Natural Sciences (Biological) @ Newnham, Cambridge in 2018

Interview format

Natural Sciences Admissions Assessment (NSAA); 2x interviews

Interview content

Personal statement, subject specific questions.

Best preparation

Read magazines & personal statement

Advice in hindsight

-

Final thoughts

<p>Don't be put off by hard questions and being wrong.</p>

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.

Interview Format

Test taken: Natural Sciences Admissions Assessment (NSAA)

Number of interviews: 2

Skype interview: No

Time between interviews: 4 - 6 hours

Length of first interview: 40 minutes; Length of second interview: 40 minutes

What happened in your interview? How did you feel?

We talked a lot about my personal statement which gave me time to talk about some of the reading and online courses I did.

A lot of the questions asked had graphs involved such as interpreting the data of unknown material.

It’s really easy to practise these - look for diagrams in your textbook and just explain them to yourself so a graph in interview is less daunting :-)

The atmosphere was very welcoming- only two interviewers and they were both so friendly! I felt mostly relaxed but not too relaxed as it is still an interview !!

I think for themes - both interviews were focused on cells.

How did you prepare?

Read lots of magazines - New Scientist, Nature, Biology Review.

Do mock interviews with teachers at school as sitting in a room with an interviewer seems daunting at first.

Know your personal statement well and know the books you read well as they could ask you anything about it!

What advice do you have for future applicants?

Looking back, what advice would you give to your past self?

Don’t be put off by hard questions - you are allowed to sit and think for a while in silence.

If the interviewer says you are wrong, try and give a different answer - they want to know you are creative and can approach questions differently.