Biochemistry @ Exeter, Oxford in 2018

Interview format

2 x 30 min interviews over 2 days

Interview content

Protein folding and amino acids, and chemistry

Best preparation

Practice speaking about biochemistry

Final thoughts

Treat it as a discussion rather than an interview

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: None
Number of interviews: 2
Time between interviews: A day
Length of interviews: Around 30 mins, Exeter interview was slightly longer that St Peter’s (it overran)
Online interview: No

What happened in your interview? How did you feel?

My first interview started out as a discussion about protein folding and amino acids, this was followed by a maths question and then I discussed my personal statement with a 4th year student that was helping out my tutor. I made a maths mistake and then joked about it with my tutor - you don’t have to be perfect, just willing to admit your mistakes and show that you can learn in a tutorial environment. My second interview started out with discussing a topic I wrote about in my personal statement, in this interview there were 2 tutors, they asked me lots of questions which were more chemistry based than my Exeter interview. This interview was a bit more stressful and I did get a bit flustered.

How did you prepare for your interviews?

Revising A-level notes so far and reading over my personal statement, making sure that I can speak about all resources/information mentioned. I practiced lots of interview etiquette with school, even down to how to walk into the room, and I got my teachers to ask me lots of questions related to biochemistry so that I could practice answering questions on the spot

If you took a test, how did you prepare?

What advice would you give to future applicants?

Treat it as a discussion rather than an interview, they want you to succeed otherwise you wouldn’t have been invited to interview. Speak your thoughts out loud (only the ones related to the interview), and it’s okay to ask questions and make mistakes, as long as you can correct them and use any information that the tutor gives you. They’re looking for people that they can work well with and that will thrive in a tutorial setting