<p>I have my MIT interview in a couple of hours... can anyone tell me what they ask? What should I read up on?? Thanks!</p>
<p>They will, according to my experience, first ask you a few generic questions such as "what was a difficult situation you were in and how did you react to it." Then, they'll move on to more specific questions about your passion in life, what interests you more than anything else, and what you want to end up doing later in life. They are specifically looking for people driven by an intense passion for something; they want people who will really get into what they're studying, and people who will add diversity and color to their student body.</p>
<p>Some of these questions are direct, and some of the "passion" questions are more cloaked: One of mine was "if you had all the money in the world, what would you do?" </p>
<p>Overall, there are only a few questions asked, but expect to dwell on each one for a long time, have your thoughts together so you can discuss them without being unprepared. No specific knowledge is required of you; you don't need to bring anything other than an open mind. If anything, the interview is a great opportunity for <em>you</em> to find out more about MIT, since you have an alum right in front of you who can answer questions about their MIT experience.</p>
<p>MIT is also really big on people who are self-starters.. my interviewer asked a variety of questions that tested to see if I ever took the initiative and started something.. like a club or anything.</p>
<p>He also brought a notebook and was furiously taking notes on everything I said.</p>
<p>Yeah, mine wrote furiously in a notebook too. I had him write down the url of a movie my friends and I made where we created giant columns of Jello and hit them with a car :)</p>
<p>Hahaha, I bet the adcom will have a lot of fun watching it. ^_-</p>
<p>There's nothing really that we can tell you that you shouldn't already know for a generic college interview. Only thing is, the admissions department seems to allow its ECs tons of room to maneuver. My EC did not ask any of the questions given by the previous posters, but instead posed some rather difficult questions that he seems to have come up with himself. The very first one, after a casual introduction, was "who are you?"</p>
<p>Please don't worry or stress yourself out preparing for the interview. Everyone's interview/EC/time is different; and especially for MIT, there's not even a single question that seems to come up in every interview (I don't even think my EC asked me "Why MIT?") What I would advise you to do is watch some TV, take a nap, have some snacks, talk on the phone... whatEVER relaxes you the most. Take maybe 5 minutes to think about how you would like to present yourself. This is not to say that you should pretend to be something that you aren't, but think of a few aspects of your personality that you would like to emphasize in your interview: fun, quirky, thoughtful, etc; and think of some thigns that may not be clear enough in your application that you would liek to expand upon (that you'd like them to take notes on) - I personally made a point to emphasize my dedication to several organizations.</p>
<p>But in the end, take a few deep breaths, and relax. The interview will rarely EVER make or break you: unless you have accomplished what most thought impossible, or you have the personality of a dead fish, it won't have any effect on your application at all. Think of it as a college's attempt to make the process more personal, and your chance to show yourself as a living breathing human under all those stacks of paperwork.</p>
<p>Best of luck, though you really won't need it :)</p>
<p>Yeah, my EC didn't even ask me the "Why MIT?" question either... I agree that the interview definitely isn't something to sweat over, but I do think that the interview DOES have an effect on your application, not only because of the admission statistics, but because it's simply like another recommendation to highlight you as a person from the view of an alum. If it didn't have any effect, then we might as well abolish interviews altogether and teacher recommendations. But no, it's the specific roles that each part of your application has that contributes to your application as a whole.</p>
<p>Oh and pebbles... I think I recognized your name under the Columbia thread. Are you also doing astronomy/astrophysics like me? I think that's really exciting.. I don't know anybody else who's doing it too. =)</p>
<p>Hamburger, care to share the URL? ;)</p>
<p><a href="http://www.e-bortions.com/jello.html%5B/url%5D">http://www.e-bortions.com/jello.html</a></p>
<p>It's very entertaining, it got a massive following the day that we posted it online...</p>