Human, Social And Political Science @ Homerton, Cambridge in 2021

Interview format

No admissions test; 2x interviews

Interview content

Interview 1: source-based; Interview 2: personal statement, submitted work

Best preparation

Went over, annotated, and practised explaining parts of personal statement

Test preparation

n/a (no test taken)

Final thoughts

Interviewers may be more approachable than you'd think, and often enjoy 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: None
Number of interviews: 2
Time between interviews: 5 minutes
Length of interviews: Roughly 30-40 minutes
Online interview: Yes

What happened in your interview? How did you feel?

My first interview revolved around a source I was given ~30 minutes prior, it was quite long but fairly easy to understand. It focused on women and science and inequalities in healthcare provision!

My second interview was based around my personal statement and written work I had submitted, as well as the very cliché - ‘what are you reading at the moment?’.

How did you prepare for your interviews?

Knowing that one of my interviews would likely revolve around my personal statement, I printed it out and annotated each topic I mentioned with things I could talk about if asked. For example, I mentioned a few books in my personal statement, so next to that paragraph I bullet-pointed down some interesting concepts or ideas I could bring up if they were mentioned!

I also (this might sound insane) spent maybe 10/15 minutes a day leading up to the interview just talking to myself and making sure I could properly explain and justify things I was saying, it can be hard to translate things you can write into verbal statements!

What advice would you give to future applicants?

Interviewers are a lot easier to talk to than you’d expect. I also asked one supervisor [Editor's note: these are people who run supervisions] whether she enjoyed doing interviews and her response was that it’s great because she’s essentially choosing which students she will be working with next year.

So remember, these interviewers are choosing you not just for your academic ability, but for how you will be as a student and to teach.