My Cambridge Engineering Interview Experience (Winter 2024/2025 entry)

2

Just wanted to document some of my thoughts/feelings, after the interview, before I forget. I applied for engineering at Queen's College, Cambridge.

Before the interview, I found it unusual that they asked us to prepare some personal projects to present (if you have any), as I haven't heard of this before at other colleges, so I printed pictures out, in order to show the professors through the zoom camera.

It was also unusual that they asked for paper and pen on hand - rather than using a digital whiteboard - especially after already testing my digital whiteboard with Queen's College in a meeting a few weeks prior. I ran the meeting on a touchscreen anyways just in case though. (Did indeed end up using the paper over the digital whiteboard)

Overall, the interview was very structured. The first 5 minutes was sectioned out for me to talk about my projects, where they asked questions about what I had done and to take closer looks. They were very friendly thoughout this interaction.

Then, we moved swiftly to questions. I won't be disclosing what these specifically were, but I will say that they were more discussion-based questions that consisted of minimal working/writing and just discussion over physicsideas in applied scenarios. They had very structured and designated timings for each question. And throughout, they took turns to ask each question so it was very much both of them involved rather than the expected observer-interviewer setup I was expecting.

At the end, after leaving the meeting, I didnt really know how to feel. They were very friendly and there wasn't much negative feedback, but also i felt the questions were unusually easy - was I not getting the hint? Did they dumb it down for me? No point overanalysing it tbf.

I would love to hear other people's experiences, and I wish the best of luck for all applicants on the 30th!!!

Reply 1

Lastyearmadness

7

Hi, I did an interview for engineering (plan to specialise in aerospace engineering) at the Churchill college. Your interview experience was very different from my experience and here’s how:

1.

There was nothing that I got from the college stating that I have to talk about a project. I am currently designing a drone and talked a lot about that in my personal experience and in My Cambridge Application, and since I was very passionate about that project, I wanted to go in much depth about the mechanics of that drone.

2.

However, the interviewers never asked anything about my personal statement or questions like why you want to study at Cambridge.

3.

In the interview, the interviewers directly went straight to the maths and physics questions. The questions were numerical based like finding the stationary points of an equation and sketch out its graph and then asking me to solve two physics numerical questions.

And that was it. I was excited to talk about concepts of aerodynamics and flight motion of aircrafts as I seen in other example interviews on YouTube, the interviewers would usual ask you about these mentioned in your personal statement and elaborate it further in the interview. However from the interview, I was getting the feeling that the interviewers didn’t even read my personal statement.

As per my experience on the interview. I was able to correctly answer their questions and the reaction from the interviewers seemed very neutral, so I really don’t know how to interpret it. My prelims or mock exams were happening around at the same time as the interview (I even had a computer science exam on the morning next day of the interview) so at that moment, I was very stressed about other exams so I didn’t had time to overthink about the experience of the interview.

Right now, I really don’t know what the outcome of my application would be as I did a lot of extracurricular activities and had A grade in every subjects, however everyone who applied to Cambridge would had have the same or even better stats than me. I just I just have to wait for another week to see whether I got in or not. I wish you the very best for your application and I really hope that you get in Cambridge.

Reply 2

Anonymous #1

Original post

by redcardigan

Just wanted to document some of my thoughts/feelings, after the interview, before I forget. I applied for engineering at Queen's College, Cambridge.
Before the interview, I found it unusual that they asked us to prepare some personal projects to present (if you have any), as I haven't heard of this before at other colleges, so I printed pictures out, in order to show the professors through the zoom camera.
It was also unusual that they asked for paper and pen on hand - rather than using a digital whiteboard - especially after already testing my digital whiteboard with Queen's College in a meeting a few weeks prior. I ran the meeting on a touchscreen anyways just in case though. (Did indeed end up using the paper over the digital whiteboard)
Overall, the interview was very structured. The first 5 minutes was sectioned out for me to talk about my projects, where they asked questions about what I had done and to take closer looks. They were very friendly thoughout this interaction.
Then, we moved swiftly to questions. I won't be disclosing what these specifically were, but I will say that they were more discussion-based questions that consisted of minimal working/writing and just discussion over physicsideas in applied scenarios. They had very structured and designated timings for each question. And throughout, they took turns to ask each question so it was very much both of them involved rather than the expected observer-interviewer setup I was expecting.
At the end, after leaving the meeting, I didnt really know how to feel. They were very friendly and there wasn't much negative feedback, but also i felt the questions were unusually easy - was I not getting the hint? Did they dumb it down for me? No point overanalysing it tbf.
I would love to hear other people's experiences, and I wish the best of luck for all applicants on the 30th!!!

Queens college engineering interview specifically asks for the "project pitch" for a number of years now.It seems a great way to show your interest, practical skills and thought process.The structured nature of the interview and the friendly atmosphere you described sound encouraging. It’s not uncommon to feel unsure afterward, especially when the questions feel easier than expected. Sometimes, interviews are designed to test how you think and communicate rather than to trip you up with overly complex problems. The fact that they engaged in a discussion-based approach suggests they were more interested in your reasoning and understanding than in catching you out. Hope you all got the good news you want!

Reply 3

redcardigan

OP

2

Original post

by Anonymous

Queens college engineering interview specifically asks for the "project pitch" for a number of years now.It seems a great way to show your interest, practical skills and thought process.The structured nature of the interview and the friendly atmosphere you described sound encouraging. It’s not uncommon to feel unsure afterward, especially when the questions feel easier than expected. Sometimes, interviews are designed to test how you think and communicate rather than to trip you up with overly complex problems. The fact that they engaged in a discussion-based approach suggests they were more interested in your reasoning and understanding than in catching you out. Hope you all got the good news you want!

Hi thanks. I completely forgot that I made this post come to think of things. Honestly i dont know how to feel right now because after getting rejected, it feels so anticlimactic.so whatever, might as well talk a bit about some questions (for future applicants sake.):

1.

Moments question about a crane and talk about frictions and energy.

2.

Honestly I dont remember at this point. Maybe something on projectile motion

3.

This was a super easy graph sketching question of some quadratic (y= x^2 +3x+9 or something). At this point I firgured they thought I was dumb and kind of got the feeling i was rejected already.

Sounds like you know a lot about the process - did you apply as well? If so how did it go for you or anyone reading this.

Reply 4

Anonymous #2

Original post

by Anonymous

Queens college engineering interview specifically asks for the "project pitch" for a number of years now.It seems a great way to show your interest, practical skills and thought process.The structured nature of the interview and the friendly atmosphere you described sound encouraging. It’s not uncommon to feel unsure afterward, especially when the questions feel easier than expected. Sometimes, interviews are designed to test how you think and communicate rather than to trip you up with overly complex problems. The fact that they engaged in a discussion-based approach suggests they were more interested in your reasoning and understanding than in catching you out. Hope you all got the good news you want!