Interview

Last week at work went really quickly. Partly because I was looking forward to my interview (perhaps looking forward to is the wrong word, more anticipating the interview) and my boyfriend coming down for the weekend and partly because of a photo frame on my desk.. For Valentine’s Day my boyfriend gave me a digital photo frame and filled it with photos of us, him and my Facebook photos. It was lovely of him, because I really like photos - my screensaver usually cycles through all my photos on my laptop at home, but also because the photos change every 30 seconds, time seems to go by very quickly.


Before I knew it, it was Thursday and interview time. I had to get there for 8.15 for an interview that wasn’t until 10.30 so they could register me and go through my documents. The girl sat next to me whilst being registered hadn’t got the form signed by her GP and hadn’t bought all the ID forms she was asked for. It really amazes me sometimes, how this is possible. We’ve had these documents for months, plenty of time to assemble what was required. If you can’t follow simple instructions with plenty of time to complete them, it doesn’t reflect well on you, surely, and it wastes the Medical School’s time, the very people you are trying to impress. I know that it probably won’t make any difference, but when it’s this competitive, I really wish it did sometimes. Sorry, rant over.

Everyone was registered by about 8.30, so we had plenty of time to sit and chat. The other candidates all seemed really nice and friendly, though most were older than me A presentation at 9 told us that lots of people had dropped out, so the two days of grad interviews had been cut to just this one and some people had had their interview times bumped up. There were 42 of us interviewed throughout the day. I don’t know how many grad places there are – they said a proportionate amount to those who applied – and I don’t know if anyone was interviewed at Plymouth. I was first up after that, and taken to a room to choose my ethical scenario of a choice of three and answer the questionnaire. After 30 minutes I was taken to the interview room where a panel of four made up of clinical people and professional laypeople asked 9 questions based on the ethical scenario, and then standard questions on situations I’ve been in and how it makes me feel. I don’t want to put too much information about the interview because this is the internet, but get in touch if you’d like more info. I did have a bit of a eureka moment when they asked me a question I’d had when I did the PMCD interview in my first round of applications and I finally understood it this time. We went on the tour, most of which I’ve seen before as it was part of a work experience course I did run at the Postgrad research side of Peninsula, but it was nice to see the accommodation and chat to some students and other candidates. It was a beautiful sunny day and nice to be out of the office for a change. All in all, I think it went quite well, she says, tentatively. Then again, I always think it went quite well, and it doesn’t normally get me anywhere. But no, this time, I didn’t stumble on any questions, I had a big smile, I gave honest answers, demonstrating what they are looking for, I made them laugh, that has to be a good sign, right? Ah well, we’ll see. They said a panel is getting together mid March and all decisions given out by the end of March. Finger crossed!!

I had a lovely afternoon off after that, watched some Lost and did some tidying ready for my boyfriend to come in the evening. He stayed until Sunday afternoon, and apart from being a bit bored when I went to work (he did ask again if he could come in with me Friday morning!) we had a really nice time. We did some shopping for Mother’s Day presents, had the best steak in the world (according to bean!) at Harry’s Grill, I beat him at Wii canoeing and Wii fit and he beat me at Wii tennis, he rubbed my back and fixed my silly back ache (5 layers at work from now on) and we went to see Alice in Wonderland at the cinema. It was a lovely, relaxing, fun weekend, and I loved seeing him before and having him to come back to after work. He’s on exercise now so I won’t be able to speak to him for a whole week, which is rubbish. Saturday morning post bought the interview pack from Nottingham, so the next set of stressing can begin.

One thing I did find from the interview that was interesting is that we were told to apply for a student fees loan anyway, even though the Student Loan Company says it doesn’t give them for second degrees, because they actually don’t mind giving them to grads on a degree leading to a professional career, I guess because they are guaranteed to get their money back fairly soon. This means that a 5 year course will def be possible to fund, even if it means the amount of debt I come out with might actually make me cry, it’s do-able. Plus one for Peninsula. I’ll leave it there for now, since this is quite long with all the interview stuffs. Hope you have a good week, please feel free to comment, and very excited to have my first follower! :)