What are you passionate about essay?

[passacaglia918]

Can I answer this prompt with "I'm passionate about people..."?

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[xerei]

You probably want a verb in there.. Do you like helping people, working with people, teaching people, giving people rectal exams?

 

[nwts]

You probably want a verb in there.. Do you like helping people, working with people, teaching people, giving people rectal exams?

I nearly spit my beverage all over my brand-new laptop.

 

[ngc 2170]

Yes. But as always, the key will probably be showing, not telling. E.g. "I like people... because everyone has a unique story. And here's a time that trait came into play," is preferable to, "I like people."

 

[passacaglia918]

I was hoping to go along the lines of meeting and forming relationships with people. And then talk about how that is a common thread through my ECs and college.

Too generic? Not specific enough? Not what admins are looking for?

 

[nwts]

Yes. But as always, the key will probably be showing, not telling. E.g. "I like people... because everyone has a unique story. And here's a time that trait came into play," is preferable to, "I like people."

This. The importance of showing and not telling really cannot be overstated. Talk is very cheap, and everybody knows that saying: "I am (positive trait). I am (positive trait). I am (positive trait)," makes you sound good. However, since everybody knows that these things are what others want to hear, they are extremely unbelievable without any evidence. As a general rule, never answer an essay question with a positive statement about yourself if you don't also show how this positive statement is true.

 

[Psai]

Write about how passionate you are about finishing these essays and moving on with your life and getting accepted, so you never have to do one of those bloody awful prompts again. Secondaries are without a doubt the most tedious part of this process.

so true
i don't know who comes up with these essay prompts but they can get really lame

 

[G.NA]

Write about how passionate you are about finishing these essays and moving on with your life and getting accepted, so you never have to do one of those bloody awful prompts again. Secondaries are without a doubt the most tedious part of this process.

how else do you think schools should try to evaluate candidates that they want to interview versus ones they don't? Let's face it – it is hard to distinguish between applicants based on the primary, much less maturity, professionalism, personal interests, worldview, etc. etc. These are things medical schools have a right to care about when they are taking in students that they lose money on (inb4 complaints – speak to anyone who knows about school finances and you'll find that, yes, even with everyone paying full tuition, med students are losses). We should be glad that schools are doing this sort of evaluation to make sure they are using their precious interview time efficiently. Otherwise, we would be dominated by the 3.7/33 biology drones who would make pretty terrible doctors without these "soft skills" that the secondaries are trying to tease out.

 

[G.NA]

And then talk about how that is a common thread through my ECs and college.

this is ridiculous. Do you even believe in that statement yourself? Your common theme throughout college was to...meet people? I sure hope your theme in life is meet and work with people. otherwise, you'd be miserable. This is so forced it is fake. You're not passionate about anything else? sad....

 

[mimelim]

Write about how passionate you are about finishing these essays and moving on with your life and getting accepted, so you never have to do one of those bloody awful prompts again. Secondaries are without a doubt the most tedious part of this process.

so true
i don't know who comes up with these essay prompts but they can get really lame

The more people that I meet in medicine, the more important the secondaries seem to become. I'm certainly not going to argue that they necessarily work. But, I'm all for anything that gets away from, "I am a good student, so I am entitled to a spot in medical school." Because frankly, there are more interesting people that will make better use of the spot than them. They may not get as high a Step 1 score, but they will do more than treat it as a 9-5 job that pays well.

 

[Goro]

Concur 100% with my learned colleague. We like passion in our applicants.

We don't like an inability to introspect.

Honestly, that is complete crap. They are not looking to rehash the EC and other items. Show me something about you, about your passion, your interests, and how you have engaged in that. It should show me qualities that you have that may make you a good physician. It isn't about the content of the events, situation or interests that you have; it is the qualities of you as a person that matter

 

[G.NA]

The more people that I meet in medicine, the more important the secondaries seem to become. I'm certainly not going to argue that they necessarily work. But, I'm all for anything that gets away from, "I am a good student, so I am entitled to a spot in medical school." Because frankly, there are more interesting people that will make better use of the spot than them. They may not get as high a Step 1 score, but they will do more than treat it as a 9-5 job that pays well.

i think we should just have applicants answer these questions on video instead and send it in. what they say can then be transcribed for people to read for reference. This would help screen out the socially awkward people who can't answer a question without having a prepared robot script, which i guess would save interviewers a lot of headaches. Maybe one day when fast internet is the norm and data storage gets even cheaper this will be a thing.

 

[On Eagle's Wings]

A good essay will be one that uses examples and stories from your life that illustrate what you are passionate about. It is way more interesting to read a well-written story than cheap statements.

 

[mimelim]

I'm not entitled to anything and I recognize that. I'm merely expressing an opinion of this portion of the application process. This is life - there are no guarantees and there's a lot of pushing through hard work that we don't like.

And my point is that these prompts are difficult if you have nothing to talk about. People that are passionate about things have no problem writing about them. People that have gone through adversity don't have difficulty writing about it. People that come from a diverse background don't have to sit there and think about a creative way to make themselves seem interesting. They simply describe themselves as they are, which frankly is pretty easy to do for pretty much anyone. The problem is that many people realize that if they do that, they look like they are tremendously self centered and boring.

 

[Psai]

And my point is that these prompts are difficult if you have nothing to talk about. People that are passionate about things have no problem writing about them. People that have gone through adversity don't have difficulty writing about it. People that come from a diverse background don't have to sit there and think about a creative way to make themselves seem interesting. They simply describe themselves as they are, which frankly is pretty easy to do for pretty much anyone. The problem is that many people realize that if they do that, they look like they are tremendously self centered and boring.

Sorry that I didn't go through adversity so that I can write an essay about it to make some adcom feel good about accepting me

 

[mimelim]

I find that many students do not examine their lives, events, issues, etc and have the introspection for find adversity. They think in terms of "events" and not in terms of "effect." That is, how did some event in your life effect you, the issues, the worry, the fear, etc. I have seen excellent essays written on nothing more than going away to school or a first date. Not hard experiences but ones that they were able to explore and discuss on the issues it presented and how they successfully overcame them.

That or they have done nothing with their lives other than go to school and have always been told/assumed that by doing well in academics, nothing else mattered. I think that there are a lot of people that need to dig a little deeper and will find that they are actually more interesting than they give themselves credit for. However...

On the other hand, when you have a stack of 100 applications, I'd guess than 20-25 of them fall into the category of, decent academics and cookie-cutter/box checking ECs. When you meet them either when interviewing or in medical school, they fit the mold of, no interest in helping others, no real interest in patient care, no inquisitive nature, no passion for medicine/science. And, that is fine. Not everyone has to have those things. But, as I said before, I think (and I think that most adcoms would agree based on how we structure our application processes) that we think that they are inferior applicants than those that demonstrate interest in those things.

 

[Affiche]

Sorry that I didn't go through adversity so that I can write an essay about it to make some adcom feel good about accepting me

This comment makes me cringe.

When answering the adversity question I literally have to prioritize the hardships I've faced so I can discuss adversity within a given word limit. I realize that the vast majority of people applying to medical school really haven't faced that much hardship, and that's okay, but what I would like to see in my future classmates is for them to at least be able to identify the hardships they have faced and develop some insight as to how it's affected their character. How are you supposed to understand your disadvantaged classmates (or future patients!) if you can't even identify any hardship you've faced yourself'? When I see people post "I'm a middle-class white male....what am I supposed to write about?" all I can think of is that this kid has no idea how to relate to other people.

 

[Psai]

.

 

[Affiche]

cry about it

i was a poverty level minority that grew up in a bad neighborhood for most of my life
bullied all the time at school and wore hand me downs from church people

sup?

didn't write about that in my essay btw because it's none of their damn business

Your maturity is astounding.

And you just contradicted your first post. You did go through hardship, you just chose not to write about it. That's not even close to the same thing as what I was referring to or what your first post implied.

 

[Psai]

i'm trying super hard to care about your opinion at the moment

 

[Affiche]

i'm trying super hard to care about your opinion at the moment

Why comment if you can't maturely discuss your opinion?

You bring up a good point. There's a fine line between demonstrating introspection and allowing complete strangers to have a magnifying glass to the most personal facets of your life. Personally, I think it's important that applicants can demonstrate relateability, but I can understand the hesitation to exploit your own hardship to check that box. So what is the solution then?

 

[tantacles]

Just a brief reminder to keep your posts professional and on-topic.

 

[passacaglia918]

Yeah, where exactly did this conversation go? But thanks to the people who kept in on track. From what people have pointed out, it seems like talking about meeting people and forming bonds with them doesn't make for a strong main point. I'll choose a more specific passion. Thanks for your help.

 

[passacaglia918]

You missed the point, what does it say about you? Are interested in their story? Are interested in learning from them? Do you find compassion for those who had a more difficult life than yours? Do you want to expand beyond the horizons of yourself? Does it help you think out of the box? What does this passion say about the qualities you have?

ok

 

[mimelim]

You're generalizing a lot about my situation with the limited-context you've been given. Even with passionate responses and experiences I have, and them not being difficult (they're just not) doing these same essays 30-40+ times is a drag, especially with how broken these applications and glitched out these applications can be. I'm sure you can relate to this situation as you were once an applicant. It gets very tedious.

So they are:
Awful prompts
Not difficult
Repetitive
Have buggy software

I wasn't generalizing or talking about you specifically. You call them awful prompts. Those of us that have read hundreds, if not thousands of applications (in the case of far more seasoned adcoms) simply disagree. We find them useful for helping tease out information about applicants, otherwise we wouldn't ask that you fill them out.

I know exactly what secondaries are like and filling them out. I have a brother as well as 4 other pre-meds who I am advising in this cycle. I have advised applicants for the last 3 cycles and have worked on an admissions committee. First, many of them repeat between schools or are very similar. Second, they typically ask about specific, predictable things. Applicants either have content to talk about or they don't. And they are either prepared or they are not. There is zero reason for this to be a rushed or difficult process. Many students have their secondary responses pre-written in April-June based on previous years' prompts.

As you said, this is not a difficult process. And with a reasonable amount of planning, it isn't exactly a ton of work either given the overlap and the essentially infinite lead up to the season that you have. I certainly can't comment on buggy software, I certainly don't remember any and haven't heard any complaints this or last year, but it is hard for that to make this so terrible to complain about.

 

[hopefulERdoc251]

trololoolol ya'll need to learn what a troll is.

 

[LizzyM]

What are you passionate about

Don't say, "your wife".

"Your wife."