11 students apply for every one medical school spot
Universities minister David Willetts has revealed that too many A level students are applying to be doctors, leaving many bright 18 year olds without a university place.
Admissions authority UCAS claims that about 4,800 straight A students failed to get a university place last year, with 1,800 of these youngsters being aspiring medics. Approximately 11 students apply for every single medical degree place, which is an increase from five years ago, when nine students were competing for every one spot.
Mr Willetts believes the focus on achieving medical school places was leading scientifically inclined students to drop physics, leaving them with limited options when they were rejected for medical schools.
Fighting for your place
Mr Willetts said “The truth is that the number of young people – and it does tend to me more girls than boys – with an aspiration to do medicine way exceeds any number of places that the NHS is likely to have.”
The chief master of King Edward’s School, Birmingham, John Claughton told The Daily Telegraph “Able boys who apply for medicine when they would have been better at something else, languages, history, natural sciences. If you teach chemistry you can find yourself with a lot of boys doing the subject for the wrong reason,” labeling over ambitious parents as another factor in the increasing numbers of medical applications.
