Advice from a former Gates Cambridge Scholar and University of Arkansas honors student
Adapted from the University of Arkansas-Fayetteville, http://fellowships.uark.edu/638.php
Of the daunting tasks that made up my fellowship application process—researching my proposal of study, requesting a preposterous number of recommendation letters, and working through thirteen drafts (yes, thirteen) of a personal statement—none was as intimidating as the interview to which I hoped the never ending paperwork would lead. After spending several months buried under my Marshall and Gates Cambridge applications, I was fortunate to emerge with an invitation to interview for a Gates Cambridge Scholarship. Grateful, yet terrified, I was assured by Dr. McCray that the hardest work was yet to come. Indeed, in the weeks leading up to my February interview, I endured a rigorous program of interview training, courtesy of the Office of Nationally Competitive Awards.
To be sure, my series of mock interviews was not easy to stomach. I had to be sure that I was familiar with every implied as well as overtly stated detail of my application. For example, in response to the question about my future career aims, I had noted that I was interested in arts administration and outreach. I was advised that my response would likely prompt a question about arts funding and the recent clashes between Congress and the National Endowments for the Arts and Humanities. “What clashes?” I asked. As it turned out, I had much to research and learn. Yet apart from all the specific facts, figures, and issues specific to my own discipline (music and the arts) I had to familiarize myself with, there were some general pieces of interview advice that I took away from Fayetteville that were particularly helpful during my actual interview. In this brief article, I’ll recount these bits of advice and give a short account of my interview.
The most important tip I took away from Fayetteville was to relax. Far too often during interview practice, I was so nervous and uptight that I found I could not answer questions and discuss issues as well as I could had I been more physically and mentally at ease. Of course, there is such a thing as being too relaxed, which might give off an impression of apathy or boredom. Finding the balance here is crucial.
Another valuable piece of information was to avoid sounding rehearsed when delivering answers with confidence. Unfortunately, delivering answers with assurance takes practice, and with this practice often comes a robotic tone. I found that one of the best ways to avoid falling into rehearsed sounding answers was to answer the same question differently each time. As a result, I think my answers always sounded fresh and “off the cuff” even though I had said them all many times before.
Other tips I found beneficial applied not necessarily to the interview itself, but to my mental approach. First, I was consciously aware that there were major benefits to interviewing as opposed to being judged on paper alone. In these twenty or so minutes, I finally had the chance to present myself in person rather than on a page. I was also afforded the opportunity to speak up about some relevant issues that I might not have covered in my application. This perspective gave me a much more optimistic outlook on the whole affair and mitigated some of the inevitable dread that comes along with this sort of event.
There was, of course, a catch: I wasn’t the one asking the questions and directing the interview. However, with a little (okay, a lot) of practice, I learned how to navigate through questions in ways that allowed me to say more than just my direct answer. I must admit that my interview is not the best example of one of those
notorious (yet perhaps exaggerated) interviews in which a student is annihilated by the interview committee, as mine was eerily friendly and non-confrontational. I must stress that while I was lucky in having a relatively friendly interview; others have not been so fortunate. No two fellowship interviews are the same, and interviews for different scholarships certainly have different vibes and expectations. While some interviewers are polite and friendly as mine were, others can be downright confrontational and even rude. (They’re not actually rude people; they're putting you in the hot seat to see how you react under pressure.)
An additional technique that I found useful was to approach the interview as a discussion structured around a series of questions rather than simply an extended line of confrontational questioning. Going in with this perspective, I found myself more at ease with answering questions, as I think my tone was consequently more conversational. Indeed, during my “interview” the committee members even discussed the issues at hand between themselves. This sort of dynamic definitely made the interview more fun and relaxed, and made me feel more like I was at a round-table discussion.
Lastly, I would urge you not to approach this process assuming that it is fair and just. Unfortunately, many perfectly qualified and even ideal candidates are often denied scholarships. I myself was very lucky in that I had completed a year of study at Cambridge as a junior and had a very supportive letter of recommendation from one of the faculty members there—a circumstance that likely led my particular committee to feel that Cambridge was the right place for me. In other words, these interviews (and the application processes that go with them for that matter) are often driven by tremendous amounts of luck and circumstance, with external factors having a hand in a committee’s decision to grant or withhold scholarships from interviewees. And speaking of such “external factors” I would like to close by explaining how one seemingly unrelated circumstance came into play during my interview, fortunately to my advantage.
The first “question” I was asked when I sat down at the table was a rather strange one: so, did you get any takers on your crab cake dinner? I’ll explain. After I had arrived at the hotel in Annapolis, I, like all the candidates, had registered in the hotel’s conference room in order to get my welcome letter, interview time, hotel key, etc. I was also informed that I could, if I wanted, write a message on the large white message board sitting on an easel in the room. The purpose of this board was for us to open the lines of communication so that we could get groups together to go out to eat and socialize for the night. I admit that, at first, I thought it was lame, but then realized that I didn’t really want to sit in my room or eat dinner alone. So I left a message—the first in fact—for other finalists: Crab Cakes Anyone? (Remember our proximity to the Chesapeake.)
As it turned out, many others wanted crab cakes as well, and the evening turned into a successful and jovial social outing. So why, you might ask, did the committee ask about this much less know about it? Well, as luck would have it, the committee members met for breakfast the morning of the interviews in the very room in which we had registered, complete with the white message board that had been left overnight. Having seen my message, my committee used it as an ice-breaking intro. My point of this anecdote is that even though these interviews seemed to be closed (i.e. ones that were not supplemented by other activities such as the cocktail party at the Rhodes interviews), there are still ways and means by which the interview extended outside the bounds of the “official” twenty minutes. It was clearly circumstantial, but there was a brief moment when I considered that I had to present myself in a way that was congruent with the aims of the scholarship, namely to be socially outgoing, while outside the interview room.
Above all, I would urge you simply to go into the interview aiming to have a great (as in constructive, not necessarily fun) experience. Whatever the outcome, remember that you are very fortunate to have made it to the interview stage; hundreds apply, and few proceed. Your University is proud, and you should be as well.
