Medical School Interview Courses

WHAT’S INCLUDED IN THE INTERVIEW COURSE?

Our Medical School interview course is the best medicine interview course in the United Kingdom. It has been running since 2012, receiving outstanding reviews and achieving exceptional results helping students get into medical school. We limit the class size to 9 students per course to ensure a personalised and interactive experience online. It comes with the following included:

• 8 hours of interactive, live online teaching
• Comprehensive coverage of all interview question types (motivation, ethics, SJT - duties of a doctor scenarios, reflecting on examples, role plays, NHS insights, giving opinions, hot topics and special stations)
• “Hot seat” practice & coaching - Test your interview skills! Answer and get individual feedback on 4 to 6 interview questions and observe many more
• Dedicated hour on how to structure your answers & performing well in online interviews
• Automatic access to the base version of our self-study Medical School Interview Course
• Covers MMI (multiple mini interview) & Panel interview question style
• Continued Support, written feedback & school-specific tips after the course via email

Who is it for?

This medicine interview prep course is ideal for students preparing for medical school or dental school interviews. We do not expect any prior preparation or knowledge before attending the interview course, but of course, if you have done a bit of reading and practice, then you get even more out of the sessions. 

Almost all of our students start their interview preparation with this 8-hour small-group interview course. It is usually followed by attending either a mock MMI circuit, a mock panel interview or interview coaching. If you plan to do only one of the above, we highly recommend you choose this interview course: this is where students improve their interview delivery skills the most. The mock MMI circuits and mock panels are more suited to students who have already come to this course, or are nearly ready and want realistic practice with past questions from the schools. 

What to expect

Throughout the 8 hours, you can expect to be shown the right approach and structure to all question types in MMI circuits and panel interviews. The course is not lecture-based but rather an interview practice course, where you are taught techniques, strategies, and how to structure your answers, incorporating mock interview questions throughout.

Once you have a method to organise your answer, you will have opportunities to brainstorm content and practice delivery and interview technique. Throughout the day, we give each student the “hot seat” in turn, to answer questions as if it was an interview. You will instantly get feedback from our tutor on your delivery, structure and content and communication skills.

The course is a perfect combination of making sure you have the knowledge you need, the structure required for each question type and getting practice and coaching throughout the day. Our small class size and the breadth of experience of our teachers is what allows us to offer such an interactive and comprehensive course that sets itself apart from other med school interview prep courses. 

By the end of the course, you should expect to have a great understanding of how to approach all question types, have a clear assessment of your strengths and weaknesses when answering interview questions and an overview of all the knowledge required for topic-specific scenarios. All of this means that, whether you’re about to encounter a traditional interview or an MMI circuit, you will walk into that interview room confident and prepared for what’s about to come!

INTERVIEW COURSE CONTENT - DETAILS

FORMAT

• We offer a friendly and comfortable small group setting. To facilitate that, all cameras are on at all times, and we make sure each session involves everyone. We have allotted time for each participant to speak about what they are looking for in the course, and within barely half an hour, it will start to feel like you know your classmates.
• We are the only course in the UK that balances learning with actual practice built into our teaching.
• We use quizzes, breakout rooms and our online interview resource centre to make full use of technology in improving the learning experience.

MOTIVATION, WORK EXPERIENCE, VOLUNTEERING

• This is usually the first session of the course and ensures that all the most commonly asked questions regarding your motivation to study medicine are covered.
• We tackle Why Medicine of course, but also Why a particular medical school, other typical questions related to your experiences and realistic insights into some of the challenges of life as a doctor.
• Everyone will get to practice a full mock question with feedback, on top of being taught on all the questions covered.

STRUCTURE YOUR ANSWERS

• This is usually the second session of the course and arguably the most important one of the day. We have developed a unique approach to questions at theMSAG after our long years of experience and let you in on our secrets. We cover how to ace questions asking you for an example as well as other types, such as questions asking for an opinion.
• You will learn frameworks and ideas for all your introductions and conclusions.
• We also cover some of the unique aspects to think about when interviewing online vs in person.

DUTIES OF A DOCTOR, SJT SCENARIOS

• Roughly 90% of all interview questions test your understanding of the duties of a doctor, in one way or another. They may ask you for examples of times when you demonstrated certain qualities (like teamwork), when you saw doctors demonstrate those qualities or give you scenarios and ask you to prioritise or how you would approach the situation.
• In this section, we first teach the critical knowledge you must have on good medical practice. We make sure that you have a good understanding of what you are tested on, how you are tested on it and teach you a great structure to approach all situational judgement scenarios.
• You also get the opportunity to practice answering some scenarios using the new structure and receive advice on how to improve your answers.

QUESTIONS ASKING FOR AN EXAMPLE

• This is a practice and coaching session. You will each have the opportunity to practice the structures taught earlier in the course and receive feedback on how you are doing with tips to improve.
• For each question, the full group is taught on things to do and not to do to continue building your skills.

MEDICAL ETHICS & SCENARIOS

• Most interesting session - focused on structuring your answers to ethical scenarios and practising them together.
• It will start with an overview of the knowledge, but not much time is spent on this as we give you full access to videos and text with all the summarised knowledge for free in our online interview resource centre.
• Instead, we focus on approaching ethical scenarios together, building “ideal” answers and teaching you how to construct these balanced, well-articulated answers on the go, and on topics you may not be very familiar with.

ROLEPLAYS

• Like for most of our content, we give you access to teaching on how to approach role plays for free in our interview resource centre online. The session thus focuses on understanding what examiners look for in role plays and creating a checklist of things that you can do each time to secure those points.
• You then practice those tips in multiple types of roleplay scenarios and receive feedback from experienced tutors. By knowing how to recognise the kind of roleplay given to you, it allows you to be structured in your approach, as you would any other question type.

HOT TOPICS & NHS NEWS

• Half of this session is spent exploring topics that are currently in the news and how you can speak confidently about what you have read recently. We discuss the best sources for hot topic information and how to handle the common follow up questions that you get asked.
• The second half is dedicated to discussing COVID related or other pertinent NHS questions, making sure we approach the topic from many different perspectives.

SPECIAL STATIONS

• The content of the special stations is adapted as we hear back from medical schools which special MMI stations they plan to have in their virtual MMI circuit this year. At the moment, we cover a comprehensive approach to:
• Calculation questions
• Picture questions
• Video questions
• Data interpretation questions

We may add more types or swap some around based on updates from medical schools to make sure you are being prepared for the most relevant stations that you can expect. The teaching on special stations makes this a comprehensive MMI interview course, as well as a panel interview course.

ABOUT THE TEAM

Over the last 8 years, we have an incredible 98.5% success rate. This means that 98.5% of the students who attended our Interview and MMI Courses have later gone on to receive an offer after their medical school interview. Follow in their footsteps and get into the medical school you want! 

Our medical interview courses are facilitated both by experienced medical doctors and senior medical students, who have the benefit of recent medical school interview experience. Additionally, 8 of our facilitators have sat or are currently sitting on interview panels at medical schools all throughout the UK.

REVIEWS