Personal statement advice - do adcoms care to hear about my childhood?

[tiny turtle]

A theme in my PS relates my cultural background and upbringing to wanting to become a doctor. The problem is this required a lot of set-up and I spent like 2 paragraphs (1700 characters out of 5300) describing my cultural background and formative childhood events in which I played a very passive role (i.e. I was mainly an observer). The information is very biographical and doesn't reveal any particular personality attributes about me (examples: resilience, compassion, or whatever); it's more like "here's what my childhood was like" and "this is what is valued in my culture."

Do adcoms care to know these "biographical" things or am I hurting my PS by including so much of it? It is HIGHKEY hard for me to trim it down more than it already is.

The advice I always hear is to focus on attributes/actions/characteristics rather than people in my life and events that happened to me.

(also sry this is vague I'm trying to be anonymous lol)

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[LongLiveThanos]

You need to figure out a way to trim down your background down significantly and/or integrate your backstory to your recent experiences. I find it alarming that you have 1700 characters without value in your personal statement. You really want to sell yourself.

 

[LizzyM]

What do you want to be able to do as a physician? How have you, as an adult, tested this desire to practice medicine (through volunteering, working, shadowing)? That is all. How you got to the point of deciding that you wanted to have the job of "physician" is not of interest. What it is that you think you will do as a doctor and how you determined that the environment and the tasks of a physician are a good fit with your ability and interests is where its at.

Leave out the childhood stuff.

 

[tiny turtle]

What do you want to be able to do as a physician? How have you, as an adult, tested this desire to practice medicine (through volunteering, working, shadowing)? That is all. How you got to the point of deciding that you wanted to have the job of "physician" is not of interest. What it is that you think you will do as a doctor and how you determined that the environment and the tasks of a physician are a good fit with your ability and interests is where its at.

Leave out the childhood stuff.

Thank you for the response! Do you think the childhood stuff would belong in a diversity essay about how culture/background led to xyz ECs (as an adult) and personal values/attributes? Or is it still very irrelevant?

 

[LizzyM]

Thank you for the response! Do you think the childhood stuff would belong in a diversity essay about how culture/background led to xyz ECs (as an adult) and personal values/attributes? Or is it still very irrelevant?

Diversity is interesting if it is novel/unusual or URM. If you are writing about your Mexican abuelita, beautiful. If it is your grandmother from Poland or China, you may not be bringing much diversity to the table in that regard.

You may have some good stories that just won't fit in the application but sometimes you can draw on them when someone asks in the interview to tell them something about yourself that is not in your application.

 

[tiny turtle]

Diversity is interesting if it is novel/unusual or URM. If you are writing about your Mexican abuelita, beautiful. If it is your grandmother from Poland or China, you may not be bringing much diversity to the table in that regard.

You may have some good stories that just won't fit in the application but sometimes you can draw on them when someone asks in the interview to tell them something about yourself that is not in your application.

Got it, that makes sense. Thanks for your help.

 

[givesumacceptpls]

What do you want to be able to do as a physician? How have you, as an adult, tested this desire to practice medicine (through volunteering, working, shadowing)? That is all. How you got to the point of deciding that you wanted to have the job of "physician" is not of interest. What it is that you think you will do as a doctor and how you determined that the environment and the tasks of a physician are a good fit with your ability and interests is where its at.

Leave out the childhood stuff.

I am an urm and my PS answers "why medicine" forming a progression from childhood in another country, to the present. Does your advice apply to my case?

 

[LizzyM]

I am an urm and my PS answers "why medicine" forming a progression from childhood in another country, to the present. Does your advice apply to my case?

It has been done a million times and rarely is it done well. Maybe yours will be different. Get plenty of people who don't know you (like some of the volunteers on this board) to read it and give feedback.

 

[Pre-med path]

A theme in my PS relates my cultural background and upbringing to wanting to become a doctor. The problem is this required a lot of set-up and I spent like 2 paragraphs (1700 characters out of 5300) describing my cultural background and formative childhood events in which I played a very passive role (i.e. I was mainly an observer). The information is very biographical and doesn't reveal any particular personality attributes about me (examples: resilience, compassion, or whatever); it's more like "here's what my childhood was like" and "this is what is valued in my culture."

Do adcoms care to know these "biographical" things or am I hurting my PS by including so much of it? It is HIGHKEY hard for me to trim it down more than it already is.

The advice I always hear is to focus on attributes/actions/characteristics rather than people in my life and events that happened to me.

(also sry this is vague I'm trying to be anonymous lol)

Including anecdotes isn't a bad idea, but few applicants are able to do it correctly. Feel free to email your statement to [email protected] for more detailed help.

 

[907914]

I am an urm and my PS answers "why medicine" forming a progression from childhood in another country, to the present. Does your advice apply to my case?

It has been done a million times and rarely is it done well. Maybe yours will be different. Get plenty of people who don't know you (like some of the volunteers on this board) to read it and give feedback.

I have read three PS like this. One was DACA who had fled cartels as a child. One was a Syrian refugee. Another told the story of walking a thousand miles to flee the Rwandan genocide. All of them were terrifying stories. All of them were very personal. I felt very connected to the people. However, none of those stories had anything to do with medicine. I came out of those stories thinking "These are very strong individuals, but I still don't know what would make them a good fit for a doctor." If you want to throw it my way, I can take a look to see if you have it going differently. However, I will likely give you similar advice as I gave those other three and LizzyM has given you.

 

[Goro]

A theme in my PS relates my cultural background and upbringing to wanting to become a doctor. The problem is this required a lot of set-up and I spent like 2 paragraphs (1700 characters out of 5300) describing my cultural background and formative childhood events in which I played a very passive role (i.e. I was mainly an observer). The information is very biographical and doesn't reveal any particular personality attributes about me (examples: resilience, compassion, or whatever); it's more like "here's what my childhood was like" and "this is what is valued in my culture."

Do adcoms care to know these "biographical" things or am I hurting my PS by including so much of it? It is HIGHKEY hard for me to trim it down more than it already is.

The advice I always hear is to focus on attributes/actions/characteristics rather than people in my life and events that happened to me.

(also sry this is vague I'm trying to be anonymous lol)

As someone who reads these things all the time, I'd rather not.