Materials Science @ Corpus Christi, Oxford in 2018

Interview format

2x 45-60 min interviews, 3-4 hrs apart

Interview content

Interview 1: introductory questions, materials / maths problems; Interview 2: graph sketching, multi-step problem

Best preparation

Try to get some interview practice

Advice in hindsight

-

Final thoughts

Try to learn from past interviews.

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: PAT

Number of interviews: 2

Skype interview: No

Interview spread: morning and afternoon of same day

Length of interviews: 45-60 minutes each

What happened in your interview? How did you feel?

In my first interview the two tutors put me at ease, asking me about my journey to Oxford. I also very briefly got asked about something on my personal statement, but these were introductory questions to make me feel relaxed. The main content of the interview was a mixture of maths and materials based problems. The maths questions were asked in the context of a materials problem and required me to differentiate and integrate an equation, as well as sketch a graph. The second tutor then went on to ask me about a material that they handed to me and asked me about what tests I could do on it to identify it. We then went on to do some geometry based around the material's structure, which they taught me about.

My second interview was at a different college and had a similar structure, but I felt much more relaxed just because I had already learnt a lot from the first interview. I was asked to sketch a graph and then I got asked a really interesting problem that had to be broken down into lots of little steps. When I got stuck, the tutors prompted me in the right direction. The tutors are there to help and I definitely left that interview feeling like I'd been challenged but also like I had learnt a lot and that I'd really like to be taught by the tutors at that college.

How did you prepare?

I did lots of the official practice papers. I then checked my answers using the resources on Physics and Maths Tutor (website).

Be familiar with your A-Level Physics and Maths syllabus. Try and get some interview practice, for example from your Physics teacher. Even if it's not explicitly Materials based questions, being able to solve problems in front of someone and explain the steps you're taking requires exactly the kind of skills the tutors are looking for. I think preparing with practice interviews definitely made my ability to explain my thought processes clearer when I was solving interview problems.

What advice do you have for future applicants?

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

The tutors are trying to see if they are able to teach you and so you should try to be as receptive to what they're saying as possible. If you have no idea how to do something they will try and teach you and then get you to apply this new knowledge to a slightly different problem.

My biggest piece of advice would be try and learn from your past interviews if you do get multiple interviews, even if one goes really badly (like it did for me!) you can learn from it and your mistakes and try to improve for the next one.