Class of 2019!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

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hellanutella said:
Sending a boatload of good vibes your way @Ace Khalifa! You got this! Nothing like interviewing on your home turf (albeit not your alma mater... but close enough in terms of location).



Truth. However, had I received this question during my interview cycle, I would have selfishly answered "My lack of acceptances."
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Honestly the "health inequality" answers come off as pandering a little bit to me...
 
Can I ask a serious question?

How do you guys gather your thoughts during interviews? I loved doing an MMI because I could just go and as I got more comfortable, it turned into more of a conversation/exchange with the interviewers. However in the 'traditional' format, I find myself talking a lot and probably repeating myself a lot. I probably say a few good things, but it all feels so unstructured that I have a lot of verbal diarrhea.

Three of my interviews are down and I'd like to make the next three count way harder. I think there's certainly a learning curve in here, but I want to be on the pointy end of the distribution from here on out. On fahking point.

I think the weird thing for me is that I have some cognitive dissonance from my college self, but talked about those activities in AMCAS. The dean of a school brought up some work I did in college and I kinda blew it off as 'yeah okay that happened'. I really should have gone more in depth because it was my opportunity to explain to him why what stood out to him mattered. I had all this stuff in my head, but just kind of blew it off. It was in a group format and while I enjoyed it, I'm not much of a braggart. I guess I know that there are ways to show that I loved what I did without sounding pompous about it. I feel like I've already discussed this stuff to death in my applications so don't feel the need to drone about it. I should probably trust that I know how to do it a bit more. (AND ALSO READ AND RE-READ MY APPLICATIONS!)

claduva94 said:
Honestly the "health inequality" answers come off as pandering a little bit to me...
Click to expand...

I talked about police brutality and profiling essentially saying what good is health if you're terrified of the very people that are supposed to protect you. Physicians take care of the victims as well and the job should be to prevent needless injury and violence not to patch it up.

People were talking about something that they were involved in and connecting it to their interests.

I guess I'm just really bad at being that self serving because I don't see the point of talking about how awesome I am. I don't want to play that game. I hate it. I already got wasted and wrote about myself in all these applications. I want people to give a crap about how I think, or what I think about when I'm free with my thoughts, not regurgitate all the **** I've already written.

This is why I like MMI's.
 
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claduva94 said:
Honestly the "health inequality" answers come off as pandering a little bit to me...
Click to expand...
Cyberdyne 101 said:
Yeah, just a tad... It's only relevant if those scenarios actually impacted you personally.
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Preach.

To all those who have yet to interview: As tempting as it is to pander, NEVER do it. At one interview, the "introduce yourself" component devolved into this humblebragging circlejerk. I was totally ready to talk about the sushi-making lessons I had signed up for, but gave into peer pressure and talked about the orphaned infants I had saved while on a interplanetary space exploration funded by my Nobel prize. Ugh. I wanted to slap myself afterwards.

Also, reliving an experience from my Very Awful Interview, I was asked what the latest book I read was. Truth be told, I had just binge-read all the Harry Potters over again and wrote my friends a very lengthy discourse on how, in retrospect, magical society is just as backwards as Muggle society and why neither Albus Dumbledore nor Severus Snape should be regarded as heroes. However, I didn't think "I reread all the Harry Potter books for the eightieth time" was the most savvy response to my elderly, somewhat-uptight interviewer, so I claimed my last book was "The Spirit Catches You and You Fall Down"... which is arguably my favourite medically-related book, but by no means an honest answer to his question. Again, I wanted to slap myself afterwards.

/endrant

Just had to come clean with myself.
 
hellanutella said:
Preach.

To all those who have yet to interview: As tempting as it is to pander, NEVER do it. At one interview, the "introduce yourself" component devolved into this humblebragging circlejerk. I was totally ready to talk about the sushi-making lessons I had signed up for, but gave into peer pressure and talked about the orphaned infants I had saved while on a interplanetary space exploration funded by my Nobel prize. Ugh. I wanted to slap myself afterwards.

Also, reliving an experience from my Very Awful Interview, I was asked what the latest book I read was. Truth be told, I had just binge-read all the Harry Potters over again and wrote my friends a very lengthy discourse on how, in retrospect, magical society is just as backwards as Muggle society and why neither Albus Dumbledore nor Severus Snape should be regarded as heroes. However, I didn't think "I reread all the Harry Potter books for the eightieth time" was the most savvy response to my elderly, somewhat-uptight interviewer, so I claimed my last book was "The Spirit Catches You and You Fall Down"... which is arguably my favourite medically-related book, but by no means an honest answer to his question. Again, I wanted to slap myself afterwards.

/endrant

Just had to come clean with myself.
Click to expand...

Completely agree. I had one interview where everyone was supposed to go around and introduce themselves with a fun fact.... It turned into people just spouting the most impressive things off their resumes, and it was frustrating. One person even said something along the lines of, "My name is Jane Doe and I've done x, y, and z impressive things since I was 3.... AND my fun fact is that I've also accomplished a, b, and c over the past few years." Like, come on. Everyone sort of laughed nervously when she said "and my fun fact is" because she had just rattled off around ten activities for us, which we assumed were her "fun facts", but she wasn't joking and just kept going. I really appreciated the last person in the circle saying, "Hi, I'm John Doe, and I like to cook meals really fast while pretending I'm on the Food Network." Be John, not Jane!
 
Also, @hellanutella, I agree on your HP analysis. Sure, Snape protected Harry cause he loved Lily and all that, but he was still a complete jerk to basically everyone. And Dumbledore was too selfish and proud to fully trust Harry, and instead made him go through a lot of anguish by not telling him the truth about virtually anything. And the magical society has a hell of a lot of problems in general!
 
Someone's introductory fact was that they'd gone to almost 30 countries. They brought this up... again.... when the dean was talking to us as a group.

I said... you know how people get malaria if they stop taking prophylaxis? Yeah....Oops.

Then the dean was talking about how he used to fly planes and stopped doing it because he almost crashed ones. It had come up earlier that I'd broken my face in a cycling accident so I raised my hand and was like "from personal experience, I can tell you that crashing a bicycle hurts. I have a feeling that crashing a plane hurts more. Thought you should know."
 
ridethecliche said:
Can I ask a serious question?

How do you guys gather your thoughts during interviews? I loved doing an MMI because I could just go and as I got more comfortable, it turned into more of a conversation/exchange with the interviewers. However in the 'traditional' format, I find myself talking a lot and probably repeating myself a lot. I probably say a few good things, but it all feels so unstructured that I have a lot of verbal diarrhea.

Three of my interviews are down and I'd like to make the next three count way harder. I think there's certainly a learning curve in here, but I want to be on the pointy end of the distribution from here on out. On fahking point.

I think the weird thing for me is that I have some cognitive dissonance from my college self, but talked about those activities in AMCAS. The dean of a school brought up some work I did in college and I kinda blew it off as 'yeah okay that happened'. I really should have gone more in depth because it was my opportunity to explain to him why what stood out to him mattered. I had all this stuff in my head, but just kind of blew it off. It was in a group format and while I enjoyed it, I'm not much of a braggart. I guess I know that there are ways to show that I loved what I did without sounding pompous about it. I feel like I've already discussed this stuff to death in my applications so don't feel the need to drone about it. I should probably trust that I know how to do it a bit more. (AND ALSO READ AND RE-READ MY APPLICATIONS!)



I talked about police brutality and profiling essentially saying what good is health if you're terrified of the very people that are supposed to protect you. Physicians take care of the victims as well and the job should be to prevent needless injury and violent not to patch it up.

People were talking about something that they were involved in and connecting it to their interests.

I guess I'm just really bad at being that self serving because I don't see the point of talking about how awesome I am. I don't want to play that game. I hate it. I already got wasted and wrote about myself in all these applications. I want people to give a crap about how I think, or what I think about when I'm free with my thoughts, not regurgitate all the **** I've already written.

This is why I like MMI's.
Click to expand...

Oh my god, I have totally been there.

For those activity questions, I would essentially recap: 1) why I chose it, 2) what I learned from it, and 3) why it motivated me to choose medicine. Like, the interviewer would go: "Ah, Nutella. So I see you worked as a Christmas elf for several years. Tell me about it." And I would go: "Well, growing up, I was determined to become a toymaker and was obsessed with Will Ferrell. Naturally, moving to the North Pole and becoming Santa's helper was the obvious choice. As a Christmas elf I became a more diligent worker and learned how to accomplish things on a tight deadline... I mean you can't deliver toys on December 26th amirite? However, while in the North Pole, I came to realize that it was extremely hard for elves to access quality, reliable healthcare. After witnessing several elves perish due to untreated gingerbread poisoning, I decided that medicine was my calling."

Don't boast. Don't brag. Talk about growth. I loved to rehash how I was a total noob in the lab/talking to patients and how I gained such and such skills over time to accomplish such and such things.

Ugh, I don't want to relive application writing. Writing/talking about myself in a positive light is hard because I love self-depreciating humour.

Another thing that also really bothered me about applications was providing specific experiences. I had no qualms talking about problems in the lab and whatnot, but I hated talking about patients' stories. Honestly, I felt like they weren't my stories to tell... I'd become privy to some very raw, very private things in patients' lives through my work/volunteering, and recounting their experiences for someone else (and sort of for personal gain) just felt wrong. I'm all for narrative medicine and learning from patients' medical experiences, but stories about others shouldn't be told to glorify yourself. 🙁 [And don't get me started about people who go to developing nations and take pictures of children for their Facebook cover page. If I ever find any of your guys' Facebooks and see pictures like those up I will judge you so hard.]

@sunflower18 amen, sista. Not to mention his whole unrequited love thing with Lily is extremely unhealthy and nothing to romanticize. If someone doesn't reciprocate your affections, please stop pursuing them.

EDIT: @ridethecliche very excellent and relevant point about the current abuse of power seen in US police force. I'm stupidly privileged enough to have never encountered such things, but the thought of such things been keeping me up at night. I can't imagine the sort of persistent, visceral fear marginalized populations must go through. 🙁
 
I loved SLU. It's my top choice now (right under UNC). Their emphasis on student wellness is frickin amazing. I actually sat in on a class because my friend and fellow Wash U graduate who is an M1 now let me join him. It was about raising personal cultural awareness, which I think is so important to address in medical school. "Everyone sees the world thru their own lens. No one has a perfect lens because we are all biased," was the basic gist of it.

I haven't had the "not-so-humble bragging circle jerk" problem at any of my interview days. Everyone I've met has been pretty chill, with the attitude of "I just wanna get in somewhere and go with that." Maybe it's more of a problem at the top tier schools? I've only been to mid tier places (besides UNC, but everyone there is super nice and chill), so I can't speak to that aspect personally.
 
ridethecliche said:
Can I ask a serious question?

How do you guys gather your thoughts during interviews. I loved doing an MMI because I could just go and as I got more comfortable, it turned into more of a conversation/exchange with the interviewers. However in the 'traditional' format, I find myself talking a lot and probably repeating myself a lot. I probably say a few good things, but it all feels so unstructured that I have a lot of verbal diarrhea.

Three of my interviews are down and I'd like to make the next three count way harder. I think there's certainly a learning curve in here, but I want to be on the pointy end of the distribution from here on out. On fahking point.

I think the weird thing for me is that I have some cognitive dissonance from my college self, but talked about those activities in AMCAS. The dean of a school brought up some work I did in college and I kinda blew it off as 'yeah okay that happened'. I really should have gone more in depth because it was my opportunity to explain to him why what stood out to him mattered. I had all this stuff in my head, but just kind of blew it off. It was in a group format and while I enjoyed it, I'm not much of a braggart. I guess I know that there are ways to show that I loved what I did without sounding pompous about it. I feel like I've already discussed this stuff to death in my applications so don't feel the need to drone about it. I should probably trust that I know how to do it a bit more. (AND ALSO READ AND RE-READ MY APPLICATIONS!)



I talked about police brutality and profiling essentially saying what good is health if you're terrified of the very people that are supposed to protect you. Physicians take care of the victims as well and the job should be to prevent needless injury and violent not to patch it up.

People were talking about something that they were involved in and connecting it to their interests.

I guess I'm just really bad at being that self serving because I don't see the point of talking about how awesome I am. I don't want to play that game. I hate it. I already got wasted and wrote about myself in all these applications. I want people to give a crap about how I think, or what I think about when I'm free with my thoughts, not regurgitate all the **** I've already written.

This is why I like MMI's.
Click to expand...
Some schools have actually adopted the MMI for the reasons you stated above. This format seems to favor the interviewers and interviewees in various regards.

Police brutality was a good answer to the "what's keeping you up at night" question. A lot of college students are actually involved in these social issues so such an answer doesn't seem contrived. On the other hand, I don't think a lot of med school applicants actually think about health inequalities, etc. I only have because I've experienced it.
Please correct me if I'm wrong here, but I'm assuming that most med school applicants come from (at least somewhat) privileged backgrounds. Therefore, I don't think it's appropriate nor practical to ask such questions.

Also, there are plenty of opportunities in med school to learn about these issues. It's practically a given during the clinical rotations. But hey, if they ask pretentious questions, they'll surely get disingenuous answers...
 
sunflower18 said:
Completely agree. I had one interview where everyone was supposed to go around and introduce themselves with a fun fact.... It turned into people just spouting the most impressive things off their resumes, and it was frustrating. One person even said something along the lines of, "My name is Jane Doe and I've done x, y, and z impressive things since I was 3.... AND my fun fact is that I've also accomplished a, b, and c over the past few years." Like, come on. Everyone sort of laughed nervously when she said "and my fun fact is" because she had just rattled off around ten activities for us, which we assumed were her "fun facts", but she wasn't joking and just kept going. I really appreciated the last person in the circle saying, "Hi, I'm John Doe, and I like to cook meals really fast while pretending I'm on the Food Network." Be John, not Jane!
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AND OH MY GOSH THE PANDERING AT VERMONT
 
Cyberdyne 101 said:
Some schools have actually adopted the MMI for the reasons you stated above. This format seems to favor the interviewers and interviewees in various regards.

Police brutality was a good answer to the "what's keeping you up at night" question. A lot of college students are actually involved in these social issues so such an answer doesn't seem contrived. On the other hand, I don't think a lot of med school applicants actually think about health inequalities, etc. I only have because I've experienced it.
Please correct me if I'm wrong here, but I'm assuming that most med school applicants come from (at least somewhat) privileged backgrounds. Therefore, I don't think it's appropriate nor practical to ask such questions.

Also, there are plenty of opportunities in med school to learn about these issues. It's practically a given during the clinical rotations. But hey, if they ask pretentious questions, they'll surely get disingenuous answers...
Click to expand...

I'm not in college but I related it to being brown and moving to the US from India right before 9-11.
I spent some time in a different interview talking about how I feel conflicted about my international health volunteer experience even though I gained a lot from it. The question is, did the people I worked with. I think so...?

I was serious when I asked the question re: gathering thoughts in an interview. I don't want to ramble anymore :/
Your tips plz?
 
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ridethecliche said:
I'm not in college but I related it to being brown and moving to the US from India right before 9-11.
I spent some time in a different interview talking about how I feel conflicted about my international health volunteer experience even though I gained a lot from it. The question is, did the people I worked with. I think so...?

I was serious when I asked the question re: gathering thoughts in an interview. I don't want to ramble anymore :/
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I'm sorry that type of profiling impacted you personally. We definitely still have a long way to go in terms of race relations...
And I can't help you with the interview stuff. I'm not there yet :/
Although, I'm sure others will chime in.
 
Cyberdyne 101 said:
I'm sorry that type of profiling impacted you personally. We definitely still have a long way to go in terms of race relations...
And I can't help you with the interview stuff. I'm not there yet :/
Although, I'm sure others will chime in.
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I don't think I was ever really 'targeted' by say police or such, so I'm lucky.

However, one of my MMI interviewers in albany brought up 9-11 in a scenario and I was thinking... she she say that because I'm a brown man with a beard because I am willing to bet that didn't come up at all and that point could have been made without referencing that at all....

And yeah, hoping others chime in as well!
 
I gather my thoughts during interviews by thinking about what is important to me and what I want my interviewer to leave the room thinking. For example, the central themes of my application are humanism/art, communication, and a passion for academic medicine. I make sure that my answers are consistent with these messages. I also agree that reading your app is important, and also having in mind a few sentences about what you've learned from each of your experiences.

I actually disagree slightly with @hellanutella regarding patient narratives... Of course you don't want to exploit the raw emotion elicited by the patients, but I find my clinical experiences to have been deeply humbling and moving, and that by sharing the gist of the story I am better able to honour the patient's experiences. So many patients are just blurs in the minds of providers -- some scattered lab values, a brief presence in a bed, a fading pulse. But by remembering the humanity of those encounters, learning and growing from that patient's uniqueness, and sharing that story with others? That patient goes from a lost moment in time to a person. So I find narratives hugely powerful and not at all selfish, at least not if they are done correctly. Aside from healing, remembering and verbalising are the most important things one can do to honour a patient's memory.
 
@ridethecliche For traditional 1-on-1 interviews, take some time to think about what you're going to say before you start talking. It is absolutely okay to not talk for 10 seconds and think of how you're going to say what you want to say. I think it's important to play to your strengths and show them who you really are during the interview. For example, I told my interviewer today that I'm an introvert who likes people in small doses (she got a kick out of that one, there was lots of laughter during this interview lololol) but I am also really able to listen to others well and I've had multiple friends talk to me 1-on-1 about personal issues. I know that extraverts like to just jump in and start talking, but that's not my style. I really have to think for a bit before I say anything, especially for a question that I have no prepared answer for. In my experience, all my interviewers wanted was to get to know me as a person, not just an applicant. So be sure to talk about things that show you are human. 😀
 
@hellanutella @sunflower18 , I totally agree with you on Dumbledore. His pride and unrealistic expectations were very detrimental to Harry... And as much as I love the HP books, they defintely romanticize the "orphan experience." While growing up, I was practically begging for responsible adults to look after me...
 
sunflower18 said:
I gather my thoughts during interviews by thinking about what is important to me and what I want my interviewer to leave the room thinking. For example, the central themes of my application are humanism/art, communication, and a passion for academic medicine. I make sure that my answers are consistent with these messages. I also agree that reading your app is important, and also having in mind a few sentences about what you've learned from each of your experiences.

I actually disagree slightly with @hellanutella regarding patient narratives... Of course you don't want to exploit the raw emotion elicited by the patients, but I find my clinical experiences to have been deeply humbling and moving, and that by sharing the gist of the story I am better able to honour the patient's experiences. So many patients are just blurs in the minds of providers -- some scattered lab values, a brief presence in a bed, a fading pulse. But by remembering the humanity of those encounters, learning and growing from that patient's uniqueness, and sharing that story with others? That patient goes from a lost moment in time to a person. So I find narratives hugely powerful and not at all selfish, at least not if they are done correctly. Aside from healing, remembering and verbalising are the most important things one can do to honour a patient's memory.
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Totally agree with you there; don't know if I'm not explaining things concisely enough. Patient stories anchor us to the humanity of medicine.

I just find relaying patient stories is a complex, powerful art... and something that many medical school applicants lack the finesse/sensitivity to do correctly. In some personal statements I have edited for others, the patient is objectified (or even "otherized" in some cases when describing the foreign/poor/disabled/mentally ill) and used as a plot device to "prove" the applicant's suitability for medical school. I guess what I'm trying to say is that if they're done correctly, they are wonderful creations. If done poorly, they will really piss Nutella off.

I just shudder to think what applicants would have written about me and my family members during the instances we were hospitalized. But then again, I may be totally off base. :shrug:

Cyberdyne 101 said:
@hellanutella @sunflower18 , I totally agree with you on Dumbledore. His pride and unrealistic expectations were very detrimental to Harry... And as much as I love the HP books, they defintely romanticize the "orphan experience." While growing up, I was practically begging for responsible adults to look after me...
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Awh, I'm really sorry to hear that Cyberdyne. 🙁 Yes, YA novels really paint a grossly inaccurate picture of the orphaned.

But Dumbledore: you run a school and yet you willingly endanger children? Lawd, no. Still love the books, despite their glaring flaws. And yes, I'd totally go to Hogwarts if given the chance, even with the totally inept staff and all.
 
hellanutella said:
Totally agree with you there; don't know if I'm not explaining things concisely enough. Patient stories anchor us to the humanity of medicine.

I just find relaying patient stories is a complex, powerful art... and something that many medical school applicants lack the finesse/sensitivity to do correctly. In some personal statements I have edited for others, the patient is objectified (or even "otherized" in some cases when describing the foreign/poor/disabled/mentally ill) and used as a plot device to "prove" the applicant's suitability for medical school. I guess what I'm trying to say is that if they're done correctly, they are wonderful creations. If done poorly, they will really piss Nutella off.

I just shudder to think what applicants would have written about me and my family members during the instances we were hospitalized. But then again, I may be totally off base. :shrug:



Awh, I'm really sorry to hear that Cyberdyne. 🙁 Yes, YA novels really paint a grossly inaccurate picture of the orphaned.

But Dumbledore: you run a school and yet you willingly endanger children? Lawd, no. Still love the books, despite their glaring flaws. And yes, I'd totally go to Hogwarts if given the chance, even with the totally inept staff and all.
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I definitely agree regarding the objectification and stigmatization of patients. And honestly, I wouldn't be surprised if others used my experiences inappropriately to "get ahead."

I actually attended a very cruel HS. I am still horrified at the manner in which we were treated by the teachers, dean, principal, etc. One kid didn't make it through freshman year... Obviously, we didn't quite grasp how awful it was while we were teens. For me it was horribly ironic. As an intellectually curious boy, such a school should have provided me with a safe haven from my hostile home. Unfortunately, it made things worse... This is one of the reasons why I'm adamant about public health related to education. Children, teens, young adults, med students, residents, etc need a learning environment that provides them with support that is proportional to the challenges they encounter. Otherwise, life will continue to mimic the Hunger Games... End of rant...
 
Cyberdyne 101 said:
I definitely agree regarding the objectification and stigmatization of patients. And honestly, I wouldn't be surprised if others used my experiences inappropriately to "get ahead."

I actually attended a very cruel HS. I am still horrified at the manner in which we were treated by the teachers, dean, principal, etc. One kid didn't make it through freshman year... Obviously, we didn't quite grasp how awful it was while we were teens. For me it was horribly ironic. As an intellectually curious boy, such a school should have provided me with a safe haven from my hostile home. Unfortunately, it made things worse... This is one of the reasons why I'm adamant about public health related to education. Children, teens, young adults, med students, residents, etc need a learning environment that provides them with support that is proportional to the challenges they encounter. Otherwise, life will continue to mimic the Hunger Games... End of rant...
Click to expand...

Oy vey. Glad it's become a 'pet issue' for you so to speak.
 
Anyone else start getting feelings of nervousness, fear, anxiety post acceptance?

don't get me wrong, im absolutely ecstatic to have been accepted, but as the new year slowly approaches, it's dawning on me that i'll be starting classes very soon. can't believe i've made it this far in life...med school. wow. it's all becoming so real.
 
dr.0ne said:
Anyone else start getting feelings of nervousness, fear, anxiety post acceptance?

don't get me wrong, im absolutely ecstatic to have been accepted, but as the new year slowly approaches, it's dawning on me that i'll be starting classes very soon. can't believe i've made it this far in life...med school. wow. it's all becoming so real.
Click to expand...

What you're describing should fill you with excitement! Definitely not fear or anxiety.
 
dr.0ne said:
Anyone else start getting feelings of nervousness, fear, anxiety post acceptance?

don't get me wrong, im absolutely ecstatic to have been accepted, but as the new year slowly approaches, it's dawning on me that i'll be starting classes very soon. can't believe i've made it this far in life...med school. wow. it's all becoming so real.
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Nervous and excited as well!
 
Hamlet on motorcycles ends tonight!
soa_cast.jpg
 
Cyberdyne 101 said:
Hamlet on motorcycles ends tonight!
soa_cast.jpg
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Quiet, you. I'm still midway through season three via netflix. Every once in while, after binging on 3-4 episodes in a row, I have to be very careful not to imitate the "Jax Teller Swagger" when walking around in public. It just doesn't look right on me.
 
hellanutella said:
Preach.

To all those who have yet to interview: As tempting as it is to pander, NEVER do it. At one interview, the "introduce yourself" component devolved into this humblebragging circlejerk. I was totally ready to talk about the sushi-making lessons I had signed up for, but gave into peer pressure and talked about the orphaned infants I had saved while on a interplanetary space exploration funded by my Nobel prize. Ugh. I wanted to slap myself afterwards.

Also, reliving an experience from my Very Awful Interview, I was asked what the latest book I read was. Truth be told, I had just binge-read all the Harry Potters over again and wrote my friends a very lengthy discourse on how, in retrospect, magical society is just as backwards as Muggle society and why neither Albus Dumbledore nor Severus Snape should be regarded as heroes. However, I didn't think "I reread all the Harry Potter books for the eightieth time" was the most savvy response to my elderly, somewhat-uptight interviewer, so I claimed my last book was "The Spirit Catches You and You Fall Down"... which is arguably my favourite medically-related book, but by no means an honest answer to his question. Again, I wanted to slap myself afterwards.

/endrant

Just had to come clean with myself.
Click to expand...

I've had very enjoyable experiences with the "fun fact" question. The best was at my home turf for sure. Despite our state and filial homogeneity, I was surprised by the diversity of the interviewee group: we had a youth pastor, a mime hobbyist, a white Bollywood dancer, a couple athletes, two Americorp folks and two graduate students (one of them was yours truly!). My fun fact was awful... I said I can sound like Siri, which I really can! 😳 And then someone said, "Well, show us!" Of course being the blockhead I was, even though I expected this response, I didn't bring my own water. I suddenly got so parched and I ended up sounding constipated lol! The rest of the day I and my group laughed about it hahaha, it was great.

hellanutella said:
Oh my god, I have totally been there.

For those activity questions, I would essentially recap: 1) why I chose it, 2) what I learned from it, and 3) why it motivated me to choose medicine. Like, the interviewer would go: "Ah, Nutella. So I see you worked as a Christmas elf for several years. Tell me about it." And I would go: "Well, growing up, I was determined to become a toymaker and was obsessed with Will Ferrell. Naturally, moving to the North Pole and becoming Santa's helper was the obvious choice. As a Christmas elf I became a more diligent worker and learned how to accomplish things on a tight deadline... I mean you can't deliver toys on December 26th amirite? However, while in the North Pole, I came to realize that it was extremely hard for elves to access quality, reliable healthcare. After witnessing several elves perish due to untreated gingerbread poisoning, I decided that medicine was my calling."

Don't boast. Don't brag. Talk about growth. I loved to rehash how I was a total noob in the lab/talking to patients and how I gained such and such skills over time to accomplish such and such things.

Ugh, I don't want to relive application writing. Writing/talking about myself in a positive light is hard because I love self-depreciating humour.

Another thing that also really bothered me about applications was providing specific experiences. I had no qualms talking about problems in the lab and whatnot, but I hated talking about patients' stories. Honestly, I felt like they weren't my stories to tell... I'd become privy to some very raw, very private things in patients' lives through my work/volunteering, and recounting their experiences for someone else (and sort of for personal gain) just felt wrong. I'm all for narrative medicine and learning from patients' medical experiences, but stories about others shouldn't be told to glorify yourself. 🙁 [And don't get me started about people who go to developing nations and take pictures of children for their Facebook cover page. If I ever find any of your guys' Facebooks and see pictures like those up I will judge you so hard.]

@sunflower18 amen, sista. Not to mention his whole unrequited love thing with Lily is extremely unhealthy and nothing to romanticize. If someone doesn't reciprocate your affections, please stop pursuing them.

EDIT: @ridethecliche very excellent and relevant point about the current abuse of power seen in US police force. I'm stupidly privileged enough to have never encountered such things, but the thought of such things been keeping me up at night. I can't imagine the sort of persistent, visceral fear marginalized populations must go through. 🙁
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I agree with you 97% on everything you wrote about here. @ridethecliche Talk about growth, talk about what you learnt and how this has impacted your perspectives/ambitions/interests. Bring up each experience/endeavor/activity like someone interviewing for a corporate job would, with enthusiasm and a matter-of-fact manner describing your motivations, the opportunity, and what you took from it AND what you contributed. I love telling stories, and I think that's the sort of tone to take with the "Tell me about yourself" question and other questions too. And just the way one talks about an endeavor is very important, and the key is to use tones and expressions that are humble. For example, I brought up a fundraiser I worked in for a lot of the team conflict questions. We raised 200,000 dollars in our small college town for so-and-so purpose, and instead of just saying the fact, I added, "It was so fulfilling and I was just so happy to be a part of this and help out my community in my own way."

The 3% I don't agree is about Sev, which is probably because I wasted my teen years reading way too much HP fanfiction, especially of the variety where Sev becomes a father figure to Harry -- and I should stop talking now because I'm embarassing myself 😳
 
Thank you for that @researchismymiddlename

Can you guys do me a huge favor? Can you just write out some of these questions? My thought processes are always better when I write them out and seeing them written out and writing out a blurb or something about them will help me keep things in mind.

I'm making myself so nervous about these now and I don't know why. I'm a huge people person. I just hate stating accomplishments. I suppose I need to get better at ignoring the acknowledgements and talking more about what I learned. That's a great way to get around the hurdle in my mind.

I love hearing these perspectives. They make me feel so much better about all of this. I just feel so unfocused when I sit down across from someone because it feels like there's so much to me that it all comes out in a jumbled heapy mess.
 
ProbablyAPenguin said:
View attachment 187653
So this arrived for me from home today 🙂 (and by home I mean my family ordered it from Amazon and sent it to me)
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o_____________________________________________o
I want to be adopted into your family. I was just talking about this stuff on here a few days ago.

Edit: Holy crap, it's $24 bucks on Amazon? It's only $10 in store. Guess I can never move too far away from T. Joe's.
 
sunflower18 said:
Peppermint bark is AMAZING AMAZING AMAZING
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Got my fingers crossed for you and Case today! Maybe they're really slacking with your interview date.

I'm just getting very weary of this waiting. I want to know a) acceptance or rejection? and b) if accepted, what is my finaid going to look like? Bam. That's it. I'm already dreading the notion of doing the long, drawn-out waitlist game.
 
ridethecliche said:
Thank you for that @researchismymiddlename

Can you guys do me a huge favor? Can you just write out some of these questions? My thought processes are always better when I write them out and seeing them written out and writing out a blurb or something about them will help me keep things in mind.

I'm making myself so nervous about these now and I don't know why. I'm a huge people person. I just hate stating accomplishments. I suppose I need to get better at ignoring the acknowledgements and talking more about what I learned. That's a great way to get around the hurdle in my mind.

I love hearing these perspectives. They make me feel so much better about all of this. I just feel so unfocused when I sit down across from someone because it feels like there's so much to me that it all comes out in a jumbled heapy mess.
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First off -- you are accomplished and unique, but it's OK to be nervous with how you present yourself! For me it was so weird because I was nervous in interview #1, not nervous at all for interview #2, but for some reason at interview #3 I got relatively nervous again, but I wasn't nervous at all for my last two interviews. I wonder if this nervousness peak appeared because after a couple interviews I just want to do even better and because of this, I set new standards for myself which made me more nervous.

When I go home tonight I will send you my sample Q list that I curated, and also answers I crafted to them 🙂 Ultimately, I wrote out every single answer as an outline and it's served me SO WELL because my thoughts were much more organized. When I step into the room, I hit points 1, 2 and 3 in those answers... which is exactly what I wanted to convey. I hope it helps!
 
hellanutella said:
Got my fingers crossed for you and Case today! Maybe they're really slacking with your interview date.

I'm just getting very weary of this waiting. I want to know a) acceptance or rejection? and b) if accepted, what is my finaid going to look like? Bam. That's it. I'm already dreading the notion of doing the long, drawn-out waitlist game.
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Agreed. I believe we are both waiting on the same three schools in the next week or 2?
 
ridethecliche said:
Thank you for that @researchismymiddlename

Can you guys do me a huge favor? Can you just write out some of these questions? My thought processes are always better when I write them out and seeing them written out and writing out a blurb or something about them will help me keep things in mind.

I'm making myself so nervous about these now and I don't know why. I'm a huge people person. I just hate stating accomplishments. I suppose I need to get better at ignoring the acknowledgements and talking more about what I learned. That's a great way to get around the hurdle in my mind.

I love hearing these perspectives. They make me feel so much better about all of this. I just feel so unfocused when I sit down across from someone because it feels like there's so much to me that it all comes out in a jumbled heapy mess.
Click to expand...
To prepare for my interviews I use SDN's interview feedback and make a super long list of all of the questions past applicants have been asked (within the past 3-4 years) and I go over each questions. If questions repeat, I make a note of them. I also outlined my 'How did you get to medicine' and 'Tell me a little about yourself' answers at the beginning of the cycle, and reviewed those answers before each interview. Finally, before each interview I research the school and make a 3 point answer of "why this school". If that helps!
 
ProbablyAPenguin said:
Agreed. I believe we are both waiting on the same three schools in the next week or 2?
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Think so: Vandy, Hopkins, and CCLCM? Didn't update Vandy or CCLCM, which I think rely heavily on "love letters".... ooops. Too late now. I'm betting you'll be going in for a triple win! 😀

I also have UCSF, which will probably be pushed back to January given the info later interview dates have received. It's just the uncertainty that's killing me.

@ridethecliche I did something similar as Penguin and Research for my first interview... then gave up and winged the rest of my interviews from there. The best practice I found was just sitting down with one of my extremely critical mentors and having them drill me with interview-y questions. That helped a lot in getting over my stage fright, learning to think off the top of my head, and removing the "rehearsed" sound that comes from regurgitating secondary prompts. 😉
 
hellanutella said:
Think so: Vandy, Hopkins, and CCLCM? Didn't update Vandy or CCLCM, which I think rely heavily on "love letters".... ooops. Too late now. I'm betting you'll be going in for a triple win! 😀

I also have UCSF, which will probably be pushed back to January given the info later interview dates have received. It's just the uncertainty that's killing me.

@ridethecliche I did something similar as Penguin and Research for my first interview... then gave up and winged the rest of my interviews from there. The best practice I found was just sitting down with one of my extremely critical mentors and having them drill me with interview-y questions. That helped a lot in getting over my stage fright, learning to think off the top of my head, and removing the "rehearsed" sound that comes from regurgitating secondary prompts. 😉
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Hahaha I doubt a triple win! i would be more than thrilled with an acceptance from any of them! I only sent an update to vandy and hopkins... I interviewed at CCLCM late enough that I decided I hadn't had time for a substantial update.... especially not with my paper out the door. Since they rely so heavily on research, I think that's an update best saved for later.

OOO UCSF would be exciting 🙂 🙂 I'm waiting on Baylor which could be anytime from now until March... but as my second interview it didn't go that well, so i'm not holding my breath 🙂
 
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