Hello,

I'm new here but I have been lurking and looking at other threads since I started my Masters last year. I've been offered an interview for a DPhil place at Oxford's Gray Institute. I'm so excited but also nervous! I've wanted to do a PhD/DPhil for some time now and this seems too good to be true! I'm honoured just to be short listed! The main project I'm interested in is on Base Excision Repair, which is what my Masters project was on so I feel pretty confident on answering questions based on the project offered and my dissertation. I expect the usual questions like "why do you want to do a PhD?" and I feel I can express my desire to research pretty well. If I can calm my nerves, that is!

However, I also have to give a 10 minute presentation on my previous work. My first lab project was in 2005, is it worth including this as well or is it too long ago to be relevant? Also if anyone here went through Oxford interviews in previous years, I would like to know what to expect: are these presentations in front of all the other candidates or just the panel (5 people according to my letter, which in a way is less scary than a one-to-one! I never know where to look!) In addition, I have also been given a journal to analyse and discuss. Its a concise paper which I understand and can pick out the main points but I'm worried they will ask me about questions not obvious from the journal itself!

I have found an old thread on the Student Room forums which is a few years old but about the same Institute but I was hoping if anyone had more recent experience, they may have some useful advice for me?

Many thanks for reading this!

Claire

======= Date Modified 26 Jan 2009 23:45:55 =======
I was shortlisted for a postdoc position at Oxford, so my experience is probably quite different to the DPhil. I thought I was presenting in front of a panel (of three/four people), but was told the day before that I would be presenting in front of department's full staff, so I had an audience of around 15 people.

The interview was brutal and no one got the position! However, I'm sure DPhil interviews are less rough and they'll be more interested in hearing about your ideas/research.

If you are an Oxford alumnus, I'm sure you'll have very little trouble getting a place. Oxbridge do favour their own.

======= Date Modified 27 Jan 2009 10:13:19 =======

just a quick point on this - i would say it is definitely worth including all relevant experience, no matter how long ago it was. even if you just describe it briefly and then go on to explain how you have improved since then, what areas you have built on, what you learnt from it in terms of where your skills were lacking and how you have tackled this etc. you probably don't need to go into technical details, but it would be a good way of showing how you have built up your experience over the years. the interviewers will probably be interested in any specific techniques you have learnt, and i'm sure some of the techniques you used back then will still be relevant now, so i would definitely mention these even if you don't state exactly when/which project they were used for.



good luck! :-)

Thankyou for your replies and advice!

I'm not an Oxford alumnus and that kind of favour is what I am worried about! I still think I am a strong candidate but I have often been told "Its who not what you know!". :S

It's the presentation that concerns me the most so thankyou very much.

Well, I heard from them and I wasn't offered a place. :(

I've been to several interviews now and I seem to keep making the same mistake: getting nervous and making a complete tit of myself when it comes to talking about issues that I feel I know a great deal about: in a way, I know what supervisors are looking for but its my nerves that are holding me back. Its getting very frustrating that I'm letting myself down and robbing myself of being given a chance at something which, in the end, I feel I would be good at. When it comes to being nervous or trying to appear not nervous at all(!) :D would anyone have any advice?

Yep. Think about how you would act if you weren't nervous. How would you stand, how would you sit, how would you speak, what would you do with your hands, feet etc, where would you look etc etc - you get the picture. Then do that. So, you catch yourself slouching, stand up straight, you catch yourself fiddling with stuff, keep your hands still etc. This is in all the run up to it, not just during the 'event'. It is very hard to continue to be nervous if your body is not expressing nerves. Your brain tells your body to be nervous, you respond physically, so your brain keeps on doing it. You've learnt that over years, so you keep doing it. Break the cycle instead. After a while it becomes your default, you forget how you used act to be nervous.