Interviewing undergraduate students may be a different experience from what you’re used to doing for full time or graduate level academic positions. LHSI applicants are current freshmen or sophomores, which means they have 1-3 semesters of college experience. Our students often do not have an extensive work history and may use examples from volunteer work, student organization participation, classroom projects, or other opportunities. It helps if you identify transferable skills that you’d like interns to have, such as communication or teamwork and then shape questions around those.

Screening for skills

Behavioral-based interview questions can help get to the transferable skills that many students already have and to the traits you’re looking for, such as:

• • Teamwork or collaboration
  • Problem-solving abilities
  • Prioritizing work
  • Initiative
  • Interpersonal skills
  • Work ethic
  • Response to stressful, sensitive, or difficult situations

A strong answer will give you some background on the situation, what the student did to meet the criteria you’re seeking, and then what happened as a result. The student should provide details and specifics. If not, ask follow up questions.

Example interview questions

• • Tell me about a situation where you had to solve a difficult problem.
  • Tell me about a time that you identified a need and went above and beyond the call of duty to get things done.
  • Tell me about a time you set a goal for yourself. How did you go about ensuring that you would meet your objective?
  • Tell me about a time when you had to work closely with someone whose personality was very different from yours.
  • Give me an example of a time you faced a conflict while working on a team. How did you handle that?
  • Tell me about a time you needed to get information from someone who wasn’t very responsive. What did you do?
  • Sometimes it’s just not possible to get everything on your to-do list done. Tell me about a time your responsibilities got a little overwhelming. What did you do?
  • Give me an example of a time you managed numerous responsibilities. How did you handle that?
  • Tell me about a time when you made a mistake. How did you handle it?