Frequently asked interview questions!!

[rsweeney]

Hey SDN, I scanned the "interview feedback" posts and compiled some frequently asked questions by interviewers at various dental schools. To potentially benefit yourself and to help those on SDN, maybe we can post some of our own answers on here---granted each answer is strictly individual and may not apply to others, some answers may give people a baseline of where to start when coming up with their own answer. Just a random thought!
Here we go:

1. What do you think the contributions of medicine will help dentistry?
2. What makes you think you should be a dentist (asked in a demeaning tone)?
3. How do I feel that my previous work in dental offices will help me in dental school?
4. Why do you want to be a dentist?
5. Why did you choose to apply to our school?
6. Your DAT scores are not in the top 5%, what did you do wrong in studying, and how are you going to fix it?
7. Why Dentistry?
8. What is your greatest Achievement?
9. How is your interest in preventative medicine going to transfer to dentistry? Why would we want a student like you here? We have many applicants who demonstrate that they have something to offer us
10. Why do you think you'll make a successful dentist?
11. What are the responsibilities of the dentist to a patient?
12. If the patient had committed a heinous crime would you treat them like every other patient?
13. How did you prepare for the DAT?
14. Why is your calculus grade low?
15. I know you were waiting for this question and we ALWAYS ask this question to all the students.... Why do you want to become a dentist?
16. What do you do for fun?
17. Your calculus grade is not as good, why do you think that is?
18. How do you feel your maturity level has changed during your time in college, and how will this effect you as a dental student?
19. What makes your application stand out from the others?
20. Do you think that you would be able to handle the competition at our school?
21. What are your strengths and weaknesses?
22. What other schools have you been accepted to?
23. Why X school?
24. What are you most proud of?
25. I see your PAT score is low--can you explain that?
26. Tell me about yourself?
27. So, you went to ...... (school) and you have a ... GPA, you were having fun, right?
28. What has been your greatest challenge?
29. What is a recent great challenge that you had to overcome?
30. If I was the fairy of dental admissions and I told you I could get you in anywhere...except NYU because they filled up last week....where would you want to go? Also...does your mother work?
31. Do you have any specific questions about our program?
32. How does your research experience relate to your wanting to be a dentist?
33. What other schools did you apply to, and why?
34. What specialty are you looking to get in to? (This is a trick question. If you're asked this, never respond ortho or perio or whatever specialty you're thinking of saying. The only correct answer is to say you would like to get more experience before deciding on a specialty.)
35. How safe are amalgam restorations?
36. Are you really prepared for how difficult these next four years will be?
37. What do you do to relax?
38. If you could be a piece of furniture, what would you be?
39. What and how had it made you turn your academic career around? (about my GPA)
40. If you could pick one person to sit next to you on the plane ride back home (non-family member) who would it be and why?
41. Why not medical school anymore?
42. What do you do in your free time?
43. Do you think music will affect you positively in school?
44. How do you want to be remembered? (Yes, when you die. that was a cheerful question, esp. given the neighborhood. I guess it they were being realistic.)
45. (While reviewing my application) I see you were in the pre-dental club and did volunteering in the hospital but not in the dental ER. Why did you do that?
46. When you were studying for your exams what would you do to reward yourself? What did you do while you took study breaks?
47. Tell me about yourself and your family.
48. What do your parents do?

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[Reed1978]

NO WAY!! I was literally in the process of making a 200+ interview question list to put on here!! outstanding!!

 

[rsweeney]

WOOHOO!! 153 to go

 

[ItsGavinC]

Here is an interview tip:

Being a succesful interviewee is all about knowing yourself. If you know yourself then there isn't any question you can't answer with confidence and with in a professor and polite manner.

My interviewers asked me those questions, but they were always in the course of a discussion. It wasn't as if they sat back and said asked #13. They merely asked #13 after we talked about golf for a little while.

Don't stress over interviews. If you are seriously reviewing 200 questions you are doing about 195 questions too many.

 

[tinker bell]

My most frequent questions are:

1. Tell me about yourself
2. Why do you want to be dentist.
3. Tell us about your community service.

Even I published papers, listed tons of research and dental experiences,,,,etc....none of those questions never came up. They seem to more interested to learn about your personality than your resume. They know what you do by reading your files. But the #1 question will tell them the most about you. I was asked that question everywhere I went.

 

[aphistis]

This thread is starting to remind me of the pre-allopathic board...

 

[ecdoesit]

hehe, is dental interivew similar to Medical interview?
how many people will ask you questions during the interview?

 

[aphistis]

The point of my last post was that the attitude of this thread is beginning to resemble the pre-MD board (where thread topics like "staple or paper clip for application?" are not unknown). You can't study for an interview the way you can for a test. It's not an exam, it's an interpersonal exercise. Remember, as dentists, you'll have a significant amount of patient contact, and your responsibility will be making that interaction as positive as possible.

Adcoms are smart folks, but it's possible to sucker them with pre-canned material on applications. Doing that in the interview environment, however, is a much taller order. If you're given an interview, you've already made the sell intellectually; the interview is showing them the kind of person you are, not the kind of brain sits behind your eyes.

Finally, I have no idea whatsoever how dental interviews compare to medical. I imagine there's a lot of overlap, but I never applied to med school.

 

[PERFECT3434]

hi aphistis,

well i am glad i found you since i have an interview lined up at indiana next month. i know that people tell you to just be yourself. however, this will be my 1st interview at a professional school and the fact that indiana is my 1st choice for dental school makes me that much more nervous. i feel soooo much pressure, because my #1 choice of schools have given me the 1st interview (how coincidental) and i really do not want to screw it up. any helpful ideas for the interview?

also i was told that some schools may ask questions like what do you think about the war in Iraq or Afghanistan. is it true that they may ask questions that are not related at all to dentistry?