This will probably be the last time that I post before my interview on Monday. After reading the summaries of the interviews at this school on studentdoctor.net I'm feeling much more relaxed. Everyone goes on and on about how they try so hard to make you feel comfortable, and that they don't have any tricky questions. Granted, these summaries are all from previous years, but from what I see the questions seem to stay the same year to year. The questions they ask seem to be centered around leadership and communication skills.
One thing I'm not looking forward to: it's 90˚F and hummmmmid at the school. Here at my current school it's just finally started to become crisp and cool. Fall is probably my favorite season. Where the medschool is I don't think it ever goes below 75˚F. Whatever, for 2 years I can totally deal. (The last two years I think can be spent rotating mostly where ever you please)
Well that's all I really have to say. Keep your fingers crossed!!! (Where the hell did that tradition come from?)
3 comments:
I will certainly keep my fingers crossed for you! Go and knock them off of their feet.
My biggest piece of advice is that they want you to succeed in the interview. That is, they want you to make it easy for them to give you high scores. Keep that in mind, just be yourself and I'm sure that you will do very well indeed. :)
Oh, and there is nothing wrong with pausing after a question is asked. Don't feel that you need to rush into an answer. Feel free to say something like "wow, that's a really great question" and then pausing briefly as you gather your thoughts. There is nothing worse then a med school applicant who rushes their answer and then trips all over their own words.
Good luck; I'm cheering you on from the sidelines.
such good advice! thank you so much!!!
Yeah, there are very few stress interviews these days from what I can gather. Every single interview that I had went very well - the interviewers clearly want you to feel comfortable, and want to get inside your head for 45 minutes or so, and see how it is that you think.
As Dr. K pointed out, pausing and thinking is a very good thing to do for any "thought" questions - it shows depth, and that you don't just like to jump to conclusions, or tried to hash out politician-esque answers prior to the interview.
The one thing that I would add to what Dr. K said, is that you should probably think of one or 2 really good questions for your interviewer - every interview I had concluded with a "ask me questions" sessions, and I did notice that they would jot notes down while this was going on. It makes sense; you can learn a lot about someone from the questions they are asked.
Questions that I saw while interviewing:
*Why do you want to go into medicine, and please, don't just repeat your personal statement - I just read it before coming into this room. (Always got this one)
*Tell me about some of your clinical experiences, and how they lead you down this path?
*Tell me about your research?
*Tell me about yourself. I don't want to hear why you want to go into medicine or anything personal statement related - I want to know who you are and what you stand for.
*Do you think that you could make the transition from your hometown to our school? The weather and culture is radically different. What makes you think that you would be happy in this environment?
*My job as your interviewer is to be your advocate for the admissions committee. If you want me to make sure the admissions committee knows one or two things about you, what would you want me to tell them?
I'm sure there were others, but these are the ones that I remember that stuck out as either commonly asked, or more interesting.
Good luck out there tomorrow, hopefully you'll be able to see this before you interview!
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