Dear reader,
Welcome to the Cambridge Widening Access to Medicine Society monthly newsletter 😊. Good luck to everyone with interviews coming up over the next few weeks! Read on for an example interview question, advice from our committee and resources to help you perform to the best of your ability! Food for Thought: an example interview question 'I have 2 ears, 2 eyes, 2 lungs and 2 kidneys. Why don’t I have 2 hearts?' There are some thoughts that come into mind when trying to answer this question. And as it’s such a broad question, you can really answer it in a multitude of different ways. A suggested approach to this question is available here on our website! Behind the Headlines: 'The Complexities of Vaccine Hesitancy' https://www.bbc.com/future/article/20210720-the-complexities-of-vaccine-hesitancy Rana, our BME Officer, has written a great piece about vaccine hesitancy, its causes and how we can tackle this. Click the here to read it on our website!
Myth-buster “If I mess up my interview, I definitely won’t get in.” Absolutely not true! Here are a couple of reasons why you shouldn’t put yourself in a pit of despair before, during or after interviews, written by our Co-President, Macky: ''1. Interviews are just one aspect of the application There’s few things that you can do that outright make an interviewer think “Reject this one.” - one of those is punching the interviewer (I wouldn’t try that one). Jokes aside, much like the BMAT and personal statement, the interview is just one aspect of the Oxbridge application. As such, not necessarily doing so well in the interviews, doesn’t mean that you’re out of the running. 2. Rarely do you and the interviewer agree on how well your interview went You’ve likely heard this before and you’re very likely to hear it again after your interviews - primarily because it’s true. You will doubt yourself: “What if I said this?”, “The answer was so obvious, why didn’t I get it?”, “The interviewer clearly didn’t like me, he wrote nothing down.”, I’ve rarely heard my peers say their interviews went fantastic and they knew that they would get in. The feeling of doubt is universal, and if you feel like that, please know that you’re not alone. It is difficult to accept, but it is often the case that although you found the interview terrifying and feel like you got all the answers wrong, your interviewer believes that you did exactly what they wanted you to do - and so you may have peaked their interest. From my personal experience, I always felt I did a sub-par job in my interviews, and often reflected (too much) on my answers and the mistakes I made during the interview. Yet, I’m here writing this for you. So please don’t worry if you end up doubting yourself - this is normal. 3. You usually have multiple interviews I applied to study at Gonville & Caius college, which typically has the format of 3 interviews (2 scientific, 1 general). As far as I’m aware, you typically get at least 2 interviews at the other colleges in Cambridge, with a varying number of interviewers there. At Oxford, a similar case applies except you often also interview at a college that you didn’t apply for - this is not typically the case at Cambridge as you are interviewed by the college you apply for. Since there’s more than one opportunity to show off, if you perhaps didn’t do as well as you would have hoped in one interview - there is at least one other interview that you can perform better in. Which is why if you think your previous interview went poorly, do not linger on it! Because ultimately, this will affect your later interviews. A little anecdote from my interview experience, I was *almost* late for my first interview of the day, and the only reason why I didn’t end up actually being late was that the previous interview ran over slightly. Following that, I felt like the interview went really poorly and so sulked outside Pret with my mum and brother until the next interview. But I tried to let the memory of the previous interview go, and I ended up enjoying my last 2 interviews. Obviously I had doubts that I did particularly well, but I knew that if I had kept the first interview in mind for the following interviews, it would have impaired how well I would have done in the next interviews. Funnily enough, this advice is especially important in MMIs. If you are applying to the Graduate course in Cambridge, you will know that rather than a ‘traditional Oxbridge interview’, you are put through MMI stations. Treat each station like it’s own interview. If you mess up on one, don’t dwell on it for the following stations because you’ll end up not doing very well in those ones either. Use the reading time to take deep breaths to ‘reset’ and go into the next station with a clear head. Easier said than done, I know, but just giving yourself the space to clear your head is absolutely essential to conquering multiple interviews (whether that be in MMI or multiple interviews in a span of time). This sentiment also very much applies to interviews at other universities. If you didn’t do very well in one interview for one university, don’t let that bring you down for the next one. Treat each interview as a clean slate. Remember: YOU GOT THIS. It’s daunting, I know, but you know what to do. Trust yourself. Hype yourself up - and remember that everyone at CamWAMS will be rooting for you.'' ~ Macky
Link of the Month Medical News Today https://www.medicalnewstoday.com It's always important to stay up to date with relevant medical topics (especially with interviews coming up)! Medical News Today has articles spanning 100s of topics sorted into recency as well as medical categories so you can read up on topics of interest. There’s also a free monthly newsletter which tailors articles to your interest, making it a brilliant starting point for medial news. If an article particularly interests you, it’s worth summarising what you read and what you think medical professionals can learn from it. Also, if you haven't already, head to our website to access our MedLife Access Day resource bank, where you'll find recordings of the talks, PowerPoint slides and answered questions on interview preparation: www.camwams.co.uk/medlife-2021. The password is medlife2021. Thanks for reading – if you have any questions then as ever please just email us at access@clinsoc.co.uk! This will be our last newsletter before Christmas and the New Year – so happy holidays everybody, we’ll be back in January! 🎄 We wish you the best of luck with your applications! Love, CamWAMS Committee https://www.camwams.co.uk/ https://www.instagram.com/camwams/ https://www.facebook.com/camwams/ https://twitter.com/CambridgeWAMS
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