After interviews, just how important is your personal statement?

[What up doc]

I spent months perfecting my personal statement, under the assumption that it could be the key that unlocks an interview. Secondaries, on the other hand, are completed within 1 to 2 weeks, and will invariably be of less quality than scrupulously crafted personal statement. But ive heard that secondaries carry just as much if not more weight than your personal statement. Is this true? Also, does your personal statement still carry as much after you interview? Do adcoms look at both your secondaries and PS post interview as being of equal importance?

oh yah, and i somehow got an S on my WS of the MCAT (pure luck i assure you), will i be expected to write like orwell in my secondaries/PS? do you think adcoms will be like "wow, he writes like ****...he DEFINTELY got lucky!"?

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[What up doc]

bump bump!~!

 

[lord_jeebus]

In my experience on an adcom, the personal statement is not something that is assessed on its strength but used as a tool to assess the personal qualities of an applicant. Hence you hardly hear "I really liked his personal statement," but rather "I really liked him."

I find that the personal statement is much less useful than interviews for assessing the character of an applicant, and come decision time is not something that often comes up directly. Of course, the PS, interviews, letters, and supplemental essays all come together to form a unified picture, which in sum is very important.