MSU College Of Osteopathic Medicine (COM) Interview Practice Test

Focusing on describing a time you faced adversity and how you overcame it directly invites you to discuss resilience in action—how you handle stress, adapt under pressure, persevere through obstacles, and learn from the experience. A responder who outlines a real setback, the specific steps taken to address it, the challenges encountered along the way, and the tangible outcomes demonstrates not just that hardship occurred, but how you think and respond under pressure. This kind of narrative reveals problem-solving under difficult conditions, emotional regulation, persistence, and the capacity to recover and grow—traits highly relevant to medical training and patient care where setbacks and high-stress situations are common. A strong answer would ground the adversity in concrete details: what happened, why it was challenging, the concrete actions you took (seeking help, adjusting plans, managing time or resources, communicating with teammates or mentors), any obstacles you faced, and what you learned that you’d apply in the future. It also helps to connect the experience to your future role in medicine—how you’d use those resilience skills with patients, in teamwork, or under time pressure. Other prompts can reveal resilience indirectly but aren’t as reliable for eliciting a full resilience story. Describing volunteering abroad can highlight service and cultural insight; learning a new hobby shows adaptability; winning a competition reflects success, not struggle. They may still touch on resilience, but they don’t prompt the same in-depth discussion of overcoming adversity.