Could you get into Oxford? University releases interview questions

Could you pass the interview? Check out some of the sample questions the tutors have released below

 Ooxford University has been criticised for its lack of diversity (Photo: Getty Images)</figcaption>

 

Getting into the highest-ranked university in the world is no mean feat.
As well as getting the best grades, candidates are expected to sit an entrance exam, and then be tested by some of the brainiest academics in the world on their chosen subject.
And as the annual release of Oxford University interview questions has proved, there is no one answer on making your way to the top.
While some of the questions posed by the academics might seem a bit more open-ended – “is religion of value whether or not there is a God?” – other questions test the scientific metal of those wishing to apply.

Could you pass the interview? Check out some of the sample questions the tutors have released below:

Earth Sciences
Q: Tell me what this rock looks like.

Photo: Simon Schmitt on Unsplash

A: For this question, you are given a hand sample of rock to examine, and are asked to describe what you see. In the second part of the question, you are asked to suggest how the rock formed, and why it looks the way it does (it is made of crystals of several different types, and the types of crystal vary in their average size).

This question does not rely on pre-existing knowledge of geology or rocks. In fact, what we are interested in is whether the candidates can make accurate and critical observations (what does the rock look like?) and are able to interpret the meaning of those observations using their knowledge of physical and chemical processes (reasoning ability: aptitude for analysing and solving problems using logical approaches).
As with many of our questions, we don’t want candidates necessarily to tell us the ‘right’ answer straight away. We want to see that they are motivated, and keen to engage with the topic. We don’t want to intimidate or overwhelm the candidates with difficult questions that they haven’t encountered before. But we do want to see that they can get to grips with new information and use it in their reasoning. So we often provide suggestions and small questions that help to guide the conversation at various points.
History:
Q: What can historians not find out about the past?
A: The aim of this question is to encourage candidates to think critically, creatively and comparatively about how historians know what happened in the past. I would use this sort of open question to allow a candidate to talk about the availability of historical evidence in whatever time period, place or theme interested them from their school-work or wider reading.
For instance, a candidate might start off by saying that they had been studying Tudor England and historians don’t know much about the lives of the poor because they were less likely to be able to write. Given these lower levels of literacy, we could then talk about what sources historians can use to learn about the lives of the majority of the population in sixteenth-century England. This would require the candidate to think creatively about alternative sources (and their drawbacks), such as, for instance, criminal court records in which people who could not write were required to give oral testimony as witnesses.
Medicine/Biomedical sciences:
Q: The viruses that infect us are totally dependent on human cells for their reproduction; is it therefore surprising that viruses cause human diseases?
A: 
Like most good interview questions, this could be a starting point for any number of interesting conversations. Most candidates will have a reasonable understanding that viruses are essentially parasitic genetic entities, but the interviewers are not really looking for factual knowledge.
In a tutorial-style discussion, strong candidates will engage with the paradox that viruses need us for their own reproduction, and yet cause us damage. They might point out that some of our responses to viral infection (such as sneezing) favour the spread of the virus. The interviewer might steer the discussion towards viral infections associated with high mortality, and the idea that any virus that killed off its host entirely would run the risk of extinction – unless it could infect other host species too. Candidates may have come across examples of viruses that jump from non-human animals to human hosts in this way.

Entrance to Oxford is highly competitive, with nearly 20,000 people applying for around 3,200 undergraduate places for entry in 2017.
However, the institution has been criticised for its diversity issues.
One in four of the university’s colleges failed to admit a single black person in three years, while an FOI submitted by MP David Lammy revealed that 82% of offers from Oxford and 81% from Cambridge went to students from the top two socio-economic groups in 2015.

inews.co.uk