The Medical School Interview

Introduction to the Medical School Interview

In golf, few tournaments have quite the excitement or importance of the Masters.
The green jacket given to the winner is a status symbol given to the best golfers ever
to play the game. 2011 saw one of the most amazing Masters tournaments in its long
history. Going into the last 9 holes of the whole tournament, the leader, Roy McIlroy,
had been leading for the entire tournament. But those last 9 holes would bring more
excitement, drama, and intensity than any tournament in the past. Roy McIlroy, after
leading for 3 days, fell and fell fast. He finished in 15th place. Many players fought for
the top spot. Eight players shared part of the lead, including one time where 5 players
were all tied for the lead. In the end one player surged. Carl Schwartzel finished his
round with 4 straight birdies, with the best final round in 22 years. No one could match
his skill on that last day, and it won him the tournament.
So why am I telling you about golf? The medical school interview is similar to
your last round of the masters. Up to the interview you have done well enough to be in

the hunt, now it is time to finish. Only three things can come out of the interview. You
can crash and burn, you can do ok and not move too much up or down leaving you
unable to really be secure that you will get accepted, or you can surge, and acceptance
is an absolute certainty. Which of those sounds best to you?
The right preparation and application of principles of an interview can guarantee
your ability for your application to surge. Those things can make you the Schwartzel of
your interview, making sure you get accepted. Take this part of your application very
seriously, it is that important.
Another advantage to learning these principles is that you master another
important aspect of the interview, confidence. As you learn and prepare your way to the
interview we will make sure you have the necessary preparation to be able to put away
all your nerves and have the confidence that you are giving yourself the best chance
possible at getting into medical school. So relax, go through this workbook, practice the
questions you can practice, understand the principles behind the answers, and rest
assured you will have everything you need to prepare yourself for the best interview
possible.
What It Means To Get the Interview
There are many misconceptions about what it might mean to the get the
interview. Sometimes people think the interview means more than it does, and
sometimes they think it means less than it does. So lets get it as straight as we can.
First and foremost, schools would not invite your for an interview if they didnt
need to. It is extremely rare for schools to have made a decision about your
acceptance or denial before the interview process. When I say rare, I mean usually less
than 1%. For 99%+ of people, how you present yourself in the interview will either get
you in or leave you out.
So I get its importantbut why? Well there are several reasons you have
gotten to this point. You have passed the baseline numbers hurtle, you have passed
the important who you are hurtle of the personal statement and other essays, and you
have preliminarily proven yourself to be a student that the school is interested in. In
other words, schools now know who you are on paper, and now they want to see who
you are in person. The interview is NOT about asking you about weaknesses, although
that does play a part. It is NOT about your numbers anymore or your activities or your
research. It IS all about the who you can show them above and beyond what they
already know.

Main Goal of the Interview

Put yourself in the shoes of a medical school for a minute. You have a list of
people who have good numbers, good personal statements, acceptable in and out of
class accomplishments, and now you are trying to decide which to admit, which to wait
list, and which to deny. Every interview you do is going to cost you time and money, so
everyone you bring in will have a chance at acceptance. Perhaps some will have a
better chance than others, and perhaps not (many schools do have a basic rank order
list when you start the interview, others look at each student with a new slate starting
from the interview), but everyone you invite for an interview will have a good chance to
be accepted. Now, with this list you have to make some important decisions about
which ones will be accepted and which ones will not be.
How would you do that? What is the main goal you have as a head of an
admissions committee? What are you trying to decide with this stack of applicants on
your desk? Think about these questions for a bit. Think about how you would try and
whittle the list down. Think about what you would try and do to accomplish this. What
would you look at in each applicant, how would you answer these questions.
Lets separate the answer to this question into two categories, the WHAT and the
HOW. When you speak of WHAT schools look for in their students it is all the same.
Schools want students who will succeed. They want students who will succeed in class,
on board exams, in rotations, and as doctors. They want students who can show the
school they can achieve that success.
The HOW is how schools decide who is most likely to be successful, and this
differs from schools to school. Most schools have an idea for the characteristics,
passions, ideas, and work ethic they can demand from their students and look for
students who fit that idea.
So what is your goal? If the schools goal is to get students with the best chance
of success, which it always is, then your goal is obviously to make the schools
understand that their best bet is the bet on you. That is itreally that is the only thing
you need to accomplish. If, when you come out of the interview you have convinced the
people with whom you interact that you are a safe bet, then you get in. If you fail to do
that you dont get in. So why is the interview so hard then?
It is hard because students dont understand the HOW. Everyone gets the
WHAT, and if you are applying to medical school you must think that you would be
successful in it. However if you ignore the details and individuality of HOW schools

come to their conclusion, you will only succeed based on luck, meaning if you are lucky
enough in your interview to say the right things.
So What Does This All Mean For You?
It means you have to learn HOW schools make their decisions, and show them
that you have those attributes. Im not talking about manipulating them or lying to them,
what Im talking about is telling your story in a way that shows strength in the same
areas that the school wants to see strength.
You need to accomplish 3 things.
1. Find out what characteristics the school looks for to define a successful student
2. Decide which experiences in your application fit the mold of what the school is
looking for and devise a strategy for accentuating those things
3. Answer the questions of the interview in a way that follows through with that
strategy, successfully showing the school you would be a successful student by
their own definition of success.
Here at Medical School Confidant, we will show you all of the things you need to
accomplish in order to realize these goals. Well help you do your research, devise your
strategy, and practice the strategy that will give you the best chance of admission. Lets
get started.

Prepare For Interview Day

Personal Preparation
The first step in preparing for the interview is getting ready mentally for the
process. Really being honest about your own strengths and weaknesses, as well as
knowing exactly what is on your application, helps you to research schools in such a
way that makes you think about your own application while doing it. You will know what
you have to offer the school right away. This will give you a huge advantage going into
the strategy planning phase of the interview.
So first, open up all of your application materials. Get everything out or opened
that you used to put together the application in the exact way that it needed to be. This
should include primary application, personal statement, letters of recommendation notes

(you probably wont have access to the actual letters but if you have an idea of what
was written you should make some notes of each letter on a piece of paper and include
it in your pile), secondary application copies including any additional essays you were
asked to write, etc. You need to include everything that you have ever turned in to the
school at which you are interviewing.
After you have done this it is time to review your application. Go through and
answer the following questions in a computer program or on paper.
1) Where are you numbers in relation to the averages of that school (below average, average,
or above average)?
2) What experiences have you written about in your essays?
3) What did you state that you learned from those experiences? How did you state that those
things made you a better person?
4) If you could go back and write those again, would you write about other experiences?
Would you talk about other things that have made you a better person?
5) What are the top two reasons, according to you, that a school should (or did) ask you for an
interview?
6) What other parts of your application are possible reasons that you should be asked to
interview?
7) What reasons would schools have to invite you for an interview but not accept you?
8) What do you wish was better about your application?
9) What do you have to offer that few others have?
10) What experiences have you had that have made you a unique applicant?
How to Interpret the Questions Above
Lets talk now about those questions, how you should think about them, and eventually
how you can apply them to school research. If you do a realistic overview of your application,
and apply that well to your research of schools, you give yourself a good chance to present to
the school in a way that can only help to convince them that you are worth an acceptance letter.
So that is what we want to do over the next few pages. As we go over these questions, add
anything or take away anything you want from the paper, remember your goal is to have a very
clear idea of the strong and weak points of your application and have the experiences you had
at the forefront of your mind.
Where are you numbers in relation to the averages of that school (below average,
average, or above average)?
Finding average numbers for the schools you have applied to is very basic research.
You probably did it before you even started your application process. So when a school asked
you for an interview, you know very well from a numbers standpoint where you stand. While
numbers have a much less impact once you are doing the interview, they still serve to give
many schools an arbitrary ranking on the interviews. So if you are below average, then you
should enter the interview with the thought that you really need to make a good impression.

Likewise, if you are above average you should know that you probably have to do less to the
make the desired impression. However, many people who interview at schools where their
numbers are above average consider that school a safety school and sometimes make the
mistake of going into an interview just a little bit arrogant. This can very easily serve to kill your
chances to get accepted to the one school at which you have the best chance. Make sure that
no matter where you are applying, you show as much interest as with any other school, and that
your strategy and research is just as well thought out.
To summarize, numbers give a good indication of where you stand, but are not by any
means a deal breaker for anyone who is invited for an interview. And no matter where you are
interviewed you have a chance to get accepted or denied and the difference is because of you,
your research, and your strategy.
What experiences have you written about in your essays?
Essays are a chance for applicants to show who they have become. While schools
some time ago wanted all their students to be robots for numbers and only living for the work,
today schools are looking for developed people who are passionate about what they do in
undergrad and have fields of medicine that they are already interested in. So when a school
reads essays in either the form of personal statements or secondary essays, they are looking
for opportunities to see that growth and passion. When they can see that, they are much more
likely to invite you for an interview. If they see only arbitrary experiences and random activities,
then they are less likely.
In essence what that means is that you did a good job of showing those experiences
which is why you have the interview. You need to really look hard now for every possible
reason that the school interviews you, starting with the essays. Go through now all of them
again; really read them closely, what are the things that you have written that show your
passion? What have you written that shows why you want to go to medical school? What have
you written that would convince the reader that you SHOULD go to medical school?
Once you have answered those questions, make sure to write them down, we will use
them in both the research section and the interview section of this workbook.
What did you state that you learned from those experiences? How did you state that
those things made you a better person?
This is just a continuation of the question above. If medical schools want to hear your
story, if they want to know who you are and what you are passionate about, it is very difficult to
give them that without talking about your growth as a person and as a student.
That being said, some people who read personal statements and other essays dont
make the connections that you are hoping they make, and need a small push in the right
direction during interview time. Knowing what you where hoping to accomplish and persuade
your reader to will help you when you set up your strategy in that they will help you stay focused
on what your application tried to portray in the first place.

If you could go back and write those again, would you write about other experiences?
Would you talk about other things that have made you a better person?
The interview is the last chance youll get to make any course corrections in the
application. If you wrote about arbitrary things in the application, or if you wish that you had
wrote about something else, the interview is the last chance you have to make other
experiences known.
There is another advantage to this exercise, which is that during the interview oftentimes
the interview wants to know MORE about you. That means they dont want to hear anything
about what you have already put in the application and instead are much more interested in
what else you can bring to the table. Get a feel for this early in the interview; if they are asking
for more details about your experiences, they probably just want to know more about those
things. If they are sort of pushing you in a direction that is separate from your current essays,
then you will want to be prepared with more experiences. I have seen it both ways and many
schools, it is very difficult to know beforehand what your interview will be like so be prepared.
What are the top two reasons, according to you, that a school should (or did) ask you for
an interview?
One of the most important parts of the interview is the ability to know what you are good
at, and not so good at. 9/10 students are asked at interviews What do you view are your
greatest strengths, this should be answered in a way that creates confidence in your ability as a
young doctor-in-training, but without sounding arrogant. This can sometimes be a tricking
balancing act because it is such an objective thing.
During a job interview, many studies have been done to see the amount of time it takes
for the interviewer to make a decision. Most studies cite times that are less than 30 seconds.
Which means, if that continues to hold true for medical school admissions interviews (which my
data seems to suggest it does) they will have made a decision on you after the first 1-2
questions; and barring anything crazy happening, you wont be able to recover if it goes bad.
That is why first impressions and first answers are so important. This question about
strengths is oftentimes the second or third one asked (right behind tell us about yourself), and
therefore very important. You should have in your head now why a school should accept you,
and we will whittle that down to an answer later in the workbook.
What other parts of your application are possible reasons that you should be asked to
interview?
This question is a little less important, but just so we dont miss anything you should
make an exhaustive list of all the reasons any school would want you and under what
circumstances. This should be according to your individual understanding. Later we will show
you how to apply it to each school through research.

What reasons would schools have to invite your for an interview but not accept you?
As with strengths, one of the other very common early questions is: What do you view
as your weaknesses. One absolute MUST NOT DO answer for this is something that is a
strength more often than a weakness. For example dont say, Im 100% committed to what I
want to accomplish and that sometimes gets me in trouble socially. It is clich and really no
interview wants to hear any more about that.
What they do want to hear though is things that you deem and shortcomings in your
application and what you are actively doing into order to stop those things from interfering with
your success. An alcoholic might answer that question by saying that he is an alcoholic but that
he is 5 years sober and this is how he did it. That would be interesting for the interviewer.
Another approach is for someone who got bad grades say that they were lazy for a year
and then worked hard but still have to shake off the lazy bug in order to make sure they are still
getting the As they are capable of, and detailing how they do that.
This question merely gives you a chance to be honest with yourself about your
shortcomings, we will guide you through how to make those sound impressive in an interview
later.
What do you wish was better about your application?
Same as the above questions, make sure your list is pretty exhaustive.
What do you have to offer that few others have?
These next two questions are perhaps the most important ones. Like I state several
times throughout this book, if you can show your unique talents, passions, or expertise, you
chances of acceptance go up exponentially.
So this one you need to think about, really think about it. If you can find several things
that really make you a unique applicant and put them together correctly in the interview, you will
almost always get in.
Those of you who only enlisted our help late in the application process, you especially
need to spend time on this. This is the backbone of whatever parts of the application you have
left.
Think about characteristics you have developed, experiences you have had, research
opportunities that no one else has had, interactions, personal mentors, extracurricular activities,
etc. Write down all you can, and we will show you how to integrate them into your interview
shortly.
What experiences have you had that have made you a unique applicant?
Same as aboveif you miss the whole book except one principle, make this principle be
the one you catch.

Researching Your Schools

One of the biggest mistakes that students make in the interview process is not
doing the RIGHT research on the schools at which they are interviewing. You probably
have in your mind that you will do research about curriculum, lifestyle, grading, maybe
USMLE average numbers, clubs, research opportunities, and other important after
acceptance things. While this is just fine and exactly what you need to make the
decision about which school is right for youthis will do little to help you get accepted.
So what does help you get accepted?
Knowing what the school wants. This is getting more difficult to know. While
years ago schools looked for numbers almost exclusively, now numbers are, for some
schools, not even in the top 2-3 things they consider. But that is why you enlisted my
help isnt it. Schools have shown a propensity to really put an emphasis on 3 things,
depending on the school. Some schools look for 1 of the 3 with much higher level of
importance, while others look at all three with a certain degree of balance. Those three
are:
1. Numbers lets get the most obvious out of the way first. Some schools really
are number-based schools, while others use numbers to weed out and rank,
while using the next two things to really make the decision. Some schools only
care about numbers to the extent that you meet the minimums and then turn their
attention to the next two things.
2. Behavioral Competencies these are an emerging topic among medical school
admissions. Many schools are starting to judge students based on their level of
competency in certain areas. These areas tend to be close to the following:
Interpersonal skills, Writing skills, Speaking skills, Project
Management/Leadership, Motor Control, and others. Some schools will look for
the chance to judge you based on those things, and therefore you should answer
their questions with these competencies in mind. As you do your research you
will get a good idea if the school uses some level of competency rubric and how
you can prove that you have the skills they need.
3. Development of Character While many schools dont use a competency model
in a formal setting as described above, almost every school now wants doctors
who are well-balanced, caring, physicians. They way that schools do this is by
measuring your level of passion and commitment to the field as well as trying to
find out what experiences have lead to the development of characteristics related

to that. Characteristics like integrity, compassion, well-being, and others that

they deem necessary to be a strong physician.
How to Prove You Are the Ideal Student
Your job at this point is to find out how the schools judge their applicants, match
those judgments with your own strengths, and finally show those strengths in your
application and interview. So, lets get started on the research.
Before we get started on this, I want to give a little warning. Most of the
strategies that Im going to include in this guide involve talking to people at the school.
Many people believe that contact with the school will be detrimental to your application.
I have not found that to be true, except in one situation. When you contact a school in
an overzealous way, you bother the people there. You come off over-aggressive,
arrogant, and just plain annoying; this WILL kill your chances of admission. So while
you contact the schools, be very sensitive to how they seem to be feeling. Some
admissions directors will let you talk to them a lot and others get annoyed more quickly,
so just be sensitive to how they are feeling, and get off the phone or stop email if they
give you the smallest hint of being annoyed.
Getting the research done is a bit of a step-by-step process, if you miss or slack
on any of these steps you will either annoy your contacts or, more likely, not get the
desired research results. So follow them closely and finish each step before moving on
to the next one.
Step 1: Preliminary Research
This is the easiest part of the process, and 80%+ of applicants fail to go past this
step. This is where you want to begin reading about the school. You should read every
single page on their website. You should organize the information as you read it into
parts.

Part 1: Stuff I need to know for the interview research This is information that
gives you clues to what the school is looking for in their applicants, well talk
more about it below.
Part 2: Stuff I need to know for the actual interview This will be things ABOUT
the medical school, and are things that should be asked in the interview, like
curriculum, academic situation, research opportunities, etc. Those questions are
much better when asked at the interview then before so hold them for the
interview
Part 3: Misc Information This is information that you may need if you decide to
go to school there. Things like financial aid, housing, etc. You do need to know

these things of course, but asking about them in interview wont help, and they
dont really give you clues for research either.
So the information you are really looking for is information that gives you clues to
what the school really looks for in their applicants. Look at their entire website, usually
a page is dedicated to an introduction or welcome from the dean. This page almost
always has good information about what the Dean determines to be importantwhich
obviously something you should take seriously as well. Look for the schools mission
statement. Look for any mission statement from any individual department, if that is
available. Look for other websites, if there are any.
Are you getting the idea? You want to search for printed clues around the
website that give you hints that can help you. The AAMC (American Association of
Medical Colleges) just published an article asking schools to put more information about
these behavioral competencies on their website, so this may already be easier than it
once was.
Part 2: Use Your Network
This is the part when you want to contact anyone and everyone that you know
from the school. Current or past students, people you know who sit on the board of
admissions, if one of your undergrad classmates went to school where you are
interviewing; it is a definite good idea to call them and ask for advice and information.
Anyone you can think of that has recent ties to the school is a huge benefit.
When you contact these people you want to ask them ALL of the questions you
want to know about the school, but make sure not to miss the questions about what the
school is looking for. Oftentimes they wont really know, unless they are really involved
in the admission process. Dont worry; you can almost always get some good
information from them.
Lets go over how to use a few of these contacts in order of most to least helpful:

Admissions Committee Member If you are lucky enough to know personally

the person that sits at the head of the admissions committee you will be in really
good shape for research in the interview. Ask them mostly about information that
is pertinent to the interview. Ask about the schedule of interview day, which
interviewers you will have, what they are like, ask them about the competencies
that really get talked about and looked at when deciding on applicants. This will
give you the chance during the interview to ask about the school, and it will give
you a chance to have someone else impressed by your interest on interview day.
Which, if you can do, you will almost always get in.

Faculty if you are lucky enough to know someone from the faculty at the
school to which you are interviewing you are in really good shape. Depending on
your relationship with that person you will be able to ask them quite a bit about
the school, about your interviewers, and oftentimes you can get them to fight for
you in the committee meeting, which is a huge benefit. Make sure to foster your
relationship with them and dont get on their bad side. They are less likely to
know, unless they sit on the admissions committee or do interviews what the
school is looking for by way of competencies or characteristics, and less likely to
know the exact schedule of the interview.
Admissions Committee Student Most schools hire a student to serve on the
admission committee. They give the tour during the interview, explaining most of
what you need to know about how the school operates and what life is like on
campus. While they are a very good source of information, and a helpful person
to have in your corner, they are less likely to be able to help then those above.
Ask them about the interview day schedule, about your interviewers, and about
the competencies that get discussed in admissions interviews. They will likely
not know all your answers, but being on the committee gives them a unique view
that can really help you in your research.
Everyone Else Most everyone else will likely only be minimally helpful. Alumni
who have been out for 3-5 years are likely behind, while current students are
likely too busy to notice much about anything that helps you get ready for the
interview. They will, however, have an idea for the things that the school has in
their curriculum that they are particularly proud of. This gives you a chance to
ask about that during interview and show excitement for it. Use this resource,
they may surprise you by how much they know, but for the most part will know
less than you want them to.

Step 3: Your First Contact

By now you should have a very basic idea of what you need to accomplish in the
interview in order to be accepted. This may or may not change significantly over the
next several contacts, but you should make sure you have everything that is available
online read and understood before your very first contact. The most annoying thing you
can do to admissions directors ask them questions with answers that you can get from
the website.
Your first contact should usually be by email, and should include that you are
interested in the school and want more information about what to expect for interviews.
You should also ask for the contact information of a student so that you can email them
about the school. The answer to this email will be your gauge on what you should do
after that email.

If the email is cold, it is likely that they dont want much contact. If it is warm, you
may continue to contact them, and if they invite you to call, or visit the school, take
advantage of those invitations as much as possible.
If the response is cold, then dont contact the admissions director any more. The
one exception to this is if he didnt give you an email for a student. Then you write one
more time, 2-3 weeks later and ask one more time for a students email address and
then use the contact with the student to get your research done. If you dont get an
email after that second attempt, you will probably have to get creative to get your
research done.
If your first contact is warm, then you continue to contact the school, always
talking about the school. Some students make the mistake of trying to sell the school
too much and dont do enough trying to find out what the school wants from them.
Step 4: No More Steps
From here on out it gets more variable. You have to respond to your contacts in
a way that allows you to get the information you need, while maintaining a positive
relationship with everyone you come in contact with. Remember you are looking for
clues to what schools are looking for. Never ask them straight out, that will make them
feel as though you are just trying to be someone you are not. But instead ask questions
like What do you look for in applicants during the interview? or What kind of students
do you most want to attract? You can also ask indirect questions that help with the
clues such as Do you deem research a very important factor for your students? You
want to show INTEREST, not MANIPULATION. Ask yourself before you plan your
questions about the interview if you are asking those questions because of a real
interest to find a good fit for a school or are you trying to make yourself fit into that
schools model. If you misrepresent yourself because that fits the school better, that is
dishonest and likely will hurt you in the long run.
So with all your research from here on, you need to be creative. You need to
change based on what the school wants and what they dont want. You need to play by
their rulesnot yours.

Moving From Research to Strategy

You should now be in a decent position. You know what your strengths and
weaknesses are, and you understand how those fit into or dont fit into the school you

are applying to. You understand the things the school is looking for, and you have
made good relationships with 2-5 people in the school who have provided you with
decent information. Your research success will range somewhere between knowing
very little and having a very clear picture of what the school wants. That isnt your fault;
some schools make it very difficult. However much research you were able to get done
though, should be used as you set up your final interview strategy.
Put it all together now. How do you fit into the system at the school? Do you
have strengths that fit well into their system? Do you have weaknesses that they are
willing to look past? How can you tell your stories of your experiences differently in a
way that brings out characteristics that the school is looking for? What are the 1-2
things you think you need to really let come out in the interview to give yourself the best
chance at acceptance?
Write down activities, experiences, or moments of personal growth that you can
present from you application that does a good job of accomplishing the following:

Presents your passion in specific areas of medicine this is by far the most
important thing you can do in any interview, regardless of research. It shows
interest, intelligence, maturity, skill, and a host of other important characteristics,
it is by far your most important goal.
Shows a strong balance in work, life, and other important aspects of what you do.
If passion is the number one thing schools want to see, then balance is number
two. You should be able to show that balance of work, community, family,
responsibility, etc through your experiences as well as the words you speak.
Make you seem like a stronger person, with strong character. Your experiences
should bring the interviewers to understand you have a strong character and
work ethic, and shows the interviewer that, if accepted, you would be very
successful.
Shows, if possible, strengths associated with areas that the school wants to see.
If they are interested more in clinical medicine, explain to them how your
experiences will allow you to be ahead of your peers as a clinician. This is true
from any area and does require research to actually know what it is they prefer.
If the school puts effort into having a formal competency rubric, you should know
as much about that as you can, and play to the strengths of that. We have all
had experiences that make us better in every aspect of life. Your experiences
can show them exactly what they want to see, if you do it right.

If you can accomplish those things, you are really on your way to success in the
interview. Think about this time hard. You should have about a to 1 page experience
written down for 2-5 different experiences that show as many of these points as
possible. Once you have them down, you are ready for your interview.

One more thing about preparation that is somewhat important. You should be
reading about and studying the political situation and ethics of medicine. It is becoming
increasingly popular for medical schools to ask about these things (the reason for this
will be discussed in the next section), and you should be educated to them. That said,
your actual ANSWER doesnt matter, only that you can sound educated about these
important areas of medicine. During the next section, Im going to go through the ins
and outs of the actual interview. Much of it is common sense, some of it is not; but all of
it is extremely important.

Interview Day
Actual interview day can be very stressful. If you feel that stress creeping up on
you, tell yourself over and over that your strategy is sound, and that you are ready. You
really are ready, you have good things to talk about, and good experiences that you can
lean on.
Dress
This is definitely common sense. Dress professionally. Couple of rules of
thumb, if you wouldnt go to a job interview in the clothes you are wearing youre
definitely should not go to a medical school interview in it. Secondly, imagine you are
telling a dying patient they are going to die, in a situation like that you would not want
your clothes to distract anyone from the importance of what you are saying. Wear
clothes that would be appropriate for that.
Other obvious stuff, dont show tattoos if you can help it. Shower and shave in
the morning (men and women). Very conservative piercings, I would suggest none for
men and no more than 1 pair earrings for women.
Interview is All Day, Not Just the Interview
Assume you are being watched and graded from the second you walk into the
door. Be professional, be courteous to everyone. Shake hands with most everyone,
with a firm but not hard grip. Get to know the other students you are interviewing with, if
there is time. If appropriate for the situation, introduce yourself to the faculty or students
who are with you and ask them about themselves in an informal way.
Ask questions about the school. Most schools give you a chance to do this,
make sure you take it. Dont ask questions that have already been answered. Dont

ask questions to someone you shouldnt(meaning dont ask the dean about housing,
but feel free to ask him about what part of the curriculum he is most proud of). Do show
real interest in attending. Ask follow-up questions about housing, financial aid, student
life etc, just make sure you ask the right people. Everyone that talks to you should
know that you are interested in attending. They should think in their minds that if you
are accepted you will be attending. Nothing compliments a school quite as much as
someone who loves the school and really wants to attend.
A Normal Medical School Interview
Most medical school interviews are made up of three basic phases. The get to
know you phase the What are your strengths and weaknesses phase and the throw
you off your feet stage. As I go through each of these phases I will be attempting to
give you the most common 2-3 questions for each phase. Remember, you dont need
to practice questions if you have the strategy in mind. Any question you get that you did
not specifically prepare for you just need to answer based on your experiences,
knowledge, passion, and character. Keep that at the forefront all the time. What I
recommend instead of worrying too much about individual questions is that you practice
answering questions you have not prepared for in order to practice answering questions
on the fly. Start here with this workbook; answer the questions on a piece of paper with
your strategy above in mind. Once you are done with that, questions you find on the
internet can serve the same purpose. Keep that in mind as you move forward.
Get to Know You
This is the phase where the interviewer asks 1-3 questions that are usually very
general. They rarely will kill your interview (though they can) and give you a good
chance to get an early home run in the interview. Why? Because the questions they
ask are so general that the answers that are normally given are general too. And
general answers are boring as a rule. So if you can give a not boring answer, you have
a strong advantage. Just follow the 4 guidelines above, passion, balance, character,
and school application. Here are some common questions

Tell us about yourself.

Why do you want to be a doctor?
What do you like?

Strengths and Weaknesses

This is the area that most interviewers spend most of their time. They want to
get a feeling for your passions, why you did the experiences you did, why you chose the
mentors you chose, and why you chose the path you chose to get to where you are.
This is the time you really need to show yourself off. Your research should make this

quite easy if you practice it. Though you will not be able to prepare for every question,
you have to be able to answer questions more quickly and in line with your strategy.
With strengths you want to focus on the strengths from your plan above. For weakness
you want to follow a process of showing a weakness, show how you overcame it, and
showing how you have become better because of it. Remember those three steps, they
are vital to addressing anything in the interview that will require you to mention
weaknesses you have, or that you will need to explain away due to drawbacks in your
application. Remember to admit to real weaknesses, explain how you worked or are
working to overcome it, and how it has made you a better applicant for medical school.
Here are some typical questions, more can be found on the web, but like I said, you
cant prepare for all of them.

What are your greatest strengths?

What is your greatest weakness?
What do you do better than most other applicants?
What unique experiences have you had?

Throw you off your feet

This is the fun part of the interview. Every school nearly always will ask 1-3
questions whose sole purpose is to make you feel out of control. Sometimes they ask
about bad grades or strange things that have come up in the interview. Oftentimes this
is where they start asking about ethics questions or political questions as well. The
important thing to remember about this part of the interview is that if you get flustered,
frustrated, mad, or upset you have lost the game. Keep a level head, think through your
answer before you say anything, and then answer in the most intelligent way possible.
One person in an interview talked about how he wanted to be a doctor, and in the
third or fourth answer he gave, me mentioned that he liked the money/lifestyle
combination that being a doctor can give. The interviewer responded by saying so you
want to make good money without working hard, and it caught him completely by
surprise. You can see how anger or frustration may be a common response, but this
student just laughed and clarified his meaning. To this day he still believe that how he
handled that question is what got him accepted to the school, and I believe he is
probably right.

You are seeing a patient who has just been diagnosed with pancreatic cancer;
he mentions that the one thing he wants is for you to not tell his wife, how do you
respond?
How would you fix US health care right now?

Other questions for this group will be very specific to your application and very
difficult to guess.
Now you are ready for your interview. 90% of interviews in the USA are made up
of some sort of schedule like the one outlined above. In the MISC section below well
talk about some of the exceptions as well as how you should follow up with the schools.

MISC Interview Things

Follow up to an interview is a very common question. At least at some schools
the follow up is very important. Most schools now are making decisions within only a
few weeks of the interview. This makes it hard to send hand written notes to the school
as a thank you and a follow up. The rule of thumb we give to applicants is that they
should only write hand written notes when there is time to receive them AND if the
school is a prestigious school. Schools with prestige tend to feel as though gestures
like that are more necessary, so I will leave exactly which schools should get those up
to you.
The note should be extremely simple and consist of three parts.

Friendly introduction Dear Mr. Admissions Director (use the name)

Thanks for the opportunity to interview
I am especially excited about __________
If you want to add one or two other compliments about people with whom you
interacted that would be ok as well.

If you are not handwriting a note, an email in the same format works just as well
for 90%+ of the medical schools.
Strange Interviews
Some schools, especially outside of the USA but even some inside the states are
adapting new methods of interviewing the students. One method that has seemed to
gain some ground is that of a rotation interview in which you are asked to go to several

different stations for only a few minutes and complete some sort of task. This may be
solving a problem as a group, discussing political turmoil with other interviewers,
interviewing mock patients, and many others. The important thing to remember about
this is that the principles remain intact. This is just the way the interview tries to throw
you off your feet. Dont let that happen. Remember, keep your head, stay calm and
highlight the things you have read and the passions you have singled out. These
interviews are very rare in the USA, I just wanted to mention them in case you see
something you dont expect.

Congratulations
At this point you are done with the workbook. I wish you the absolute best of luck
in the interview and the application process. I welcome strongly any questions,
comments, suggestions, or corrections. This is always a work in progress and I update
it frequently. Also, I would very much like to hear about your interview including who
interviewed you and what questions you can remember. Please use the Contact Form
on my website to do this.
If you get through this workbook, and feel as though you need help, yet have not
yet purchased coaching, this may be the right time to consider some one on one
coaching. I can bring you through all of your questions and help you to feel more
comfortable going into the interview.
If you have purchased some coaching time as of now, then be sure to write down
any questions you have at any point and bring them to our meetings.
Again, good luck, I wish you the very best. Working in a job that allows you to be
passionate about your work is one of the best things you can do in life. Being a doctor
is that for you, reach for those dreams and dont let them go.

Medical School Confidant