Test taken: Arts-Humanities Admissions Assessment (AHAA)
Number of interviews: 2
Time between interviews: 1.5 hours
Length of interviews: 30 minutes
Online interview: No

The first interview was initially based around a news article I’d been given to read just before I went in - it wasn’t particularly complicated or difficult to understand. It then moved on to questions about my personal statement.

The second interview began with questions about my personal statement, but they also asked me questions about the subjects I did at A-level.

The first interview was with a sociology professor and a social anthropology professor, the second was with a politics and IR professor and a land economy professor, this kind of dictated the theme of each interview. I was nervous at first but the interviews were a lot more comfortable than I was expecting, and at times answering the questions was really quite enjoyable

An admissions tutor from Magdalene college came into my sixth-form as part of an outreach scheme and gave a talk on how to approach the interviews. I reviewed each of my submitted statements and where possible I asked my teachers to go over any content I had mentioned with me - mainly so I could practice discussing it more confidently. I also had two mock interviews with a supervisor from my sixth form. You don’t need to know everything, but you need to practice explaining what you do know clearly.

My teachers hadn’t really seen the test before so I printed out the two practice papers available and had a go at them. I was naturally quite good at paper 1 which was a reading comprehension because the skills were similar to my A-level subjects. For paper two there were ten practice essay questions available so I tried answering a couple of them under timed conditions and asked a teacher to check them as well as they could.

Don’t feel like you have to know everything, that’s not what the interview is about. They want to see how you think and how you approach a problem, not that you’ve memorised a text book. It’s ok to not know the answer and to admit that, what matters is how you then approach solving this. The best advice I can give was given to me by an admissions tutor who visited my sixth-form: if you’re being interviewed, you’re clever enough - no college is going to waste its time and money interviewing someone who isn’t - the interview only determines whether your style of thinking and learning is suited to the university. The best way to view the interview is as something exciting, you get to discuss the subject you love with someone who loves it just a much as you do. I’d advise to go slowly, narrate what you’re thinking so the interviewers can understand your thought process.