I have a really hard time selling myself. A lot of times, I look at the things I’ve done and think “man, I got really lucky on a lot of things” rather than attributing it to any sort of internal success. I’ve gotta figure out how to sell myself without sounding cocky for this interview season. It really isn’t easy.
This is literally me. I attribute all of my success to luck. Like, oh that just happened to work out well for me.
Do u have a sig other??? They are the best at highlighting ur best qualities without going overboard.
Mine would most definitely go overboard. 😀
Dam mine keeps reminding me "that i aint ****"
This is an interesting idea, but she would probably highlight the things in our relationship that she appreciates more so than my academic or leadership abilities. I’ll give it a go.
Right? I have two papers waiting to be published with me as first author, how did I get it? I got lucky in contacting the right people. I got good board scores, how did I get them? I got a lot of material I felt comfortable with, for the most part. Etc on down the line, for everything I’ve ever accomplished haha
better to be lucky than good
No, you were smart and picked the appropriate lanes. Working smart > working hard. I tell every M1-M3 if you don’t have a guarantee for a publication and if it takes longer than 6-9 months to produce, walk away. Go volunteer your time somewhere else. I can’t count the number of people at my school who did years of work, only to wind up with another ‘research experience’ on the CV.
I think it's pretty specialty dependent, yeah?
I wasn’t able to get an away in the speciality I’m applying to (neuro of all things) so hopefully very unimportant
For not craz competitive fields . Psych , PM&R. Neuro or anesthesia.
Applying neuro as well. I was lucky to have found my 2 neuro AIs outside of VSAS very early on before VSAS even opened. I got 2 virtual away electives through VSAS as well, but they aren't neuro related.
a general format for department letters, just found out last week. I think they tried implementing it during last cycle.
Yeah they somehow thought introducing this magic new format in the middle of a cycle (post ERAS opening by far, and after many letters were already in. I think it was pretty late they said it, like close to apps being sent to programs), in the middle of a pandemic, when aways were actively discouraged, was a good and helpful idea.
No but I think if you are doing IM you should have a departmental letter as most schools have IM departments (MD that is)......
Our department already made letters over a month ago. We are a small program, doubt they followed this script.
I don't think a lot of programs are using that.
I think my PS is terrible as well, but I take solace in the fact most PS’s are bland and boring, yet most people match anyway! Don’t overthink it.
Already used a writing lab, sought professional counsel, and got wildly different advice.
I enjoyed it. But pretty balsy. Maybe send to 10 reach programs
I hired someone on fiverr to write two for me, one per specialty. Ended up retooling both so they sound more like me, but the raw material I was working with was great and I’m super glad I had someone give me an initial draft. I regret nothing. It took a ton of angst off my plate.
I believe so. My plan is to ask for a letter at the end of August from my sub-I.
Okay great! Yeah that was my basically my plan also
I feel like these people should get an auto-accept to heaven/paradise/whatever’s out there. They’ve earned it.
I would take the high pass personally. High pass and honors looks pretty good. At my school we only have the option of pass/fail and it sucks because you have to assume the PD will take the time to realize it was graded P/F. Especially in your case when they'll see you honored another sub-I. I think it'll look worse.
That's assuming that PDs (or whoever is reading your app) have time to read every little details on your transcript. I'd get the HP. And why would 2 audition rotations show two different grading patterns? That would probably look suspicious.
Exactly. That would just look like you were trying to hide something if they even bothered to read it.
Exactly this.
If you take Step 2 by the first week of September, you should have your score back with plenty of time left. With that said, I'm assuming that the impact of not having it back by ~October 1st is specialty dependent.
I was told to keep it at about 750 words max. Also, I have heard that copying and pasting straight from a Word document can mess up with your formatting on ERAS, and that you have to paste it on Notepad first before transferring to ERAS.
Really? Why would it look suspicious?
