WVSOM’s interview day was very relaxing. My interview day started at 10 AM. Half of the people had their interviews first thing at 8 AM and the rest of us were interviewed after the presentations, tour, and lunch. WVSOM seemed to feel that keeping the interview day very personal was a way to make interviewees feel at home and comfortable (I rather enjoyed how comfortable the day was). We started off the day in the foyer where we all sat in a circle in nicely padded chairs. There we had quick presentations about the school.

Since this post is about the interview day I will start with what my interview was like. I was interviewed by a 3 person panel. One DO, one PhD, and one admissions office member. Of all of my interviews WVSOM’s interview was the most intense; however, it really wasn’t that bad. Right as I walked in the room I was greeted in Japanese by Dr. Zachary Comeaux (Dr. Comeaux heads an exchange with a Japanese osteopathic school and wanted to test what I put on my application). Luckily, Japanese is a language I know and I quickly responded and we went on with the interview. The interviewers did notice that I had a few blemishes on my academic record, but they didn’t ask me to directly respond to why I struggled in those classes. The questions they asked that stood out the most were:

1- What do you do when you find you are struggling in a class?

2- How will you handle the fast pace and difficulties of medical school?

3- Why do you want to be a DO? Why did you only apply for osteopathic schools?

Obviously there were more questions than that, but they seemed to be fairly standard “getting to know you” questions. I was a little doubtful because of how much they seemed to focus on some past struggles. Only one of the people interviewing me seemed to really care (the PhD), but the other two seemed to think that my more recent academics and my plan I presented proved that I could handle the stresses that would come. Apparently my answers were good enough because I found out two days later that I was accepted. WVSOM’s online system is nice because you don’t have to wait for the letter to come in the mail; you can check out your account whenever you want to see for updates. My acceptance was already posted by the time I got home from the interview. Talk about a stress reliever.

And now for other interview day information. First we heard from different faculty members and the financial aid office. About the only bad thing about the West Virginia School of Osteopathic Medicine was the tuition for out of state students. Now, the tuition is high, but the cost of living is relatively low. Because of this the overall budget is still high but is closer to being competitive with DO schools in places like California, and it is quite a bit lower than the budget at Michigan State University.

After the presentations we went for a tour of the campus. It was a very nice campus. I really liked how spread out the campus was, and that you were able to go outside when moving between classes and buildings. The WVSOM anatomy labs was huge and was very clean, both visibly and smelling. The cadaver tables are equipped with special ventilation systems to remove the special stench that most labs have.

The classrooms were nice too. The classrooms are very large lecture halls with nice chairs. Each room also has 3 screens for powerpoint presentations. They also record all the lectures for students so you can download them later. It seemed like a pretty nice setup.

WVSOM is also building a few new buildings. One of them is going to be a really nice gym, or “wellness center.” I wish I could remember what the other building was, but I remember it sounded nice, something like a research center…I don’t quite remember. All I know is that WVSOM was one of my favorite schools I have seen and if you get the chance to interview with them I would highly recommend it.