Getting into Oxbridge: How to tackle the questions during Oxford and Cambridge University admissions interviews

For free real time breaking news alerts sent straight to your inbox sign up to our breaking news emails Sign up to our free breaking news emails Sign up to our free breaking news emails SIGN UP I would like to be emailed about offers, events and updates from The Independent. You’ll frequently hear tales of students who were asked seemingly obscure questions like, “Why do we have two nostrils but only one mouth?”, or impossibly difficult ones such as, “How many grains of sand are there in the world?” If taken in context, both of these are very fair Oxbridge interview questions. This is the main reason why it’s not particularly useful for interviewers to ask purely knowledge based questions such as, “What is the normal plasma concentration of magnesium?” Knowledge of isolated facts is neither necessary nor sufficient for a successful Oxbridge interview. This is the question tabloids would take out of context to make the interview seem like an array of bizarre questions when, in fact, this was perfectly reasonable giving the preceding questions. Dr Rohan Agarwal is the director of operations at admissions company UniAdmissions For more information, The Ultimate Oxbridge Interview Guide includes worked solutions to over 900 questions asked in Oxbridge interviews