a couple questions

[echoyjeff222]

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Hi all,

Excited to finally post in this section of the forum ... mostly been on the MCAT side of the forum for awhile 🙂

I had a couple questions about the application process:

1) Is the personal statement the same each year? It sounds like there's no prompt at all, just "tell us about yourself?"

2) If so, what is the general format of the personal statement? Can I go super creative and tell a story? That's what I usually do on essays for scholarships and such. I find it much more effective than simply listing "why I want to become a doctor."

 

[estanton]

Yeah the "prompt" is the same each year. My advice is to either get a book of med school personal statements or look some up online to find a few you like--that should give you a pretty good idea about what format you like. Good luck!

 

[NickNaylor]

1) There's a formal prompt which you can read, but it essentially asks you to talk about your interest in medicine, why you want to be a physician, and what led you to that.

2) You can go super creative if you want, but most people (myself included) would advise strongly against it. The reason being that you're applying to professional school, thus a certain degree of decorum and formality is expected, and most people don't executive creative personal statements successfully. It is acceptable (and a good idea) to include directly pertinent experiences that led to your interest in medicine. That stuff is important. However, I would really avoid doing anything unconventional unless you have it looked over by many, many people that have direct experience in medical admissions. I read a lot of personal statements, and most of them sound pretty much the same. That's fine. From my perspective, the goal of the personal statement is to simply do a good enough job to not make a huge mistake. It's very unlikely that your PS will have much of an impact on your application - positive or negative - beyond that.

 

[Catalystik]

Panda Bear's famous example of what not to do: http://forums.studentdoctor.net/showthread.php?t=285834

A starting point:
Depakote’s PS tips: http://forums.studentdoctor.net/showthread.php?t=536199
PS guide: http://www.startmedicine.com/app/PersonalStatement.asp

 

[Goro]

Stealing blatantly from the sage gyngyn, think of the PS as "why you should invite me to your school for an interview."

Hi all,

Excited to finally post in this section of the forum ... mostly been on the MCAT side of the forum for awhile 🙂

I had a couple questions about the application process:

1) Is the personal statement the same each year? It sounds like there's no prompt at all, just "tell us about yourself?"

2) If so, what is the general format of the personal statement? Can I go super creative and tell a story? That's what I usually do on essays for scholarships and such. I find it much more effective than simply listing "why I want to become a doctor."

 

[sunflower18]

My PS experience: I ended up writing 3 vastly different versions of my PS. I really liked how the first 2 came out in terms of eloquence and flow, but I had to be very critical and ask myself, "Do these REALLY explain why I want to go into medicine?" And the answer was no. It seems like a simple enough thing to write about, but in my first draft, I wrote an essay basically about why I switched career trajectories without answering why exactly I switched to medicine. In my second draft, I wrote about things I've seen in medical settings, not things I've done or ways I've tested my passions. Finally, in the PS that I submitted, I wrote very clearly why I was interested in medicine and what direction I see my career going in, which is of course what I should have done all along, but it's easy to fall into the trap of writing an autobiography or trying to be unique or being defensive about concerns you think adcoms might have with your application. The PS is not the time to do any of those things; it is the time to convey your focus and goals and experiences, IMO. I'm glad that I really took a good look at the essays I was producing and kept trying when I realized that what I had written was not sufficient to apply with. This process took several months though (since stepping back from the essay is useful too), so I commend you for starting early. Best of luck! 🙂