diversity statement and difficult childhood

[qtpai]

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Diversity essay from one of my secondaries:

"6. The Committee on Admissions regards the diversity of an entering class as an important factor in serving the educational mission of the school.

The Committee on Admissions strongly encourages you to share unique, personally important, and/or challenging factors in your background, such as the quality of your early educational environment, socioeconomic status, culture, race, ethnicity, or life or work experiences. Please discuss how such factors have influenced your goals and preparation for a career in medicine.

Please limit your answer to 2,000 characters including spaces."

I had a difficult childhood, but I don't want to go into the details, because I think it is something personal to me, not something I should write about in an essay that several strangers might end up reading. So, I want to basically use the exact words "difficult childhood" in my essay, using this notion to explain why I have more empathy for suffering, strength of character, even determination than I may have had otherwise. I think if I play it well, I can portray this correctly without detailing the challenges I faced when I was young. I certainly do not want to elucidate my difficulties, just to perhaps prepend "personal" as an adjective to "difficulties," possibly, and move on from that point onto positive things.

Is this a valid strategy for this essay? I am certainly not making this up, and if it comes up in the interview, I think I will tell the interviewers that I want to keep it personal there as well.

What do you guys think?

 

[se2131]

Make sure you answer the question, don't forget that you need to show why this proves that you will add a strong, unique element to the class.

 

[AmoryBlaine]

I think it's pretty risky to write an essay around a topic you don't really want to discuss. 90% you'd be fine but you very well might get that one interviewer who pressed you for details, then if you had to say, "I don't really want to talk about that" he might appropriately wonder why you had chose to write 2000 words about it.

 

[87138]

I selected a pretty personal (and somewhat embarrassing) situation to write about for a school's application that had one of those "write about whatever you want that would give us insight into you as a person" prompts.

It got me an interview, and you can bet that the essay/subject came up at the interview. It was a little odd to talk about it face to face with a stranger, but I was prepared to do so beforehand, and I think it went well.

Basically, if it's on your application, it's fair game for interview discussion. And the more it stands out, the better the likelihood it will come up.

Edit: I shouldn't say it got me an interview, obviously there are a lot of factors there. But it didn't prevent me from getting an interview, and this is at a school that doesn't really favor OOS applicants like myself.

 

[Phoenix.]

Yup. If you write about it, be prepared to talk about it at least a little. For one of those "tell us about a difficult/challenging time in your life" I wrote about something I really don't want to talk about or feel particularly comfortable discussing. I've had interviews at two schools whose secondaries included that question. One school only gave the interviewers some parts of the primary application, so obviously it didn't come up there. At the other school, however, they had my entire application, including the secondary, and one of the interviewers actually BEGAN the interview asking me questions directly about what I described in that essay. I answered one or two questions quite tersely, and he moved on. I got accepted, so obviously you don't have to be chatty about your difficult situation. They interviewers are human, so they'll most likely be respectful and tactful, but they may want to ask a question or two to either verify what you wrote, or see how you feel about it in person.

Whatever you write, just be genuine, and don't write about it if it would be an absolute nightmare to be asked questions on the topic. I think you could definitely write (evasively) what you were thinking of writing, but just be prepared to offer one or two examples of what your "difficult childhood" meant, even if it is personal. Otherwise, perhaps don't talk about it at all. Or take the gamble and deal with that question at the interview if it comes up. Good luck.

 

[lei217]

I'm not sure about AMCAS but on TMDSAS as you may know it asks for mother & father's occupation, address, etc. Well. my father is is prison and I did not want to talk about it but I didn't want to lie about it either so I filled it all out. One of my interviewers wanted to talk extensively about it even though I felt I was making it clear I was uncomfortable discussing it. In the end, it turns out he had a similar situation in his childhood and it opened up the rest of the interview for us to talk on a much more personal level so we'll see if it really helped me. I guess what I am saying is if you REALLY don't want to talk about it don't mention it but it may be a sign of maturity if you can talk about difficulties in your past and how you have been affected by these.

 

[qtpai]

I think I will think long and hard about this, and do a few mock interviews with friends. I think you guys are certainly correct in that I cannot completely avoid questions related to the essay, but I am already feeling so good about this essay that I feel if asked about it, I can open up a bit. As in your case, lei, if I do end up with an interviewer that experienced something similar to myself, I suppose that would be a boon, but that might be the only time when I would be open to completely revealing myself.

I actually have nearly finished writing the essay, and as I say, am feeling very strong about it, but I would still like some feedback from the outside. If anyone would like to read it and give me some feedback, please post here, and I will send the essay. It is less than 2000 characters, as per the prompt.