Is it okay to include a high school experience on my PS?

[M.MD]

Thanks for reading. In my PS I'm trying to tell a story which explains how/why I decided medicine is right for me. I have a great experience from high school I would like to include because it played a big role in my decision to pursue this career. I have read (and have been told by an adviser of mine) that we should really only include experiences from the beginning of college and anything earlier is pretty risky, so I'd like some more feedback. The experience:

I had this great AP bio teacher who got me interested in human biology and disease. I was so intrigued that I decided to start a shadowing program for students at my high school who were interested in pursuing a career in healthcare. I did a lot of the leg work to get things set up, and it ended up with a group of 15 students getting to spend a day or two at the local hospital shadowing the medical staff. There's more detail to the story, but this is the gist of it.

Thoughts?

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[Keladry]

I think you're fine to include it, as long as you have plenty of things from college to include as well. My PS started with a high school experience as well - that's when I started thinking about becoming a doctor, so it made sense to include in "why medicine."

 

[Psai]

I think it's okay, I included a volunteering experience from high school in my PS.

 

[ThisCouldBeYou]

This is your journey towards where you are today. You're not going to include it in your 15 activities, which should just be AFTER high school, but writing about this in your personal statement makes sense.

 

[M.MD]

I appreciate your responses. Reading through them, I've decided to keep it in. It's definitely too important to leave out. But yes, I will only include this experience in my personal statement, not my activities descriptions.

 

[mrh125]

If it's meaningful do it and make it applicable to medicine. Lots of people will moan and say "omg high school dont include it", but if you can make it fit well do it.

 

[Catalystik]

I appreciate your responses. Reading through them, I've decided to keep it in. It's definitely too important to leave out. But yes, I will only include this experience in my personal statement, not my activities descriptions.

Sounds good to me.