GEMSAS interviews: which school you sit, and why

You do not pick which GEMSAS school interviews you. You rank up to six courses. The consortium works down that list until a school both wants you and has an interview place. You then sit one interview. Only people who are interviewed are eligible for a course offer.

That is the whole machine. Forum posts about "collecting four MMIs" are describing a different country, or a year before the current rules.

Read GEMSAS Interviews, About us, Policies, Key dates, and the school entries for 2027 entry. Those pages win over this one.

This is not Sydney's metropolitan MD, which is a direct University of Sydney application and currently has no standard interview. It is not Bond's assessment day. It is not an undergraduate UCAT circuit at Monash or UNSW. You can sit GEMSAS and a UCAT interview in the same year. Do not mix their rules.

The one-interview rule

GEMSAS is explicit:

• If you are invited, you interview at one medical school only.
• You receive one interview offer only from a GEMSAS application.
• Academic results are not discussed.
• Interviewers are trained.
• Your interview score is standardised and may be used by lower-preference medical schools if you are not offered a place where you sat.
• A school where you were not interviewed may still contact you about course requirements. That contact is not an interview and does not guarantee an offer.
• You pay any costs of attending.

Exception, in GEMSAS's words: if you apply directly to the University of Melbourne via the Guaranteed Entry Pathway, MD Rural Pathway, or Indigenous MD Student Entry Pathway, you may receive an additional interview offer through those pathways. This page will not freeze whether Melbourne's standard GEMSAS MMI "runs" as a standalone essay, the 2027 GEMSAS entry currently describes an eight-station MMI of about five minutes with a single assessor. Confirm on Melbourne's GEMSAS page and Melbourne's MD selection guidelines for your intake.

You cannot later leapfrog a higher GEMSAS preference you were not interviewed at. Preference order decides which school can invite you, not how much they like you once you are in the room. A few schools publish preference-sensitive rules (Deakin Rural Training Stream must be first preference; Wollongong gives a first-preference bonus and a guaranteed-interview rule for eligible NSW rural applicants who put UOW first). Those are written on the school entries. Rank the school you would actually enrol in first.

Dates for 2027 intake (application year 2026)

From GEMSAS key dates. School entries add the sitting days.

• 1 May 2026: applications open.
• 29 May 2026, 5pm AEST: applications and payment close.
• early September 2026: interview offers released; unsuccessful-for-interview emails go out too.
• September/October 2026: interviews. See each school's entry.
• end of October / early November 2026: place offers.
• COB 23 December 2026: conditions on mid-December offers (degree completion, GPA) due.

If you are not selected for interview at any of your chosen schools, GEMSAS says you will be notified by email. That is the end of the offer path for that cycle.

Which school you sit, published formats only

Do not practise a generic eight-station actor circuit "for GEMSAS." Practise the format on the entry of the school that invited you. Station counts below are what those pages currently publish. If a page is silent, we are silent.

• ANU: interviews online, two parts, Friday 4 to Friday 11 September 2026. GEMSAS does not call this an MMI. Do not invent stations. Offers 50% interview / 50% GPA, GAMSAT composite.
• Deakin: MMI, up to 6 consecutive stations, 5 minutes each, online, September 2026. Qualities may include communication, rural and regional commitment, evidence-based practice, self-directed learning, teamwork, motivation, social justice, professionalism, use of resources, health promotion. A maximum of 220 applicants interviewed.
• Griffith: GUMSAA, scenario-based interviews via SAMMI online, tentatively 21 to 25 September 2026, you choose a slot, with practice recordings. First Peoples pathway: not GUMSAA; a panel including GUMURRII and Indigenous office representatives.
• Macquarie: MMI, "a series of short interview stations." Domestic: face-to-face, Saturday 26 September 2026. International: modified MMI by videoconference in June/August/October rounds. Offers 50% GPA / 50% MMI.
• Melbourne (GEMSAS standard): eight-station MMI, about five minutes, one assessor. Stations could include practical tasks, short films, or explaining your thinking. Non-academic qualities named: cultural sensitivity, maturity, collaboration, reliability, communication. Offers GAMSAT 25 / GPA 25 / interview 50.
• Notre Dame Sydney and Fremantle: MMI on a recorded (asynchronous) online platform. Interview offers September 2026. Offers 50% GAMSAT/GPA/Casper/bonuses and 50% interview. Casper is required.
• UQ: MMI, online, September 2026. Same circuit as provisional applicants, currently eight stations, two-minute silent read, seven-minute response, no acting or role-play in the current briefing pack. Details live on UQ's interviews page. See UQ.
• UWA: online interviews expected 22 September to 3 October. GEMSAS does not name MMI or a station count. We will not either. Offers (standard) GPA 30 / GAMSAT 20 / interview 50.
• Wollongong: online live MMI, eight stations, week commencing 17 September 2026. Blueprinted to communication, empathetic and ethical approach, reflective manner, teamwork, decision-making, rural/regional/remote care, Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander health. Offers 70% interview / 30% admissions bonuses.

Indigenous and rural pathways at several of these schools use different interviews or waive GAMSAT. If that is your application, the pathway page is the exam. Do not use the standard MMI as your only mock.

How to prepare once the email lands

1. Confirm which school and which mode (live Zoom, async recording, campus). Virtual versus in-person is the logistics switch. What to wear is still neat clothes you can think in. 2. Confirm clock and station count from that school's entry and briefing, not from this list if they have moved. 3. Practise why medicine, ethics, and role-play only if that school uses those vehicles. UQ currently does not use actors. Auckland is not GEMSAS. 4. Remember the score may travel. You are not performing for one faculty's private joke. You are still in Australia: AHPRA's Good medical practice, not the GMC. Closing the Gap, Medicare, rural workforce, voluntary assisted dying as statute.

What an MMI is still holds for the schools that use one. MMI versus panel still holds for the school that does not name stations. Scoring is how those published percentages fit together, including GEMSAS z-score sharing.

After GAMSAT, this is not the undergraduate Sep to Dec UCAT timeline, but the operational sequence is the same: confirm format, spoken reps, one full mock in the actual mode, then stop tinkering. Reading time still exists on live MMIs.

MasterMed's first speaking station is free on /interview. No card. The trial never auto-converts. Use it to hear a timed start before early September, then rebuild the mock to the school that actually invited you.

If the live GEMSAS guide disagrees with a sentence here, throw this page out. Formats move. The allocation rule, one school, one interview, standardised score that may travel down the list, is the piece that has been stable enough to build a plan on.