Interviews provide applicants with the opportunity to present themselves authentically and professionally while bringing their application to life. It also gives schools further insight into an applicant’s non-academic qualities and potential contributions—areas that the application alone cannot fully capture. The interview is meant to evaluate an applicant's personality, maturity, self-awareness, and readiness. Interviewers are looking applicants personal qualities and skills such as:
- Interpersonal and communication skills
- Personal strengths and weaknesses
- Ethics
Interviewing is about who you are, why are you interested in your chosen field, and how you fit with their school. HPA recommends applicants to view interviews as an additional aspect of one’s application.
Health Professions Advising offers a variety of interview preparation services, including one-on-one interview prep advising, HPA’s annual Interview Week workshop series, and mock interviews. Applicants are strongly encouraged and welcomed to join HPA to practice and refine their interview skills through advising appointments, workshops, and events.
Preparation
HPA understands that waiting for an interview for health professional schools can be nerve-wracking and encourages applicants to stay active, including preparing for future interviews by practicing what you may want to share and building confidence in your responses. Upon submissions of secondaries, applicants may want to begin preparing as interview opportunities can come with little notice.
During an interview, it can be challenging to come up with examples on the spot or how to fully formulate your thoughts into words to answer the whole question. To prepare:
- Think about what experiences you can use to support your responses to a variety of questions.
- Practice telling your stories out loud.
- Recruit friends, family, mentors, and advisors to practice with you.
- Record yourself and watch yourself to evaluate how you present.
- Students are encouraged to look up sample questions and think about how they would respond to them as extra practice for their interviews.
There are different formats of interviews including:
- One-on-one (Traditional)
- Panel or small group
- Multiple mini interviews (MMI)
- Prerecorded (Kira)
Be ready for interviewers to ask about anything like:
- Academic background
- Extracurricular activities and hobbies
- Employment and research experience
- Views on current events and ethical issues in healthcare and your future health profession
- Your motivation to be in healthcare and your awareness of future health profession
Applicants are strongly encouraged to review their application and secondary materials as part of preparing for the interview. Interviewers can ask follow up questions to any responses. If applicants wrote about certain experiences, they should be able to explain in both professional and everyday languages as well as provide more context to their answers.
Applicants are encouraged to also research the schools they are interviewing at to see what makes them unique and be able to answer why you are interested in them.
Here are a sample of the types of questions an interviewer might ask:
- Open ended questions: Tell me about yourself. Tell me about a non-academic interest.
- Personal maturity and self-awareness: Describe a time you had a difficult conversation with a team member.
- Current issues: How do you think COVID-19 has impacted healthcare in America today?
- Dedication to profession: What do you think makes a good (health profession)? How do you know you still want to be a (health profession) in 10 years?
- Personal and academic struggles: Tell me about a time you handled an unexpected challenge.
When answering questions, applicants should back up their assertions with specific details. Using the PARK strategy can help students craft a more cohesive interview answer:
- Problems you faced
- Actions you took
- Results based on what you did
- Knowledge you gained
Ultimately with each answer, the goal is to reveal more about your personal qualities, strengths, maturity, and readiness to pursue a professional school education.
Finally, it’s important to listen to what is being asked and answer the question that was asked!
Interview Day
Whether your interview is in person or virtual, know the logistics of your day and what to do if you have any challenges. If there are any issues, contact the admissions team immediately. Preparation and planning also vary depending on if the interview is in-person or virtual. For In person, you will need to consider travel, lodging, and transportation to and from the interview; all with costs associated. For virtual, you will need to find a location where you will have reliable internet access and free from interruptions.
Overall presentation is important to making good first impressions to interviewers. Attitude is key! Applicants will want to demonstrate confidence when answering their questions. It is ok to be nervous! Managing the nerves is key. Practicing positive self talk, self visualization, and managing anxiety are helpful ways to boost confidence on interview day.
It’s important to also maintain professionalism while answering questions:
- Avoid slang and filler words
- Speak clearly, calmly, and confidently - enunciate
- Be kind to everyone you meet
- Be aware of your nonverbal communication (eye contact, facial expressions, body posture, hand gestures like fidgeting)
Professionalism also includes looking the part. Make sure to:
- Dress professionally and groom meticulously
- Wear the whole outfit - not just the upper half (for virtual interviews)
- Make sure your clothes fit comfortably, sitting down and standing up
- Dress conservatively and classy
- For those doing virtual interviews, check if your attire clashes or blends into the background
Check out HPA’s guide to learn more about tips and strategies for in-person and virtual interview day: Tips for a Successful Health Professional Interview.
Interviewers ultimately want to learn about the applicant so it is important to be yourself! Make a connection with the interviewers and respond to them with confidence and enthusiasm. Again, have confidence!
Post Interview
Congratulations on finishing the interview! There may be a mixed bag of emotions after; that is perfectly normal!
If possible, take a moment to ask admissions if updates are permitted. Within 1-3 days after the interview, take a moment to send out thank you notes, if permitted. If given the interviewer’s contact, thank you notes can be directly sent to them. If not, they can be sent to admissions to forward to interviewers.
Interview Frequently Asked Questions
- When should I expect to hear about interviews?
- Students will hear about interviews depending on the health profession and the application cycle students are in. Oftentimes, students can receive an interview invite, from a few weeks to a couple months after submission, sometimes it can take even longer. If secondaries were part of the application, interviews can follow anytime afterward.
- I heard that if I have not received an interview after a couple of months after submitting, I will likely not get any. Is this true?
- Even if applicants don’t get an interview offer after a couple of months, that does not mean they won’t ever get one! Schools receive many applications and it can take time for them to review all of them while giving offers to interviews.
- How do schools communicate with me?
- Schools can call or send emails as forms of communication; these can come from an unknown phone number or email address. Students are encouraged to have a voicemail set up so a message can be left if they are unable to answer and to check their spam folder regularly.
- How should I prepare for Interviews?
- Both the Health Professions Advising and the Internships and Career Center hold interview practice workshops in which students will be given a set of questions and feedback on their responses. The HPA office also holds Mock Interviews in late Summer and Fall Quarter. Check HPA’s Events page to see any upcoming interview prep sessions. Applicants are also welcome to attend drop-in advising for practice.