(Don't) Freak out!

It's never good when your interviewee is visibly shaking--and, although she tried to hide it, my second interview of the evening was visibly shaking. She also was doing everything possible to avoid eye contact.

"Thank you for coming into town to meet with me," I said, smiling what I hoped was a reassuring smile that would put her at ease. "As I mentioned in my email to you, my interviews are pretty informal--just a chance to get to know you some, learn more about your background, interests, etc. Do you have any questions before we start?"

I thought she was going to puke. Instead, she just quickly shook her head.

"OK then. Well, just to start with the obvious, let's talk about academics. What's your favorite subject?"

"Ummm.... I really enjoy English," she offered, in a voice that I had to strain to hear. "And literature. I'm in AP literature right now. And I like that."

"That's great--I was almost an English major," I said. "What's the favorite book you've read so far?"

For a second I thought that I'd asked her to calculate the square root of 17 to eight places. She tried to keep her hands under the table, but it was still obvious they were shaking.

"Well, um..." her eyes darted around the room, "I actually loved Pride and Prejudice. Most people hated reading Jane Austin, but I liked it. "And...um, actually, I need to get a glass of water. Do you think I can get a glass of water from the barrista? Do you mind?"

Advice
If advice can be judged by the recipient's ability to implement it, I'm about to give you the most useless advice ever: calm down. If you're visibly nervous and look like you're about to puke, it's going to stress out your interviewer just as much--and destroy any chances you have of impressing your interviewer.

Personally, when I'm interviewing someone who's clearly petrified, I do two things:

First, I mentally knock their score down. If you can't handle having coffee with me for 30 minutes, how are you going to handle going to my school?

Second, I reign in the questions I'd otherwise ask to the most basic, non-panic inducing ones--thus reducing your ability to shine even more. I understand that everyone gets nervous before big events--and an admissions interview is clearly in the 'big events' camp. Short of knocking yourself out on Xanax, what should you do?

First, calm down. This isn't a Wall Street stress interview. Your interviewer really doesn't want to make you cry. He or she really does just want to learn more about you and determine whether you'd be a good fit for admissions to the incoming class. If it helps calm you down, consider this: Worst-case, you'll come across as an average applicant, fail to impress your interviewer, and your interview won't help your overall application any (although if you're reading this site, you should do better than that!) Very--very--few applicants do so poorly on an interview that they actively hurt their application. The majority are "nice, fine... nothing really special". That's not what you're aiming for, but if that's what you hit, it's not the end of the world.

Second, prepare! The more you know what to expect in your interview, the more comfortable and less nervous you'll be. Although going to the dentist is never fun, it's much more frightening the first time, when you have no idea what's going to happen. So read this site, read the school's material on the web, read interview tip books from your library--in short, prepare for your interview. If you know what to expect, you'll be less nervous.

Third, practice, practice, practice. Again, to pull teeth--the more times you go to the dentist, the more comfortable you are being there. Same with interviews. Have friends, family, teachers, counselors--anyone you can coerce into doing so--give you practice interviews. Learning how to talk about yourself isn't an art, it's a practiced skill--the more times you practice it, the more comfortable you'll be doing it (and the better you'll do).

Finally, try to schedule your top schools last. The more interviews you do, the better you'll get at it--you'll get used to the style (most schools' interviews are similar) and you'll get used to talking about yourself. Just like college sports teams open the season with a couple of games against lower-ranked opponents to work out the kinks in a live-game setting, you should schedule easier schools (or just schools you're less interested in) first. By the time you get to the ones that are more important to you, you'll have hit your stride and know what you're doing.

Despite all that, will you still be nervous? Of course--everyone gets nervous. But you won't let your nerves crush your interview chances. --------CJ