@surejen OMGGG congrats!!! And, yeah, I got advice!
I got interviewed by a 4th-year student who didn’t read my entire app but got notes from colleagues who did read my actual materials. The whole process was really chill, as they said it would be. We started of with the interviewer asking me questions, but it quickly transitioned into a conversation. The interviewer was very nice and encouraging, didn’t make me feel nervous at all. We ended at around 40 minutes. It was a fantastic and relaxed talk. I still smile thinking about some of the things we talked about.
I agree with everything @rh1616 said about the interview being A LOT about your actual application. I’d say 95% of it was about my activities, my school, my interests, etc.
Here are some things you should run yourself through before going into the interview. Just a note tho, the questions I list here are by no means the actual questions I got asked. Just relevant prompts to get you thinking.
Read over the app you submitted and think about the things you wrote. What did you do? Why did you do this? What did you learn from it? What problems did you run into when doing this? How did you overcome them?
Get ready to talk about your school. What is it like? Who are your peers? What’s special about your school? What’s good/bad about your school?
Think about the majors you put down and why you’re interested in them. The only curveball question that made me kind of panic was something specific to my major.
I have a feeling they’re trying to pinpoint your central beliefs and motivations. I got asked follow-up questions that were something along the lines of “how did this concept make you feel?” or “what do you think about this pedagogy?”
Think about why Yale NUS, of course.
Prepare questions for the interviewer.
There were no weird questions like the whole “what would you do if you went back in time and had more hours in a day”, so relax :))
One thing that I cannot stress enough- think about the why and how, not the what. Think about your underlying motivations, your interests, why you developed those interests and why you did what you did. I assume they’d hate to see someone who has an impressive resume but has no insightful reasoning towards why they did those activities, or have no significant learning from them.
All the best to everyone going into interviews! Feel free to ask me more questions, I’m here for y’all :))))
@Cly2019 I’m technically from mainland China, my passport at least. But I’m applying from a Singapore school and I also submitted directly through Yale-NUS. Not sure if I’m helping, but for your information!
@spinachbrain211 Woah, thank you so much! This was probably the most helpful piece of advice I’ve gotten so far! And I am so happy your interview went this well!
I will make sure to post an update after mine as well, especially if there are any differences to what has already been said. And good luck to everyone, I am sure you will soon hear back from YNC, we’re all in this together
@ spinachbrain211
Thanks. That helps a lot. I shared my app with YNC (Cuz I directly submitted my app to Yale) and I haven’t heard back from YNC. I submitted “Why YNC” essay on Jan 22 and I assume that maybe the AO hasn’t reviewed my essay or I have already been kicked off from the pool.
@Cly2019 Noooo, I don’t think that means you’re kicked out. Based on past years’ intel, they will keep offering interviews until mid-end of Feb. Also, when I went to their admissions office for my interview, everybody looked visibly stressed haha-- they’re probably still reading a huge amount of applications, so you definitely still have time and chances.
I just got an interview invite from YNC! @maddy09 I’m from India, and I just got shortlisted. I wouldn’t stress though - some friends of mine got their interviews way earlier, so I guess they’re still reading through our apps.
@spinachbrain211 Thanks for the advice, I’m going to need it. There weren’t too many slots available for the interview for me, so I have only a few days to prepare for mine
Speaking of going over the app, has anyone found a way to view or download your app after submitting it? I unfortunately forgot to save the preview in my rush to submit so I have no record of the app I submitted
Hmm… Nothing since October just feels so lonely, and I’m getting anxious about this. I would want to email them about the interview while afraid it might distract them from reviewing thousands of applications. So… upcoming 20 days may be one of the most crucial period of my life, I just hope everything will turn okay.
Congratulations to those who have been shortlisted so far!
@blrcollegekid24 Ooof, I had the same issue but I only forgot to save one small section of my app. I personally couldn’t find a way to download, sorry
Do try to remember what you put though, or just think about your experiences as a whole. I’m going to repeat myself and say again that quite the bulk of my interview was around my application, my activities and my major interests.
As for preparation time, I also only had a couple of days, less than a week I think. I was super busy with school work too at the time, so I technically didn’t start preparing until the night before. I was fine. You should be too!
Hello. I applied through Yale common app and I submitted my “Why Yale-NUS” essay on January 22. By now, I haven’t heard from Yale-NUS nor Yale. Frankly speaking, I’m worried about my application…
@spinachbrain211 Thank you so much for your tips! And congrats for all of you who already got shortlisted. @yich3n Same goes for me, except that I submitted it later than you did… Let’s all hope for the best for now! I feel like the AO reviews our essays on either a random basis or in their own way which we don’t know, so let’s stay calm and be productive on other things in the moment hahaha
Hello guys, I just had my interview and here are my impressions:
My interviewer was a 4th year student who wanted me to stick to the questions, so we didn’t really have a natural conversation, rather more of a Q&A session. I don’t think this is a bad thing - judging by other applicants’ experiences it happens sometimes. Especially if you’re interviewing online.
Most of my questions were about my high school experience and my expectations for life at Yale-NUS, only two or three questions were related to my ECs (and they were about my top ECs too). I think the interviewer aims to see whether you’d fit into the community, they don’t put that much emphasis on your application that has already been reviewed and approved by someone else.
I definitely second @spinachbrain211 's advice to look up your first indicated major beforehand. I had a lot of questions related to mine (anthropology) and had to explain why I chose it, as well as how I think it pertains to my desired career in the media field.
Prepare to talk about a challenging situation of some sort. I hadn’t thought much about my personal setbacks at school/ECs, so I said something really dumb in response to a question about how I dealed with a hard situation
Get straight to the point. My interview was exactly 25 minutes, and there were so many things I wanted to mention but didn’t get to talk about because of how much details I included in my answers.
All in all, I have no idea whether I am happy with my interview or not. It could’ve gone better, but I don’t think I failed it too.
My top advice would be to not stress too much. I know it’s inevitable, but there is really nothing to fear - the interviewer is probably someone close to your age who definitely wants to help you get accepted. I spent a whole week stress crying over my interview, but two minutes into it I realised all of my worries had been pointless. And I believe that had I spent less time overthinking the ways it could go wrong, I would’ve definitely done better. So even if it’s hard, try relaxing and trust yourself. You have what it takes!
@surejen@spinachbrain211 Thanks for all the advice regarding the interviews! Fingers crossed that it goes well
@maddy09 I submitted my app on the 14th of Jan, through the Yale-NUS application form directly, since I haven’t applied to Yale or any other schools in the US
@surejen Huh, you had a pretty different content structure than I did. I guess I was a tad bit more dominant, so the interview more so followed my logic than my interviewer’s logic.
Although I personally didn’t get asked as much (only 1-2 Qs, I think) about my high school experience, I can totally see the interview going that direction since it was one of the first questions my interviewer asked. So maybe if I followed my interviewer’s logic and not vice versa, the bulk of it would’ve been about my school. Thus, for sure I second @surejen with that point!
