Personal essay advice. Help!

[exmike]

I'm a non traditional applicant in that I've taken three years off, one doing research and two at public health school. I took time off because I basically bombed my first two years of college, but finished off really strong (deans list last three semesters).

A lot of my motivations now to go to med school has to do with my public health education and my interest in community health.

So my question is:

Should I discuss my motivations for medical school, or should I discuss my very poor academic performance my first two years of college? I really cant fit both in while describing either in great detail, so I feel like its either one or the other. Help!?

ps. I got a 35P on the mcat, so I thought that might assuage the adcom's concerns about my academic abilities w/o me explaining it in detail.

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[tBw]

People like positive - it'll be a lot easier to be positive by talking about why you are committed and interested in medicine than rehashing academic suicide from 4 years ago...so I vote strongly for going over your motivation rather than your grades...

 

[Lactic Folly]

It wouldn't really set the right tone to discuss your poor performance in detail. Definitely focus on your motivation for medicine and your academic upward trend. You can explain (not excuse) your first two years briefly, and emphasize how you've shown that you have the academic ability to succeed in medicine and that you've matured since then (if you attribute your poor performance to lack of maturity).

 

[manta]

definitely talk about the motivations - your background and motivations are very similar to mine, and people were very receptive to my personal statement. but be prepared to answer some questions about your grades during interviews. if there was something specific that happened that impacted your academic development, i would take a sentence to mention it. and there is another thread somewhere with a list of people willing to read essays; if you do decide to bring up grades, i would get as many people as possible to read it over.

 

[ashkan33]

i would definitely discuss both. obviously, you don't want to say too much about your poor performance because it will just turn into a self-bashing essay if you devote your entire essay to that. i would say a few lines(2-3) at most would suffice. and your motivation/commitment/why you want to be a doctor stuff should take up the bulk of your essay. hope that helps.

 

[DarkChild]

dont waste valuable space making excuses for yourself. save that for the interview - if it comes up
remember, the point of your essay is to explain why you want to do medicine. getting side tracked into talking about why your grades were weak is shooting yourself in the foot. dont do it

 

[exmike]

Originally posted by DarkChild
dont waste valuable space making excuses for yourself. save that for the interview - if it comes up
remember, the point of your essay is to explain why you want to do medicine. getting side tracked into talking about why your grades were weak is shooting yourself in the foot. dont do it

Thanks for all the replies. I guess i'm just thinking, what if i dont even get to the interview part b/c of those grades, thats why i want to address them

 

[mute360_CO]

I was in the same situation. I decided to keep the AMCAS essay upbeat and positive while only mentioning poor grades as a side note. Many schools' secondary applications give you an opportunity to write an essay about any topic you wish to discuss. This is how I explained my past performance to the adcoms. I think the most important thing, though, is to highlight your triumphs and how you learned from your failures. It worked for me!

 

[Andrew_Doan]

Originally posted by exmike
Thanks for all the replies. I guess i'm just thinking, what if i dont even get to the interview part b/c of those grades, thats why i want to address them

The best approach is to clearly discuss the motivations that guided you to being a physician. This is what ADCOMs want to know.

It will not help to explain the poor grades unless there are some really unusual circumstances, e.g., you got really sick and had to be in the hospital for 4 weeks.

 

[gwyn779]

My grades dropped my junior year of college and I just sort of vaguely alluded to the reason in a sentence or two. I had one interviewer bring it up. But even that was more of a side note for him.

 

[Cydney Foote]

exmike, it sounds like your academic performance increased pretty drastically. A low GPA often is attributable to the simple fact that college students are still growing up. In fact, a 3.0 GPA that starts out below 3.0 and trends upward consistently, with the final semester or two in the 3.5 range or higher, is not nearly as worrisome as a GPA that trends in the opposite direction. Your MCAT scores will go a long way towards making this up.

My advice is to put a lot of effort into writing an amazing personal statement. I would not even mention the grades unless it tied into your motivation somehow (i.e., you decided after your sophomore year that you wanted to be a doctor for some really specific reason). Unless this is the case, I think your strategy should be to catch their attention and make the admissions committee want to know more about you. If the opportunity presents itself on the secondaries, you can write about your grades there. But only if you have a good excuse and only if asked.

I think that with a great essay, good MCAT scores, and really strong recs, your early years won't keep you from getting interviews.

Good luck!