Bringing a gameboy to interviews?

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lol that would be awkward. But if he is reading this, i'll tell him what I told him in person: THE COWBOYS SUCK.

Yea man, the Houston Texan and rockets are where it's at! amirite?

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Yea man, the Houston Texan and rockets are where it's at! amirite?

i don't know if i'm buying into them. yesterday they almost lost. SANCHEZ got 200+ yards, threw 2 picks, and they barely won by a touchdown. These next 2 weeks will prove whether they're good enough to hang with the big boys.
 
i don't know if i'm buying into them. yesterday they almost lost. SANCHEZ got 200+ yards, threw 2 picks, and they barely won by a touchdown. These next 2 weeks will prove whether they're good enough to hang with the big boys.

Oh I thought you were a devout Texan fans from what you told me. Oh well...
 
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nope. not a fan of texas sports.

Lol come on man.
Srsly, sorry that you were annoyed. I didn't realized that at all lol. I have to defend my teams because it's rare to meet someone who hate the cowboys so much.
Good talks though lawl.
 
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"Do you have any questions for me?"

"Yes, just one...

Are you a Pokemon master? Because get ready to BATTLE"
 
Rule of thumb. Don't even play with your phone until interview is over. I've heard adcom that would auto reject you if they saw you playing with your phone at any time, at least that's what the advisor at the school told us when she saw someone texting on their phone.

I had schools tell me to check my phone in case the admin office changed my interview/something came up, so I highly doubt that pulling a phone out while waiting is going to get you an auto reject. They also know that you have to arrange transportation to the airport, so unless they expect us to be telepathic then phone use is probably okay.
 
A gameboy? I didn't know that med schools interviewed 4th graders.
 
I had schools tell me to check my phone in case the admin office changed my interview/something came up, so I highly doubt that pulling a phone out while waiting is going to get you an auto reject. They also know that you have to arrange transportation to the airport, so unless they expect us to be telepathic then phone use is probably okay.

AFTER the interview day, sure. Walking away from your group to make a call or pulling out your cell in the middle of the admissions conference rm with 12 other interviewees there during a "break"....yeah, kinda awkward/demonstrates lack of self-awareness --> likely rejection.
 
it's rare to meet someone who hate the cowboys so much.

Really? Everyone I know was pumped when TO joined the Cowboys, because then everything they hated was concentrated on one team!
 
Really? Everyone I know was pumped when TO joined the Cowboys, because then everything they hated was concentrated on one team!

Rare for me, I live in Dallas. And until the Texan got rly good recently. Most people in Texas are cowboys fans
 
If that's not a sign that you're not ready to be an adult, I don't know what is.

Bringing a video game to interviews of kind, much less med school? Grow the **** up.
 
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If that's not a sign that you're not ready to be an adult, I don't know what is.

Bringing a video game to interviews of kind, much less med school? Grow the **** up.

I'm bringing my xbox to medical school.

Or is that an auto rejection?
 
A shame the attention span or willingness to wait and interact with others is slowly dwindling... someone needs to call up James Cameron to raise the bar a little higher!
 
I'm bringing my xbox to medical school.

Or is that an auto rejection?

Bringing an Xbox would make your place the chill room :)

OP, the more important question: What kind of gameboy?
 
Whelp, looks like I'm rejected from all the schools I interviewed at for sending texts or getting other people's numbers.
I learned this the hard way. When I received some exit interview feedback about why I was rejected from my home school this past cycle, there was a specific note in my file that I had been chewing gum, which called into question my understanding of professional behavior and proper decorum. Oh Noes! Not teh chewing gums! :rolleyes:

Alas. It's true, I did chew a piece of gum that day. For all of ten minutes, during the first pre-interview orientation session, because I didn't want to go into my interview with bad coffee breath. I disposed of said piece of gum before starting the "real" interviews. But clearly it made enough of an impression upon the person leading the orientation chat that they felt it was a dealbreaker.

I wish I were making this up. Seriously. I can only presume that their minds were made up for other reasons and they were just looking for specific reasons to give me, otherwise I think it's it's incredibly odd.

Bottom line: You should assume that your entire interview starts the minute you step/drive onto campus, and lasts until you leave.
 
I heard if you can beat your interviewer on pokemon blue it's an auto acceptance.

Pokemon-Blue-Nintendo-Gameboy-Gameplay-Screenshot.jpg

I never understood why the plant pokemon had an advantage over water ones
 
I never understood why the plant pokemon had an advantage over water ones

Because plants drink/soak up water. Duh.

Although, Bulbasaur is the worst choice of the three in the long run...
 
Your best bet would be to just bring a fat spliff to calm your nerves. It'd also be a great icebreaker.
 
This thread has to be a joke...right? Don't bring a gameboy, don't whip your phone out to play games during breaks, don't bring head phones for music...I wouldn't even bring a book. Act like you are interested in the medical school and the people around you. I don't even remember having more than a few minutes of downtime, and no one ever made time for Pokemon.
 
Is this acceptable?

Look at it like this. You will be the only person there playing a Game Boy - in fact, you'd likely be the first person this season to do it. Therefore, you will be remembered for it. Do you really want to be?

Playing it safe is the only reasonable decision here. Mega Man can wait (painful as it is for me to utter those words =( ).
 
This thread is just making me feel like I failed all my interviews so far:

Did I bring a book? Yes.
Did I read this book during down time and no one else was around? Yes.
Did I check my phone from time to time while waiting? Yes.

Clearly I have failed to show a sincere and mature interest in attending medical school.
 
How am I being sarcastic? Some times at interviews, I just don't feel like talking to people. I was sitting next to a guy during one interview that was really nice, but he was trying to convince me that the Cowboys should have won the superbowl last year. He also called Tony Romo elite and said the Mavs would beat the Lakers in the playoffs this year. Do you think I want to listen to this deluded guy ride Dallas franchises? I've seen quite a few trolls in my days but I don't think this guy was trolling. Like I said, nice guy, funny as hell, but when he started talking about the cowboys, I just shut down.

and you would rather play a game boy?? i didnt even know they still made them. Seriously dude, you gotta stop caring about living in your own world, and realize that other people make judgments about the way you look and act. At a certain age you gotta give the game boy, there's a reason toys r us targets their ads for 10 year olds.
 
Thread title made me laugh. Solid troll, OP. (I hope)

I like how most/all of the med students are saying "Don't bring a gameboy (lol), text, play phone games, read a book, etc" and several of the pre-meds are like, "WUT? That's ridiculous."

There's something to be said for that.

Simple stuff like posture and body language are good to be mindful of too... not to the point of paranoia, but definitely be mindful.
 
Is it acceptable to bring my laptop to play WoW if my clan has a really important raid the day of my interview?
 
LOL, this is hilarious.

On a related note, I am an MS3 who does interviews for my school. So if you have any questions about interviews, I'd be happy to answer them based on my knowledge.
 
LOL, this is hilarious.

On a related note, I am an MS3 who does interviews for my school. So if you have any questions about interviews, I'd be happy to answer them based on my knowledge.

What do you look for during an interview?
 
Thread title made me laugh. Solid troll, OP. (I hope)

I like how most/all of the med students are saying "Don't bring a gameboy (lol), text, play phone games, read a book, etc" and several of the pre-meds are like, "WUT? That's ridiculous."

There's something to be said for that.

Simple stuff like posture and body language are good to be mindful of too... not to the point of paranoia, but definitely be mindful.

It really sounds like self-righteous professionalism when a book is deemed unworthy to bring for down time.
 
What do you look for during an interview?

This is exactly what I am supposed to find out, copied and pasted from my interviewing manual:

A. From Application

1. Challenge and relevance of curriculum
2. Connectivity to medicine
3. Extracurricular activities
4. Special qualities of the personal essay


B. General Description of the Candidate

1. Appearance
2. Distinguishing characteristics (Diversity)
3. Interpersonal skills

C. Motivation

1. Experiential basis for career decisions
2. Resilience
3. Special interests
4. Plans for career as M.D. (What?, Where?, Vague?, Clear?, Unrealistic?)
5. Research interests
6. Social concerns - is person motivated by wish to be helpful?

D. Important Topical Medical Issues

1. Ethical questions (There is no litmus test for "correct" answers. Rather we look for reasoned judgment; ability to articulate both sides of an issue.) Questions frequently discussed include AIDS, euthanasia, physician-assisted suicide, and access to health care. When discussing medically related topics, avoid posing complex scenarios or asking "technical" questions that only a physician or student physician would have the experience or knowledge to respond to intelligently.

2. The changing structure of the medical care system.


E. Non-medical Interests

1. Social life
2. Hobbies
3. Academic
4. Work
5. Political
6. Volunteering
7. Leisure - what does person do for fun?
8. Athletics

F. Personal Characteristics as Demonstrated in Interview

1. Relaxed - tense or anxious
2. Open - guarded and/or defensive
3. Pleasant - unpleasant
4. Warm - cold - bland
5. Mature - childish or naive
6. Interesting - dull
7. Likable - not likable
8. Articulate - difficulty expressing self
9. Ability to conceptualize and deal with complex questions such as euthanasia or affirmative action
10. Judgment - sound or questionable
11. Open-mindedness. Fixed biases, inability to see different points of view
12. Range - breadth of interests - does the candidate think seriously about issues other than getting into medical school? What does the candidate consider to be important in his/her life? Ability to think of problems of others. Ability to invest interest, time, energy in causes beyond those which immediately profit the individual.
13. Curiosity - perhaps no other characteristic distinguishes effective physicians better than an individual's continuing interest in learning. Does the candidate take courses for grades or does he/she give evidence of curiosity and interest beyond the required level needed for grades? How much reading does the person do beyond those required? About what?
14. Sense of humor - The quality was found in one study to be related to a physician's ability to relate to patients.
15. Leadership
16. Collaborative Skills
17. Respect
18. Maturity
19. Professionalism
 
It really sounds like self-righteous professionalism when a book is deemed unworthy to bring for down time.

I think this comes from a different perception of what that "downtime" really is and is not -- namely, you call it "downtime," I call it "unstructured time." In other words, the interview is when everyone KNOWS they are being watched. The rest of the time is when people are more likely to let loose and hopefully Admissions will get to see who you really are. Reading books during open time periods might not create the impression you had hoped.

Just take a look at the behaviors the previous poster wrote about looking for:

This is exactly what I am supposed to find out, copied and pasted from my interviewing manual:

A. From Application

1. Challenge and relevance of curriculum
2. Connectivity to medicine
3. Extracurricular activities
4. Special qualities of the personal essay


B. General Description of the Candidate

1. Appearance
2. Distinguishing characteristics (Diversity)
3. Interpersonal skills

C. Motivation

1. Experiential basis for career decisions
2. Resilience
3. Special interests
4. Plans for career as M.D. (What?, Where?, Vague?, Clear?, Unrealistic?)
5. Research interests
6. Social concerns - is person motivated by wish to be helpful?

D. Important Topical Medical Issues

1. Ethical questions (There is no litmus test for "correct" answers. Rather we look for reasoned judgment; ability to articulate both sides of an issue.) Questions frequently discussed include AIDS, euthanasia, physician-assisted suicide, and access to health care. When discussing medically related topics, avoid posing complex scenarios or asking "technical" questions that only a physician or student physician would have the experience or knowledge to respond to intelligently.

2. The changing structure of the medical care system.


E. Non-medical Interests

1. Social life
2. Hobbies
3. Academic
4. Work
5. Political
6. Volunteering
7. Leisure - what does person do for fun?
8. Athletics

F. Personal Characteristics as Demonstrated in Interview

1. Relaxed - tense or anxious
2. Open - guarded and/or defensive
3. Pleasant - unpleasant
4. Warm - cold - bland
5. Mature - childish or naive
6. Interesting - dull
7. Likable - not likable
8. Articulate - difficulty expressing self
9. Ability to conceptualize and deal with complex questions such as euthanasia or affirmative action
10. Judgment - sound or questionable
11. Open-mindedness. Fixed biases, inability to see different points of view
12. Range - breadth of interests - does the candidate think seriously about issues other than getting into medical school? What does the candidate consider to be important in his/her life? Ability to think of problems of others. Ability to invest interest, time, energy in causes beyond those which immediately profit the individual.
13. Curiosity - perhaps no other characteristic distinguishes effective physicians better than an individual's continuing interest in learning. Does the candidate take courses for grades or does he/she give evidence of curiosity and interest beyond the required level needed for grades? How much reading does the person do beyond those required? About what?
14. Sense of humor - The quality was found in one study to be related to a physician's ability to relate to patients.
15. Leadership
16. Collaborative Skills
17. Respect
18. Maturity
19. Professionalism

People are going to make assumptions about you. How might their assumptions about you in regards to the above change if you do or do not interact with other applicants? (Esp. with regards to the bolded.)
 
OP make sure you keep your spaghetti from falling out of your pocket.
 
To be fair, you're right about the whole "you're supposed to be nice in an interview", but judging someone based on 1 limited interaction with them is hardly fair. But that's just the way that the cookie crumbles I guess.
What exactly do you think an interview is?

True, but at least you're being judged more fairly. Or at least you think you are.
No. Being watched outside of an interview would actually be more fair to the interviewer. You can easily pretend to be something you're not during the interview.

Rule of thumb. Don't even play with your phone until interview is over. I've heard adcom that would auto reject you if they saw you playing with your phone at any time, at least that's what the advisor at the school told us when she saw someone texting on their phone.
Oh really.

If you're texting during a speech or interview, but they're not talking about during downtime.
 
It really sounds like self-righteous professionalism when a book is deemed unworthy to bring for down time.
If it's a full room of people who are interviewing to spend the next four years of their lives working together very closely to become professionals at a very high level, yeah, you do look like you're clueless if you're sitting there calmly reading Mockingjay. Communication is an extremely important skill in this business, and you should demonstrate that you can do it, throughout your entire interview day, whether or not you realize you're being watched at that moment.

Now, if I walked out into a quiet room full of applicants, and the one I was going to interview was reading a book, I wouldn't put too much thought into it, but if you were doing it to avoid social interaction, yes, it would have hurt you.
 
This is exactly what I am supposed to find out, copied and pasted from my interviewing manual:

A. From Application

1.Challenge and relevance of curriculum
2.Connectivity to medicine
3.Extracurricular activities
4.Special qualities of the personal essay


B. General Description of the Candidate

1.Appearance
2.Distinguishing characteristics (Diversity)
3.Interpersonal skills

C. Motivation

1.Experiential basis for career decisions
2.Resilience
3.Special interests
4.Plans for career as M.D. (What?, Where?, Vague?, Clear?, Unrealistic?)
5.Research interests
6.Social concerns - is person motivated by wish to be helpful?

D. Important Topical Medical Issues

1.Ethical questions (There is no litmus test for "correct" answers. Rather we look for reasoned judgment; ability to articulate both sides of an issue.) Questions frequently discussed include AIDS, euthanasia, physician-assisted suicide, and access to health care. When discussing medically related topics, avoid posing complex scenarios or asking "technical" questions that only a physician or student physician would have the experience or knowledge to respond to intelligently.

2.The changing structure of the medical care system.


E. Non-medical Interests

1.Social life
2.Hobbies
3.Academic
4.Work
5.Political
6.Volunteering
7.Leisure - what does person do for fun?
8.Athletics

F. Personal Characteristics as Demonstrated in Interview

1.Relaxed - tense or anxious
2.Open - guarded and/or defensive
3.Pleasant - unpleasant
4.Warm - cold - bland
5.Mature - childish or naive
6.Interesting - dull
7.Likable - not likable
8.Articulate - difficulty expressing self
9.Ability to conceptualize and deal with complex questions such as euthanasia or affirmative action
10.Judgment - sound or questionable
11.Open-mindedness. Fixed biases, inability to see different points of view
12.Range - breadth of interests - does the candidate think seriously about issues other than getting into medical school? What does the candidate consider to be important in his/her life? Ability to think of problems of others. Ability to invest interest, time, energy in causes beyond those which immediately profit the individual.
13.Curiosity - perhaps no other characteristic distinguishes effective physicians better than an individual's continuing interest in learning. Does the candidate take courses for grades or does he/she give evidence of curiosity and interest beyond the required level needed for grades? How much reading does the person do beyond those required? About what?
14.Sense of humor - The quality was found in one study to be related to a physician's ability to relate to patients.
15.Leadership
16.Collaborative Skills
17.Respect
18.Maturity
19.Professionalism

This is awesome thanks!
 
I think this comes from a different perception of what that "downtime" really is and is not -- namely, you call it "downtime," I call it "unstructured time." In other words, the interview is when everyone KNOWS they are being watched. The rest of the time is when people are more likely to let loose and hopefully Admissions will get to see who you really are. Reading books during open time periods might not create the impression you had hoped.

Just take a look at the behaviors the previous poster wrote about looking for:



People are going to make assumptions about you. How might their assumptions about you in regards to the above change if you do or do not interact with other applicants? (Esp. with regards to the bolded.)

If it's a full room of people who are interviewing to spend the next four years of their lives working together very closely to become professionals at a very high level, yeah, you do look like you're clueless if you're sitting there calmly reading Mockingjay. Communication is an extremely important skill in this business, and you should demonstrate that you can do it, throughout your entire interview day, whether or not you realize you're being watched at that moment.

Now, if I walked out into a quiet room full of applicants, and the one I was going to interview was reading a book, I wouldn't put too much thought into it, but if you were doing it to avoid social interaction, yes, it would have hurt you.

Guys, I understand that talking to other interviewees is important. I'm talking about when you're waiting 30 minutes to an hour, by yourself, and you're waiting for the busy MD to invite you to his office.

I just get the impression from this thread that if you consider bringing a book to interview day, then you're not fit to be a physician. All this professionalism garbage concerning how unorthodox it is to bring a book is just the typical "one upping" that is done on SDN.

Edit: I'll admit that a Gameboy probably isn't a good idea, just changed my mind on that one.
 
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Guys, I understand that talking to other interviewees is important. I'm talking about when you're waiting 30 minutes to an hour, by yourself, and you're waiting for the busy MD to invite you to his office.

I just get the impression from this thread that if you consider bringing a book to interview day, then you're not fit to be a physician. All this professionalism garbage concerning how unorthodox it is to bring a book is just the typical "one upping" that is done on SDN.

Or you could listen to the people who are in med school, interview applicants, and/or have professional work experience.

This is theoretically one of the most important days of your life - you can't sit still for 30 mins without something to read? And I doubt your scenario even presents itself - I can't say definitively but I never had an interview day (out of 11, reasonable sample size) where I was just sitting alone for that long.
 
Guys, I understand that talking to other interviewees is important. I'm talking about when you're waiting 30 minutes to an hour, by yourself, and you're waiting for the busy MD to invite you to his office.

I just get the impression from this thread that if you consider bringing a book to interview day, then you're not fit to be a physician. All this professionalism garbage concerning how unorthodox it is to bring a book is just the typical "one upping" that is done on SDN.

Edit: I'll admit that a Gameboy probably isn't a good idea, just changed my mind on that one.
I have a feeling you're going to get many more "professionalism" lectures in medical school that you don't agree with if you don't have the self awareness to realize its weird.

I went on ~10 medical school interviews and ~30 residency interviews. Exactly 0 people had books. A few did the occasional cell phone check.

You need to learn to play the game. Much more of your time will be wasted in medical school than just the 30 minutes of interview downtime. Get used to sitting and appearing interested while your mind is elsewhere.
 
Or you could listen to the people who are in med school, interview applicants, and/or have professional work experience.

This is theoretically one of the most important days of your life - you can't sit still for 30 mins without something to read? And I doubt your scenario even presents itself - I can't say definitively but I never had an interview day (out of 11, reasonable sample size) where I was just sitting alone for that long.

I just had two interviews where I was waiting 30 minutes by myself, so I picked up my book. What the he... is the problem with that??? If my interviewer came by and saw me reading then he can keep his pre-conceived notions of how much of a bookworm/antisocial/crazy applicant I am and reject me if that's how nitpicky interviewers are about accepting people.

It's just really neurotic to think, "Oh... he's reading a book... he must be socially awkward...obviously he wouldn't know how to talk to patients."
 
I have a feeling you're going to get many more "professionalism" lectures in medical school that you don't agree with if you don't have the self awareness to realize its weird.

I went on ~10 medical school interviews and ~30 residency interviews. Exactly 0 people had books. A few did the occasional cell phone check.

You need to learn to play the game. Much more of your time will be wasted in medical school than just the 30 minutes of interview downtime. Get used to sitting and appearing interested while your mind is elsewhere.

You know what SDN... I give up. Books are bad, reading is bad. Thanks for being an... nvm.

Edit: Btw, the condescension from you guys on this issue is insane.
 
Cliffs on how a thread about bringing a gameboy to an interview managed to receive 100 replies?
 
I just had two interviews where I was waiting 30 minutes by myself, so I picked up my book. What the he... is the problem with that??? If my interviewer came by and saw me reading then he can keep his pre-conceived notions of how much of a bookworm/antisocial/crazy applicant I am and reject me if that's how nitpicky interviewers are about accepting people.

It's just really neurotic to think, "Oh... he's reading a book... he must be socially awkward...obviously he wouldn't know how to talk to patients."

While your behavior here might not be that weird, you have to think about what you are competing against. Interviewers make notes on whatever they see and the committee picks those notes apart. People have been rejected for much less than reading a book at an interview. An acquaintance of mine who is a senior member of the adcom at another school has had to argue on behalf of candidates on multiple occasions when multiple colleagues wanted to reject candidates for things like "sipping too much water/too quickly" (after being handed a cup of water at the beginning of an interview as a "courtesy") or having an "unprofessional haircut." Those things have literally NO relevance to clinical practice. Reading a book at an interview shows a lack of self-awareness, which could be an issue later and IS a common reason applicants are rejected. That you feel you have to argue this is, frankly, kind of funny. If you don't want to change your behavior, then don't. Get in somewhere and come back next year to say "I TOLD YOU SO!" and we'll all applaud for you....


:corny:
 
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