· Prepare for your meeting with your
professor so that you can present your prob-
lems in a clear and concise manner.
· Make an appointment to see your
professor in advance and arrive on time.
· Try to be specific in describing a
particular problem and indicate how you are
attempting to resolve it.
· Professors who get to know you and with
whom you develop a positive relation-
ship may be good sources to provide
recommendations for you at a later date.
· Remember, however, that in most cases,
your premedical advisor should be your
primary source of information and
guidance.
THE INTERVIEW
____________________________________________________
At the outset, it should be realized that the
interview is not just a brief exchange
between yourself and one or more
representatives of the school that has requested your
appearance. The interview should not be looked
upon as a one-sided affair, but rather as
an opportunity for a dialogue that has
advantages for both the school and you.
The school uses the interview to
determine
1. if your personal attributes are as appealing
as your academic record (this goes,
of course, for a student who is already
academically acceptable), and if your
personal attributes will enable you to overcome
any deficiency that may appear.
2. if your personal attributes will place you
in the overall acceptable range (if you
are considered academically
borderline).
3. if you are considered to have some obvious
academic or physical deficiency,
whether you have the personal attributes to
overcome the deficiency.
4. if your combination of qualities will most
likely enable you to succeed as a
medical student, therefore meriting your
interviewer's recommendation for
acceptance to the school's admission
committee
5. if you possess the qualities that will
enable you to fit in with the individual
school's mission (such as primary
care).
6. if the interviewer can entice you to enroll
by means of a "soft" or "hard" sell in
the event you are an exceptionally attractive
applicant.
The interview will permit you to
1. have an opportunity to sell yourself by
projecting as favorable an image as pos-
sible, and thus overcoming any deficiencies in
your record.
2. familiarize yourself with the campus and
with its facilities, as well as with
members of its student body.
3. obtain firsthand answers to questions about
the school that may not yet have
been answered.
Significance of the Interview
It has been previously noted that there are
five primary criteria for admission to medical
school. These are your nonscience GPA, science
cumulative average, MCAT scores, let-
ters of recommendation, and the interview. More
than a decade ago Academic Medicine,
the journal that focuses on medical educational
issues, carried out a survey of U.S. med-
ical schools to determine which of these five
criteria ranks highest in importance. The
result was that the criterion selected was the
interview. It was chosen because they felt
that by means of an interview the medical
school could determine better than in any
other way the noncognitive skills of an
applicant. The interview also provides the possi-
bility of obtaining the essential segments of
information noted above.
User Comments Add a comment…