Congratulations on being selected for an interview!

February 7 - February 11, 2022

We look forward to meeting you and are pleased to have this opportunity to introduce you to the University of Alaska Anchorage and the University of Washington School of Medicine (UWSOM).

Interviews will be conducted virtually this year. More information will be coming soon.

The Interview

You will meet with 3 interviewers simultaneously and the interview will last approximately 30 minutes. Interviews for applicants from Alaska will usually have two members of the Alaska Admissions Committee and one from Washington as part of the interview panel. One of the interviewers is a member of the Executive Committee on Admissions (EXCOM) and will represent you during the decision making process.  The Executive Committee member has access to your entire file, including previous applications. The other members of the interview panel see only your current application - without your grades and MCAT scores.

Each interviewer rates you independently and submits his or her evaluation. The 3 interviewers then discuss their opinions and the EXCOM member submits an overall evaluation. If one interviewer has a significantly different impression from the others, you MAY be invited for a second interview with a different group of interviewers. All of these evaluations are subsequently available to the Executive Committee during the meetings at which decisions are made.

Candidates are reviewed by the Executive Committee at the first meeting that follows the interview. At this meeting, one of three things will happen: you may be accepted, you may be rejected, or you may continue to be under consideration. Some applicants who interview in February remain under consideration until the final decisions are made in late March. Members of the admissions committee often wait to act on applications in order to see how they compare to the total applicant pool.

The interview is not rigidly structured. Members of the Admissions Committee know how much rests on this meeting, and many of them have gone through this process before you. They want more in-depth information about who you are and how much you know and what motivates you to become a physician.

Preparing for your interview

See UWSOM Admissions Interview Preparation for questions to think about while preparing for your interview. The questions are also designed to reinforce or make you question your decision to pursue a career as an M.D.

If you are interested in a mock interview and are in the Anchorage area the WWAMI students have offered to conduct mock interviews, if outside of Anchorage contact your premed advisor to see if they offer mock interviews or if you are in Seattle the Alliance for Equal Representation in Medicine (AERM), a student group at the UWSOM, offers mock interviews.  Contact Nancy Hall at 907-786-4789 or nancy@uaa.alaska.edu for an Anchorage mock interview.

Office Contacts 

UAA WWAMI School of Medical Education 3795 Piper Street, Room 301 Anchorage, AK  99508
Nancy Hall | 907-786-4789 | nancy@uaa.alaska.edu
Maryann Kniffen | 907-786-4794 | mikniffen@alaska.edu