Hi, I’ve got my first alumni interview on Friday (and another on Sunday) and I wondered what sort of preparation people did, if any. I know that they stress that you don’t need to prepare anything and that in the grand scheme of thing your interview counts very little towards the admissions decision, but I was thinking along the lines of researching the school, rereading application, listing questions to ask etc or should I try to be spontaneous?
I’m from the UK and the only other uni interview I’ve done was my Oxford one which I suspect was wildly different, and I prepared for weeks for that (only to make a complete mess of the actual thing)
What you’ve listed is good. Prepare in your mind your best reasons for attending the school. I’m still shocked at some students whom I meet they clearly convey to me that they’re indifferent to attending my college. That tells me everyone is wasting their time… and I note so clearly in my report.
The one question I would suggest being prepared for is “Why do you want to go to this college in particular?” Going to their website, thinking about it, and writing down two or three phrases to remember to bring up would be sufficient.
And thinking of two or three brief questions to ask the interviewer about the experience of going to the school would be good. In my experience, the best interviews (for colleges or jobs) are ones where you get the interviewer talking about their college/organization, and then manage to bring it back to “Yes, that really relates to what I’ve done/want to do because . . .”
Google “your schools website & interviews”. However, as I understand it, in the UK - interviews REALLY count - for the most part in the US they do not - only a few highly selective schools and some LACs. For the most part I believe you can simply go over the unis websites, jot some notes/questions and go with the flow. And remember! - your English Accent is going to automatically confer HUGE amounts of bonus points and prestige points.
BTW - In the US we have a “Common Data Set” for most unis, and they will list whether or not an interview is required, considered or not important/not required. For example, at Northwestern, what is considered for admissions is listed on page 7. http://enrollment.northwestern.edu/pdf/common-data/2014-15.pdf
You will note that interviews are “considered” - but I have had 2 kids admitted to NU and neither interviewed and both were admitted. Good Luck!
My D did nine interviews. Some went better than others, but she surprised herself overall. She is shy and quiet and was very worried before her first one. She developed a kind of “routine” for lack of a better word. She always made sure she had a couple of questions that weren’t easily found on the website, and that pertained to something she was particularly interested in. She asked the interviewer about him or herself, often something like “why did YOU choose this college? What has changed since you were there?” She tried to find natural opportunties to bring up these questions, rather than just pull out a list of questions at the end.
She thought being entushiatic about classes she might want to take at college would be a good way of talking about classes she was currently doing well in. For example, she was surprised at how much her appreciation of French grew throughout high school. She would do some research to find out what opportunties, classes, etc…were available at the college to be involved with French. Or psychology, or whatever she saw that reflected her interests.
She also thought it was important to be normal. She had to read a book over the summer that she really didn’t like, and there was usually an opportunity to bring up the book. She discovered many people seemed to feel the same about the book, and it lead to more discussion. She didn’t want to sound “perfect” and she felt that this book was a good foil for that.
She was accepted to a bunch of colleges, though not the tippy top ones she applied to. In her opinion, her best interviews were always the ones that were just conversations. A lot of it has to do with how skillful the interviewer is at putting people at ease.
It’s helpful if you can talk about specific programs at the school which might fit with your background and interests.
My son had one bad interview. He was tired (it was the morning after first term finals) and completely missed the opportunity to mention his senior project…which was something that was especially relevant to the college’s mission and (importantly) it was something that would have been of interest to the interviewer.
@greenstudent I hope your interviews went well! I’m an American who’s interested in applying to Oxford and I was wondering how you would suggest preparing for them. If you don’t mind, could you let me know what major you applied for and what it was like? I’m interested in the chemistry program
Hi, my interview went ok I think! The women was lovely, and although looking back I keep finding mistakes at the time I thought it was going well! I’ll send you a message about Oxford
