Geography @ St Catharine's, Cambridge in 2018

Interview format

Geography Admissions Assessment (GAA); 2x interviews

Interview content

Interview 1: human geography, pre-reading questions; Interview 2: physical geography, interpreting graphs

Best preparation

Past paper questions

Final thoughts

Practise articulating your thoughts about your subject

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: Geography Admissions Assessment (GAA)
Number of interviews: 2
Time between interviews: 10 minutes
Length of interviews: 25 minutes
Online interview: No

What happened in your interview? How did you feel?

I received a text to read for 30 minutes before my interview. My first interview was a human geography interview and all of the questions were based upon the text I read beforehand.

My second interview was a physical geography interview and in this I was showed graphs and mapped data which I had to answer questions about. I wasn't asked anything about my personal statement in either interview.

How did you prepare?

I used past GAA papers. I made sure I was familiar with all of the books I mentioned on my personal statement. I practiced answering questions about these books with my parents.

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

Practise articulating your thoughts about your subject.