A ready-made hand-out for your medicine, dentistry and veterinary applicants: the free, virtual work experience and online courses they can do from school, plus a printable reflection log. No placements, connections or budget required, and everything links to our existing free directories.
Written by Dr Akash Gandhi, NHS GP and founder of TheUKCATPeople. Updated 28 September 2026.
What is inside
For your school
One-day UCAT and interview courses for a whole cohort, in person at your school or live online, and priced per cohort.
One intensive day covering every UCAT section, taught live by a doctor, with the strategy and timing each subtest needs.
Suits the summer term of Year 12, before students sit the test.
A live MMI circuit with real station rotation, panel practice, ethics and NHS hot topics, run by doctors and dentists, with feedback on the day and a debrief for you afterwards.
Suits the autumn of Year 13, before interview season.
In-person placements are hard to get, but a strong profile does not depend on them alone. A few points you might share with your cohort before they start.
No placements or connections needed
Three kinds of experience, each with a free route
Then, for any of them
Reflection matters more than prestige
Material to draw on for the personal statement and at interview
A modest placement, well reflected on, beats an impressive one written up as a list of tasks.
Free to use on school websites, in newsletters and in presentations, with a credit link to the page it comes from. The image carries our name and this page's address, so it stays credited wherever it goes.
<a href="https://www.theukcatpeople.co.uk/teachers/work-experience"><img src="https://www.theukcatpeople.co.uk/teachers/work-experience/what-counts-as-work-experience.png" alt="Diagram by TheUKCATPeople: what counts as work experience for medicine, dentistry and veterinary applicants, with no placements or connections needed. Three kinds of experience each have a free route: virtual work experience (Observe GP and the Brighton and Sussex Medical School Virtual Work Experience, from a classroom or at home); caring and volunteering (The Work Experience Finder: care homes and hospices near any UK postcode, with a ready-made request email); and super-curricular learning (Free MOOC directories for medicine, dentistry and veterinary, plus our wider-reading hubs). Reflection matters more than prestige: whichever route a student takes, a reflection log of what they did or saw, what they learned and how it links to medicine, dentistry or veterinary gives them material to draw on for the personal statement and at interview." width="1600" height="1000" style="max-width:100%;height:auto" loading="lazy"></a> <p>Source: <a href="https://www.theukcatpeople.co.uk/teachers/work-experience">Free work experience your students can do from school</a>, TheUKCATPeople</p>
Structured online programmes made for aspiring medics, such as Observe GP from the Royal College of GPs and the Brighton and Sussex Medical School Virtual Work Experience, are widely accepted when in-person placements are hard to find. They are free and can be done from a classroom or at home.
A longer, regular commitment in a care home, hospice or community setting often teaches more about patient-facing work than a short shadowing day. It is also easier for students to arrange themselves.
Free online courses (MOOCs), wider reading and following current healthcare topics all show sustained interest. They give students something to reflect on, whatever placements they manage to get.
Selectors care more about what a student understood and how it changed their thinking than about where they went. A modest placement, well reflected on, beats an impressive one written up as a list of tasks.
Source for the access points above: our own free Work Experience Finder, which sets out the same guidance for students in detail.
The well-regarded virtual programmes, and a free tool to find real placements. Some schools share these with the whole cohort so nobody is left with nothing to write about.
Students search any UK postcode for GP surgeries, hospitals, dental practices, care homes and hospices to approach, with contact details and a ready-made request email. The page also points them to the free virtual programmes for when in-person shadowing is not possible.
Filterable directories of free-to-access online courses, ready to set as super-curricular reading. Every course is free: students never need to pay for a certificate.
A filterable directory of free online courses for medicine applicants, from Harvard, Yale, the NHS and top UK universities. Filter by topic and length, with tips on how to reflect on a course instead of just listing it.
The same idea for dentistry applicants: free, wider-reading online courses to build super-curricular depth around oral health, science and the profession.
Free online courses for aspiring vets, covering animal health, biology and the realities of veterinary practice, ready to use as super-curricular reading.
Our free guide hubs give students something current to read, think and write about between activities, if you would like to share them.
Free, regularly updated guides your students can read and reflect on.
Free, regularly updated guides your students can read and reflect on.
Free, regularly updated guides your students can read and reflect on.
Free, regularly updated guides your students can read and reflect on.
A simple outline to adapt for your own enrichment or super-curricular programme. It runs over two years, with no single big placement to organise.
Year 12, autumn
Start early and build the habit
Year 12, spring and summer
Add real caring experience
Year 13, autumn
Turn experience into an application
One page a student fills in after each activity. Print it or copy it into a shared document; by Year 13 it is a ready list of things to write and talk about.
Work experience reflection log
Name:
| Date | Activity (and where) | What I did / saw | What I learned | How it links to medicine, dentistry or veterinary |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Date for entry 1 | Activity (and where) for entry 1 | What I did / saw for entry 1 | What I learned for entry 1 | How it links to medicine, dentistry or veterinary for entry 1 |
| Date for entry 2 | Activity (and where) for entry 2 | What I did / saw for entry 2 | What I learned for entry 2 | How it links to medicine, dentistry or veterinary for entry 2 |
| Date for entry 3 | Activity (and where) for entry 3 | What I did / saw for entry 3 | What I learned for entry 3 | How it links to medicine, dentistry or veterinary for entry 3 |
| Date for entry 4 | Activity (and where) for entry 4 | What I did / saw for entry 4 | What I learned for entry 4 | How it links to medicine, dentistry or veterinary for entry 4 |
| Date for entry 5 | Activity (and where) for entry 5 | What I did / saw for entry 5 | What I learned for entry 5 | How it links to medicine, dentistry or veterinary for entry 5 |
| Date for entry 6 | Activity (and where) for entry 6 | What I did / saw for entry 6 | What I learned for entry 6 | How it links to medicine, dentistry or veterinary for entry 6 |
Tip for students: write your entry within a day or two of the activity, while it is fresh. Focus on what you learned and how it changed your thinking, not just what you did.
Yes. Structured virtual programmes made for aspiring medics, such as Observe GP from the Royal College of GPs and the Brighton and Sussex Medical School Virtual Work Experience, are well regarded and free. Medical schools know in-person placements are hard to get, and they look at what a student learned and how they reflected on it, whatever the format.
Where a student can arrange some real caring experience too, virtual work sits well alongside it. Either way, one reflection-log entry per activity.
Our free Work Experience Finder lets a student search any UK postcode for GP surgeries, hospitals, dental practices, care homes and hospices near them, with contact details and a ready-made request email. No connections or paid placement are needed.
Suggest students contact several places, follow up politely after a couple of weeks, and start care-home volunteering or a virtual programme while they wait.
One approach is to set one free virtual programme and one free MOOC as a shared starting point, with a reflection-log entry from each student afterwards. The group then has something in common to discuss, and you have something to look at before personal statements.
The MOOC directories are filterable by topic and length, so you can pick a course that fits a single lesson or a half-term project.
A simple reflection log works well, and there is a printable one on this page. For each activity a student notes the date, what they did or saw, what they learned, and how it links to medicine, dentistry or veterinary study. Kept up, it gives them material to draw on for the personal statement and at interview.
A few lines written the day after an activity are usually more useful than a long description written months later.
No. Everything linked from this page is free for your students to use, with no account, card or school licence required, so you can hand it to a whole cohort at once.
Share this page with your medicine, dentistry and veterinary applicants, or bookmark it for your enrichment programme. Our team of NHS doctors, dentists and vets has supported 2,700+ students through their applications.
Reviewed by Dr Akash Gandhi · Last updated 28 September 2026
Ultimate Package students from our 2025/26 cycle, with their UCAT scores and offers, who trained with us for the UCAT, personal statements and interviews.
“Harry got my UCAT up to 2,590, working through the sections I kept dropping marks on week by week. Gemma then ran my interview practice so the MMI stations didn't catch me out, and Dr Akash mentored me the whole way through. I'm off to King's for Medicine.”
“The interview prep was the part that actually moved the needle. Proper mock MMIs, not just lists of questions, and feedback that was honest about what I was getting wrong. I ended up with four offers and firmed UCL.”
“The Ultimate Package kept me organised from UCAT through to interviews. They knew what dental schools actually ask and tightened up my personal statement. Four offers in the end, and I'm going to Birmingham.”
“Vet applications come down to the written SAQs as much as the interview. Dr Rebecca went through my SAQs line by line, sharpened my answers and prepped me for the panels. I came away with four offers and chose the RVC.”
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