most bizarre interview moment?

Med School Insiders
This forum made possible through the generous support of SDN members, donors, and sponsors. Thank you.
Originally posted by Robz
My most bizarre interview moment was when a physiology professor that I was interviewing with actually went of on what he called "lazy" medical students that wern't ready for the workload of medical school and wanted to slide by at the end without doing most of the work. He then went off on a tangent about how anyone with a MCAT below 24 should never be allowed into medical school and they will fail miserably. To me he just seemed like a slightly bitter older physician. I just kept thinking to myself that I would not want to have a class with him.
Click to expand...

Which school was this? Not a school in TN by any chance...

CCW
 
Originally posted by celticmists18
One of my interviewers asked me what I planned to do if I didn't get into medical school, if I would re-apply, and if I had considered my other options.
Click to expand...

Other popular responses are: "I hear the Grenada is f***ing sweet this time of year!"

CCW
 
Originally posted by Cooper_Wriston
Which school was this? Not a school in TN by any chance...

CCW
Click to expand...

Yes it was. It wasn't Vandy, UT or ETSU either.
 
One of my interviewers was M4 guy. He was kinda weird anyway, but one of his questions was just the best. He showed my a paper he need to fill out about me and my characteristics and said:"Well, don't worry a lot about this interview. I just have to fill it out. Basically, they (adm. com) want to make sure that you are not crazy. Are you crazy?" Can you imagine that???
I was absolutely unprepared to that kind of question. I stared at him for a second trying to think of an answer. My sarcastic sense of humor made me say the following: not lately... Then I saw a very stange face he made at this moment and I confessed that I''m joking.....
To tell you the truth, by the end of the interview I really wanted to ask HIM the same question....but it's another story
 
Two tough interview experiences, although not for med school:

One guy asked me what type of music I listened to. I told him I had an eclectic taste and didn't limit myself to just one type of music. His answer: "That's the WORST answer you could have ever given me" 🙄 . Ended up not getting that job.

In another interview the dude was just asking general questions on my background, and then throws in a crazy one I'd never heard before:

"Tell me a joke".

I was able to get out of it by telling him a funny story, but still, that's probably one of the toughest questions out there.
 
Originally posted by DoctorKevin
haha, celticchemist i did that same thing at USC, saying i was accepted at UCSD. unfortunately, it doesn't seem like this was a good idea in terms of getting in at USC.

but it felt really good at the time! that's what they get for being condescending.
Click to expand...

I got a similar question at UCLA, but it wasn't asked in a condescending way; it was more out of curiosity. So I told him SUNY Upstate, Jefferson, Vanderbilt. He actually wrote all of them down...but I used it as a chance to say, "Yea, but if I'm accepted here, I'll definitely pick here over all the other schools"

I guess you can kinda turn the question into showing your interest for the school 😉
 
one of my interviewers asked me riddles. he even made me take one home and email him the answer. and he kept telling me that my answers had nothing to do with his feedback.
 
In one of my interviews, I had a strange coincidence.
Before applying, I had worked on a thesis that used CB3 virus to induce myocarditis in mice, which is an obscure immunological field.
When I got to the interview, I found out that the MD who was supposed to interview me had an emergency, and I was the only person whose interview was rescheduled with another faculty member.
The guy was a Phd, and as we were talking, he asked what I did my thesis /research on. THe moment I mentioned my labwork, he interrupted and said "You're kidding me!! That's the same thing I worked on!!" (the same virus& method &all) So we talked about our lab experiences quite a bit and found out that we had lots of mutual acquaintances in the immunology field. (He knew my PI, who wrote my LOR for me)
We also talked about books, and it also turns out that the last book we had mutually read was "COld Mountain". 😛
I got accepted three weeks later! I really lucked out


Also, this isn't so much as weird, but funny. At another interview, I thought that I had brought my bag with me into my interviewer's office. After the interview, as I was leaving, I reached for a bag parked next to my seat thinking it was mine. It was actually my interviewer's briefcase and he actually reached out to physically restrain me from taking his bag. um yeah.. haven't heard from that school...
 
Originally posted by mangotango
It was actually my interviewer's briefcase and he actually reached out to physically restrain me from taking his bag. um yeah.. haven't heard from that school...
Click to expand...

I wonder if he wrote kleptomaniac on his review... 😛
 
Originally posted by drlexygoat
I was asked "What is the color of love" by an interviewer. I sat there puzzled for a minute. Then the doc burst out laughing, telling me he just likes to see people sweat that one.
Click to expand...

Haha, that's evil asking a question like that when someone is about to implode from interview pressure.

Kinda like if you were a doctor and you said to a patient "Well there's no easy way to tell you this... (long pause)' then slap him on the back and say just kidding, you're fine.
 
I have two interesting interview experiences...


This first was this summer when I was interviewing for a clinical research position. After interviewing with the Clinic Director and PI for about an hour, they invited me to shadow a coordinator to get a flavor of the place.

Of course I agreed, even though I had driven 250 miles that morning to get there and it was noon and I hadn't eaten yet. About 5 minutes into watching the coordinator put an EKG on a patient I began to feel flush and hot. Next thing I knew I was being dragged down the hall by two ladies - one a foot taller than me, the other a foot shorter.

After passing out and then throwing up in front of the entire office staff and a few patients, I got up, realized what had happened and was offered the job.


When it came time for my first medical school interview, I decided to drive up to the city the night before and stay with an acquaintance (this city is about 45 min away in good traffic, 2 hours in rush hour and the forecast called for snow). I thought this would also be a great chance for me to meet up with an MIII I knew to get confidence and a feel for the school and interview process.

I arrived at my hostess?s house at 8:30 pm and left to meet Mr. MIII at 9. On my way, I was broadsided and my car was totaled!

After dealing with the insurance company/towers/family, I got to sleep at about 3 am, but the next day during the lunch I sat with a guy who was on rotations with Mr. MIII and had just heard about my accident! 🙂

It turned out wrecking my car was a nice ice-breaker/conversation piece during that awkward day of interviews/being watched.
 
Interview with the Dean of Admissions at Pitt.
Dean: What other schools did you have interview at?
Me: VCU, EVMS, Syracuse
Dean: My brother-in-law is on admission committee at EVMS
Me: Oh, don't tell me he interviewed me there.
Dean: No, probably not.
Me: Does he wear glasses?
Dean: Everybody wears glasses nowdays.
Me: Is he tall?
Dean: No, he is short!
Me (shaking head in disbelief): I don't know, HE LOOKED KIND OF LIKE YOU.
Dean (after staring at me for at least 5 sec): I said he is my brother-in-law, HE IS NOT RELATED TO ME. 😱
Me (after staring at DC for at least 5 sec): So, I really liked your booklet... :
 
One interviewer used the F word about ten times in my interview. He also told me how he met his wife.... how he asked her out because she had a nice behind. Yuck!
 
iliab said:
Interview with the Dean of Admissions at Pitt.
Dean: What other schools did you have interview at?
Me: VCU, EVMS, Syracuse
Dean: My brother-in-law is on admission committee at EVMS
Me: Oh, don't tell me he interviewed me there.
Dean: No, probably not.
Me: Does he wear glasses?
Dean: Everybody wears glasses nowdays.
Me: Is he tall?
Dean: No, he is short!
Me (shaking head in disbelief): I don't know, HE LOOKED KIND OF LIKE YOU.
Dean (after staring at me for at least 5 sec): I said he is my brother-in-law, HE IS NOT RELATED TO ME. 😱
Me (after staring at DC for at least 5 sec): So, I really liked your booklet... :
Click to expand...

thats funny 😀 ....... did they accept you??
 
asked at two top ten med schools, and all the rest:
"Do you think you are an alcoholic?"
 
After my interviewer finished asking all of his questions, he sat back in his chair, shrugged, and said, "well...you're not an a$$****." I let out a big laugh, but he remained serious. "No, seriously, that's mostly what we're looking for. I have no doubt you'll get in." And I did.
 
patzan said:
After my interviewer finished asking all of his questions, he sat back in his chair, shrugged, and said, "well...you're not an a$$****." I let out a big laugh, but he remained serious. "No, seriously, that's mostly what we're looking for. I have no doubt you'll get in." And I did.
Click to expand...

Are you serious ........ What did you say gee thanks 😀
 
I've seen some other people have had the same interviewer as I did at Tulane (the retired admiral). He walked into the interview room and when he saw me, he called me "that Florida son of a bit##"

He spent the whole half an hour cursing about everything--it was the best interview I've ever had in my life; I just had fun the whole time.

Needless to say, his attitude sold me on Tulane, and I'll be there in a few months.
 
patzan said:
After my interviewer finished asking all of his questions, he sat back in his chair, shrugged, and said, "well...you're not an a$$****." I let out a big laugh, but he remained serious. "No, seriously, that's mostly what we're looking for. I have no doubt you'll get in." And I did.
Click to expand...

what school is this? i'd like to apply there.
 
At Ohio State, they paired me up with an interviewer who had attended my undergrad university approximately 30 years prior. Two seconds after shaking me hand, he asked me to please sing the alma mater for him. I just stared at him. . . I swear, I couldn't sing it if my life depended on it! So then *he* sung it from start to finish for me. Then he asked what the Latin on the school seal read. Again, I had no idea, so he had to tell me. It was terrible.
 
An interviewer was looking over my file and asked if I had applied to Baylor; I said I hadn't. He then asked me why I had not b/c he thought I had excellent chances of getting in. Well I don't know what came over me and why I just didn't shut up because I proceeded to tell him that I attended a summer program at Baylor and that I wasn't particularily impressed by the way the dean of admissions emphasized that their school is "all about numbers". I told him that this kind of environment was not what I wanted to be a part of. I then went on and told him that I believe there are more tangible qualities in an applicant that a medical school should be looking for rather than "all about numbers". When it was all said and done, he went on to say, "I guess Baylor has changed since I last attended medical school there". 😱 Unbelievable, what are the chances????? I just wanted to crawl in a hole.

Luckily I got into my top choice in the Texas match... 🙂
 
At UTH, it was their first interview day so I think everyone hadn't gotten in the swing of things yet...the first woman to interview me kept asking me "Do you have any other questions?" so I kept coming up with them, but she didn't have answers to any of them, and after several rounds of this she stated in an accusatory tone, "Well it's 11 minutes after your time is up! I guess you should be going!" A lovely person I'm sure, but it was a disconcerting conclusion to the interview. I matched there...but after that, when people would ask me if I had any questions for them, I stuck with one question and then refused to ask any more! And at Baylor, one of my interviewers was a student, which caught me off guard, and after what seemed like the right amount of time I just got up to leave during one of his looooooong pauses between questions, but he wasn't done yet! I think I flustered him - he's probably never had someone try to escape before. I'm going to Baylor...I ran into the guy, he's totally nice, but I think he thinks I'm crazy.
 
bump + 10 characters
 
My interviewer was an old Marine who is a Vietnam Vet. No nonsense kind of man.

Interviewer: So what's it like to grow up poor?
Me: It sucks.
Interviewer: I bet.
Me: I don't let it limit me.
Interviewer: Good. Want a cigarette?
Me: Um, no thank you.
Interviewer: Don't be polite, you're in. Now, do you want a cigarette?
Me: If you insist.

I got in, went, and he's still one of my friends!
 
The day before leaving for one of my schools, I scratched my cornea slightly with my contact. I told the student health center doctor that I had an interview coming up, and he didn't make me wear the patch, he just told me to stay out of the sun, wear my glasses, and use sunglasses when outside (the really dark eye surgery ones). Well I go to my second interview of the day at this school and the chair the interviewer asks me to sit in is right in a direct beam of sunlight facing a window. I sit down and my eye immediately begins throbbing and tearing and swelling up. I try and struggle through the interview, but halfway through the guy looks at me and just says, "Are you okay?" Finally I fess up, and he starts cracking up!! He thought I was haveing a nervous breakdown or something. we switched seats and had a great rest of the interview!
 
At one of my interviews, I was asked for about 10 minutes about ticks: I had to name two diseases they carry, what animals tend to have them, what attracts ticks, and a way to capture ticks.... all this because I'm from Virginia.
 
Look at this thread from another pre-med forum

It's about McMaster's interview this year. The school switched to a multi mini-interview format with a bunch of different, short scenarios/interviews with a couple of minutes in between each. This one's crazy.
 
At one of my interviews the interview coordinator was telling me where to go and then adds not to be put off but the Dr. I was interviewing with had a parrot in his office and keeps the room really dark. Ok great. Well the interview started out ok he was nice and laid-back. But he kept asking me little questions about how old people were that worked with me and stuff. Eventually
he says are you even 21? (I dont think they are supposed to ask questions about age)
me: yes, I am 21
him: really? you dont look a day over 15.
me: nope, 21. (trying to think of something) well I do get that a lot. on the flight here they tried to kick me out of the emergency exit row (you have to be 15 to sit there).
him: laugh
me thinking "doh i guess i should have said something to make myself seem more mature instead of less. arg"

got waitlisted
 
Well, this isn't so much bizzare as it is ironic. On the way to my second interview at UTHSCSA, I learned it would be with a trauma surgeon. I thought to myself, this will be interesting -- don't see many of those.

Well, I'm on the 1st floor and his office is on the 7th. And of course it was just my damn luck that the elevators on that side of the building were broken. So I had to hike my ass up 6 flights of stairs and greet his secretary all out of breath.

So, we're talking, and notices that my work history lists "Walt Disney World". He asks me about it, and I tell him about how I was a lifeguard there for the College Program and had a great time. I thought, he being a trauma surgeon and all, wouldn't be very interested in talking about Disney all that much. But come to find out, he wore a Goofy costume and would waterski around the parks for over 12 years! We ended up spending the next 45 minutes talking about Disney World and how crappy Eisner is. 🙂

And now, I'm a MS1 at UTHSCSA. 😎
 
Daddysoy said:
At one of my interviews, I was asked for about 10 minutes about ticks: I had to name two diseases they carry, what animals tend to have them, what attracts ticks, and a way to capture ticks.... all this because I'm from Virginia.
Click to expand...
Nevermind
 
Chartres said:
Well, I guess it's a good thing the interviews at Tulane were closed file....if it was open file you would have been asked about STD's
Click to expand...

at least i'm not a virgin!!!
 
When I interviewed at Texas Tech last year my interviewer and I were just sitting down after greeting each other and he asked me, "so, how do you like our little school so far?"
I had just come from lunch and really enjoyed it because it had barbecue and all this stuff. They had gone all out compared to most places I had been. So I said, "Your lunch was really good."

Dead silence. The guy just sat staring at me. "Is that it?", he said.

I was like, "uh..I like your school too." or something to that effect. The rest of the interview went to hell from that point on. I was so shocked that I made the food remark in the first place that I spent the rest of the interview trying to get my foot out of my mouth and it never panned out. Needless to say, I got drunk that night. I also got a rejection from them 4 months later.

All because of god d@mn barbeque!!
 
these stories are hilarious :laugh:

well - mine is not so dramatic.. but for my first interview.. i had a cold for about two weeks before the interview and finally started recovering (from the cough/sore throat) unfortunately, i also completely lost my voice.

you could barely hear anything i was saying but i had flown to NY (i'm from CA) and couldn't really reschedule the interview w/o going to a GREAT deal of trouble

during the interview, whenever i started answering (in length) any of the interviewer's question.. my voice would just fade away until you couldn't hear what i was saying

she got me a cup of water and cough drops (at least i had something substantial to thank her for in my cards 🙄 ) b/c she only got 1/4 of an answer to every single question unless it was a simple "yes" or "no"

considering this school has a closed file interview policy, she probably didn't get to hear that much about me. however, some other students mentioned to me that she is a pretty difficult interviewer so maybe it helped that she couldnt' ask me anything

surprisingly, i got accepted to the school
 
My interviewer was an old Marine who is a Vietnam Vet. No nonsense kind of man.

Interviewer: So what's it like to grow up poor?
Me: It sucks.
Interviewer: I bet.
Me: I don't let it limit me.
Interviewer: Good. Want a cigarette?
Me: Um, no thank you.
Interviewer: Don't be polite, you're in. Now, do you want a cigarette?
Me: If you insist.

I got in, went, and he's still one of my friends!

:laugh: :laugh: :laugh: :laugh: :laugh: I almost fell out of my chair
 
One of my interviewers asked whether I was interested in intl medicine, to which I responded "yes". She then proceeded to tell me for the rest of the interview how her ex-husband, an intl med proff, ran off with a bosnian woman while doing drs w/o borders, and how the divorce financially ruined her. She talked about the bosnian mistress and her subsequent economic downsizing for 30 minutes straight! I felt like her therapist.
 
Pawster, if you're a guy, you should've been like, "I got what you need girl...and you've got what I need....so lets do this." :laugh:
 
my interviewer took me up onto the helipad of the hospital and showed me around the city. we took some pics too.
 
During my interview, my interviewer received a page and turns out one of his patients went into respiratory distress or something like that. He left and I sat alone in his office for 45 minutes.

Also, he cursed when he received the page.
 
during my interview they ask me about my hobbies, I brought up that I was an avid fan of classic horror movies and then went into a 30 minute tirade about the impact of george romero's classic night of the living dead. Not one word about my school or anything, just a conversation about zombie movies. The funny thing is, I got in.
 
pawster said:
One of my interviewers asked whether I was interested in intl medicine, to which I responded "yes". She then proceeded to tell me for the rest of the interview how her ex-husband, an intl med proff, ran off with a bosnian woman while doing drs w/o borders, and how the divorce financially ruined her. She talked about the bosnian mistress and her subsequent economic downsizing for 30 minutes straight! I felt like her therapist.
Click to expand...

haha. how weird. did you get in?? :laugh:
 
You must log in or register to reply here.

Similar threads

S
Most Meaningful Experiences
Replies
2
Views
840
Mr.Smile12
Mr.Smile12
pinkbowbunny
Are most secondaries good?
Replies
20
Views
4K
Pallas
Pallas
polymerization
FAU loses most of its clinical sites
Replies
12
Views
3K
polymerization
polymerization
F
  • Question Question
Changing Research to Most-Meaningful?!
Replies
1
Views
545
cooper_m
C
FutureDOCTORR123456789
Do most people take gap years?
Replies
11
Views
2K
eigen
eigen
Top Bottom