MMI interview?

[bbozo]

Hello!
I noticed that pretty much every vet school that conducts interviews follows the MMI format.

MMI's are defined as "A series of timed scenarios, which assess attributes such as communication skills, ethical and moral judgment, management of team and self, problem solving and critical thinking abilities and creativity."

This description is both vague and confusing I was wondering if anyone who has been invited to do a MMI interview at a vet school can explain what to expect, what type of questions/scenarios you're asked, the format and your personal experience with the MMI's

Thank you!

(sorry if this a dupe thread )

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[SocialStigma]

For confidentiality reasons, we aren't allowed to disclose questions that were asked. But the gist of my MMI was 10-12 stations (can't remember exactly the number). We had 2 mins outside the room to read the question/scenario and jot down some notes. After 2 mins, a bell rings and you go into the room with the interviewers (2-3 people). We had 8 mins total to present our case, if we finished early then we could either sit in silence or leave the room. After the full 10 mins, everyone moves to the next station. We didn't have any breaks in between for my MMI.

 

[DVMoftheFuture]

MMI Questions!

 

[hopefulequinedr]

Just to clarify, I don’t think that most schools that interview use MMI. I interviewed at 6 schools this past application cycle and only 1 used MMI. From my experience, the MMI style was personally my least favorite and more stressful.

I interviewed at Texas A&M and their set up was two minutes outside the room to look over the question and gather your thoughts (we could take notes and bring them in with us), 6 minutes in the room to answer the question and each room had 2 interviewers (if you finished early they would then talk to you like where are you from, etc but this part did not count towards your interview), and then 2 minutes outside the room before moving to the next station (total of 6 stations).

I liked how we were able to look at the questions first, but overall I did not like the format. I liked all of the other interviews that I attended better because I was able to ask my interviewers questions at the end to help get a better feel for the school, environment, and curriculum. I know the MMIs are designed to level the playing field, but I liked how in other interviews if I answered their question and peaked their interest on something they could ask other questions to follow up, even if you could tell they weren’t the specific questions that they were asking everyone. The other interviews were also more relaxed and conversation like to me, and I walked away enjoying the interview process.

That’s just my personal experience though. Best of luck!

 

[finnickthedog]

Yeah, so like SocialStigma I can't actually tell you about the questions themselves. I think she pretty accurately described the basic set up of an MMI. Some aspects will vary however. The number of stations may vary depending on the school as well as the amount time allotted per station. You may or may not be able to jot down notes. There might be multiple interviewers in the room or just one. You may be allowed to leave the room when finished or you might be expected to just sit there until the time runs out.

Overall, my personal experience with MMIs was positive and I prefer them to a traditional interview. Once I got into the first station and the initial anxiety of not knowing what to expect was gone, I was fairly relaxed and honestly it might have been fun if I didn't have it in the back of my head that... ya know, it was a vet school interview. One of the things I really like about them is that I can mess up on a question and not let it affect the rest of my interview going forward because I feel like I get a clean slate with each station... the new interviewer doesn't know me and can't judge me on how I answered previous questions because they don't know. That's relaxing to me.

Will also note, I'm not sure if it's accurate to say that most vet schools use MMI. At least a handful definitely do, but I never got the impression that it was most. I don't know the actual numbers on that though.

 

[TheGirlWithTheFernTattoo]

Many schools will offer mock MMI services, you should check those out. I think it is more common for med school applicants, so check through that campus organization or the school career centre.

 

[Devastating]

I had an MMI Interview at Texas A&M. My experience was mostly the same as SocialStigma's, except that after finishing our answer we were then allowed to make small-talk with the interviewers with any remaining time (interviewers asking you things like "what are your hobbies", with no bearing on your evaluation). TAMU had us watch a brief orientation video explaining the MMI process beforehand, and once we started on the scenarios I felt more relaxed and didn't find it nerve-wracking--since it's a comparatively active process, I almost could have forgotten the fact that it was a vet school interview. I may be in the minority because I heard a lot of people afterward say the format stressed them out and they didn't really like it, but I did.

I liked being able to formulate my thoughts on a (usually ethics-based) scenario, which were actually pretty interesting, and then explain my reasoning to the interviewers. I agree with what Finnick said, the whole "clean slate" thing is also a huge plus if you ever feel like you stumbled on a question, something I definitely wish I had on my traditional interview. I'm a "wing it" type of person, so it was kinda reassuring being able to come in to the process with zero knowledge of the questions/scenarios and make responses knowing I would have a clean slate each time. And at least in TAMU's case we did still get to have some rapport with the interviewers, it def would have been awkward if we had to sit in silence. Probably the only things that made me feel slightly nervous in this format is that you don't really get feedback during your answer, and I finished every single room with some amount of extra time (which always made me feel like I should have had more to say, even though they constantly reassure you not to worry about not using all the allotted time).

 

[JustPaws]

I did an mmi at MSU and really liked it. MSU has a video example on their admissions site for anyone to watch. I liked the questions and after the initial stress, it went so fast that I didn't worry too much. I also liked having a different interviewer in each room for the same reason as Finnickthedog.

 

[MixedAnimals77]

I did an mmi at MSU and really liked it. MSU has a video example on their admissions site for anyone to watch. I liked the questions and after the initial stress, it went so fast that I didn't worry too much. I also liked having a different interviewer in each room for the same reason as Finnickthedog.

I did MMI at CSU. Use Paw's video! It's a great example of kind of what to expect. We had 2 minutes to read followed by 6 to respond. Our interviews were 1 on 1. Some questions were ethical, some were problem solving, some were personality based. Sometimes there was only the one question while other scenarios had 2-4 follow up questions. I have to agree I was stressed on my first one but after that it was easy. I can't say I like MMI better or not over traditional. I felt most at ease I think with traditionals because it's about me and who knows yourself better than you? At the same time though the clean slate is definately a nice thing.

 

[mmmdreamerz]

I personally had a lot of fun doing MMI at VAMD. I just treated it like a game

 

[jtab]

I'm not sure if ethical questions will show up in vet school mmi's, but for my medical school mmis I definitely benefitted from learning some ethics before hand (i.e. competency, going through different ethical scenarios, etc)

 

[philthyj]

Just to clarify, I don’t think that most schools that interview use MMI. I interviewed at 6 schools this past application cycle and only 1 used MMI. From my experience, the MMI style was personally my least favorite and more stressful.

I interviewed at Texas A&M and their set up was two minutes outside the room to look over the question and gather your thoughts (we could take notes and bring them in with us), 6 minutes in the room to answer the question and each room had 2 interviewers (if you finished early they would then talk to you like where are you from, etc but this part did not count towards your interview), and then 2 minutes outside the room before moving to the next station (total of 6 stations).

I liked how we were able to look at the questions first, but overall I did not like the format. I liked all of the other interviews that I attended better because I was able to ask my interviewers questions at the end to help get a better feel for the school, environment, and curriculum. I know the MMIs are designed to level the playing field, but I liked how in other interviews if I answered their question and peaked their interest on something they could ask other questions to follow up, even if you could tell they weren’t the specific questions that they were asking everyone. The other interviews were also more relaxed and conversation like to me, and I walked away enjoying the interview process.

That’s just my personal experience though. Best of luck!

So just to clarify, it was mainly just you presenting the case, and not much back and forth between you and the interviewer? In other words, they just listened to your case and didn't ask any questions about it? Then after you briefly chatted off record?

 

[DogtorWannabe]

Multiple Mini Interview (MMI): Winning Strategies from Admissions Faculty / Edition 1

This book was so, so helpful to me when I was preparing for my MMI at Michigan. It is written for medical school applicants, but the information still absolutely applies. What I really liked about it was that it helps give you a process to use in the interviews to think through the facets of each question/scenario so that you can give the fullest answer possible. Also helps to point out what kind of concepts a question might be getting at (ethics, compassion, etc.) so that you can make sure to hit on those things in the time allotted. It’s a quick read, and I would highly recommend it!

 

[JustPaws]

Multiple Mini Interview (MMI): Winning Strategies from Admissions Faculty / Edition 1

This book was so, so helpful to me when I was preparing for my MMI at Michigan. It is written for medical school applicants, but the information still absolutely applies. What I really liked about it was that it helps give you a process to use in the interviews to think through the facets of each question/scenario so that you can give the fullest answer possible. Also helps to point out what kind of concepts a question might be getting at (ethics, compassion, etc.) so that you can make sure to hit on those things in the time allotted. It’s a quick read, and I would highly recommend it!

I used the same book!

 

[ziggyandjazzy]

Multiple Mini Interview (MMI): Winning Strategies from Admissions Faculty / Edition 1

This book was so, so helpful to me when I was preparing for my MMI at Michigan. It is written for medical school applicants, but the information still absolutely applies. What I really liked about it was that it helps give you a process to use in the interviews to think through the facets of each question/scenario so that you can give the fullest answer possible. Also helps to point out what kind of concepts a question might be getting at (ethics, compassion, etc.) so that you can make sure to hit on those things in the time allotted. It’s a quick read, and I would highly recommend it!

I also read it and found it helpful.

I generally prefer MMIs to traditional interviews. They are less bias and I think give a better impression of a person instead of everyone just stating boring scripted answers.