Natural Sciences Admissions Assessment (NSAA), 2x interviews
Interview 1: Questions on personal statement, Source-based question; Interview 2: Questions on personal interests and personal statement, Questions on diagnosis and disease
Consolidating A-level material, Completed a mock interview
Completed timed past papers; Used PAT and BMAT multiple-choice questions to practise
If you're unsure about something the interviewer has asked you to do, don't be afraid to ask!
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:
Number of interviews: 2
Time between interviews: 5 minutes
Length of interviews: 25 minutes
Online interview: Yes
To my surprise, the questions were much more approachable than I was expecting! I had two interviewers in both of my interviews.
My first interview started by asking about a webinar organised by Cambridge I had attended during the summer, which I had mentioned on my personal statement. We had a bit of discussion and started to feel more at ease quite quickly. I felt like I didn't really remember it that well, but I guess it must have been fine! The other interviewer then showed me a photo of a plant and asked to talk a bit about it. This developed into another discussion.
In my second interview, I was asked what particular interests I had. Since this was the start of another interview, I was feeling quite nervous again and didn't really say that much, but again, it must have been alright. We then discussed the process of diagnosis for a disease, which further developed into a discussion about a specific method of diagnosis, which I had mentioned in my personal statement as well. I had also expressed an interest in photosynthesis, so this made up most of the discussion with the other interviewer. We ended by talking a bit about a topic in data analysis. The interviewers were all really friendly and had a lot of input during the discussions, so it didn't feel like I was on the spot and expected to just talk by myself for several minutes.
I focused on consolidating the material I had covered at A-level, as well as reviewing the things I said I did in my personal statement. I also asked my school to arrange a
To be honest, I didn't really find this mock interview to be an accurate representation of the actual interview, although it was definitely helpful to practise talking to someone I didn't know in this kind of setting.
The most difficult aspect of the NSAA was the time pressure, so make sure you complete the past papers under timed conditions! The old specification questions are also useful, although bear in mind that you will only have to do multiple-choice questions.
The multiple-choice section from the
If you're unsure about something the interviewer has asked you to do, don't be afraid to ask! A little nudge in the right direction can be really helpful and it shows that you are actually engaging with the discussion instead of just guessing.
That being said, I never felt like I had no idea how to approach a question - there were none of those wacky questions that you see mentioned on the internet. Definitely try to talk through your thought process out loud, it's really helpful for the interviewers to see how you think logically.
If you don't know something, don't panic! Sometimes they might ask if you know what a particular thing is, but quite often it doesn't matter if you don't know, the interviewer will just move on to something that you can answer. Remember that the interviewers want to see what you can do, they're not trying to make you feel like an idiot (even if it might feel like that). You've got this :)