Access Into Medical School: Guide - Your community for widening participation in medicine: UCAT training, BMAT training, mock interviews and mentorship.
About Us
Medical students that want to help young people get into medical school
We are a group of medical students committed to making medicine more accessible to everyone, regardless of their background. The entire team has successfully completed the application process and are all passionate about supporting others to achieve the same. We are based in the North East and support students nationally.
The AIMS.Guide vision is for all medicine applicants to have a fair chance at securing a place on a medical degree, regardless of their circumstances. We’d like to become the service that all teachers tell their students about when they are considering whether to apply to medicine.
Our mission
- To provide services that improve equality of opportunity in the medical admissions process.
- To empower medical applicants by supporting their application to medical school.
- To inspire students that have not previously considered medicine.
- To support students in deciding whether medicine is right for them.
- To create and adapt programmes based on the direct needs of the students.
- To foster networks between disadvantaged medics to combat the inbuilt inequality of medical careers and academia.
We recognise that the medical profession does not reflect society
Not having advice and support when applying to medicine puts applicants at an immediate disadvantage. Private schools and paid services provide support to those lucky enough to be able to afford them, which makes the application process unfair, as well as harming the medical profession by reducing its diversity. Private education does not make a student any more able to thrive in medicine, in fact, evidence shows that state educated students perform better in medical school than those that have been privately educated.
Currently, around 5% of medical students come from a working class background, compared to 14% of the population. 25% of medical students without a previous degree have had a private education, compared to 7% of the population. Students are often told that they need to have the highest grades at A-level and GCSE to stand a chance at getting a place to study medicine. This is often not the case.
We are outraged at how poorly the medical profession reflects the general population, and believe that one reason for the underrepresentation of students from less privileged backgrounds is the lack of support and advice they receive in their applications.
. . . .
We’re trying to help by supporting students with their application
We are combatting this by providing the same information and support to students for free. Our resources, calculator, outreach and mentorship programme are designed to support and inform all students, however we place a specific focus on students from disadvantaged backgrounds, ensuring that every student is aware of opportunities that they are entitled to.
Supporting medicine applicants for free
Mentoring for students, by medical students
We’re a team of medical students that are keen to offer mentorship and advice to help improve your chances of getting into medical school.
A calculator to discover your medical school
Your free calculator that highlights the medical schools you might be eligible for, including which schools offer reduced criteria for underrepresented groups.
The co-founders
Robbie
Co-founder
Robbie is a 4th year medical student at Newcastle University. He has been working to help students get into medical school since the beginning of his course and is passionate about giving everyone a fair chance of getting into medical school. Outside of medicine he attempts triathlon (because he enjoys making everything three times harder than it needs to be).
Reece
Co-founder
Reece, our in-house tech guy, is also a 4th year medical student at Newcastle University. By combining his prior mentorship experience with his ‘nerdiness’, he hopes to make medicine more accessible to underrepresented groups. Aside from his love for 1s and 0s, he’s also a big fan of garlic bread, badminton, and psychological thrillers (in that order).
Conferences, Awards and Partnerships
Proud of the work that we do, we want to lead the way and encourage similar initiatives to join our cause. We showcase our work at conferences to prompt people to recognise the challenges that young people face. Research also helps us understand the bigger picture of “widening participation” whilst highlighting key areas that we think need improvement.
We also use the money earned from conference awards to fund the services that we offer. We don’t expect young people or schools to make any donations; we’re dedicated and want to secure alternative sources of income. As part of this, our activities benefit from the generous support of volunteers. We seek to secure meaningful connections with groups that share our goals.
Did you know?
We regularly consult with a board of young people, “Youth Advisors”, that help guide our work and make sure it’s useful.
See who is on our team
Overall Best Project Award
Widening Access to Medical School Week, 2020: An overall brilliant widening participation project that is skilfully conveyed through the poster.2020
Peter Meisner Fund
Funding to support AIMS.Guide’s online initiative and outreach efforts, generously donated to Newcastle University, UK by Peter Meisner.2022
More to come
We regularly submit our work for review to raise awareness of our cause and to help keep our services free.