I applied for a developer position, a position within a research facility in a university. I hope that...

I applied for a developer position, a position within a research facility in a university. I hope that this is a step up for me, but all I really know is from the description on the hiring site.

A contact, an associate professor, responded and asked me to prepare a fifteen-minute presentation discussing my suitability for this position. Given the one-sheet I saw, all I can really say about this position is that it involves dealing with handling data from human subjects and thus must follow HIPAA. I worked at a medical clinic earlier in my career, so I'm familiar enough for now.

I've gone through a number of interviews in my life, and this is the first time I've ever even heard of this as part of the interview process. I'm not too afraid of presenting itself -- I've given many presentations to user groups and the like -- but nothing in the job description says anything about presenting like this, so I'm not seeing it as anything to do with the duties of the position. This raises red flags with me.

Is this a thing, just not a thing I haven't heard about before?

(Evidently off-topic for programmers.SE, and seems too specific for the suggested Workplace.SE.)

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