HAA; 2 x interviews
Interview 1: source based; Interview 2: personal statement
Mock interview.
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Read beyond the curriculum
Remember this advice isn't official. There is no guarantee it will reflect your experience because university applications can change between years. Check the official Cambridge and Oxford websites for more accurate information on this year's application format and the required tests.
Also, someone else's experience may not reflect your own. Most interviews are more like conversations than tests and like, any conversation, they are quite interactive.
Test Taken: History Admissions Assessment (HAA)
Number of interviews: 2
Skype interview: no
Time between interviews: within 2 hours of each other
Length of interview 1: 30 minutes roughly; Length of interview 2: 30 minutes roughly
The first interview was source based. The source had been sent to us in advance and I had prepared some thoughts about the text and jotted them down. They asked me to evaluate the historian’s position and anything I thought was unconvincing. I had the opportunity to ask my own question at the end.
The second interview was on my personal statement. I was very nervous and did not ease into it until 3/4 of the way through. It felt
We had informal examination preparation in a group. I was very lucky because my
I would recommend doing your own reading, because this really helped me find my own passion within history. But you could just work off a subject you’re learning about in history class anyway, and just read a bit more widely, or find a niche within the period to focus on.