Recruitment

Ophthalmology switched to national recruitment in 2012. ST1 recruitment is administered annually by Severn (Bristol). Applications usually open and close in November, with interviews undertaken in early February. The Royal College keep an up to date link on this page for recruitment. I highly recommend studying all the documents on the Severn website carefully.

Currently there is no ST3 level recruitment, a decision on whether this will continue again is awaited. 

After the interview, you will undergo online preferencing of training locations. The person who ranks highest at interview will be offered their first preference. The second ranked person will get their first preference if it is still available, and so on, until offers are given for all the posts.

There is then a period in which candidates will accept or reject their offers (a few other options are available), and then any further offers will be made by the software until all posts are filled with an accepted offer.

Not all locations have a post available every year. It is dependent on a training number being available at the right time (if no one exits the training programme that year, then there will not be a training post available in ST1 recruitment).

Tactics:
If you are willing to go to any training location: rank all the locations in order of where you would most like to go first.
If there are some places you would not go to, even if that was your only offer: do not rank locations you would not be willing to accept an offer from.
There is no benefit from ranking places you would prefer to go to below places that you think may be less popular. Don't do it!

3 comments:

  1. Is there a strategy to secure a match? I don't care much about the location but rather getting a post.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. If you don't mind going anywhere, ensure you rank every location, in your order of preference.

      Delete
  2. Hi Dan, There's LAT ST3 position for 6 months only. What are pros and cons of applying for 6 months post?

    ReplyDelete