What's the interview structure? I've never been interviewed, but it seems that the traditional interview (3 people talk to you kind of thing), assuming they are not blind to your file, consists of you being asked about your experiences, personality traits, and so on. MMI's tend to be more about your problem-solving skills, ethical and moral compass, etc.
I interviewed at WSU last year, it was my first interview! 3 days before I went to my undergrad career center and did a mock interview and OMG did that help!!! Thank god I went bc the mock interview was horrible!!! I almost cried in the middle of it bc I was so nervous and I realized how bad I was messing up!!! Lol she then calmed me down and we came up with a plan/outline to organize my thoughts....the killers were the open ended questions... "Tell me about yourself" I just rambled and was all over the place!! So she really really helped me get my thoughts together and stick to an outline in my head. I was blown away how helpful it was. SO I HIGHLY RECOMMEND FINDING ONE AT YOUR SCHOOL!! Lol! Plus I had never met that person before, and it was just her and I...so it was pretty intense. Hard to keep eye contact with only one person.
So in Washington....my interview was with 2 people. Both DVMs, one male and one female. I'll start out by saying my interview went really well, and I was mostly comfortable during it. But.... There was definitely some turn offs...I'm not sure if it was all part of a strategy by them or what but it was defiantly "good cop bad cop". The guy was very friendly and soft and smiling, I kept eye contact with him mostly for this reason. The woman was pretty tough (however my boss is just like this so I'm used to it). They kind of acted like they were super busy and said they looked at my application a month ago and they didn't have time to review it again so they said "let's just glimpse at it really quick". Then they asked my why I am "older" and why I took 3 years off between high school and college, which was totally fine bc I was hoping they would ask for that...(since I went and worked in different fields and fell in love with vet med and then chose to pursue it). Then they asked me "why don't you do well on standardized tests" and kind of chuckled together and were like well your GRE scores and your gpa reflect that....(I was hoping it was just a strategy to rattle me bc my scores are still above average and hey, they called me for an interview). So I stood my ground and said I actually think my scores are excellent considering that I work 20 hours a week while going to school full time, and that I'm not the average undergrad where I can sit in the library all the time, I live on my own, support myself and have to pay for school blah blah blah....
Another turn off was when the woman interrupted me during my answer to an ethical question but I think she was just trying to get my to change my answer... It was "is it ever ok to lie to a client" obviously no and was answering and she was like what if blah blah blah....
Anyways...a lot of the other parts were good and they nodded their heads and wrote stuff down. I walked out feeling good about it. I was waitlisted after that, but I was also a junior and wouldn't have gotten my degree yet, idk if that was a factor.
I think I wrote more in the WSU 2019 applicant thread about the interview. So go check that!! Everyone else I talked to up there had good experiences with their interviews! So I think you'll be fine! Go do a mock interview with the career services, someone who can give you interview advice. Super super helpful even if just for the nerves!!
GOOD LUCK!
