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What questions do American college admissions interviewers often ask?
Many students will prepare some interview strategies when applying for studying in the United States, and some questions often asked by interviewers are the main contents. So what common questions do American interviewers often ask? Follow me to have a look! Welcome to reading.

Question 1: Tell me about yourself.

Variants of this question are self-introduction, self-description, etc. , generally used to introduce topics in interviews. Even so, you can't underestimate this problem, which determines your first impression of the interviewer.

The following example comes from an interviewer of an alumnus of the University of Chicago, which proves the importance of the first impression: two groups of interviewers with the same interview training have done research. The first group interviewed more than 100 people for half an hour, filmed them all, and then showed the first five minutes to the second group for them to evaluate the admission results. The result is that the two groups have similar views on the same person. This shows how important the first impression is.

Answer the prompt:

A) The answer should not be too long, but about 2 minutes is better.

B) Don't cover everything and don't need too many details; The purpose of this question is to open the topic and leave the details to the interviewer.

C) If you have a sense of humor, you can prepare a paragraph at the beginning, but people who are not humorous should not force themselves to do things that they are not good at, just clean their hearts.

D) What personality traits do you want the interviewer to remember? It is very important for you to impress the interviewer. When your name is mentioned, a unique image will come to mind. So you should prepare three keywords that can best describe yourself, and the whole interview will focus on these three keywords. Describing yourself can be introduced by these words, and each word corresponds to one or two things. Of course, these three words can be said indirectly, but they must be implicit. For example, if the key word is cooperation, then tell more stories about projects with classmates.

E) You can talk to the interviewer about your family and friends. What the interviewer wants to know is that the applicant is A? A complete person? What it feels like. Sometimes people always pay attention to themselves and ignore the people around them. They have always supported you, which will definitely have a great influence on your character building. You might as well play a warm card, tell the story of your family and reflect on what made you who you are today. There are still many details to be excavated.

F) be confident! Confidence! Confidence! Say the important words three times. Besides, the interviewer of your dream school is sitting in front of you. How can you not get excited?

Question 2: Why are you interested in our college?

This kind of question is just like writing why essay. It must be very, very specific. From academics to school activities, from student groups to community atmosphere, the examples given must be accurate to the name of a community or a project, and related to one's own experience and expertise. The question to consider here is, what is the biggest difference between this school and other schools? What is the meaning of this difference from me?

Skills of answering questions: It is best to have at least one specific example mentioned that is academic.

Question 3: Tell me about a challenge/success/failure?

The interviewer is human, everyone likes to listen to stories, and it must be a story full of details.

Answer (for reference only):

A) A story is 2-3 minutes, not too long. You can deliberately leave blank to induce the interviewer to ask further questions about a certain detail.

B) About the details of the story: Many times, people tend to say what they did in general, without talking about the details. The interviewer has met many interviewers and never leaves them. The interviewer may have heard a lot of similar activities you did. Only details can deepen the interviewer's impression, and the more vivid it is, the more infectious it is. So, first of all, you can prove that you are not bragging, you really participated in this activity and made a lot of efforts. Secondly, you can see that you are devoting yourself to doing what you love.

C) Tell the story clearly and don't jump logically. There is a universal magic weapon here, the star method. I know all the routines, but this method can help you quickly extract the core of the story, the logical perfect score. * What's the situation? What was the situation then? Describe it briefly. * Task? What tasks need to be completed in that situation? What problem do you want to solve? * Action? What action did you take? Always mentioning details. Avoid using too much? we? . The interviewer wants to know what you did, not what others did. You need to show your contribution. * The result? What are the results of these actions?

D) After that, the result is divided into two parts. The first part is the result of the event itself, and the second part is your gains as a problem solver. How much do you know about yourself? How does this matter affect your academic interests and extracurricular hobbies? What's your new view of people, things and things around you? The process of solving problems is the first, and your gains are the second.

Question 4: Why major?

Same as above, you can tell some stories about when you decided to major. It doesn't matter if it's undecided You can talk about several majors you are considering. You can be uncertain about your major, but the reason cannot be that you don't know what you want to do. The acceptable reason is that there are too many interesting contents to choose from, or there are subjects of slight interest, but I am not sure whether I want to study this major and want to try something, so I am ready to continue exploring.

Question 5: Tell me about your extra activities now?

The same is to ask all kinds of questions related to extracurricular activities on your resume.

A) As in question 3, you can tell a story.

B) Or you can take these three steps why, how and why you do it: you must be your own original thought! How did you do it: what did you find most interesting in this process; Who do you ask for advice? What have you learned; What's the point of leading a team? What's the point of doing it well? Is it to stimulate some academic interest? What did that bring to your high school career? Does it help you better understand a subject, or to what extent does it help you become a person?

Question 6: What is your greatest weakness?

I have said a lot about my own advantages. Will it be a bit embarrassing to encounter this problem suddenly? First of all, please avoid the following three answers:

A) Examples that have a great negative impact on yourself, such as not attending classes, defective conduct and morality, etc.

B) similar to? My biggest weakness is that I study too hard and won't relax. I ask too much of myself and others? Wait, it's not a disadvantage at all. It is too deliberate to whitewash one's purpose, which seems insincere.

c)? I went to bed too late. I don't like vegetables? Wait, these are not the biggest weaknesses at all. The interviewer asks this question mainly to see whether you have a clear understanding of your own advantages and disadvantages, and also to see your attitude when facing your own shortcomings. When I met this question in the interview, my answer is that sometimes I pay too much attention to details and spend too much time pursuing perfection in every place, which leads to insufficient task time and often needs to run behind the dead line. The more important part of the answer lies in the action taken after realizing my own shortcomings: I said at that time that in order to solve this problem, I could only start preparing early, act according to the timetable, or hesitate to ask my teammates for help and help in details.

To sum up, the way to answer questions is as follows: a) Say a common shortcoming, such as sometimes procrastination, fear of failure, fear of rejection, etc. B) How do you try to correct yourself after telling a shortcoming?

Question 7: Tell me about a time when you failed.

Here, we must answer a real failure experience, not those who turned defeat into victory and died. Examples can be the failure of objective events, such as losing in a competition, or the result of the activity is not ideal, the activity did not start as expected, you did not meet other people's expectations, and so on.

Similarly, the event itself is not the most important, and the reflection and summary afterwards must be mentioned at the end of the answer.

Question 8: What do you enjoy?

Do you have any hobbies? At this time, we can talk about things other than academics, such as painting and singing, as well as skydiving, skiing, horse riding and other sports. Mainly to make people feel that you are a person with rich life experience. If the interviewer happens to be interested in your interests, there is another topic to talk about. For example, I told the interviewer that I like singing very much. I was a member of the choir from primary school to junior high school. I also took vocal lessons in high school and sang Acabella with my classmates. The interviewer mentioned that I was also playing in an ensemble when I was in college, and introduced which acapella groups were more active.

Question 9: Tell me a book you like.

Please be prepared for this problem. You can choose academic books or literary novels. In any case, you'd better review your writing background, content outline and your feelings before the interview. Once you ask this question, the interviewer will probably spend five to ten minutes discussing the book with you. I chose dan ariely's Predictable Irrationality, a book about behavioral economics. The interviewer asked me first, the general content of this book, if you haven't read it carefully, it's hard to talk nonsense. Then, he talked to me about a case in my sample book, and finally asked me what I thought, which was very interesting.

My suggestion is that you must choose books that you find interesting, not books that are too high. A few minutes can't explain clearly, but it's important to show enthusiasm for a topic. Treat the interviewer as your friend. How to recommend a book that you think is excellent? How to introduce this book in the interview?

Question 10: What makes you stand out? Why should we accept you? How are you going to contribute to the school?

In fact, the whole interview is to answer the ultimate question of why this school should admit you. If you have a unique interest in a certain field, please feel free to say how your investment in this field can contribute to the school. You can talk about the topic you want to do, the group you want to set up, the competition you want to participate in and so on. If you have a skill, sports and music, you can talk about your contribution to the school community. Finally, always remember the three keywords mentioned at the beginning that are related to yourself. I call them identifiers to impress the interviewer. These words can describe your personality characteristics or your unique experiences (such as living in another city for a long time as a child, or especially enjoying a certain sport, surfing, horseback riding, etc.).

In this question, you can integrate these three words into the answer again and talk about your differences. I reflected on my own identifiers at that time, such as entrepreneurship (with many experiences of student companies), interdisciplinary (economy, environmental protection, corporate social responsibility) and acapella, and felt that it was still too scattered to concentrate others' attention. Especially in recent years, there are more and more student teams doing entrepreneurship, and the word entrepreneurship can no longer attract others' interest as before. Remove it? Student entrepreneurship? Think about the driving force behind the act of starting your own business. After all, starting your own business only represents a way, and what you want to achieve through your own business is the most important.

Question 1 1: Why do you want to study abroad?

I can honestly say that I like the setting of liberal arts and want to go abroad to see the wider world, etc., because the educational resources abroad are better.

Question 12: Who is your hero/who do you admire?

It can be relatives and friends, teachers, people in books, athletes, artists, directors and so on you admire. Be familiar with this man's deeds, but don't spend all your time describing his achievements. The focus is on where his/her deeds influenced you, how far-reaching the influence was, and what decisions you made.

Question 13: Do you have any questions for me?

The time when you ask the interviewer questions. Four no principles:

1. Don't ask questions that have nothing to do with the school or the application unless the interviewer takes the initiative, such as? What do you think of China's economy? It has nothing to do with the college and the interview;

2. Don't ask questions that don't belong to the interviewer's professional field in order to show your strength;

3. Don't ask questions that challenge the authority of the interviewer;

4. Don't ask negative news about the school.

The following are the questions I have prepared for all schools for your reference: a) How has the school changed you? Why did you apply to this school? Is it what you expected? C) Ask some questions about the policy/treatment of international students. D) What do you wish you knew when you were a freshman/applying? Do you have any recommendations for me? E) Your typical day? F) Issues related to school traditions

Asking questions is skillful. No matter the question in the interview or the question in the last link, there must be two characteristics. First, be specific, not illusory, and it is not difficult to answer. There is no need to ask students such vague questions as how hard they study in college. Second, open-ended questions, don't end with whether or not to ask questions not to show your IQ by confusing the interviewer, but to show your enthusiasm and curiosity about the school, as well as your personal characteristics, concerns and personality.

Question 14: What do you think you will do in 10 years?

I was asked this question once, mainly to see what the applicant has planned for his future. The interviewer knows what will happen in 10 years, so he won't ask you to have a detailed plan, you just need to take it out. Actually, I really thought about it, okay? The posture is ok. The idea is as follows:

A) it can be discussed in different categories. If I major in X, I may go on to graduate school and then pursue a doctorate. If you study Y major, you may go to work directly, stay in the United States if it goes well, or consider going back to China to engage in xx industry if there is an opportunity in China;

B) it can be calculated according to the number of years. My answer at that time was that I enjoyed the uncertainty of the future, but I also imagined my future. One possibility is to spend two to three years in an industry that allows you to get in touch with the business world after graduating from college for four years. Determine my professional passion and understand my strengths/weaknesses. With three years of experience and contacts, I will consider returning to China to start a business. So ten years later, I may be an entrepreneur who is forced to work overtime in a rented office with a group of like-minded people, and then insert why I have to work first and then start a business, and why I have to return to China to start a business. Or consider going to school B.

C) To explain the reasons behind each choice, it is best to have something to do with the university you are applying for.

Tips before departure

Do several groups of mock interviews with senior interview counselors, friends and teachers before the interview. Imitation is the best way to reflect the real interview attitude and improve the interview skills quickly. After the interview, record in detail what you need to improve. At least 5 mock interviews are recommended.

Prepare two resumes to take to the interview, one for backup; In addition, you can prepare a copy of extracurricular activities, make it into PDF or PPT and save it in the tablet computer. If you have the chance, you can show it.

Whether it is a video interview or a face-to-face interview, you should choose appropriate clothes, usually business casual clothes. Too bright colors will distract the interviewer. Girls can wear light make-up, boys should be clean, not too mature, and look like students as a whole.

Perfume is not recommended.

Confirm the date, time and place of the interview with the interviewer one day in advance.

Go to the guidance office ten minutes in advance, please go alone, don't bring your family.

Ask the interviewer for a business card after the interview. If you need their help or have questions after applying, you can keep in touch with the interviewer.

It is good manners to send a thank-you email to the interviewer on the second day of the interview.

The above is an introduction to some questions frequently asked by interviewers studying in the United States. I hope I can help you.