2017 UCSF pharmacy school

Started by Paladin258
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I'm really anxious to see how this all goes down the 1rst but I really am just grateful to have been given an opportunity to interview. Even if this interview goes up in flames, I think all of us will be okay. At the end of the day, we all have something special or we wouldn't have gotten the interview to begin with right? 🙂
 
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Paladin258 said:
Is is ok to carry a backpack or at least a case to the interview?
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I think so. For sure I'm going to bring my backpack along with my kanteen, pens, and my notebook. I also assume they might provide us with a lot of housing/apartment brochures and other papers.
 
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Hey guys!
On the interview day link .. The format of the interview is stated as MMI. Do you guys know if there will
Be a traditional interview portion as well?? Or is it just scenarios?
 
Best of luck for everyone interviewing today. Can you guys let us know how it went and how was the MMI format, etc? Thanks!
 
I enjoyed the MMI. Joel talked about a problem with tradition interviews that I had elsewhere, and I believe that the MMI did address it. Just go into it with an open mind. With all that being said, if people start talking about specifics on here, yell at them. We practically signed an NDA, and I honestly have no idea how much the situations change, but it isn't going to be as fair or equal if the first people start spilling the beans on it.

Again, just be relaxed. It was a lot of fun.
 
TeRRaNoXiC said:
How would you suggest we prepare for it? Does answering the questions that they told us to think through on the UCSF website actually help during the interview?
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I practiced some scenarios before the interview, and I didn't find that very helpful. Time goes by really fast, and you'll be done before you know it. I agree with BobbyK that you should just relax and not worry too much.
 
drugdealer2b said:
I practiced some scenarios before the interview, and I didn't find that very helpful. Time goes by really fast, and you'll be done before you know it. I agree with BobbyK that you should just relax and not worry too much.
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That's good to hear. Generally when people say don't worry about it, it's true. Looking forward to the interview!
 
Yeah... you can't really prep for it unless you somehow found a list of every MMI question, and figured out an answer for them. That isn't really feasible though. They instructed us to be ourselves, and I think that should be enough.
 
Well, this one will finally be my last pharmacy interview, this Thursday. I'm excited for it and I am glad you guys all had positive experiences.

Do you mind sharing how long the entire process takes? Is it actually 5 hours as stated in the email? Thanks a bunch!
 
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I started at 1pm didn't finish till 6:45pm but that's because I took the tour/talked to everyone I saw lol. It was my first interview and the other two schools I'm interviewing at have some big shoes to fill. I left the school even more eager to be a part of its team. They showcased themselves very well. Joel was great to see and helped to calm us down. I felt like I stumbled on some of the interview questions though
 
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By the way, UCSF isn't the only school doing MMI. Oregon State did it too. Although Oregon only had 4 questions so it was all over in an hour and felt very short.
 
Whoever already interviewed, remember we signed a NDA so we have a responsibility to uphold this!

Advice to everyone else still waiting to interview, BE YOURSELF. The interview itself wasn't bad but interesting and fun, the essay was easy (for me). They had told us every question and prompt changes with each interview group so our input wouldn't even help anyway.

Cannot stress enough to be yourself and you already have the answers in you. Relax and have fun!
 
catherweenie said:
Whoever already interviewed, remember we signed a NDA so we have a responsibility to uphold this!

Advice to everyone else still waiting to interview, BE YOURSELF. The interview itself wasn't bad but interesting and fun, the essay was easy (for me). They had told us every question and prompt changes with each interview group so our input wouldn't even help anyway.

Cannot stress enough to be yourself and you already have the answers in you. Relax and have fun!
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Hearing you say that makes me less nervous (only a little haha). 🙂 Definitely looking forward to the interview! The weather looks pretty great too 😉
 
"Relax" is good advice, but I am finding it hard to! I love SF so much and have been there many times throughout my life. It's definitely my favorite city I've visited. I know all the other applicants are such interesting and intelligent people so there will be no shame in being rejected, but I really want to go here. 😳
 
catherweenie said:
Whoever already interviewed, remember we signed a NDA so we have a responsibility to uphold this!

Advice to everyone else still waiting to interview, BE YOURSELF. The interview itself wasn't bad but interesting and fun, the essay was easy (for me). They had told us every question and prompt changes with each interview group so our input wouldn't even help anyway.

Cannot stress enough to be yourself and you already have the answers in you. Relax and have fun!
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Catherweenie, I agree with you. Going against an NDA (nondisclosure agreement) is essentially opening the door to dismissing one's opportunities be it a job or school application. Actually it was quite sad, I once heard of someone who was great applicant for a job but botched it due to their lack of integrity. Therefore, not just for the sake of an unfair advantage for future applicants, but for those already interviewed, it's best to honor the NDA.

That said, I'd go with what BobbyK and Catherweenie said: the best tip of advice is to relax and of course be yourself. 🙂

I wish us all good luck!
 
I don't trust any of this advice. I think I should be extremely nervous and act like someone else. ;-)

Sent from my SPH-L710 using SDN Mobile
 
Cheepcheep, don't worry! I was super nervous going into the interview as well but when you actually begin your interview, I feel like it just disappears and you just keep going. I don't know how else to explain it but that anxiety and nervousness dissipates. Honestly, Joel and the staff were so nice and welcoming that they made you feel more at ease!

Sohelia, I know saying to relax is easier said than done but that applies to most things right? Haha after interviewing, I just want to go to UCSF even more! I'm in love with the city and the school.

As Noael said, if you have already interviewed, please remember to be responsible for the things you say and disclose to others. It's unfair for other applicants and the ones who interviewed first. But again, I can't force anyone to not say anything. I agree with you wholeheartedly Noael. I can't believe that happened though!

Everyone who is interviewing or already interviewed is very deserving to go to this amazing school!
 
It takes about 5 hours. Shorter if you opt not to take the optional tour.

My thoughts on SF:
Loved the school, great program, the interview was very well done... but I just cannot get over how EXPENSIVE it is to live there. I was comparing the UCSD cost of living budget versus UCSF, and it is about $10K extra a year when comparing living on campus for both schools. SF may well have more scholarships, so I guess if I get into both (not gonna hold my breath on that one), I'll be able to see from the financial aid packages what is more feasibly.
 
Overall the MMI was definitely different. I think the MMI is to test your ability to handle situations rather than showing your personality. My advice would be relax, stick to your heart and guts and treat the scenarios as "real life situations" and ask yourself how you would actually handle the situation and not try to answer what you think they are looking for. Since Joel did emphasized that last year, people sounded too rehearsed. Well in doubt, just follow your heart.

I hope this helps! Good luck everyone else with their interviews!
 
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Wow. 6 min is pretty short! I don't know if that's a good thing or not. I guess it prevents people blabbing on and on. Which I would probably do.
I do agree with you, the previous MMI I did felt more "impersonal" because we had to say goodbye to each interviewer so soon. Thanks for your advice!
 
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do you talk non-stop for 6 minutes, or do they ask you questions about your response to clarify/expound? If it's the former, that actually sounds like a long time to me. I typically like to keep my responses to around 1 minute each but, of course, MMI may be different.
 
PharmD177 said:
do you talk non-stop for 6 minutes, or do they ask you questions about your response to clarify/expound? If it's the former, that actually sounds like a long time to me. I typically like to keep my responses to around 1 minute each but, of course, MMI may be different.
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I can't speak for UCSF, but at Oregon, I found the questions were deep/broad enough that I could easily talk for about 4-6 minutes. Sometimes they followed up with questions after I was done, sometimes they interrupted me. At Oregon it was an entire 10 minutes, so by the end the interviewer and I were usually way off topic 🙂
 
BobbyK said:
It takes about 5 hours. Shorter if you opt not to take the optional tour.

My thoughts on SF:
Loved the school, great program, the interview was very well done... but I just cannot get over how EXPENSIVE it is to live there. I was comparing the UCSD cost of living budget versus UCSF, and it is about $10K extra a year when comparing living on campus for both schools. SF may well have more scholarships, so I guess if I get into both (not gonna hold my breath on that one), I'll be able to see from the financial aid packages what is more feasibly.
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Just my 2 cents: I think UCSD is definitely the more difficult program between the two. Even though it's P/NP, those med school courses during your 2nd year are quite difficult. Curriculum at UCSD looks a little more rigorous with not as much flexibility to take electives. UCSF also let me waive a couple of courses (biostats, pharm calc) and there's the option to waive biochem, o-chem, and immunology if you have the coursework and can pass the waiver exams.

I had the same concerns about UCSD vs. UCSF last year and was leaning towards SD since I love Socal and it was cheaper. A few things that can help out with the cost disparity:
  • Starting Spring your 3rd year, you go out on rotations. It's not necessarily in SF, you could live in the South Bay, LA, Fresno, Davis, or North Bay. That may help with cost of living.
  • You'll be done in March of your 4th year. UCSD goes all the way through June of your 4th year.
  • SD, I feel you need a car to be able to get around most of the city. SF is more accessible via public transit, so you can save by not having a car.

And really, it's SF. I was apprehensive about moving so far from LA and didn't enjoy the city at all during Fall quarter, but the city's grown on me. I know the cost disparity sounds really high, but for me, the chance to go to UCSF is the opportunity of a lifetime. You can always make that money back later in life, but you only get to choose your pharmacy school once.
 
Very true. It is a ton of money, but I can definitely see where SF(and UCSF) would have many perks over SD. I definitely did enjoy the mass transit options too.
 
TeRRaNoXiC said:
This is pretty sobering. Check these articles out:

http://www.kevinmd.com/blog/2011/11/problems-multiplemini-interview-medical-school.html

http://www.ucdmc.ucdavis.edu/publish/news/newsroom/6802

I would even add that age/life experience plays a bias too. I would think that a 40yr old would be more socially mature than a 20 yr old.
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Thank you Terranoxic! I heard of the UCD study but not the kevinMD one.

In fact, I found the kevinMD one to be really enlightening. I didn't realize that McMaster University profits from licensing the MMI questions it provides to other schools and that the correlations/ predictions between MMI results and OSCE results were possibly from skewed testing pools to begin with.

Definitely a lot of food for thought since I'm sure setting up the MMIs are pretty time - if not cost intensive and of course since it's determining a lot of applicant's fates.
 
I agree with those opinions stated in the studies. I would think interviews are meant for schools to get to know the applicants especially personally, among all things. I'd also think the MMIs are highly impersonal. They may help evaluate an applicant's ability to think on their feet but if we're given dilemmas we haven't been in before, and we blab about what we might do, isn't that just testing whether we can talk our way through for a few minutes? - that's a huge pointer that MMI scores must have a correlation with more social/extrovert characters. And is that even something we want to do as future health practitioners - beat around the bush?
 
For those who had interviewed, was there any traditional interview question asked at all? I feel like MMI would not allow applicants to showcase their personal experience and why they want to go into pharmacy.
 
01262013 said:
For those who had interviewed, was there any traditional interview question asked at all? I feel like MMI would not allow applicants to showcase their personal experience and why they want to go into pharmacy.
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Due to the honor code we are not allowed to talk about questions from the MMI, because it's unfair to give others an advantage. There isn't really any way to prepare, just be flexible and follow your instincts.
 
It was certainly "interesting", to say the least! Now that it's over, I have to agree with all the previous posters.
 
cheepcheep said:
Look at you guys, making me all anxious and stuff 😀
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Don't worry, they give you an orientation about how it's going to work when you get there. They explain everything pretty well. It's really a test of your ability to think quickly and how you approach different situations.
 
anyone going to interview tomorrow? mine starts at 7:30 ... :scared:

I *really* hope my flight doesn't get cancelled this evening... 🙁
 
i didn't care for the MMI interview. I feel as though they may have traded some problems for others, including the ones noted above. Still, the structure of the whole day was much better than UCSD's, though it did drag on a bit at times. btw, it is definitely NOT 5 hours, even without the tour at the end.
 
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PharmD177 said:
i didn't care for the MMI interview. I feel as though they may have traded some problems for others, including the ones noted above. Still, the structure of the whole day was much better than UCSD's, though it did drag on a bit at times. btw, it is definitely NOT 5 hours, even without the tour at the end.
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So how long would you say the whole process was??
 
For those who had an interview on Feb 2nd, what was the name of the lady who gave us the speach?

Good luck to everyone, it's gone be a long and anxious way till we would hear back!🙁 time is going by very slowly for me!
 
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