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Bad idea. Honestly I doubt thy would spend their time reading 13 pages. Even 3 pages is excessive.
Enter a crazy analogy: if you're boss announces that the hardest worker will be most strongly considered for a raise, and you and your coworkers have an equal opportunity to work overtime, but only you and a few others work 120 hours overtime, then you're at a greater advantage to receiving the raise. Sure, there's the chance that you may screw some things up during those 120 hours or not be working as efficiently, but if you really focus on performing and concentrating your effort during those 120 hours, then it could mostly be to your advantage. Likewise, if I really try to condense and cut out all unnecessary, extraneous details and only provide information that is directly pertinent to the essay topic, then one must logically assume that a very long, thoughtful, and informative essay will mostly be to my advantage. If my coworkers choose not to take advantage of working overtime, then that is within their discretion and possibly to their disadvantage.
I see where you're coming from, but if 'value of time' was truly of such value to admissions, then one would assume that they would have put a character or word limit on the essays. The fact that there is no character limit allows for the unique opportunity for applicants to designate the amount of time admissions will review their essays: if you write more, then they will spend more time reviewing your essay; if you write less, then they will spend less time reviewing your essay (assuming they don't round file it at the mere sight of it). This is known at the time of essay submission so it should be of no surprise, and of no disadvantage, to the applicant or the admissions representative that someone who writes more garners more time designated to their application. Every applicant has the opportunity to write just as much as I do. It is one's decision not to, if they so choose. One should note that getting more time designated to one's application is not equivalent to getting an interview, but it can be advantageous.
Enter a crazy analogy: if you're boss announces that the hardest worker will be most strongly considered for a raise, and you and your coworkers have an equal opportunity to work overtime, but only you and a few others work 120 hours overtime, then you're at a greater advantage to receiving the raise. Sure, there's the chance that you may screw some things up during those 120 hours or not be working as efficiently, but if you really focus on performing and concentrating your effort during those 120 hours, then it could mostly be to your advantage. Likewise, if I really try to condense and cut out all unnecessary, extraneous details and only provide information that is directly pertinent to the essay topic, then one must logically assume that a very long, thoughtful, and informative essay will mostly be to my advantage. If my coworkers choose not to take advantage of working overtime, then that is within their discretion and possibly to their disadvantage.
So you can do what you want. 😉
First, I agree with DAPI. Making the assumption that longer essay = longer (and therefore more in depth) review period is a stretch. 13 pages is a LONG essay, and despite your best efforts, it may not be quite riveting enough to keep a reviewer engaged through the entire piece. Honestly it seems that you've already made the decision and are just looking for confirmation rather than feedback.
Second, your understanding of the mechanics of motivation are possibly outdated. Check this out:
http://www.ted.com/talks/dan_pink_on_motivation.html
Good luck on the secondary!
I am sitting on my couch procrastinating doing real work. I am very inclined to read your half-page essay that you posted, yet I only made it through the first paragraph before I moved on. How do you honestly expect someone to read 13 pages of this? Don't even mind the fact that the reviewer knows that they have 100 more applications to read after yours...
Bad idea. Honestly I doubt thy would spend their time reading 13 pages. Even 3 pages is excessive.
Hey, thanks for the opinion!
It isn't logical to state that the admissions committee will give me "negative points" for writing a detailed and long essay because it shows a lack of value of time because the essay instructions explicitly state "You may write as much as you like. This box accepts unlimited text." That's like a town enforcing no speed limit and then giving someone a ticket for a speeding.
Again, I appreciate the action of trying to answer my post, so I do not want to seem ungrateful, but I do want to make the clarification that I am not in favor of submitting 13 pages. Doing this involved explaining what I saw wrong in the first responder's message.
Real work is reading posts on SDN? Man, I'd like that job! You're also assuming that the content and writing style in my post on this thread is the same as in my tentative essay for the secondary. That's a pretty silly assumption![]()
sorry, i'll clarify, i am procrastinating by posting on sdn. You seem pretty bent on submitting your 13 page essay, so just do it and let us know how it goes.
I have yet to be convinced that the admissions process is completely logical.
Here's a list of pros and cons that I came up with:
Pros: could indicate your serious interest in the school, give the admissions committee a full, detailed picture of who you are as an applicant, make you stand out in a good way
Cons: would be time consuming to write, could run the risk of lulling your reader into a coma (due to length, not quality), make you stand out in a bad way
All in all, I think the risk of an adcom skimming your secondary response, rather than reading it in detail, outweighs the potential benefits. I would lean towards writing succinctly.
I feel this may be as simple as... put yourself in their shoes. You have a pile of applications sitting in front of you and you have been reading apps at least 60% of of your day every day of the week. You have to get through enough apps to bring a sample to committee meetings. If anything is longer than 2 pages (the longest limit I have seen in other applications; virginia tech carillon) that thing better have features like choose your own ending, illustrations, descriptive locations of places I have been before, and clever twists along the way. Yes, I would see that long of an essay and think "this person thought they were so important that they expected me to read this for an hour or more". That would reflect upon you poorly if I was an adcom member. Of course I am not an adcom member and never will be but I feel most people would agree given the overwhelmingly one sided response. It's of course up to you but I think you're nailing your own coffin. If you cannot answer a question with anything short of a thesis, I don't know what to tell ya 😀
Good luck potential future classmate!
I see where you're coming from, but if 'value of time' was truly of such value to admissions, then one would assume that they would have put a character or word limit on the essays. The fact that there is no character limit allows for the unique opportunity for applicants to designate the amount of time admissions will review their essays: 1) if you write more, then they will spend more time reviewing your essay; if you write less, then they will spend less time reviewing your essay (assuming they don't round file it at the mere sight of it). This is known at the time of essay submission so it should be of no surprise, and of no disadvantage, to the applicant or the admissions representative that someone who writes more garners more time designated to their application. Every applicant has the opportunity to write just as much as I do. It is one's decision not to, if they so choose. One should note that getting more time designated to one's application is not equivalent to getting an interview, but it can be advantageous.
2) Enter a crazy analogy: if you're boss announces that the hardest worker will be most strongly considered for a raise, and you and your coworkers have an equal opportunity to work overtime, but only you and a few others work 120 hours overtime, then you're at a greater advantage to receiving the raise. Sure, there's the chance that you may screw some things up during those 120 hours or not be working as efficiently, but if you really focus on performing and concentrating your effort during those 120 hours, then it could mostly be to your advantage. Likewise, if I really try to condense and cut out all unnecessary, extraneous details and only provide information that is directly pertinent to the essay topic, then one must logically assume that a very long, thoughtful, and informative essay will mostly be to my advantage. If my coworkers choose not to take advantage of working overtime, then that is within their discretion and possibly to their disadvantage.
So you can do what you want. 😉
It may seem like I am just looking for confirmation rather than feedback but that's only because I was responding to DAPI's comment that didn't seem to make logical sense. If you provided me with a illogical defense that was in favor of an applicant submitting a 13 page essay then I would have countered it with a reason that shows why it is illogical. Don't assume I am in favor of it because 3) I am underscoring the faulty assumptions in DAPI's statement.
There's an unlimited space provided that literally says "you may write as much as you like" and yet he/she thinks the admissions committee will look unfavorably upon a longer application because I wouldn't be "valuing time." 4) If time was really that important why wouldn't they put a character limit on the essay? Seriously, why wouldn't they? 5) I appreciate DAPI's attempt to help me, but in all honesty, it was generic and not really well thought out. It's incongruous to assume that a lack of value for time would be the result of taking advantage of their unlimited space offering. If there was an optional character limit or a suggestion about what the limit should be then he may have a point. However, there is no character limit, 6) so the admissions representatives are clearly not looking to scorn their applicants for taking advantage of what they seem to encourage in the instructions for their essays.
What I am seeking on this thread are logical pros and cons to submitting a voluminous essay. 7) Specifically, I want to know if it would be more beneficial or not to do so. 8) It isn't logical to state that the admissions committee will give me "negative points" for writing a detailed and long essay because it shows a lack of value of time because the essay instructions explicitly state "You may write as much as you like. This box accepts unlimited text." 9) That's like a town enforcing no speed limit and then giving someone a ticket for a speeding.
Again, I appreciate the action of trying to answer my post, so I do not want to seem ungrateful, 10) but I do want to make the clarification that I am not in favor of submitting 13 pages. 11) Doing this involved explaining what I saw wrong in the first responder's message.
I guess what threw me off is that in all the other secondary essays that had a character limit I paced quantity (succinctness) over quality because the length of the essay needed to be at or under a certain limit no matter how significant or applicable I deemed my essay to be. For the Wake Forest secondary, because of its no character limit, I assumed that I could--for once--finally be able to put quality over quantity and just focus on the best way to answer the essay question in a detailed, thoughtful form. I never sought out to write a 13 page paper; it just ended up being that way because of my interest and experiences related to medicine. I don't mean for it to seem obnoxious and long, so I do eschew peoples' prejudices against a long paper solely because it is long despite it being qualitatively significant and there being no character limit requirement. I do loathe everyone's seemingly-gut-reaction to admonish a lengthy paper without even acknowledging the potential for relevance, quality, and importance within the content of the essay. In sum, even with no character limit, quantity reigns over quality. I don't agree with this, but I guess this is the unfortunate truth.
The question still stands: why would they have an unlimited character limit for their essay if they place quantity (succinctness) over quality, as many of you suggest?
OK fair enough. What do you think is a reasonable length that is not too short and not too long. If I could edit this essay down to a succinct essay, what would the length that best defines succinct be? I'll settle for a ballpark answer 🙂
OK fair enough. What do you think is a reasonable length that is not too short and not too long. If I could edit this essay down to a succinct essay, what would the length that best defines succinct be? I'll settle for a ballpark answer 🙂
So I've been away for a few days and came back to this and I'm not even really sure where to begin, but here we go.
1) This is a large assumption. I honestly would not spend the time to read 13 pages. I probably would not even read anything over 2 pages. Anything over that would get round filed, like I said, or get a very very quick skim, whereas a 1 page essay would get an actual read. I personally would spend about the same amount of time on each app, regardless of how much someone wrote. To clarify this, because rowjimmy likes to over analyze everything, obviously some apps will get more time if they have something super interesting to say and other less if you reject the app really quick, but I'm not going to give someone who wrote a 13 page essay more time than someone who wrote a 1 page essay just because they wrote more.
2) I don't like crazy analogies, but I'll bite. Just because you spend more time on something does not mean you're a "harder" worker or are at any advantage. Honestly, I see this as the most annoying worker. Someone working 120 hours a week is going to cost me (as the boss) a lot of overtime pay. I would rather reward someone who showed they were a quality worker that worked the regular 40 hours a week then someone who wasted several weeks working 120 hours a week, when they could have shown the same quality in 40 hours.
3) Now this just seems like a personal attack. I was unaware I was required to write a 13 page essay defending my stance on an online forum
4) Because they probably think students applying to med school understand that adcoms do not have 20 minutes to read a 13 page essay when they have 4000 apps to review. They think students understand that it should be around 1-2 pages at most, just like the personal statement.
5) See #3 🙄
6) Maybe not, but they expect applicants to use common sense.
7) It would be to your disadvantage to submit an essay over 2 pages long IMHO.
8) The admissions processes is not logical, therefore I think my assumption is logical.
9) Again with the crazy analogies. True, but it would be reasonable to give you a ticket for reckless endangerment, aka: not using common sense.
10) Why are we having this conversation then and why did you ever write a 15 page essay edited down to 13 in the first place? Seems like a misuse of time.
11) See #3 again.
8,000 characters. (about 2 pages.) That's the max I've ever seen for any other secondary essay question.
The fact that they didn't specifically include a character limit doesn't mean they are making room for 55,000 character, 13 page essays, it means that they wouldn't turn down those with slightly longer 2-3 page essays - still long essays, but not ridiculous.
If I were a reviewer and opened up a 13 page document, I would stop and smh. at best, I'd start skimming after the first page. at worst, I'd just stop after the first page.
You seem to just want support for your 13 page essay. Which, as others have stated, I agree is too much. I think 3 pages is way more than enough. U can't express your opinion concisely and adequately in that length? You may be veering away from the prompt.
I don't want to get way off topic and I certainly don't want to get into a tit-for-tat. I was just providing objective feedback and my interpretation. I really did not mean to offend you in any way.
Not offended in anyway - I thought the meanie face made light of that.
I'm just not one to let people walk all over me (maybe a bit harsh of wording for this, but couldn't think anything lighter real quick) for something I wrote in about 30 seconds w/o giving a full explanation, as I thought it was obvious.
I am glad that you are going to submit a much shorter essay as it seems even you agree 13 pages is a little ridiculous.
How acceptable/unacceptable would submitting a 13 page essay be for the first essay? Will it seem completely obnoxious? I essentially go through four different life experiences and challenges I've faced that will help me be a better physician. I'm extremely specific and give a lot of details. I can cut it down a little but THIS IS the edited version (the original was 15 pages!). On one hand I feel like it is obnoxious but on the other hand it is unlimited space for a reason. What do you guys/gals think?
Thanks!
"Your application is complete. Interviews are by invitation from September to March.* If you are invited, you will receive a e-mail or phone call to schedule an interview."
Oh boy. Does this mean my app's been reviewed but didn't make the first cut?
Does anybody else have this status?:
"Your Secondary Application has been recieved. If your recommendation letters have been received by AMCAS we will be loading them into our system soon.* We do this in batches so please allow 2-3 weeks for your file to be complete."
Submitted the secondary 7/23
Could someone post the link to the status checker? I deleted that initial email when I got the secondary invite email....
Thanks!!
here ya go! it hopefully should take you there.
https://www.hrfin.wfubmc.edu:8022/psp/pspro/EMPLOYEE/EMPL/h/?tab=PAPP_GUEST
I just checked my status, I have this now:
"Your application is complete. Interviews are by invitation from September to March.* If you are invited, you will receive a e-mail or phone call to schedule an interview."
Few days ago this was the "1-2 weeks review" status. Does this mean I'm on hold?
Here is some info that might be helpful for those interviewing that haven't scheduled yet:
I was told they begin interviewing 9/4. As of now September is wide open except 9/10, 9/20, and 9/28.
Based on my sleuthing, the nearest airport is Greensboro. But the nearest major airport is Raleigh, which is 2 hours away. For me personally the tickets were $250 cheaper to go to Raleigh, so if you can find a way to get from Raleigh and it doesn't bother you, there's another option. I'm a geezer, so I can rent a car.
And for those interested, unfortunately there is no student hosting program.
I appreciate their open approach. I wasn't aware any school even did that. As opposed to "Here is your interview date. Deal with it."
Most likely this status means your on "hold" according to last years thread there are different tiers within their holding pool. Some tiers will be pulled from for interview invites before others. I remember them saying on last year's thread that you have to call admissions to figure out or get a feel for your standing.
Hope that helped. !
and sorry for spelling, Im on my phone.
Hmmm, normally, there isn't that much of a price difference between Raleigh and Greensboro airports. In any case, Winston Salem is still a pretty good distance from Greensboro's airport. Honestly, you might be best off flying into Raleigh and trying to hitch a ride with someone from this forum...many of Wake Forest's applicants are in state. I would be happy to help someone out in this way if they are coming from out of state and interview on the same day as me (if i get an interview).
Eh... Winston is about a 25 minute drive from Greensboro PTI. RDU is about 2 hours. Charlotte CLT is closer than RDU...Hmmm, normally, there isn't that much of a price difference between Raleigh and Greensboro airports. In any case, Winston Salem is still a pretty good distance from Greensboro's airport. Honestly, you might be best off flying into Raleigh and trying to hitch a ride with someone from this forum...many of Wake Forest's applicants are in state. I would be happy to help someone out in this way if they are coming from out of state and interview on the same day as me (if i get an interview).
Its also pretty unlikely you will meet someone on here interviewing the same day as you. Wake does interviews 3 days a week at the peak of the season, with only six kids max per day, personally i liked it. Also if price is not a factor, choose fly into PTI instead of RDU, it is about 30 miles from campus, but its all freeways and stuff, and you can rent a car from the airport for like 30-40 bucks a day, or cabs here are dirt cheapHmmm, normally, there isn't that much of a price difference between Raleigh and Greensboro airports. In any case, Winston Salem is still a pretty good distance from Greensboro's airport. Honestly, you might be best off flying into Raleigh and trying to hitch a ride with someone from this forum...many of Wake Forest's applicants are in state. I would be happy to help someone out in this way if they are coming from out of state and interview on the same day as me (if i get an interview).
just went from the "1-2 week review" status to "interviews are from sept to march and we will contact you if invited"
WHAT DOES IT MEAN 😱
Call admissions?
Please don't. It will just wait yours and their time. All it means is they have reviewed your file has likely been put you in either an II pile, a hold pile, or a rejection pile. IDK how Wake works, but thats how most schools work. You will hear from them when they want you to hear from them. Don't call them. 😎
just went from the "1-2 week review" status to "interviews are from sept to march and we will contact you if invited"