Tom

New College

My school came on an access programme in year 11 and when I came down I loved the city. When I then looked at the course for what I wanted to do I was really enthused by it. I chose New at first because it’s musical but then I went on an open day (which I recommend, by the way) and met the tutors and stayed in the rooms and felt the atmosphere of the college and fell in love with it.

I went to a state comprehensive so wasn’t really given help, beyond someone reading through my personal statement. My school gave me a mock interview which was useless and actually scared me more. I came on open day and it was actually meeting the tutors and realising they weren’t scary which was most helpful. I heard once I got here about how people had been coached for interviews, had lunchtime sessions and that kind of thing, and at the end of the day, the best preparation you can do is make sure you’re applying here because you are passionate about your subject(s) and the tutors will see that. That said, I read quite a bit around my subjects, which my tutors seemed to like.

Before I came for interviews I sat the HAT test for History, which is again not something you can be coached for. It’s good to look at past examples (online) so you know the format and to think carefully about sources you use, but no coaching is really possible (my sources were on Nigeria, so I knew nothing about it!). The test is looking for potential more than knowledge really.

For interviews I arrived on Wednesday night; my first night was quite lonely and stressful, and people at dinner were talking about scary interviews which, in hindsight, I don’t believe actually happened. When I arrived I got a pack which included some texts to look at for the German interview and a timetable telling me when they were. Thursday started with meetings with the tutors, so they could let us know what was going to happen. Then I had my German admission test (look at samples online – it’s basically grammar) in the morning.

My first interview was German. I’d looked at the texts they’d given me (and made major use of the dictionaries in the library): one was a literary extract and one was a newspaper article. I walked in to see the tutor and the Lektorin (she’s the one who does oral lessons once you get here) sitting by the fire and I sat on the sofa, nervously! The first five minutes were in German, and the Lektorin asked me a couple of questions about the article, asking me about vocab, to rephrase bits, and some general questions. They don’t expect your German to be perfect – that’s what the year abroad is for – they just want to see potential. Then we talked about the literary extract in English (!) to see what I could draw from it and see how I responded to her playing devil’s advocate. I managed to confuse ‘a writhing intestine’ with ‘a dancing woman’ so my analysis was a little interesting, but we both laughed about that! Then my tutor started talking more generally about the German books I’d read (some were in English, that’s fine too) and she asked general questions about them. Afterwards I thought my interview went fine, but if you don’t, don’t panic, it means nothing.

My history interview was next. I went in and my tutor started from the essay I’d sent (German unification) and asked me questions around this to see how much I’d thought about it. He would give me with new bits of information to see if/how I adjusted my argument and how I justified myself. It felt a lot like a two-way discussion and I came out feeling more relaxed than I was when I went in, and it was over really quickly.

That night the shepherds took us to the cinema, which was awesome, and then a friend and I crashed in the common room with Kettle Chips and a DVD. The next day some people had interviews at other colleges; you had to just wait around until you were called. All the historians went home, and it was just linguists left. I went to the Ashmolean and did some shopping, but most of the time was hanging around waiting to be called for interview. I wasn’t – again this means nothing. Friday night was our last night so a bunch of linguists went to the Turf and had some cider and a game of ‘I have never’ which was…revealing, to say the least! The only caution is one friend got back at midnight to discover she had another interview at 8am the next morning! Saturday morning we were all told we could go home.

The best advice I was given was to read around my subjects, as that shows you’re really committed and enthusiastic about the subject(s) you’ve chosen, and then I shoved the books on my personal statement. Be warned, though, you will get asked about stuff you say you’ve ‘read’! I recommend this though. Any reading is good, so just pick up whatever looks interesting (and don’t be embarrassed about translations). Same for history and just try to think about the wider issues when you’re studying something.

I actually enjoyed interviews, but at the same time it was quite scary. They were nowhere near as bad as I had expected though, and don’t listen to horror stories. They’re not true. If you’re passionate and interested in your subject(s) they’ll love you, and that can’t be coached!