Rewriting Personal Statement

[therocketman]

Hi all. So I am reapplying this year T_T and I had a question. I see the general consensus is to rewrite the personal statement. I was wondering if you should mention that you are a reapplicant within the personal statement or not. Or should I change the personal statement with the extracurricular activities I have been doing in the break.

Thanks.


On a side note, man did i learn from last year's cycle. I am applying as early as possible... finishing the secondaries late screwed me.. I think haha

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[RxnMan]

You can choose not to. If the school has a check box for re-apps, you have to check it, but you don't have to put it in your statement. And if asked in an interview, you have to be honest. But if you feel that being a re-app works against you, then there's no need to trumpet it either.

If you do, always show it in a positive light (e.g. here's how I have improved from last year).

 

[therocketman]

thanks for the reply. The reason I was thinking of putting in the fact that im a reapplicant was to show that I was still committed to pursuing medicine.

 

[reezer4]

therocketman-
When did you finish your secondaries? i.e. what do you define as late?
Thanks!

 

[therocketman]

um.. pretty late haha. like november T_T.. yeah i screwed myself

 

[nellia]

so overall what i've gotten is that the general consensus is re-write your ps. my ps was pretty specific and talked about how a clinical experience motivated me to pursue a particular field of research blah blah blah and how this really has motivated me to want to become a doctor. it's been really hard for me to think of an equally significant event so i'm having trouble "rewriting" completely. can i basically just revise a huge chunk of my essay or does it have to be completely different ? (sorry if this has been posted elsewhere..)

 

[Mattabet]

I definitely don't think you need to rewrite the whole thing (although that's what I'm doing with mine). If you have some one, critical experience in your life that led you to medicine, it'd be silly to think you'd have another one in the course of a year.

That said, I think you should revise. When you reapply, schools will have access to your old application as well (at least that's what I've been led to believe). I think it might look a little lazy to resubmit the exact same thing, but with some revisions or a little reorganizing, I think you can get by on the same ideas without a problem.

 

[mdessay1]

Playing the devil's advocate - school's receive so many apps, will they really remember your particular essay? Especially given that any given reviewer only reviews a subset of all the applications. You probably shouldnt mention that you are a reapplicant. Did you get any interviews? If not, then your essay should be updated. But don't just add in what you've been doing over the last year. That's already evident in the rest of your app. It should tie together and stand on it's own two feet as a story.