and social science section tests skills in interpreting and understanding socio-cultural themes and verbal reasoning. Different types of stimuli will be used such as prose, poetry, argumentative writing and cartoons. Questions test your ability to draw conclusions, make judgments and discriminate between closely related or commonly confused words.
The written communications section is divided into two 30-minute writing tasks. Each writing task has a generous choice of five essays on a central theme such as happiness or wealth, from which you must pick one. The first task is centred on socio-cultural issues, while the second is more personal. The essays are assessed on clarity of thought, structure and grammar.
The third and possibly most worrying of all the sections is the reasoning in biological and physical sciences. This spans biology and chemistry (mostly organic) at first year college level and physics at Leaving Certificate level. While the questions in this section do require some recall and identification of facts, it also tests your problem-solving in a scientific context. This includes estimating measurements, discovering relationships, analysing data etc.
If you type Gamsat into any search engine on the internet, you will find an infinite number of websites offering different study programmes and sample papers, at a range of different prices. The standard sample paper offered by Gamsat costs £25.00 (€36.50) is available at www.ucas.co.uk
A more expensive option is to opt for a private company that offers sets of sample papers guidebooks and feedback. Details of Gamsat preparation courses in Ireland can also be found at www.gamsat-ie.org.
In addition to the cost of study, the exam itself costs €300. So before deciding to sit the Gamsat it is advisable to do some research on the exam. Websites which offer general advice and open forums on graduate entry into medicine both in Ireland and abroad can be very helpful.
All of these websites will be of some use to you.
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