Quick question about secondaries- please help! :)

[badger12]

For secondaries, should the essays be structured kind of like the personal statement (having a strong "hook," maybe a central theme)? I didn't know if that format would get old for adcoms reading our PS and secondaries, like I'm trying too hard?

I realize it's hard to say without reading the essays themselves, but if anyone has any advice or input just in general, I would greatly appreciate it!


Thanks!

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[vellez]

If by a hook (or theme) in your PS, you mean "why I want to be a doctor", then yes. If by hook, you mean some gimmicky story at the beginning that no one will read, then no, your secondaries should not have a hook.

 

[nwts]

My rule on writing for any applications, be it medical school applications, scholarship applications, undergraduate school applications, or anything else, is answer the question and keep it unified. Your response to each prompt should obviously answer the question that has been posed, and it should seem like one unified answer instead of a whole bunch of random points that seem like they were more or less drawn from a hat. Your answers to various questions (personal statement and secondaries, one secondary question and another question on the same secondary) don't necessarily have to go together or be on the same theme or topic, but they should seem like the same person wrote them. Don't have wildly different writing styles, present conflicting personality characteristics, etc. I'm not sure if this was what you were asking, though.

 

[LilEngineThatCould]

No, just focus on what the question asks and make sure you are answering it coherently. Adcoms read a lot of apps. Also if there is a word count or character limit try to stay on the low side. If you need a little more that's fine, but don't think, "Oh, I have 1500 characters!" and use them all up if you don't need to.

 

[badger12]

Okay that all helps a lot. Thank you everyone for your input!