2024-2025 Case Western Reserve

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chilly_md said:

2024-2025 Case Western Reserve Secondary Essay Prompts: Read instructions carefully & select a program​

University Program Applicants​

Required Responses:​

  1. Greatest Challenge: The Admissions Committee is interested in gaining more insight into you as a person. Please describe a significant personal challenge you have faced, one which you feel has helped to shape you as a person. Examples may include a moral or ethical dilemma, a situation of personal adversity, or a hurdle in your life that you worked hard to overcome. Please include how you got through the experience, how you handled the uncertainty or stress, and what you learned about yourself as a result. (2,000 character limit)
  2. Personal Growth: Based on your current maturity and wisdom, reflect upon an experience from the past few years that you would handle differently today. (1,000 character limit)
  3. Cultural Awareness: Many have been reckoning with the impact of systemic injustices on social environments and healthcare equity. Describe a personal experience that has deepened your cultural awareness and humility, and the impact of that learning on how you look at health and healthcare. (1,500 character limit)
  4. Gap Year(s) if applicable: If you are taking time off between college graduation and medical school matriculation, please tell us why you made this decision and what you will be doing or have done during this gap. (1,000 character limit)

Optional Responses:​

  1. Research/Scholarly Work: One of the four pillars of the Western Reserve2 Curriculum is Research and Scholarship. Although research is not a prerequisite requirement for the University Program, if you have participated in research or other scholarly project (capstone project, honors thesis, etc.), please reflect on the experience, including how you learned from it, what challenged you, and how it may have impacted you educationally and professionally. If you have not completed research or scholarly project, please indicate that in the text box below. (2,500 character limit)
  • If the details of your project are included elsewhere in your application no need to repeat them here. We are interested in learning what you took away from the experience(s).
  • If you are applying to both the University Program and the Cleveland Clinic Lerner Program, the research response will default to the CCL Program required response.
2. Additional Information Response: Is there any further information that you wish to share with the Admissions Committee that may not be captured in the rest of your application? (2,000 character limit)
++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

CCLCM (5 yr. MD) Applicants​

Required Responses: ​

  1. Greatest Challenge Essay: The admissions committee is interested in gaining more insight into you as a person. Please describe a significant personal challenge you have faced, one which you feel has helped to shape you as a person. Examples may include a moral or ethical dilemma, a situation of personal adversity, or a hurdle in your life that you worked hard to overcome. Please include how you got through the experience and what you learned about yourself as a result. (2,000 character limit)
  2. Research Essay: Please tell us about ONE research project to which you made a significant contribution. In your essay, describe your role on the project, the hypothesis of your research and whether you contributed to hypothesis generation, why the methods were selected to answer that hypothesis, your results, and interpretation of your results with respect to future findings. In addition, please briefly share your motivation for pursuing this research project and reflect on how this experience affected your future career goals. (3,500 character limit)
  3. Personal Growth: Based on your current maturity and wisdom, reflect upon an experience from the past few years that you would handle differently today. (1,000 character limit)
  4. Cultural Awareness: Many have been reckoning with the impact of systemic injustices on social environments and healthcare equity. Describe a personal experience that has deepened your cultural awareness and humility, and the impact of that learning on how you look at health and healthcare. (1,500 character limit)
  5. Career Essay: What does your ideal career entail fifteen years after medical school graduation? (1,000 character limit)
  6. Gap Year(s) if applicable: If you are taking time off between college graduation and medical school matriculation, please tell us why you made this decision and what you will be doing or have done during this gap. (1,000 character limit)

Optional Responses:​

Additional Information Response: Is there any further information that you wish to share with the Admissions Committee that may not be captured in the rest of your application? (2,000 character limit)
+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

MSTP (MD/PhD) Applicants: Please refer to the Case Western page here: Secondary Application Questions | MD University Program | Case Western Reserve University

Good luck to all applying!

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Wondering if anyone has any input for the research/scholarly work essay. I conducted research as an undergraduate and talk about it here, but I still have room left. I also worked on a project, where I developed instructional videos for the a department as my school, alongside a professor. I was wondering if this would be considered as "scholarly project" and if I should also talk about it here, or if I should only talk about my wet-lab research.
 
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eg123 said:
Wondering if anyone has any input for the research/scholarly work essay. I conducted research as an undergraduate and talk about it here, but I still have room left. I also worked on a project, where I developed instructional videos for the a department as my school, alongside a professor. I was wondering if this would be considered as "scholarly project" and if I should also talk about it here, or if I should only talk about my wet-lab research.
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This sounds like a media project to me but add it in if you think it is relevant. 🤷‍♂️
 
since the character count for the research question is so long, would it be appropriate to talk about 2 different projects? I'm wondering if I can talk about my capstone project for my minor (though it was through a class). Idk if it really falls into "research" though, in which case i'll just talk about my wet lab experience
 
chilly_md said:
  1. Research/Scholarly Work: One of the four pillars of the Western Reserve2 Curriculum is Research and Scholarship. Although research is not a prerequisite requirement for the University Program, if you have participated in research or other scholarly project (capstone project, honors thesis, etc.), please reflect on the experience, including how you learned from it, what challenged you, and how it may have impacted you educationally and professionally. If you have not completed research or scholarly project, please indicate that in the text box below. (2,500 character limit)
  • If the details of your project are included elsewhere in your application no need to repeat them here. We are interested in learning what you took away from the experience(s).
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I described my research projects in my primary application, but I had just begun one when I submitted my primary application. Would it be okay to describe my research project again based on the changes made since I submitted my primary application?
 
Thoughts on cultural awareness essay? How is everyone approaching this prompt? I have a humbling experience with healthcare inequities relating to homeless people that I have written about, but there wasn't necessarily any "cultural awareness" involved, so I'm not sure if this would apply really.
 
baguette-indian said:
Am I cooked if I don't submit within the two week span (i.e. am just a few days late)
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@CWRU.Sman I am in the same position as @baguette-indian as I am trying to make my secondary the best it can be! Will submitting 1-2 days outside of the 2-week window be frowned upon? I know in previous years submission times weren't tracked exactly, so submitting closely outside the 2-week frames didn't hurt your chances. Is this still the case? Thank you for all your input!
 
Does Case Western prefer to see health/science-based research projects for the optional research prompt or could i talk about the history thesis I wrote and how it impacted my approach to medicine?
 
vegyaki said:
@CWRU.Sman I am in the same position as @baguette-indian as I am trying to make my secondary the best it can be! Will submitting 1-2 days outside of the 2-week window be frowned upon? I know in previous years submission times weren't tracked exactly, so submitting closely outside the 2-week frames didn't hurt your chances. Is this still the case? Thank you for all your input!
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It's fine. and not frowned upon. The 2 week recommendation is just that - a recommendation. Our emphasis to applicants is - don't wait until November or December to submit the secondary if you received it in July/August.
 
malpacca90 said:
Does Case Western prefer to see health/science-based research projects for the optional research prompt or could i talk about the history thesis I wrote and how it impacted my approach to medicine?
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Dealer's choice! It's your application. Research for the University Program is defined very broadly - it does not have to be clinical or basic science-related. And, the prompt is really focused on your growth/reflections from the experience, less so the details of the project which are usually contained in the activities section of the AMCAS application. We are trying to get away from duplicative information from our applicants.
 
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Sakkarai7481 said:
Thoughts on cultural awareness essay? How is everyone approaching this prompt? I have a humbling experience with healthcare inequities relating to homeless people that I have written about, but there wasn't necessarily any "cultural awareness" involved, so I'm not sure if this would apply really.
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I think you're on the right track.
 
albatross234 said:
I think they are saying you do the CCLCM research question not the university one, if im not mistaken. It's longer too
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@CWRU.Sman hello! thank you so much for all your help with responding to questions! can I just confirm that this is what we are expected to do if applying to both CCLCM and the university program?
 
banananabread said:
@CWRU.Sman hello! thank you so much for all your help with responding to questions! can I just confirm that this is what we are expected to do if applying to both CCLCM and the university program?
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i can confirm! once you select both programs in the portal the CCLCM research prompt pops up
 
Hello,

I finished writing my essay for "The Greatest Challenge" prompt but I am second-guessing my topic of choice. I choose to write about video game addiction in middle and early high school and overcoming that. It helped me develop a lot as a person and come out of my shell.

I know some people say not to write about mental health, and although it is not exactly a mental health thing, I am unsure if I am trudging too close to that line. I also know addiction essays can be a bad idea as well if adcoms think you can relapse or not do well, but I don't think a video game addiction is on that level? for me, video games were more an escape and I found better things to do essentially; it was just difficult to come out of my shell and leave the familiarity and ease of the virtual world.

Does anyone have any advice? Please and thank you so much.
 
aaronrodgersachilles said:
Hello,

I finished writing my essay for "The Greatest Challenge" prompt but I am second-guessing my topic of choice. I choose to write about video game addiction in middle and early high school and overcoming that. It helped me develop a lot as a person and come out of my shell.

I know some people say not to write about mental health, and although it is not exactly a mental health thing, I am unsure if I am trudging too close to that line. I also know addiction essays can be a bad idea as well if adcoms think you can relapse or not do well, but I don't think a video game addiction is on that level? for me, video games were more an escape and I found better things to do essentially; it was just difficult to come out of my shell and leave the familiarity and ease of the virtual world.

Does anyone have any advice? Please and thank you so much.
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I'm an applicant so grain of salt etc, but from everything I've seen and my thoughts is honestly that there will be very little sympathy for that topic. Don't get me wrong, video game addiction is very real, but I don't think most people are going to see it that way. Also raises huge red flags for matriculation/ school success on their end, the same reason people say not to talk about mental health. You don't want to volunteer information that suggests a threat or risk to you completing med school successfully, and video game addiction definitely would fall under that. Again, I dunno, but that's my two cents. Someone more qualified can chime in too, I'm sure
 
Crisco387 said:
I'm an applicant so grain of salt etc, but from everything I've seen and my thoughts is honestly that there will be very little sympathy for that topic. Don't get me wrong, video game addiction is very real, but I don't think most people are going to see it that way. Also raises huge red flags for matriculation/ school success on their end, the same reason people say not to talk about mental health. You don't want to volunteer information that suggests a threat or risk to you completing med school successfully, and video game addiction definitely would fall under that. Again, I dunno, but that's my two cents. Someone more qualified can chime in too, I'm sure
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I gotcha thank you so much, this is why I was having cold feet on the essay ig trust the gut feelings
 
Another question: If I had spoken about adversity through being a from an minority immigrant family along with being treated differently could this be seen in a bad light in an essay? I hear some people say topics on racism can be controversial and put applicants who speak on it at a disadvantage, however, I feel like its a great way to express how an applicant could be more culturally inclusive and aim to apply such themes to their goals as a physician since they had experienced first hand how it had effected them and how they overcame it. Is this a bad idea?
 
aaronrodgersachilles said:
Hello,

I finished writing my essay for "The Greatest Challenge" prompt but I am second-guessing my topic of choice. I choose to write about video game addiction in middle and early high school and overcoming that. It helped me develop a lot as a person and come out of my shell.

I know some people say not to write about mental health, and although it is not exactly a mental health thing, I am unsure if I am trudging too close to that line. I also know addiction essays can be a bad idea as well if adcoms think you can relapse or not do well, but I don't think a video game addiction is on that level? for me, video games were more an escape and I found better things to do essentially; it was just difficult to come out of my shell and leave the familiarity and ease of the virtual world.

Does anyone have any advice? Please and thank you so much.
Click to expand...
I'm also an applicant but that sounds like a really cool essay idea, as long as you hit on the exact steps you've used to overcome it, how you've become more sympathetic toward others with this same addiction, awareness of the stigma against it, also Dr. K in pop culture has been addressing this topic so it's been brought more to light!
 
hey yall for the research/scholar question, I am unsure if it would be better to talk about my clinical skills as a research coordinator who conducts clinical visits (and sees how our patients progress through an exercise intervention) or about my side research project (submitted abstract, conference presentation, soon to be submitted paper). I am splitting this question into two parts, and the first part is about another research experience I did that lead to a paper and how that helped me decide that I wanted to integrate research into clinical medicine. I dont want to sound too repetitive by describing two experiences that lead to papers and was thinking that by mentioning clinical research skills could diversity my application.
 
flowerplant2000 said:
hey yall for the research/scholar question, I am unsure if it would be better to talk about my clinical skills as a research coordinator who conducts clinical visits (and sees how our patients progress through an exercise intervention) or about my side research project (submitted abstract, conference presentation, soon to be submitted paper). I am splitting this question into two parts, and the first part is about another research experience I did that lead to a paper and how that helped me decide that I wanted to integrate research into clinical medicine. I dont want to sound too repetitive by describing two experiences that lead to papers and was thinking that by mentioning clinical research skills could diversity my application.
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personally I opted to talk about all of my research experiences -- both as a CRC and in academic settings. there's plenty of space to, so why not include it all? 🙂

just make sure youre giving a fresh perspective on the activities and follow the prompt
 
Hi! If I indicated an interest in pursing an MD-MPH on AMCAs, is there a separate process for applying to the MPH or just regular secondary? Additionally, if I notated MBA on the AMCAs as well as I hadn't yet decided which of the two would be a better fit and now am certain on an MPH, do I need to let the admissions office know?
 
Chef'n Curry said:
congrats all! does anyone know if a UP II means a CCLCM pre-II R (and vice versa)? FWIW this seems to be the case, at least from what i've seen

@CWRU.Sman if you'd be able to comment on this that would be great as well!
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no they are independent programs. one does not influence the other
 
KnightTalking said:
Hi! If I indicated an interest in pursing an MD-MPH on AMCAs, is there a separate process for applying to the MPH or just regular secondary? Additionally, if I notated MBA on the AMCAs as well as I hadn't yet decided which of the two would be a better fit and now am certain on an MPH, do I need to let the admissions office know?
Click to expand...
For CWRU, pursing admissions to the grad program happens after an acceptance the med school. The grad school app process can be somewhat expedited.
 
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