2008-2009 Johns Hopkins Secondary Application Thread

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shemarty

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If you have already received your bachelor's degree, please describe what you have been doing since graduation, and your plans for the upcoming year. (700 char)

If you interrupted your college education for a semester or longer, please describe what you did during that time. (700 char)

List any academic honors or awards you have received since entering college. (600 char)

Briefly Describe your most rewarding Experience or some achievement of which you are particularly proud. (900 char)

Are there any areas of medicine that are of particular interest to you? If so, please comment. (1100 char)

Briefly describe a situation where you had to overcome adversity; include lessons learned and how you think it will affect your career as a future physician. (900)

If Applicable, describe a situation where you were not in the majority. (1100 char)
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Hopkins LOR Requirements:

There is only space on the secondary to list two LORs. If you've been out of school and working, they ask for your employer to write a LOR.

According to the Hopkins office, you may send letters of recommendation from any two science faculty and other letters of support from the other things you have been involved with such as your research, volunteering, etc.

You must mail in a supplementary list of who they should expect to receive letters from. Your application will not be considered completed until the office has received all of the letters from the writers you indicate on the secondary application.

If you're letters are arriving as a committee packet, there is no limit on how many letters can be in the packet. Use good judgment and don't over-do it, though.
 
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I'll give this thread a bump in case anybody else is working on the Hopkins secondary and has questions about it :)

I just noticed that I wasn't consistent in my title format between my Hopkins thread and Columbia thread. I put the 2008-2009 first in one and last in the other.

:(

Aah, I wish we could edit our thread titles.
 
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If Applicable, describe a situation where you were not in the majority. (1100 char)
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:laugh:

Am I reading that right?

shemarty said:
I just noticed that I wasn't consistent in my title format between my Hopkins thread and Columbia thread. I put the 2008-2009 first in one and last in the other.:(Aah, I wish we could edit our thread titles.
Click to expand...

Won't make any difference from a search standpoint or from the index-thread standpoint.
 
Yea... if applicable? Can we leave that one blank? It sounds like we should probably try to answer it.

And I know, but it would look so much prettier if it were all consistent :)
 
Classic perfectionist... :D
 
What in the world do they mean by "Describe a situation where you were not in the majority?"
 
For the ApplyYourself system, did you guys make separate accounts for each school? I know you could do all the applications with the same account, but is that advisable?
 
hsperson said:
What in the world do they mean by "Describe a situation where you were not in the majority?"
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I take it to mean a situation where most people wanted to do X, but you stood your ground with Y, thinking and believing it was the right thing instead. I think this works only if it ended up being in your favor (i.e., Y was better than X).

Any other input would be greatly appreciated as well!
 
What are some prestigious academic honors? I have no idea.

I know there are one or two prestigious societies. The Golden Key, etc.

Any of you have any opinions on things actually worth listing for a question like that?
 
Golden key is not considered prestigious in academic circles. I would probably put in things such as PBK, Departmental awards (depending on how rare they are), etc.
 
Is a departmental excellence in teaching award worth mentioning on a secondary? I just got it today at my department's commencement.
 
When are you guys thinking its best to submit these secondaries?

I feel like I should work on it since it's out, but am way too lazy.
 
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1956Goldtop said:
I would probably put in things such as PBK, Departmental awards (depending on how rare they are), etc.
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13 people in the department got the same teaching award that I did. (including some masters students and phd students). So it's not rare, but teaching is a big theme in my application, so maybe I should mention the award, because it ties together with the other stuff?
 
Hey all, current student here willing to answer questions. Been a few years since I did the secondary but I'll see what I can do.

For the minority one, if you don't have anything strong, just come up with something straightforward and innoffensive. I've been in the minority on things plenty of times but I didn't have anything particularly interesting to write about, just wrote a short essay to show I took the question seriously and left it at that. No one ever mentioned it again.
 
1956Goldtop said:
Golden key is not considered prestigious in academic circles. I would probably put in things such as PBK, Departmental awards (depending on how rare they are), etc.
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:laugh: I thought Golden key = PBK.
 
costadelsol said:
For the ApplyYourself system, did you guys make separate accounts for each school? I know you could do all the applications with the same account, but is that advisable?
Click to expand...

No I believe that they say if you read the fine print that you can just create one account and use it for other secondaries as well. I only have one for both Columbia and Hopkins.
 
Last year when I applied, I used the same account for Columbia and Hopkins and it worked out okay.
 
JHopRevisit said:
For the minority one, if you don't have anything strong, just come up with something straightforward and innoffensive. I've been in the minority on things plenty of times but I didn't have anything particularly interesting to write about, just wrote a short essay to show I took the question seriously and left it at that. No one ever mentioned it again.
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Are you saying that you didn't actually answer the question and instead talked about how privileged you were? or did you answer it using an example of being a non-majority?
 
baltimore dont look like such nice place to live. hey, i just noticed you went to stanford. im almost chose to go to stanford too.
 
So is the minority one asking about a decision that put us in the minority? Could we discuss an experience regarding being a minority? The question is quite vague.
 
Bretzel said:
So is the minority one asking about a decision that put us in the minority? Could we discuss an experience regarding being a minority? The question is quite vague.
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It's vague so you can think it over and put forth an answer that best distinguishes you. Do just that.
 
ChemGrad08 said:
Are you saying that you didn't actually answer the question and instead talked about how privileged you were? or did you answer it using an example of being a non-majority?
Click to expand...

What? How privileged I am? What in the world do you mean by that?

No, I wrote about what the question asked, times when I've been in the minority. Now that I think about it though, I forgot if we had that exact wording, but we did have something similar. I answered the question they asked, but I answered it with a short and not particularly thrilling response. I'm just saying that if you don't really feel like you have much to put for any particular question, especially for these vague ones, don't put down a ton of BS, you don't have to win a Pulitzer, you just need to show you're taking the app seriously and write a solid, inoffensive response.
 
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Does anybody know which other schools use the same online website for secondary applications as Hopkins and Columbia? I was just curious.
 
Okay, I have an actual question about this prompt " Are there any areas of medicine that are of particular interest to you? If so, please comment."

I'm interested in academic surgery, and I have a lot of shadowing and research experience to back that up.

Do you think the question is asking "WHY do you like surgery?" As in, it's very direct and hands on. It's a tangible solution to a problem. Academia because I want to be involved in teaching future medical students and residents. Research because I want to advance the field.

Or, do you think I can answer "How did you realize you liked surgery?" I started out by shadowing... then I continued shadowing in other surgical subspecialties to expand on my narrow experience. I met many surgeons, this led to my involvement in their clinical research projects. Therefore, I have established my interest in academic surgery.

What are your thoughts? the first one is more of a ... vague fuzzy discussion of why the field appeals to me. The second is more of a concrete way to describe how i became interested and what I have done to pursue and strengthen this interest.
 
I went with vague because when I wrote that it sounded prettier, and they can see my various experiences on the rest of the app. I kinda figured anything that demonstrated I was a little more human was a good idea.
 
shemarty said:
Okay, I have an actual question about this prompt " Are there any areas of medicine that are of particular interest to you? If so, please comment."

I'm interested in academic surgery, and I have a lot of shadowing and research experience to back that up.

Do you think the question is asking "WHY do you like surgery?" As in, it's very direct and hands on. It's a tangible solution to a problem. Academia because I want to be involved in teaching future medical students and residents. Research because I want to advance the field.

Or, do you think I can answer "How did you realize you liked surgery?" I started out by shadowing... then I continued shadowing in other surgical subspecialties to expand on my narrow experience. I met many surgeons, this led to my involvement in their clinical research projects. Therefore, I have established my interest in academic surgery.

What are your thoughts? the first one is more of a ... vague fuzzy discussion of why the field appeals to me. The second is more of a concrete way to describe how i became interested and what I have done to pursue and strengthen this interest.
Click to expand...


I assumed that it was more like the first - what interests you have and why. Nothing is stopping you from subtley infusing the two. From my shadowing experiences, I realized my interest in academic surgery. It is the hands-on nature that appeals to me...... The character limit is short though, so we have to be creative.
 
shemarty said:
Okay, I have an actual question about this prompt " Are there any areas of medicine that are of particular interest to you? If so, please comment."

I'm interested in academic surgery, and I have a lot of shadowing and research experience to back that up.

Do you think the question is asking "WHY do you like surgery?" As in, it's very direct and hands on. It's a tangible solution to a problem. Academia because I want to be involved in teaching future medical students and residents. Research because I want to advance the field.

Or, do you think I can answer "How did you realize you liked surgery?" I started out by shadowing... then I continued shadowing in other surgical subspecialties to expand on my narrow experience. I met many surgeons, this led to my involvement in their clinical research projects. Therefore, I have established my interest in academic surgery.

What are your thoughts? the first one is more of a ... vague fuzzy discussion of why the field appeals to me. The second is more of a concrete way to describe how i became interested and what I have done to pursue and strengthen this interest.
Click to expand...

Yeah... I'm currently struggling with this same issue. I mean we both are interested in Academic Medicine and a specific specialty, for me Orthopedic Surgery for you (Vascular?) Surgery.

My plan of attack is to explain why I am interested in Orthopedic Surgery since I have more concrete reasons for that and loving the philosophy behind orthopedic sports medicine. The following paragraph I will talk riefly about my interest in academic medicine since I feel that it is important to mention that you are interesting in academic medicine. I heard from my advisors that that top schools really like the idea of keeping their doctors in education (this is what you would expect, but it's nice to be reassured about this). I think that since both are important to mention that I am going to be as concise as possible.
 
Also... writing these things I realize how short 900 and 1100 characters really is, especially when they ask 3 questions in one: "Briefly describe a situation where you had to overcome adversity; include lessons learned and how you think it will affect your career as a future physician. This space is limited to 900 characters."
Seriously hard to cut that short.
 
I'm running against the character limit for describing a rewarding experience, too. I was going to talk about an entire club, but now I think I'll have to change it to ONE event that the club organized, or else pick a different topic altogether.

This is hard. I have lots of "rewarding experience", but to pick ONE that perfectly compliments the rest of my application...

The topic I really would have wanted to talk about , I already talked about in my PS, so I don't want to repeat. The ones I haven't talked about, it takes a few sentences to set up the situation, so then I run out of characters. :(
 
shemarty said:
I'm running against the character limit for describing a rewarding experience, too. I was going to talk about an entire club, but now I think I'll have to change it to ONE event that the club organized, or else pick a different topic altogether.

This is hard. I have lots of "rewarding experience", but to pick ONE that perfectly compliments the rest of my application...

The topic I really would have wanted to talk about , I already talked about in my PS, so I don't want to repeat. The ones I haven't talked about, it takes a few sentences to set up the situation, so then I run out of characters. :(
Click to expand...


I'm having the same problems as you, my most rewarding experiences and best accomplishments were in my PS.

Are the service activities and experiences supposed to be just a copy of what we listed on our AMCAS?? I pretty much put everything in there, so I didn't know if everyone else was being redundant like me.
 
dr drummer said:
I'm having the same problems as you, my most rewarding experiences and best accomplishments were in my PS.
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Yea, and it's definitely not a good idea to repeat something you already emphasized. I'm decided to talk about an entirely different thing. (Using my honors thesis research experience in a basic science lab to develop and improve the curriculum for one of the rotations in the sophomore introductory biology lab class. I trained a team of 8 TAs, and we made the lectures more coherent and interesting and added a new more hands on experiment. I actually prefer clinical research to basic science, but my goal was to take my own lab experience and build a curriculum that could inspire ~150 students to become interested in research. Well, even if just a few of them become interested in cell/neuro research (or any other kind of biology research) after taking the class, I'll have accomplished something!)

dr drummer said:
Are the service activities and experiences supposed to be just a copy of what we listed on our AMCAS?? I pretty much put everything in there, so I didn't know if everyone else was being redundant like me.
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Yes, I'm pretty sure they just want an exact copy of what's on AMCAS. Many schools ask for this again. It's super redundant, but I guess they just want to include it on their own secondary so they can have the info in the format that they want. Makes me wonder if any school actually reads our activities section on the AMCAS!
 
For the community service/extracurricular activities section, how should we calculate our hours per week, i.e. if the activity only took place during certain months, or lets say 4 hours on a Saturday morning once a month, should we average it out over the entire year or just say however many hours we would do for the weeks worked?
 
shemarty said:
Hopkins LOR Requirements:

There is only space on the secondary to list two LORs. If you've been out of school and working, they ask for your employer to write a LOR.

According to the Hopkins office, you may send letters of recommendation from any two science faculty and other letters of support from the other things you have been involved with such as your research, volunteering, etc.

You must mail in a supplementary list of who they should expect to receive letters from. Your application will not be considered completed until the office has received all of the letters from the writers you indicate on the secondary application.

If you're letters are arriving as a committee packet, there is no limit on how many letters can be in the packet. Use good judgment and don't over-do it, though.
Click to expand...

By mail in a supplementary list of which letters to expect, does that just mean list the two that you indicate on the secondary?

Can I just list two letters on the secondary, include those in a packet of 6 letters, and include the other 4 without listing them anywhere?
 
dr drummer said:
For the community service/extracurricular activities section, how should we calculate our hours per week, i.e. if the activity only took place during certain months, or lets say 4 hours on a Saturday morning once a month, should we average it out over the entire year or just say however many hours we would do for the weeks worked?
Click to expand...

I averaged, so if it was one saturday a month for 4 hrs I put 1 hr a week, this led to funny things with like .5 hrs a week (because of summer and whatnot), but whatever.
 
copingmethods said:
By mail in a supplementary list of which letters to expect, does that just mean list the two that you indicate on the secondary?

Can I just list two letters on the secondary, include those in a packet of 6 letters, and include the other 4 without listing them anywhere?
Click to expand...

I actually got the impression we were not supposed to list the 2 letters on the secondary. Instead, I'm writing "PACKET" for the name and "See supplemental list (mailed)". Then I'm going to snail mail them the list of actual names/titles of the people whose letters are going to be in the packet that my school's career center sends them.

I'm a little confused too, but I think they want you to list them so that they can keep track of them as they receive them. Since they're arriving in a packet, they just need to know to expect a packet. I think they ask for the supplemental list so they can be sure that they've received everything we intend to send them.
 
And I got the opposite impression from what I read online. I thought just to write the main writer (aka the cover letter author) and then since everything will come as a packet not to include any of the other authors.
Hmmm Maybe I should email them...
 
rowerlauren said:
And I got the opposite impression from what I read online. I thought just to write the main writer (aka the cover letter author) and then since everything will come as a packet not to include any of the other authors.
Hmmm Maybe I should email them...
Click to expand...

From an e-mail I received:
You may send a supplemental list of the additional names of individuals who will be writing your letters,along with the hard copy of the secondary application you will mail to our office. Since the "packet" of letters is being sent via your Career Center, you are correct, we would receive them at the same time. You may either type, "refer to supplemental list" or "Career Center's Packet of letters" which is not a pre-medical committee letter however, we will know that you have sent a packet of letters.
 
Oh I forgot to mention that my packet has no "main writer." There is no cover letter.

It's not a real pre-med committee writing a committee letter. My school's career center just collects all the letters (I ask my writers to mail them to the career center) and then mails them out in one big envelope. It's like interfolio, but through my school.

I decided that it would be pointless to list 2 names out of 8 on the "faculty" section. I bet they only ask this so that they can keep track of the 2 letters as they receive them in the mail. This wouldn't apply to us if all the letters are arriving together as one packet.

So, I'm going to click the "committee" button and write "Stanford University - Letter Packet" as the name and "See supplemental list (mailed)" below it.
 
shemarty said:
Oh I forgot to mention that my packet has no "main writer." There is no cover letter.

It's not a real pre-med committee writing a committee letter. My school's career center just collects all the letters (I ask my writers to mail them to the career center) and then mails them out in one big envelope. It's like interfolio, but through my school.

I decided that it would be pointless to list 2 names out of 8 on the "faculty" section. I bet they only ask this so that they can keep track of the 2 letters as they receive them in the mail. This wouldn't apply to us if all the letters are arriving together as one packet.

So, I'm going to click the "committee" button and write "Stanford University - Letter Packet" as the name and "See supplemental list (mailed)" below it.
Click to expand...

Are you just going to have the career center send the supplemental list in the same packet as the letters?
 
copingmethods said:
Are you just going to have the career center send the supplemental list in the same packet as the letters?
Click to expand...

I was going to send it with my printed-out version of the Hopkins secondary.

It almost seems ridiculous to send it with the letters themselves, since the purpose of the list is to confirm that the packet really does include everything you intended for it to include.

Most other schools let you send a packet but never require you to list who's writing the individual letters. This is something unique to Hopkins, as far as I can tell right now.

Do any other schools ask you to print out the secondary and mail in a paper copy?
 
Shemarty, I also have my premed committee collecting letters and sending them out in a packet. When I asked Hopkins about having extra letters, they replied:

"We prefer a minimum of 2 letters from science faculty and one from a non-science faculty person, however, if you have worked or have completed a research experience or volunteer experience and you wanted to submit letters of support from those outside persons, we will accept them."

Did Hopkins say to send a supplemental list with the printed app?
 
knuck000 said:
Shemarty, I also have my premed committee collecting letters and sending them out in a packet. When I asked Hopkins about having extra letters, they replied:

"We prefer a minimum of 2 letters from science faculty and one from a non-science faculty person, however, if you have worked or have completed a research experience or volunteer experience and you wanted to submit letters of support from those outside persons, we will accept them."

Did Hopkins say to send a supplemental list with the printed app?
Click to expand...

Refer to post #40. http://forums.studentdoctor.net/showpost.php?p=6806286&postcount=40

I called them, too. It sounded like they wanted me to mail in a printed list. I don't think this will matter either way. No matter what, you mail in the whole packet, they will receive the whole packet, and theoretically, read the whole packet. Whether we include a supplemental list or not... that's just so they can check off the LOR writers names as they open up the packet, right?

Feel free to e-mail them or call them to clarify. I sort of gave up, and I think what I'm doing will probably satisfy their requirements.
 
Thanks, I'll include a list of letters with my printed app. It's a little unnecessary, but whatever, they're the ones wearing the pants in this relationship. It's going to be a lot of fun keeping track of each individual school's quirks and hoops over the next month or so.

Good luck with Hopkins, everybody!
 
shemarty said:
Does anybody know which other schools use the same online website for secondary applications as Hopkins and Columbia? I was just curious.
Click to expand...

The application service lists these schools as customers. I'm not sure if they're referring to the undergraduate programs or MD.

http://www.applyyourself.com/customers.html

By the way, is anybody else having any problems copying and pasting into these applications using mac computers. My mac won't seem to let me paste essays into the prompts.
 
knuck000 said:
http://www.applyyourself.com/customers.html

By the way, is anybody else having any problems copying and pasting into these applications using mac computers. My mac won't seem to let me paste essays into the prompts.
Click to expand...

I'm not having that problem on my mac. I'm using firefox (I didn't download the version that came out yesterday--I heard people were having compatibility issues with that), and Microsoft word.
 
Q: For employment and extracurricular activities, if they are still
occurring throughout this upcoming year, should the "end date" be left
blank, or should I write August 2009, which is presumably when I will
move away to begin medical school.

A: you may start with the start month and year and end it with "present." You may also do it the way you have suggested, "August 2009."


Q: "List any academic honors or awards you have received since
entering college" Does this mean "academic honors" and "any awards,
academic or not"? I won a service award from the office of student
affairs, a teaching award from my biology department, and a summer
research grant from my university's undergraduate research office. I
also graduated with departmental honors because I completed an honors
thesis and poster presentation. Are these to be included? Or is this
question referring to honors/awards such as Dean's List, Phi Beta
Kappa, etc?

A: This usually relates to award like, Dean's List, Phi Beta Kappa, etc.


Q: If Applicable, describe a situation where you were not in the
majority." I am a bit confused by the phrase "if applicable." Is this
question optional or required? Is it to be answered only by students
who had a significant experience when they were not in the majority
(for example, racial discrimination)? Or, is this question also
referring to small squabbles between club members, friends or
classmates, and we should describe how we resolved the disagreement?

A: "If applicable" means you have a choice if you have something to say. We leave it up to you what you should write about.
 
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