Med School Interview #1 (hopefully the first of many)

Being interviewed by a psychiatrist is odd.

I spent Monday at the University of Maryland Medical School in Baltimore for my "interview." I put it in quotes because at Maryland, like many other schools, the hugely sought after "med school interview" actually consists of a day of activities at the medical school. On Monday, I, along with the 12 other applicants being interviewed that day went to a presentation on financial aid (read: "medical school is insanely expensive, cheap loans are hard to get, sucks to be you"), we heard from the Dean of Admissions and had lunch with current first year students. We went on a tour of the medical school campus and hospital (which included a trip to the anatomy lab (cadavers) (!) ) and then each had two interviews.

My first interview was with a psychiatrist who is the head of the Community Psychiatry department and I think it went pretty well. It was rather straight forward--she asked questions and I answered them and there was really only one question (what is the most challenging situation you've had to deal with in the last four years?) that I didn't have a great answer for. But I didn't walk away feeling super about our talk--and I'm blaming this not on me, but on her being a psychiatrist. Psychiatrists are not supposed to show judgement when talking with their patients, they are supposed to listen, prod, and allow their patients to make discoveries on their own. While this might be perfect for someone trying to figure out why it is that they really hate their father, it makes for an odd interviewer-interviewee relationship. I'm used to being able to make some connection to the person who is interviewing me and in this case, although she was listening to me, I could never really tell if she was interested in what I was saying. It's not that she seemed disinterested, she was just pretty much blank. Not that I was expecting a hug and cheers of encouragement and reassurance that I'd be accepted after my interview, but I think I'm pretty awesome and it would have felt better if she had let on that she agreed.

My second interview was with a second year student and it was fantastic. We connected on a lot of things, not the least of which being that she had taken a bunch of English classes at College Park. Maybe it is because she isn't a hardened doctor interviewer yet, but she made me feel like she was actually interested in and impressed by what I was saying. We talked for a full hour and I left feeling really good about myself.

Who really knows what any of this means though. It's actually impossible to tell and I guess I won't really know until I find out if I've been accepted or not. Overall the day was great and has reignited my excitement (which was slightly dampened by filling out so many applications) about medical school. ... !!!