Medical School Allocation Error Causes Distress

The medical students of St Andrews were prematurely allocated their partner schools on Thursday, the 29th of January. This allocation, supposed to take place on Friday the 6th of February, brought with it tears and confusion. The students on the English allocation route were asked to rank their preference as either Manchester — which offers many different hospitals — or Barts, a medical school based in London. The allocation decision was made by the University based on the pupils' scores from the first semester of the 2025/26 academic year, putting a lot of localised pressure on the students. The partner medical schools can only take on a certain number of students, with Barts only offering 10 places for St Andrews students.

I interviewed an anonymous second-year medical student about their experience of these surprise allocations:

“I thought at that time that I would be okay, even if I didn’t get [allocated to] Barts. In a word, it was unideal — obviously no one expects a surprise — but it was made worse because I felt that I had done well enough [in the last semester] to achieve what I wanted.” 

Source: University of St Andrews

This appeared to be an issue beyond exam marks, however. After these allocation results came out, students were realising that many weren’t getting their first choice.

“Lots of people were saying that they didn’t put Barts first but were being sent there, which made no sense to me.” 

Later, it was realised by the University that a mistake had been made, and several allocation results swapped and sent to the wrong students. The University is yet to release a statement on the cause of this terrible mix-up. Upon hearing this news, the student I interviewed ”felt immense relief; [They were] overjoyed but still slightly worried that it wasn’t true and perhaps another mistake had been made.” 

I also spoke to the University regarding this recent error. A University of St Andrews spokesperson said:

“The mistake was spotted very quickly, and follow-up communications [were] sent soon after. An apology for any misunderstanding was also offered. This was a simple human error, but one which was corrected very rapidly.”

It has now been several days now since the incorrect results were posted and, reflecting upon this event, our second- year medical student remarks:

“It was quite surreal at the time. I understand that mistakes get made; nothing is perfect, and the response to the issue was fast and apologetic. Of course, the University cannot be blamed for my human reaction, but it certainly wasn’t enjoyable to experience a false failure before I got the true success.”

Although the experience was devastating at the time, it was resolved in a timely manner. However, as it has been reported in recent news that a student in Glasgow University tragically took their own life after receiving an incorrect grade for a course, it is important to emphasise the great responsibility expected of educational institutions to handle grades and allocations with the utmost accuracy and sensitivity. Mistakes like these can severely affect the mental wellbeing of their students.