Pre-Allo FAQ Series: How Do I Write My Personal Statement?

Id like to also point out that I also have a thread that DP and I had talked about making in my signature which is an official guide to personal statements, which may provide for some helpful insights into the personal statement. DP should we just merge these two threads?

1. I always hate when professors tell me this, but write as much as you need to write to show the adcoms who you are. My PS was relatively short: 4000 characters, out of the 5300 allotted, and I have gotten 3 US-M.D. interviews, and have been accepted to 1 so far (waiting on the other 2). I also got interviewed and accepted at a high-level D.O. school and one of the strongest Caribbean schools.

2. Write about something real to you, and write honestly. Make sure to somehow show who you are as a person.

3. If you are applying with amazing extracurriculars, mcat, gpa, etc, then the PS is probably not too important, in my opinion. But, if you write an absolutely terrible one, then it certainly can break you. Chances are, though, if you've worked to be that good in all other aspects of your application, with a little effort, you'll write a good PS. If the rest of your application is weak or only borderline strong, then a PS can go a long way! However, in this case, a PS can also break you.

I applied in 07 with a 29P MCAT (7V, 11PS, 11BS). I knew my verbal score would screen me out of a lot of schools, but I applied anyway (after seeking advice from my premed advisor, and 2 professors who are on the adcom of the med school at my university). I tried very hard to write a good PS (which my English professor (see below) praised), applied EARLY, and was accepted.

I'd say one of the most important things to do is USE YOUR RESOURCES!

I had my personal statement read and reread by several different people, multiple times. Those people included, my girlfriend (who applied the same year as me), my pre-med advisor (who is also the author of my committee LOR, since he is the head of that committee), my English professor who authored 6 novels, my older siblings.

Happy writing

1. I shot for 1 page with both my PS and LOI. It's long enough to be interesting, and so long that the reader will lose interest. A little longer is OK, though. Mine ALMOST reached the 5300 character limit for AMCAS, and it was a good length.

2. Here, I have the same answer as everyone else: talk about what makes you unique. Tell stories.

3. I think a well-written PS can be relatively important -- like the interview, it makes you "3D" instead of just numbers and ECs on a page. A number of interviewers commented on my PS. It was important enough to me that I spent about 3 months refining it, so it was good enough in the end to give an extra boost to my application.

A question for those who know about the PS character limit on the AMCAS...
Does the 5300 character limit include spaces?

An early thanks to anyone who knows!

It does. Go with character count in MS Word with spaces.

1) How long can it be? It should be close to the max. Being concise and to the point is good, but it takes a fair amount of writing to really provide the depth for a strong personal statement.

2) What should I talk about? What is a personal statement? Whatever you feel is important about you/your-application. I talked about my path to medicine, and some of the important experiences that led to my decision. You might talk about your incredible research, your life-changing travel, or lifelong dream (though I advise against the lifelong decision into medicine route).

3) How important is a personal statement to applying? Similarly to what others have said, it won't make your application, but it can help. If you're a borderline applicant, definitely have a good personal statement. It's the one chance for admissions committees to hear your voice and really get a sense of who you are and what you're about. That's why I advise about being honest and telling them what's important about you/your-application in the statement.

If anyone wants/needs more advice, I'm happy to help.

1) the 5300 is a max, it can always be shorter, but I think you should focus on telling a good story first and worry about length later.
2) Again, tell a coherent story. it could be what brought you to medicine or what your goals are and how you've tried to advance them. Me, I talked about my path, from discovering medicine in high school, getting accepted to a 6-year BA/MD program but turning it down to get the full four years of college, and how I've spent my time in college to gain experience and discover my talents and interests.
3) I don't know how much weight is given to the PS during adcomm meetings, but items from my PS were discussed at every single interview. Most of my interviews were closed-file, and all the interviewer was given was my PS. The PS was therefore used as a basis for questions from the interviewer. Even my open-file interviews contained discussions of my PS. I think the PS is like an opening/closing argument in a court case...it's a good way to summarize and bring all the evidence (stats and ecs) together into a coherent picture.

Your personal statement is the one area that you can really stand out as an individual. Be yourself.

Avoid cliches. Tread carefully with the "Sirens Screaming in the Night" genre amongst EMTs, losing a loved one, etc. These have been done to death.

There is no law that says you need to use the format about 95% of people use, which is:
Story to set the scene --> Flash back to life to date --> End with the story started at the beginning.

in general, the level of impact the PS plays in your application can depend on your stats. i had very borderline stats so i really needed strong PS's (more than one for MD/PhD) to intrigue adcom to at least give me a chance with those secondaries and interviews. i know plenty of people with great stats-crappy PS-acceptance as well as OK stats-great PS-acceptance.

Dr. Pardi,

I second braluk's motion of merging this with the other thread. it makes more sense to do so.

A common mistake in writing a personal statement is to spit back your resume. That sort of information can be found in other places in your application, so to write in this manner is to waste space. Best thing to do is keep in mind a theme or message that you want to convey; some of the common questions that a reader has when going through the statement is "why does this applicant want to be a doctor" and more importantly "what will make this applicant a good doctor in the future."

Of course, coming directly and answering these questions would put your literary skills on par with a twelve year old. Telling never works in personal statements - making conclusions and generalizations about yourself like "I volunteered at ____ and it was a great experience" and "I learned great work ethic from research" doesn't convey much. The trick is to show the reader yourself, usually via anecdote, so that they can come to the conclusions themselves. You must write in a way that when the reader goes through your statement, they can actually visualize YOU doing these things like ECs, volunteering, research - instead of a bunch of words. Your personal statement should be a guide, a maze of a puzzle where the reader moves from one section to the next, collecting pieces of you till they form the big picture message.

Buying "How to write personal statement" books usually is counterproductive, stay away from anything that will make you sound like a "cookie cutter" premed. There is no set formula or way to do this, it is a voice, tone, and structure that only comes with draft after draft and revisions after revisions. Go to PS workshops offered by your premed office if you have one. Go to your school's writing centers, career centers, or premed advisors for tips and starting points. Get everyone you know to read it - screw the grammar and length at first and hit the content hard. Get all your ideas on paper, and formed into an intricate and sophisticated piece of art.

Once you have a working draft, then you can dive into the technicals. Grammar and more importantly, tightening up the statement. That doesn't necessarily mean making it shorter, more like making it more efficient - ie cutting out unnecessary adverbs (the "ly"s), cutting down on unneccessary clauses, etc.

At some point you will be making revisions just for the sake of making revisions. Everyone will always find one or two things that make them pause for a millisecond, some people depending on their experiences and writing skills may not have chosen a certain word or sentence structure if they were in your shoes. Then enough is enough, and turn the statement in. Give yourself plenty of time to write this, it may be the difference between an interview or not - it is the first bit of humanity they will see in your application.