The interviewer may ask you any kind of question relating to your academic, extracurricular or personal experiences, according to College Board. These questions can raise from "Why did you get a C+ in Biology in high school" to "What is your relationship with your mother?" Though some of the questions asked may seem strange, the interviewer has a reason for each one: to get a better idea of who you are as a person and as a student. Other questions that an interviewer may ask are: "What is your favorite subject in school," "Why do you want to attend our college," "Do you think your grades reflect your academic potential," "What do you want to be after you graduate," "What is a situation that you had to deal with adversity," and "If you could change one thing about your life, what would it be?"
Sometimes you may get a curveball thrown your way and you may be unsure of how to answer it. For example, an odd question that can appear is "If you could have one superpower, what would it be and why?" Most likely, you will not have an immediate answer. Stall by telling the interviewer what an original question it is, allowing you to think and assess the questions quickly and effectively. Ideally, you answer should mingle your experience and academic goals to form a distinct answer your interviewer will be impressed by.
Understand that it is more important to sit in silence for ten seconds to think about an intelligent answer, as opposed to stalling with "um," "uh," or nervous laughter. The interviewer would rather hear a smart answer, than a quick, mediocre, off-the-cuff response.
In addition to your answers, the interviewer will be looking at your facial expressions, your body language and any other aspect of you that they can see, according to Acting For Business. Because it is tough to determine a person's character in a brief interview, the admissions counselor must take everything into consideration. This can include your eye contact, posture, grammar while speaking, enthusiasm, the speed you speak at, your volume, how much you fidget and how sincere and interested you seem in the campus and the interview. Sit on the edge of the chair and lean forward a bit to portray sincere excitement to speak with the counselor.
The worst thing you can do is to sound too prepared. If you memorize answers to questions before the interview, then simply spit them out when the admissions counselor asks the question, you will sound more like a robot than an excited high school student. By doing this, the counselor sees you as boring, too formal and not sincere about the opportunity to attend. Of course you should thoroughly prepare for the interview by simply thinking about what is important to you, ideas you want to touch on and potential answers to certain questions; however, you should not feel pressured to recite memorized answers as this will make for an interview disaster. Instead, when the interview occurs, simply relax and let your mind say what you truly feel. Remember, the counselor is also judging how you might fit into the social lifestyle, so if you lie or if you fail to act like yourself, the counselor may be accepting you for a school that you may not belong at.