5300 Characters is so little room!

[student113]

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Omg I just cannot cut anymore from my PS. After initially being twice as long, I chipped away at it for months but now I'm still over by 900 characters (including spaces). I'm starting to lose content and can't compact it anymore. Maybe there will be a miracle that increases the character limit?

Did everyone have such a tough time fitting everything in 5300 characters? How the heck am I supposed to take out another freaking paragraph.

 

[MiniMoo]

Omg I just cannot cut anymore from my PS. After initially being twice as long, I chipped away at it for months but now I'm still over by 900 characters (including spaces). I'm starting to lose content and can't compact it anymore. Maybe there will be a miracle that increases the character limit?

Did everyone have such a tough time fitting everything in 5300 characters? How the heck am I supposed to take out another freaking paragraph.

My PS was originally over by about 1500 characters, but I was able to cut it down to the required length without too much of a problem. I had others read it and tell me what to keep and what to take out. I noticed that I wasn't a good judge of whether a detail was necessary or not. I obviously deemed every little thing important because it was part of "my" story, but oftentimes too much can just bore the reader. Have multiple people proofread your PS to help you out.

 

[flip26]

Narrow the scope of the PS - it is not intended to be an an all encompassing, mind numbing autobiography - answer the question "why medicine, why me?" using a couple of anecdotes and you will have a better PS.

Mine came in at around 4300 characters, I believe.

 

[bobsmith]

Omg I just cannot cut anymore from my PS. After initially being twice as long, I chipped away at it for months but now I'm still over by 900 characters (including spaces). I'm starting to lose content and can't compact it anymore. Maybe there will be a miracle that increases the character limit?

Did everyone have such a tough time fitting everything in 5300 characters? How the heck am I supposed to take out another freaking paragraph.

You're probably just going to have to lose some more content. Remember that you can still potentially use some of the stuff that you cut out in your secondary essays, so it might not all be wasted!

 

[swamprat]

Some sentences you wrote probably have a bunch of unnecessary adjectives and what-not. That's what helped me cut a lot of crap out..

 

[45408]

5300 characters is too much, in my opinion. My residency PS was 3500 characters, and that was plenty.

 

[Frazier]

Omg I just cannot cut anymore from my PS. After initially being twice as long, I chipped away at it for months but now I'm still over by 900 characters (including spaces). I'm starting to lose content and can't compact it anymore. Maybe there will be a miracle that increases the character limit?

Did everyone have such a tough time fitting everything in 5300 characters? How the heck am I supposed to take out another freaking paragraph.

You don't have that many interesting things to say.

Sorry, but get chopping! 🙂

 

[wwdaffodils]

Omg I just cannot cut anymore from my PS. After initially being twice as long, I chipped away at it for months but now I'm still over by 900 characters (including spaces). I'm starting to lose content and can't compact it anymore. Maybe there will be a miracle that increases the character limit?

Did everyone have such a tough time fitting everything in 5300 characters? How the heck am I supposed to take out another freaking paragraph.

Its very doable. Think about how you want to start, what you want to convey at the very end, and the overall arc of the "story" (ie, how you get from point A to point B). Whatever doesn't fit into that arc can be taken out; it's fluff. And also- restructure your sentences and simplify the wording. Instead of: "It was then at that very moment that I absolutely knew...", say, "I knew then..."

Honestly, when I look back at the 10 or so drafts of my PS, some of the stuff I thought was so important frankly seems ridiculously over done.

 

[futuredoctor10]

Did everyone have such a tough time fitting everything in 5300 characters? How the heck am I supposed to take out another freaking paragraph.

Yes. Honestly, no joke, my initial PS was over 8500 or 9000 characters.
I wrote everything that was on my mind, though, and later did sifting, sorting through, cutting, and major edits to bring it down below the 5300 char limit!

 

[gravitywave]

get thee to the writing center at your university. those folks are marvelous at showing you all the words you so loved, that the rest of the world finds superfluous.

 

[Bernoull]

Use semicolons instead of some conjunctions.. every bit adds up...

 

[Jolt21]

you probably have more than one topic. make it about one topic. there is always secondary essays for the other topics.

 

[BlueElmo]

Have someone read it, they'll for sure cut out some stuff to make it 5300 characters.

 

[Morsetlis]

There are professional services that can do this for you.

Besides, you don't need to talk about your amazing leadership experience TAing or that time you spent a week shadowing a nephrologist or your Asian/Pacific Islander club membership and canned food drive.

Keep it about you and your transformative experiences. Everything else is already in the AMCAS.

 

[Jolt21]

There are professional services that can do this for you.

that's beyond lame. i can't believe people use that.

 

[Morsetlis]

that's beyond lame. i can't believe people use that.

Have you seen what a professional writer can do for you? While GPA/MCAT are of course the most important parts of an application, the subjectives are what sets an interesting candidate apart from a boring one.

I get my BA Lit and BA Psych friends to revise my essays ;p

 

[Hoody]

get thee to the writing center at your university. those folks are marvelous at showing you all the words you so loved, that the rest of the world finds superfluous.

This. times 1000.

👍👍👍👍

that's beyond lame. i can't believe people use that.

OP disregard this ^^ post. Some of the worst information I have seen on this forum(!!!) from a normally sensible poster. Seriously. bad. bad advice.

👎thumbdown👎thumbdown

 

[JJMrK]

OP, as others have said, the PS isn't intended to be a list of all your activities. Ask yourself "why medicine?" and answer that using just a few examples. Try asking somebody from the PS readers list to take a look.

 

[Tatastrophy]

concur with others....give it to a practiced reader. we are rarely as concise and clear as we imagine ourselves being.

 

[LingoLaine]

You're probably being too broad. Mine is very narrowly focused and though it's not quite done (I'd say about 95%), it's only 3100 characters.

 

[student113]

Thanks for all the ideas and support guys!!

Yes I have been focusing on keeping it just about my story, it's just that my story of "why medicine" is incredibly long. It's hard for me to evaluate which step in the entire scheme is more or less important than the other ones. I'll follow the advice and send it out for harsh editors to read it!

Thanks and

 

[rowerontheriver]

You won't be able to write a novel in even the most interesting of patients charts. No time. No space. (research is a different story, but then again, so are secondaries)

Think of it as a way of practicing efficiency even before you get to med school!

 

[Legacy87]

I wrote 3900 characters. Keep it short and sweet.

 

[sportsfreak]

i think 5300 is much more then u need, i don't think i came anywhere close to that many characters

 

[BlueElmo]

I wrote 3900 characters. Keep it short and sweet.

Wow, good job, was that hard? I can't imagine shortening mine by that much.

 

[Jolt21]

get thee to the writing center at your university. those folks are marvelous at showing you all the words you so loved, that the rest of the world finds superfluous.

Have you seen what a professional writer can do for you? While GPA/MCAT are of course the most important parts of an application, the subjectives are what sets an interesting candidate apart from a boring one.

I get my BA Lit and BA Psych friends to revise my essays ;p

there is a difference between paying someone and having english major friends/the school writing center help you. i agree, the OP should def visit a writing center if he/she is having trouble, or hand it around to a couple friends. but paying a professional service is just incredibly weak imo. there is no need for it. you have access to so many free resources that will get the job done just as good, if not better

OP disregard this ^^ post. Some of the worst information I have seen on this forum(!!!) from a normally sensible poster. Seriously. bad. bad advice.

👎thumbdown👎thumbdown

hoody, i thought you ignoring me. things were so much better then. how'd this app cycle go for you? of yea, you haven't applied yet.

 

[Practitioner]

I wrote 3900 characters. Keep it short and sweet.

With spaces?!

I ended with 4390 and 4405 with spaces (two different versions) after endless revisions. Advisers cut out much content and added more content, doc I work with did similar, then writing center helped restructure sentences. All in all, 13 revisions and months of thinking and working on it, and cut it down from ~6000+ to the 4390.

I kept copies of all intermittent versions and the first draft is nothing like the final.

 

[CarlATHF]

Mine ended up being 4600 characters or so, after starting at around 5800. It can be done. Anybody who's ever read opinion pieces know that succinct and to the point articles always drive the point home more effectively.

 

[The Enchanter]

Don't start chopping a flawed PS. If you keep scraping away parts of a too-bulky-to-begin-with personal statement it will sound disjointed. Narrow your focus and start fresh, writing multiple essays - each one will be a little closer to what you want. Read them out loud. Read them to various people and listen to their opinions. Then you'll have the luxury of picking between several versions rather than a single clunky draft.

 

[Hifey]

Yes, my first draft (which I had actually thought was pretty concise) was about 7000 characters. Had my best friend who is an English teacher read it and she helped me reword, take stuff out, and generally cut it down even more. I hated it because I felt like I was losing stuff but then I read over the final product and realized that it was beautiful, concise, and straight to the point. I am REALLY proud of my personal statement (the final product anyway). It did take 2-3 weeks of agonizing HOURS of reading and rereading to cut it down appropriately. I was so sick of it that I haven't read it since May. seriously.

 

[Tatastrophy]

Wow, good job, was that hard? I can't imagine shortening mine by that much.

Mine was 5300 exactly. I had to get real creative with my word choice in places. lol.

OP...if you want boundless space to write..apply to Duke, they have no word limit. Then again I think you will curse it in the end for having too much room.
Good Luck!

 

[BlueElmo]

Mine was 5300 exactly. I had to get real creative with my word choice in places. lol.

OP...if you want boundless space to write..apply to Duke, they have no word limit. Then again I think you will curse it in the end for having too much room.
Good Luck!

I think mine was 5298 or 5299 or something.

 

[Legacy87]

Yea 3900 with spaces. I was always told by my english and especially my science lab professors to cut out the "fluff" and get to the point. I did not reiterated my AMCAS app, but rather told about a story which showcased my strengths that will make me a good future physician and at the same time, forced them to re-review my E.C.'s.

You have to imagine that adcoms read 10-15 PS at a time (sometimes at 2-3 in the morning), so if they don't get your msg, they'll just go straight to the next applicant.

 

[nonsciencemajor]

Omg I just cannot cut anymore from my PS. After initially being twice as long, I chipped away at it for months but now I'm still over by 900 characters (including spaces). I'm starting to lose content and can't compact it anymore. Maybe there will be a miracle that increases the character limit?

Did everyone have such a tough time fitting everything in 5300 characters? How the heck am I supposed to take out another freaking paragraph.

i didnt have any trouble. I actually like it this way, as you should try to say what you need to say in such a short space knowing that the ad com's will glance at it

 

[Musclemass]

Yes I have been focusing on keeping it just about my story, it's just that my story of "why medicine" is incredibly long.

No one will find your "story" to be as interesting as you think it is. On that assumption, no part of what you've written is truly essential.

Write it to make it memorable and (if possible) different, not to be thorough. If you want it read, keep it short. For such a long section, aim for at least 15% less than the max. If it's too long, in addition to not finding it interesting, many readers will also not make it to the end.

 

[werd]

the character limit is a blessing in disguise... admissions committees and interviewers aren't going to read long personal statements. there's so many applications that long or uninteresting PS's get browsed at best. try not to talk much about things that are already in your resume, avoid using conjugations of the verb "to be," and try to keep it as concise as possible. good luck, it's not a fun process.

 

[Hoody]

hoody, i thought you ignoring me. things were so much better then.

Hi Jolt. thought you were ignoring me as well? not so much eh? and how could things be better if I never ignored you in the first place?

how'd this app cycle go for you? of yea, you haven't applied yet.

whats your point? that because I haven't applied yet, I'm not allowed to tell people that using a professional writing service is OKAY if they need help with their PS? Yeah, OP, don't utilize people who went to college and made a profession out of helping people in situations just like yourself. that would be, like, so, like, lame of you.


Great advice Jolt 👍. I suppose if you meant what you said in your second post then you should have put that in your first post and then there wouldn't be any confusion now would there? 🙂