Anyone else have a least favorite secondary essay?

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dwarfplanet

dwarfplanet

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Another privileged individual worrying about how lame their adversity essay is. I ended up talking about going college away from home while my relationship with my best friend deteriorated back home. The gist is that I came from small private schools and a safe suburban setting where I knew everyone to a big urban campus where I knew nobody, feeling desperately alone and not having an old friend to fall back on. So it basically just talks about how this forced me to grow as a person, become more confident, outgoing, and self-reliant, and mature into a better person because of it.

It just feels blah no matter how many times I've revised it.
 
dwarfplanet said:
Another privileged individual worrying about how lame their adversity essay is. I ended up talking about going college away from home while my relationship with my best friend deteriorated back home. The gist is that I came from small private schools and a safe suburban setting where I knew everyone to a big urban campus where I knew nobody, feeling desperately alone and not having an old friend to fall back on. So it basically just talks about how this forced me to grow as a person, become more confident, outgoing, and self-reliant, and mature into a better person because of it.

It just feels blah no matter how many times I've revised it.
Click to expand...
My least favorite is the diversity essay. Mine is basically “I am first gen which brought me to the army where I learned to be a leader and to interact with people from across cultures and also I am engulfed in other cultures through my Native American wife and child so that’s pretty dope.” It is really bland lol But meh, such is the process.
 
Least favorite is why school essays. In general, all schools have the same or very similar programs. They all focus on serving the underserved, having early clinical exposure, having a mentor....

I feel like its really hard to write one of those that is good unless you have some sort of connection to the area.

I also think the failure essays can be tough because they can weed out people who have lived very privileged lives. Thankfully, I had a great essay for that prompt but not many schools ask it.
 
spuding102 said:
Least favorite is why school essays. In general, all schools have the same or very similar programs. They all focus on serving the underserved, having early clinical exposure, having a mentor....

I feel like its really hard to write one of those that is good unless you have some sort of connection to the area.

I also think the failure essays can be tough because they can weed out people who have lived very privileged lives. Thankfully, I had a great essay for that prompt but not many schools ask it.
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Agree that the why us comes in close second. You start to feel crazy writing those ones.
 
OxenFoxen said:
My least favorite was definitely Dartmouth's "The other" essay

Edit: My favorites so far:
USC - what is the most fun you have had recently?
WV - what is your theme song and why?
Both of these secondaries in general were fun to fill out
Click to expand...

Those are really fun questions, wish I had them!
 
OxenFoxen said:
My least favorite was definitely Dartmouth's "The other" essay
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I worked on that essay for almost two weeks. I went through SO many drafts, and I just could not make up my mind about what direction to take. I eventually had to force myself to submit the version I was most reasonably happy with. Each subsequent round of revision was just making the essay different, but not necessarily better.
 
University of Miami had my most and least favorite prompts. I really liked the opportunity to write about my favorite travel experiences, but I definitely didn't enjoy dealing with a bunch of mandatory essay prompts where I basically had to regurgitate my AMCAS PS/activities section. "Discuss your research experience..." I ALREADY DID!
 
dwarfplanet said:
Another privileged individual worrying about how lame their adversity essay is. I ended up talking about going college away from home while my relationship with my best friend deteriorated back home. The gist is that I came from small private schools and a safe suburban setting where I knew everyone to a big urban campus where I knew nobody, feeling desperately alone and not having an old friend to fall back on. So it basically just talks about how this forced me to grow as a person, become more confident, outgoing, and self-reliant, and mature into a better person because of it.

It just feels blah no matter how many times I've revised it.
Click to expand...
Not secondary related, but SDNers sure hate the "Tell me about yourself" interview question.
 
I hated the “greatest” challenge and/or accomplishment essays because sometimes your actual greatest challenge (or accomplishment) isn’t something you want to write about in a secondary.
 
I didn’t even submit a secondary to eastern Virginia because of this slew of excellent secondaries

  • Briefly describe your exposure to medicine
  • What do you think you will like best about being a physician?
  • What do you think you will like least about being a physician?
  • Describe yourself and your medical career as you see it ten years from now:
 
Cornfed101 said:
I didn’t even submit a secondary to eastern Virginia because of this slew of excellent secondaries

  • Briefly describe your exposure to medicine
  • What do you think you will like best about being a physician?
  • What do you think you will like least about being a physician?
  • Describe yourself and your medical career as you see it ten years from now:
Click to expand...

OMG, thought it was just me.
I still have Kaiser's sitting in a word doc bc of that 'intellectual pursuits' question.
And NOVA with their 5 million questions...

I'll take the L on these secondaries.
 
spuding102 said:
Least favorite is why school essays. In general, all schools have the same or very similar programs. They all focus on serving the underserved, having early clinical exposure, having a mentor....

I feel like its really hard to write one of those that is good unless you have some sort of connection to the area.

I also think the failure essays can be tough because they can weed out people who have lived very privileged lives. Thankfully, I had a great essay for that prompt but not many schools ask it.
Click to expand...

Do schools really weed people out based on how “lame” someone’s diversity/failure etc essay is?
 
Engrailed said:
Do schools really weed people out based on how “lame” someone’s diversity/failure etc essay is?
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Why not? I feel like if someone hasn't ever dealt with failure or had any life experience it shows in what they pick for those secondaries. If your greatest failure is the B- you got in physics then you are not ready to be a physician.
 
Cornfed101 said:
Why not? I feel like if someone hasn't ever dealt with failure or had any life experience it shows in what they pick for those secondaries. If your greatest failure is the B- you got in physics then you are not ready to be a physician.
Click to expand...

Ah haha yes those “My greatest failure was an A- in Orgo” people are special for sure haha
 
MemeLord said:
My least favorite is the diversity essay. Mine is basically “I am first gen which brought me to the army where I learned to be a leader and to interact with people from across cultures and also I am engulfed in other cultures through my Native American wife and child so that’s pretty dope.” It is really bland lol But meh, such is the process.
Click to expand...

Lol so much better than mine dude
 
Cornfed101 said:
Why not? I feel like if someone hasn't ever dealt with failure or had any life experience it shows in what they pick for those secondaries. If your greatest failure is the B- you got in physics then you are not ready to be a physician.
Click to expand...

I get what you're getting at and I more agree with you than I disagree, but why would someone whose never failed be automatically not prepared to be a physician? I'm just imagining a student unlike myself who has perfect stats and experiences being discounted because apparently he didn't fail enough.
 
Any of Dukes 10 essays or any of UCLAs 10 essays... screw that character count
 
Cornfed101 said:
I didn’t even submit a secondary to eastern Virginia because of this slew of excellent secondaries

  • Briefly describe your exposure to medicine
  • What do you think you will like best about being a physician?
  • What do you think you will like least about being a physician?
  • Describe yourself and your medical career as you see it ten years from now:
Click to expand...
Thisssss. By the end, I felt like I wrote a lot about a medicine (great) and almost nothing about the rest of my life (not great). If you're gonna have me write all those essays, at least let me express myself a little.
 
Last edited:
MemeLord said:
My least favorite is the diversity essay. Mine is basically “I am first gen which brought me to the army where I learned to be a leader and to interact with people from across cultures and also I am engulfed in other cultures through my Native American wife and child so that’s pretty dope.” It is really bland lol But meh, such is the process.
Click to expand...

Bro, I want to meet you after reading this. The native American part is interesting.
 
Kirby Smart said:
I get what you're getting at and I more agree with you than I disagree, but why would someone whose never failed be automatically not prepared to be a physician? I'm just imagining a student unlike myself who has perfect stats and experiences being discounted because apparently he didn't fail enough.
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Never failed at anything? If you have never failed at anything outside of academics you need to move out of your parents' basement and experience life a little (a student unlike yourself like you said. Just speaking hypothetically). It doesn't have to be something crazy. It could be as simple as screwing up on the job or in a volunteer responsibility.
 
Cornfed101 said:
Never failed at anything? If you have never failed at anything outside of academics you need to move out of your parents' basement and experience life a little (a student unlike yourself like you said. Just speaking hypothetically). It doesn't have to be something crazy. It could be as simple as screwing up on the job or in a volunteer responsibility.
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I guess I was thinking of a more significant failure than just "screwing up on the job" but I guess you're right that that would suffice and it would be pretty impossible for a qualified applicant to not have some situation like this lol
 
Kardio said:
Bro, I want to meet you after reading this. The native American part is interesting.
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It is, but then again it really isn’t as it is their culture not mine lol I have learned how to bead, strip feathers off a dead eagle (which is apparently something that is illegal except for NA communities which is pretty Cool), how to make a bunch of nifty foods, and how to say “grandma” in Navajo. Lots of other things, but on the day-to-day just people peopling along.
 
Kirby Smart said:
I guess I was thinking of a more significant failure than just "screwing up on the job" but I guess you're right that that would suffice and it would be pretty impossible for a qualified applicant to not have some situation like this lol
Click to expand...

That's all mine was... I mean it was a pretty big screw up. I almost ruined the entire claims and remittance portion of the EHR upgrade for Duke University Hospital :whistle:
 
MemeLord said:
It is, but then again it really isn’t as it is their culture not mine lol I have learned how to bead, strip feathers off a dead eagle (which is apparently something that is illegal except for NA communities which is pretty Cool), how to make a bunch of nifty foods, and how to say “grandma” in Navajo. Lots of other things, but on the day-to-day just people peopling along.
Click to expand...

That’s wild! I don’t know anything about their culture.

I don’t know man - I think the fact that your son/daughter is a member of that group gives you a deeper relationship to the NA community than the vast majority of us will have.

10/10 would interview @MemeLord
 
Kardio said:
That’s wild! I don’t know anything about their culture.

I don’t know man - I think the fact that your son/daughter is a member of that group gives you a deeper relationship to the NA community than the vast majority of us will have.

10/10 would interview @MemeLord
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I think it is grabbing at straws. Diversity essay is the only one that 80% have lame essays for
 
I appreciate the diversity and adversity prompts because there wasn't any place to appropriately discuss such things on the primary and I feel like I have some genuinely compelling answers. I think they should always be optional, though, and schools should be more straightforward about what types of answers they actually want (for example, Harvard's diversity essay did a good job of mentioning specific answers they're looking for).

I dislike "why our school" prompts, especially when there isn't much information on the website... how can we possibly answer these well?
 
spuding102 said:
I think for a lot of people the diversity can be hard to write about. I wonder what the average applicant from suburban CT writes about
Click to expand...
"I'm gay and here's what that has to do with the rest of my app and medicine, please let me in" Source: me, an average applicant from suburban CT
 
Goro said:
Not secondary related, but SDNers sure hate the "Tell me about yourself" interview question.
Click to expand...

Hate this question. I did a mock interview with a physician that I shadowed, and he was kind enough to hit me with it. As I rambled on and on and on with an artfully constructed response, I watched the light go out of his eyes.

X_X
 
OxenFoxen said:
My least favorite was definitely Dartmouth's "The other" essay

Edit: My favorites so far:
USC - what is the most fun you have had recently?
WV - what is your theme song and why?
Both of these secondaries in general were fun to fill out
Click to expand...

USC truly had a bomb secondary. <3
 
Phoebus Apollo said:
Hate this question. I did a mock interview with a physician that I shadowed, and he was kind enough to hit me with it. As I rambled on and on and on with an artfully constructed response, I watched the light go out of his eyes.

X_X
Click to expand...
How do you think interviewers would respond to starting off with a joke? Like:

“Well, I’m a Gemini, so that probably tells you all you need to know about me.”
 
MemeLord said:
How do you think interviewers would respond to starting off with a joke? Like:

“Well, I’m a Gemini, so that probably tells you all you need to know about me.”
Click to expand...

Lolz PLZ NO.

I honestly found in my experience that answering that question very, very simply and moving on quickly was the best move. Ppl literally just want to know a little about you, and then get into the good stuff
 
MemeLord said:
How do you think interviewers would respond to starting off with a joke? Like:

“Well, I’m a Gemini, so that probably tells you all you need to know about me.”
Click to expand...
I don't think you're being serious about doing this, but don't. Lol.
 
EmbryonalCarcinoma said:
I don't think you're being serious about doing this, but don't. Lol.
Click to expand...
I was thinking of “Well to start off, I am a Taurus *we all chuckle* in seriousness, *I am a blah blah blah my favorite hobby is hiking and yadda move on*”

Start off with a really light and obvious joke...?
 
MemeLord said:
I was thinking of “Well to start off, I am a Taurus *we all chuckle* in seriousness, *I am a blah blah blah my favorite hobby is hiking and yadda move on*”

Start off with a really light and obvious joke...?
Click to expand...

I would not
 
OxenFoxen said:
I would not
Click to expand...
OxenFoxen said:
I would not
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I now actually have a genuine question on this kind of thing:

Is it good to try to utilize tactful humor? Like 95% serious, 5% conversational humor? The point of the interviews is to show that there is a personable human behind the person we portray on paper, right? I don't want to force myself to be too stiff, as jokery is natural part of conversation.

Genuine question that I am unsure of then. @Goro @LizzyM @gyngyn what are your opinions on humor(not as the central focus of, but as a component of) the interview?
 
MemeLord said:
I was thinking of “Well to start off, I am a Taurus *we all chuckle* in seriousness, *I am a blah blah blah my favorite hobby is hiking and yadda move on*”

Start off with a really light and obvious joke...?
Click to expand...
I would chuckle with you, MemeLord.

I know humor is frowned upon in the application process (sad), but I'd hope a little levity is appreciated.
 
MemeLord said:
Is this because there are people who actually are like that...?
Click to expand...
Kinda yeah, also it’ll sound a bit scripted, particularly since if you get asked this, it’ll be the first question. I promise, there will be opportunities for much more natural humor as the interview moves on through more interesting subjects than a 5 second biography
 
MemeLord said:
I now actually have a genuine question on this kind of thing:

Is it good to try to utilize tactful humor? Like 95% serious, 5% conversational humor? The point of the interviews is to show that there is a personable human behind the person we portray on paper, right? I don't want to force myself to be too stiff, as jokery is natural part of conversation.

Genuine question that I am unsure of then. @Goro @LizzyM @gyngyn what are your opinions on humor(not as the central focus of, but as a component of) the interview?
Click to expand...

I do not think you can plan ahead as to whether you can tell jokes at an interview or not - - it totally depends on who is across from you, I think their facial expressions, body language, and tone of voice will make it obvious whether they would be turned off by silly jokes or not
 
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