The interviews account for a certain percentage of our overall score that the schools use to rank us. How much they make up depends on the program and usually we have no idea. Personally, I think voodoo is involved.
The goal of our interviews (and everything to this point actually) is for the schools to want to rank ME number one. ME ME ME ME. That makes it much more likely that I will get the program I rank number one. I’ll explain this in a post about ranking.
Prep for the interviews includes collating all our best stories from our clinical experiences. We want to make sure we have examples of good and bad team interactions, leadership, earth shattering awareness that THIS is the specialty for us, strengths, weaknesses, difficult ethical experiences, conflict with a “superior” and anything that shows that we’re not the babbling idiots we usually feel like we are. We practice answering questions but have to be careful not to practice too much because it tends to make it sound too rehearsed.
We buy a suit, or two, and worry about which shirt to put underneath.
Then the actual interviews begin. CaRMS interviews take place in the last week of January to February. In Canada, winter can be less than reliable. Students in my class have had their flights and trains cancelled. Roads have been slippery. I haven’t heard of any interviews that had to be cancelled for weather, just plenty of stress in getting in on time.
The kind of interview you get depends on what specialty you are applying to. Since I want family, my questions usually went something like this:
1. why family?
2. what skills do you bring to family medicine?
3. what challenges do you see family docs may have?
4. challenges the residents may have?
5. tell me about a good/bad team experience and what you learned from it
6. tell me about a particularly difficult clinical encounter and how you feel it has shaped the doctor you will be
7. why this program?
8. tell me about this thing you wrote down on your cv...
9. tell me about your strengths and weaknesses
10. tell me about yourself (very few actually asked this)
Family is a very chill interview - they try to make it more like a conversation so they can get to know us and figure out if we are the kind of person they can work with for the next few years. I was always interviewed by a doc and a resident in a clinical exam room, except one where I was in a board room of a hotel. The interviews lasted 10-30 minutes, with an average of 20.
Friends in other specialties had different kinds of questions though. My friend applying to gen surg was asked “if you were a salad, what kind would you be” - what?? Another in obs gyne was asked multiple ethics type questions and had MMIs rather than just hanging out with the one group. Safe to say that the type of interview you will get really depends on to what discipline you are applying.
With family and some of the other disciplines, there is a morning orientation when they go over the program in detail and why the residents *love* to be there. Family is split into programs on multiple sites so we always get several lecturers to talk to us about the different programs available through the school. This can take hours and is why family med orientations take so much longer than the other specialties. On the upside, we often get at least one meal out of the deal, usually two.
The orientation is followed by the actual interviews. Having such a long introduction to the day has the odd benefit of lulling us into a close to coma state so we are not as stressed about the interview itself. Or maybe it’s just me.
The interview tour has brought out the best and the worst in some people.
Some are acting like competitive children, ignoring conversations started by students from other schools. Others are actively trying to psych one another out. Still others are so insecure in their own worth, they are lashing out at those around them.
The majority are just trying to get through interviews in one piece.
The best though are sticking up for one another. Sharing hotel rooms when the weather is terrible and requires colleagues to stay in the city an extra day. They are meeting the people from other schools and getting to know them as well. Some even help up clumsy candidates when they fall all over the ground...no one I know I’m sure...
They are being the genuinely nice people they are. These are the classmates I am incredibly proud to know.
I was definitely not immune to the stress. The night before one of my interviews I had a dream that the school had decided to get rid of the usual Q&A and make it a spaghetti eating contest instead.
I decided it would be easier to not rank that school than deal with the insanity.
The goal of our interviews (and everything to this point actually) is for the schools to want to rank ME number one. ME ME ME ME. That makes it much more likely that I will get the program I rank number one. I’ll explain this in a post about ranking.
Prep for the interviews includes collating all our best stories from our clinical experiences. We want to make sure we have examples of good and bad team interactions, leadership, earth shattering awareness that THIS is the specialty for us, strengths, weaknesses, difficult ethical experiences, conflict with a “superior” and anything that shows that we’re not the babbling idiots we usually feel like we are. We practice answering questions but have to be careful not to practice too much because it tends to make it sound too rehearsed.
We buy a suit, or two, and worry about which shirt to put underneath.
Then the actual interviews begin. CaRMS interviews take place in the last week of January to February. In Canada, winter can be less than reliable. Students in my class have had their flights and trains cancelled. Roads have been slippery. I haven’t heard of any interviews that had to be cancelled for weather, just plenty of stress in getting in on time.
The kind of interview you get depends on what specialty you are applying to. Since I want family, my questions usually went something like this:
1. why family?
2. what skills do you bring to family medicine?
3. what challenges do you see family docs may have?
4. challenges the residents may have?
5. tell me about a good/bad team experience and what you learned from it
6. tell me about a particularly difficult clinical encounter and how you feel it has shaped the doctor you will be
7. why this program?
8. tell me about this thing you wrote down on your cv...
9. tell me about your strengths and weaknesses
10. tell me about yourself (very few actually asked this)
Family is a very chill interview - they try to make it more like a conversation so they can get to know us and figure out if we are the kind of person they can work with for the next few years. I was always interviewed by a doc and a resident in a clinical exam room, except one where I was in a board room of a hotel. The interviews lasted 10-30 minutes, with an average of 20.
Friends in other specialties had different kinds of questions though. My friend applying to gen surg was asked “if you were a salad, what kind would you be” - what?? Another in obs gyne was asked multiple ethics type questions and had MMIs rather than just hanging out with the one group. Safe to say that the type of interview you will get really depends on to what discipline you are applying.
With family and some of the other disciplines, there is a morning orientation when they go over the program in detail and why the residents *love* to be there. Family is split into programs on multiple sites so we always get several lecturers to talk to us about the different programs available through the school. This can take hours and is why family med orientations take so much longer than the other specialties. On the upside, we often get at least one meal out of the deal, usually two.
The orientation is followed by the actual interviews. Having such a long introduction to the day has the odd benefit of lulling us into a close to coma state so we are not as stressed about the interview itself. Or maybe it’s just me.
The interview tour has brought out the best and the worst in some people.
Some are acting like competitive children, ignoring conversations started by students from other schools. Others are actively trying to psych one another out. Still others are so insecure in their own worth, they are lashing out at those around them.
The majority are just trying to get through interviews in one piece.
The best though are sticking up for one another. Sharing hotel rooms when the weather is terrible and requires colleagues to stay in the city an extra day. They are meeting the people from other schools and getting to know them as well. Some even help up clumsy candidates when they fall all over the ground...no one I know I’m sure...
They are being the genuinely nice people they are. These are the classmates I am incredibly proud to know.
I was definitely not immune to the stress. The night before one of my interviews I had a dream that the school had decided to get rid of the usual Q&A and make it a spaghetti eating contest instead.
I decided it would be easier to not rank that school than deal with the insanity.
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