Test taken: None (but a short pre-interview exercise, responding to a reading prompt)
Number of interviews: 2
Length of interviews: 30-40 minutes
Online interview: Yes

There was a theme for each interview — my first interview largely focused on gender, and the second one more broadly on world affairs. In one interview I was shown a political cartoon and then asked to interpret it, which led to a discussion about the socioeconomic issue the cartoon was drawing attention to. In the second interview, I was shown a part of an article from the Economist and asked to discuss that.

Through both interviews, we moved on from the sources to general discussion, and I surprisingly wasn't asked about my personal statement. Instead, one of the interviewers asked about one of my extracurricular non-academic passions (which I suppose someone mentioned in my reference) and asked me to talk about the links between that passion and HSPS. I was a bit nervous at the beginning, as is to be expected, but the conversation was really interesting and the interviewers were lovely so I eased into it. I even answered a question "incorrectly" — I misinterpreted what I was asked — but the interviewer let me know, asked the question again, and I got it the next time.

The most useful thing I did was keep up to date with world affairs since I wanted to specialise in Politics and International Relations. I also went through a few standard interview questions, such as why do you want to study this course, what appeals to you about Cambridge  specifically and made sure I was confident about all the academic themes I mentioned in my personal statement. The key piece of advice I received was to THINK and BREATHE before answering. Practice pausing for a few seconds in mock interviews if you can, or otherwise by reading questions, pausing and collecting your thoughts, then answering.

The interviewers are looking for someone they would like to teach in a supervision — the interview itself is a mini supervision! They don't expect you to have the answers to all the questions they're asking — instead they want to see that you can think through a tough situation. Even if you have no idea what the answer is, take a deep breath and tell them your thought process out loud —that's what they're looking for. E.g. if they ask you how just a Wall Street bailout is, and you don't really know, you can talk about the general situation that leads to a bailout — usually an economic crisis that impacts the everyday person much more than the banks etc. — and start the conversation from there. Let them know you can think for yourself basically!