Use all the free resources available to you from SDN: articles, guides, expert advising, forums discussions, and school research.
Yes, they released an update last week saying they will be bringing back international students in January with medical students as one of the priority groups. Whether that means year 1’s or not though im not sure. Fingers crossed.
Students in year 2-4 are able to obtain an individual exemption to the travel restrictions under current guidelines outside of the International Student Arrival Plan. UQ has told us current first year students that we will be officially recognized as second years once our grades come out on Dec 1 (assuming we passed everything...) and that UQ will submit a bulk exemption request on our behalf at that time. Hopefully the vast majority of us will be able to enter via an individual exemption, which should leave more spots available via the International Student Arrival Plan pathway. I don't know exactly how they will prioritize y1 med students vs other health professions but UQ has consistently told us from the start and throughout the year that we would be first up if an arrival plan were to be approved.Yes, they released an update last week saying they will be bringing back international students in January with medical students as one of the priority groups. Whether that means year 1’s or not though im not sure. Fingers crossed.
International students: update on returning to campus
about.uq.edu.au
I really hope so too! This is specific to UQ and ik NSW has plans starting December too. Do you know anything about Melbourne?
As spoken to my agent, the 2nd school will not be able to issue the COE until the 1st school has cancelled the original COE. And judging that Aus schools usually give out more offers than places, the place in the 2nd school will not be secure. My agent also confirmed that there is no guarantee that the place in the 2nd school will be kept even if the deposit is paid.
Okay. Then how does ANY student from the school know that their place is secured
I got my COE from the second school after accepting and paying the deposit. After I received my second COE, I withdrew from the first school. As such, I was holding two COEs from two schools at one time. Your place is secured after receiving COE.
This is interesting.... means my agent gave me the wrong info despite me checking with her twice. She was sure that 1 student can only have 1 COE. Thanks for the reply!
Onshore internationals are getting 0 exemptions at the moment so probably not
This program is aimed at students who are not included in the current exemption categories, see the link here: hhttps://covid19.homeaffairs.gov.au/travel-restrictions#toc-5. Med Students in 2nd, 3rd and 4th year are exempt from the restrictions and can book flights freely (they don't need to be part of this program). NSW and Victoria scrapped all quarantine requirements on Nov 1st if you were fully vaccinated. Anecdotally, an email was sent to all internationals at my school (in Victoria) to sign up to be apart of a program like this. From the information provided by my school, it seemed these programs are aimed at getting students in professional programs into the country first as the priority (med, dental, law, OT, nursing, physio etc). On a side note I'm surprised its only one flight every two weeks based on what that article says (please correct me if I'm wrong) seeing as there were around 290,000 internationals studying in NSW pre pandemic. Fingers crossed they prioritize you guys!View attachment 345618
Hi guys, so I read this on the Oztrekk's website... based on the title, can you say Sydney and Macquarie might send out their offers and CoEs for MD 2022? Has anyone heard about this?Or is it for upper year students from other programs who had commenced online (as Sydney hadn't sent any offers last year, so there isn't anyone finishing Year 1 offshore and online)...
New South Wales government announces return of international students
It's official! Fully vaccinated international students keen to study at a university in New South Wales will not be required to quarantine.oztrekk.com
It seems like a high possibility unless the policy changes. Current situation is that upper year students are selected to participate in the pilot program.
Were upper year med students not already exempt and allowed in? The gov website says those in the final 3 years of a med program are given exemptions.
Depends on your program. Some programs are not exempt like med is. The arrival plan is prioritizing these students and last year's med student who already did their MD1 online. One thing I did gather is when the vaccination reaches the 90% milestone in Victoria, there may be new announcements from the government. Hope for the best.
Yes all 2nd, 3rd and 4th year med students are exempt. The first years at my school (who just finished their 1st year) are getting their exemptions in December as they will be classified as 2nd year by then. What that last person said is wrong, upper year med students aren't part of any pilot program. The pilot program is for incoming 1st year med students and others not on the exempt list.
Definitely not. I think it would be very helpful to know anatomy going in because it will make things easier, but it is not essential. I haven't heard of a medical school that expects you to know anatomy that well going in--it's such a significant part of the medical school curriculum! I wonder which school the student quoted went to, and I really doubt it's UQ.
I don't have any. It still seems scheduled to begin January 2022 as there haven't been any announced changes. Current medical students who will become M2s once grades come out should qualify for individual exemptions like the posters above said. Now we just have to wait a few weeks to see how things play out.
LOL, that's not true of any med school. Why teach anatomy as a course if you already know it??? That statement looks it was written by someone that didn't even attend med school.
The quote above seems to be from a graduate of the Doctor of Physiotherapy program at the University of Melbourne:
Sure, I won't pretend to be an expert on what residency is like in Canada but from what I've heard it's similar to the US.
Would going to a Canadian school matter for US citizens who hope to return to the US for residency? Since Canadian schools are also LCME approved and graduates do not need to take the ECFMG, would graduates be considered IMG at all? Of course students in Can. schools have it harder in that they have to take the MCQEs, Canada’s version of the USMLE, as well as the USMLEs. Students who go to UQ -Ochsner only have to take the USMLE. I’m don’t know much about other Australian medical programs.
If you were able to get into a Canadian school as a US citizen, you would probably be seen as equivalent to a US graduate with some caveats. You might be excluded by residency programs that filter all US-IMG applicants before any holistic review. It is also probably easier to get into a US medical school than a Canadian medical school as a US student, so unless you have a very strong reason to be in Canada for those 4 years it's probably not the greatest idea. Again I'm not an expert on Canadian schools so if you're looking at potentially going down that path it would be a good idea to try and find someone who's actually gone to a Canadian school.
I’m a proud incoming UQ-Ochsner student! No plans to switch anywhere!
Haha yes that makes sense! Sorry, I did use a lot of "you"s in my response but I did intend to speak more generally
This is good for the universities overall but may or may not be a good thing for us in particular. The ISAPs were a way for the states to prioritize certain subsets of students meaning medical students would be at the top of the list. Now everyone will be able to get in, which is good since travelling earlier may be an option, but also means flights are going to become even more challenging to get. There are about 160K international students with visas overseas (actual enrollments may be lower), and in October about 18K people total arrived by flight to Australia. Flights are starting to scale up but we'll have to see how quickly it happens. We'll probably be over there soon but it might be expensive and a bit of a mess.So it appears that the international student arrivals plan just got thrown out of the window (good riddance) and eligible visa holders (student visa included) can enter Australia without special exemption starting Dec 1, 2021.
Eligible visa holders can enter Australia from December 1, including skilled workers and students
Fully vaccinated eligible visa holders can come to Australia without needing to apply for a travel exemption from December 1.www.9news.com.au
COVID-19 and the border
covid19.homeaffairs.gov.au
I'd definitely prefer that over quarantining in brisbane. I guess my only fear is that if i were to for example, head to sydney and hangout there for 2 weeks, then unluckily test positive when the day I flew to brisbane and potentially miss orientation/classes (which of course is unlikely). What did they say about modifying our OHSC again? Mine doesn't start till jan 10th and that wouldn't accomodate for the time needed for this option. Happy to hear we'll be starting in person though!
Considering aus schools start in Feb, you'll probably lose out on some to a lot of money (flight $ + housing $ + school deposit refund depending on what date you drop out) if you get an interview and then wait to see if you get an offer from Canadian schools.
for OHSC they said to msg the insurance people to have your date move up but tbh, some people have called up their rep and the rep said just buy additional dates on your coverage (like buy coverage for Jan 3-Jan 10 and we would be fine), its only like 10$ too so not too bad
One of my friends is 4th year at UQ now and he always has a lot of complaints about the program, though according to him nothing there is truly insurmountable. One main takeaway I got was that there is definitely a lot of self-directed learning and self-discipline involved.
Don't forget they also hooked up with one of the other interviewees DURING the day of med school interviews (maybe someone watched too much greys anatomy and decided to write some fan fiction), laments how easy it is for Australians to get into med school and thinks one country having 4 more medical schools than the other is "double the amount of schools".
As a current UQ-Ochsner student--this stuff is not currently true, although I've heard it too many times now from too many different sources to disregard it completely. My sense is that this was a much bigger issue in the past, and UQ has been taking steps to rectify these problems.
Honestly, I would try and get into the country as early as possible just incase things do shut down again for some reason. Like @Wolvvs said they don't really know yet how effective the vaccines are against it, but on the plus side Australia does have a pretty high vaccination rate. In Victoria they have just implemented a 72hr home quarantine for all international arrivals, so quarantine requirements/restrictions can change very quickly.
Terrible timing. How much earlier are people thinking?
