Richard Doll Society branching out

This autumn the Richard Doll Society (RDS) hosted an outreach day workshop for the first time featuring mock interviews. It built on a successful afternoon Oxbridge Medicine Admissions Workshop in conjunction with its annual conference in 2021 and was a response to unanimous feedback requesting a longer workshop.

Through a partnership with the Social Mobility Foundation, the event was advertised to high-achieving students from low-income backgrounds across the UK. 30 students were selected to attend: with some travelling from as far as Carlisle and Cardiff for the event. Upon arrival, students were served brunch before participating in morning workshops addressing personal statement composition, BioMedical Admissions Test (BMAT) preparation and interview guidance.

For many students, their schools are unable to offer mock academic interviews for Medicine. To help provide this invaluable experience, the RDS recruited a brilliant team of GTC medical students who gave each student three mock interviews over the afternoon.

All of the students attending were highly engaged throughout the day and provided the following feedback on the event:

• ‘The whole day was just absolutely amazing. The members were all really supportive and approachable. I wasn’t very confident about my chances of applying and was starting to be a bit put off. Now the process doesn’t seem as intimidating and I feel like I do have enough knowledge and the confidence to give it a go and see what happens!’
• ‘The workshop was all so interesting, informative and fun. I didn’t know what to expect from Oxford but from today it seems a lot more friendly than I thought. Across the day I feel I’ve learnt so much that will help my application and the booklet will hopefully be my guide to the whole process’
• ‘My school has been encouraging me to apply to Oxbridge but I didn’t really see it as a possibility until today. I saw myself in a lot of new academic situations, which was a really unique and special opportunity as I am not used to it all. The interviews were difficult at the start, but all the interviewers were extremely nice and made settling in much better’

This new outreach work has all been made possible by the generosity of donors to the Annual Fund. For several students, their attendance at the workshop was only possible following travel reimbursement. The RDS is therefore incredibly grateful for the funding it received and hopes to continue to grow its outreach work in the future.