Personal Essay/statement..where Do I Start??

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renetagy

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i'm trying to write my personal essay for my med. school application and i have no clue where to start or what the format should be or what the main focus of the essay should be...any suggestions??😕
 
It's a little early to be worrying about it, IMHO. Anywho, just talk about your experiences with medicine and how they have made you want to be a doctor and why. Admissions committees want to see that you have a good understanding of what medicine really is, and they want to see that you have reasons for wanting it as part of your life.
 
it's not necessarily too early. you might want to give a copy to people who will be writing you LORs.

I'd start with an outline of what it is you want to say.
 
Armybound -

Everytime I see one of your posts I swat at my screen to get the bug off... I keep doing it! :laugh:
 
Yes, its really early to be worrying about it now. However, I'll throw out me two 2 cents and suggest now letting your recommenders know about your intentions and setting up your LOR's either through a letter service or committee.

The Personal Statement is something which should not be a list and should not contain things like quotes or in depth info about research and such. I made mine kinda chronological and that format made it easier to read. Oh yeah, rule number one: make sure it is easy to read.
 
Read your private message 🙂 And it's really not too early. I began writing my personal statement as a freshmen because that's how my undergrad operated. As I gained new experiences I tweaked it of course. My final draft was written on an airplane ride my senior year. Try to find a clever theme and weave your experiences and motivations for medicine into it.
 
I started writing my personal statement the October before I applied. My idea was that I would have plenty of time for my own re-drafts before I had anyone else read it and critique it. If going to medical school means enough to you, you will do all you can to make your application flawless. I also suggest the book "Essays That Will Get You Into Medical School" Here is a link to it on Amazon:

http://www.amazon.com/Essays-Medical-School-Into-Second/dp/0764120298/ref=pd_sim_b_title_6

If you want to PM me, please do. I would love to help you get started on your essay!
 
Id start with the word "The" and see where it goes from there. Other popular beginnings are "My" and "Medicine".
 
Start at the beginning and when you get to the end, stop.

But really, it is not to early to start. I wrote 2 different personal statments and spent a year off and on coming back to the one I thought was better and tweaking it and having people read it over and give suggestions. The 2nd one came in useful during some of the 2ndary essays.
 
One vet school had this up as their recommendations for writing a personal statement. I would assume the guidelines would hold for med schools as well:

3 main elements:
- brief paragraph about who you are
- brief paragraph on when you made your adult decision to be a doctor
- rest of the essay you should articulate what you have learned from your experiences with the field (for vet school this was more about vet shadowing, animal experience, and research)
 
My pre-med adviser told me that I should start my personal statement a year before I apply. In addition to that, the personal statement should show for what reasons you want to be a doctor and what kind of person you are.
 
banditalfi said:
One vet school had this up as their recommendations for writing a personal statement. I would assume the guidelines would hold for med schools as well:

3 main elements:
- brief paragraph about who you are
- brief paragraph on when you made your adult decision to be a doctor
- rest of the essay you should articulate what you have learned from your experiences with the field (for vet school this was more about vet shadowing, animal experience, and research)
Click to expand...

sounds boring and formulaic to me. they are so sick of reading cookie cutter PSs.

mix it up a bit. i did and have received very positive comments from interviewers. BUT maybe did not get interviews some places because of it. i'll never know, but i'm happy with my approach: 8 interviews and 2 acceptances so far.

stupid example, but you get the point:

"My ballroom dancing instructor leaned in and whispered . . ."

an opening like that will get their attention!!
 
I told the story in my PS of how I decided to narrow my career choice to medical research via family influences, school/volunteer work, coursework, lab work, other experiences, in more or less chronological order. I figured it was a good way to do it since it showed my ability to write, which is what a PS is about, gave me a chance to explain my career goals, showed that I made a mature/educated choice of studying medicine, and allowed me to incorporate activities/experiences within the PS, especially for those that were not listed previously in the app.


And I started off with a strong statement, which my interviewers and reviewers clearly remember - word for word...I spent more than a week on those starting sentences alone, the rest just fell in one one afternoon.

Cheers
Piyush
 
lemon tree said:
stupid example, but you get the point:

"My ballroom dancing instructor leaned in and whispered . . ."

an opening like that will get their attention!!
Click to expand...

oh yea, beat this "Water droplets ran down from the air conditioning unit into a big black mold spot on the wall."

In all seriousness, I really tried to stay away from the laundry list/life history strategy that a lot of people use. I went really into depth in one particular aspect and then related it to being a doctor.

If you read the essay books, I think they call this format "the story."
 
Jolie South said:
oh yea, beat this "Water droplets ran down from the air conditioning unit into a big black mold spot on the wall."

In all seriousness, I really tried to stay away from the laundry list/life history strategy that a lot of people use. I went really into depth in one particular aspect and then related it to being a doctor.

If you read the essay books, I think they call this format "the story."
Click to expand...

wait a minute!! essay books?? i thought i made that approach up!!
 
shucks! I guess I used "the story" as well. But I won't post my first sentence, as it is just too awesome.

I <3 my PS 😍

😉
 
"The details of my life are quite inconsequential...very well, where do I begin...."

Points to who can identify that reference.

I started my personal statement in freshman year. I am now a junior and still work on it a little bit every other week. I have gone through MANY drafts to be able to say exactly what I want to say in the best way to say it.

You should start by first forming a good understanding of what a PS is, what needs to be put down, and a list of questions you must answer about yourself. To do this you should brainstorm - look at the questions you made (Why medicine? why me? etc) and answer them. Then just combine the answers and you have a foundation of what you want to write. Read over what you wrote and edit as you see fit. Don't worry about length, just type as much as you want. Keep doing this everyday and slowly start shortening the PS to fit the word count requirement without removing the message you wish to convey.
 
Even though it seems several of us used "the story", i think this is the format the most conducive to a unique and thoughtful ps.

reading through sample essays, i just kept coming across one after the other that was the laundry list type and couldn't even focus after they mentioned their research, volunteer experience, etc. it didn't allow anything to jump out at me.
 
I'm just on my first draft, but I'm focusing on 3 influential periods of my life and what I've learned from them. Through telling the stories of these times, I'm giving examples of personal qualities and lessons I've learned, as well as touching on my life experiences. I'm wrapping it up with a summary of the qualities I believe that can be built upon so I can become a good doctor.

I'm trying to tell a little bit of my story, demonstrate my personal qualities and simultaneously explain why I want to be a doctor. I'm not separating these elements into paragraphs, I think they are all interrelated so should all work together. Is this cookie cutter?

And I'm NOT mentioning my stinking research. I'm only talking about one EC that really influenced my decision. The place to list ECs is not in the PS, I beleive.
 
decafplease said:
I'm just on my first draft, but I'm focusing on 3 influential periods of my life and what I've learned from them. Through telling the stories of these times, I'm giving examples of personal qualities and lessons I've learned, as well as touching on my life experiences. I'm wrapping it up with a summary of the qualities I believe that can be built upon so I can become a good doctor.

I'm trying to tell a little bit of my story, demonstrate my personal qualities and simultaneously explain why I want to be a doctor. I'm not separating these elements into paragraphs, I think they are all interrelated so should all work together. Is this cookie cutter?

And I'm NOT mentioning my stinking research. I'm only talking about one EC that really influenced my decision. The place to list ECs is not in the PS, I beleive.
Click to expand...

you are dead right about the ECs not being in the PS. just remember, it is not supposed to be a biography. you cannot hope to tell everything about yourself in xooo words. so do not try. SHOW who you are don't DESCRIBE who you are. your story should reveal layers of things about you.

Be subtle. Be poetic. Make em shiver or cry or laugh. Create images where they can picture you in a situation. by telling a story, we do not mean telling YOUR story; we mean telling a story that illustrates something about you.

Mostly, they need to NOTICE you and REMEMBER you. if you read it and think they may have heard it all before, start over!!!!
 
At one of my interviews, my interviewer started our conversation off by telling me HE was really excited to meet ME because after reading my PS he felt like he and I had a lot in common, and that I reminded him of himself when he was an applicant.

The rest of the interview went extremely well (I thought), and a few weeks later I received a nice fat envelope from that school. I think a big part of it was the connection I had made with the interviewer even before I met him. The PS can be a pretty powerful tool.

I had started mine over a year before I applied, thinking I would be applying last year. I ended up waiting a year, and after coming back to my original copy in about February or March of 2007, I realized it was essentially garbage. I gave it a big overhaul, cutting out a lot of rambling, basically gutting it while keeping some of the main skeleton structure similar. I did a lot of pre-writing (something I never do when I write) and eventually came up with a draft I thought was good. I shared it with several friends whose opinions I could trust, and after they tore some of it apart and praised other parts of it, I finally arrived at a version I was very pleased with. My pre-med committee told me it was a very strong PS, and I think it has certainly helped me along the way in my application cycle.
 
Hey, I've got a question about the personal statement as well. I ran across a website (http://www.essayedge.com/medical/essayadvice/) which claims that most personal statements are professionally edited? Is this true, or just a sales pitch? (Sounds kinda shady to me.)

Also, I ran across a website a while back that had a bunch of sample essays that you could look at to see what a good essay look like. I think the address was something like emed.org or emcat.org, but I can't seem to find it again. Does it sound familiar to anyone?
 
lemon tree said:
you are dead right about the ECs not being in the PS. just remember, it is not supposed to be a biography. you cannot hope to tell everything about yourself in xooo words. so do not try. SHOW who you are don't DESCRIBE who you are. your story should reveal layers of things about you.

Be subtle. Be poetic. Make em shiver or cry or laugh. Create images where they can picture you in a situation. by telling a story, we do not mean telling YOUR story; we mean telling a story that illustrates something about you.

Mostly, they need to NOTICE you and REMEMBER you. if you read it and think they may have heard it all before, start over!!!!
Click to expand...

I'm trying to focus on those parts of my life that show who I am through my responses and actions, and also share some of my feelings from that time. The short bits from different parts of my life are not padded with a lot of unrelated detail, just the parts that are relevant to the point I'm subtly trying to show them which is that I have what it takes (without appearing arrogant) and I'm certain about my choice to pursue medicine.

Maybe I should have two rough drafts and ask some people which one sticks with them more?

I want my PS to match the rest of my application and highlight my uniqueness, not distract from it. I could write an edgy essay about my time in a developing country, but I don't think that would highlight the rest of my more practical life experience that I think help me stand out. If I was the usual 21 year old with "100 hours in the ER, shadowed Dr. Jones twice, and captain of the soccer team" applicant, I think that might be a reasonable way to spice up the application. I think that my time overseas is just one thing I've done, and isn't the experience I use to define myself and my reasoning for becoming a physician.

Is it more important to tell them some meaningful information about my history (and therefore myself) that they can't find in my EC's, or to focus on a more-or-less irrelevant, but exotic experience and somehow correlate that to the attributes that I feel are important, even though it wouldn't be the best example of the attribute I'm trying to demonstrate?
 
Auron said:
"The details of my life are quite inconsequential...very well, where do I begin...."

Points to who can identify that reference.

I started my personal statement in freshman year. I am now a junior and still work on it a little bit every other week. I have gone through MANY drafts to be able to say exactly what I want to say in the best way to say it.

You should start by first forming a good understanding of what a PS is, what needs to be put down, and a list of questions you must answer about yourself. To do this you should brainstorm - look at the questions you made (Why medicine? why me? etc) and answer them. Then just combine the answers and you have a foundation of what you want to write. Read over what you wrote and edit as you see fit. Don't worry about length, just type as much as you want. Keep doing this everyday and slowly start shortening the PS to fit the word count requirement without removing the message you wish to convey.
Click to expand...


Austin Powers... Dr. Evil.

I love movie quote games.
 
decafplease said:
I'm trying to focus on those parts of my life that show who I am through my responses and actions, and also share some of my feelings from that time. The short bits from different parts of my life are not padded with a lot of unrelated detail, just the parts that are relevant to the point I'm subtly trying to show them which is that I have what it takes (without appearing arrogant) and I'm certain about my choice to pursue medicine.

Maybe I should have two rough drafts and ask some people which one sticks with them more?

I want my PS to match the rest of my application and highlight my uniqueness, not distract from it. I could write an edgy essay about my time in a developing country, but I don't think that would highlight the rest of my more practical life experience that I think help me stand out. If I was the usual 21 year old with "100 hours in the ER, shadowed Dr. Jones twice, and captain of the soccer team" applicant, I think that might be a reasonable way to spice up the application. I think that my time overseas is just one thing I've done, and isn't the experience I use to define myself and my reasoning for becoming a physician.

Is it more important to tell them some meaningful information about my history (and therefore myself) that they can't find in my EC's, or to focus on a more-or-less irrelevant, but exotic experience and somehow correlate that to the attributes that I feel are important, even though it wouldn't be the best example of the attribute I'm trying to demonstrate?
Click to expand...

you're asking all the right questions, i think. and thinking about the PS in a variety of ways.

i don't think you need to try to talk about "exotic" experiences, the story you use to illustrate what you are trying to get across about yourself could be quite mundane on the surface. (my ballroom dancing teacher was just to get your attention.)

It just can't be a laundry list of your life experiences.

you are definitely on the right track and are very wise to ponder this as you are, considering a variety of approaches.

i am sure you will kick ass with your PS. good luck.
 
Hi: the personal statement says it can be up to 5300 characters "or about one full page"...however, 5300 characters is far more than one full page....which should it be?
 
pjg said:
Hi: the personal statement says it can be up to 5300 characters "or about one full page"...however, 5300 characters is far more than one full page....which should it be?
Click to expand...

5300 chars.
 
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