Secondary on failure/challenge, is this too controversial?

[fillyme]

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Hello,

For my secondary, I was thinking about the following two paths I could take:

• I volunteered as an EMT but was shy due to my cultural upbringing. I quit and let my certification lapse. During COVID, I re-earned my certification and embraced that discomfort by returning to my old EMS squad.
• I grew up in an conservative muslim family, but gradually stepped away from organized religion. Not seeing religion as an excuse or blaming it, but just a part of my journey, and how leaving it has shaped my values and patient care.

Option two is more controversial, and I feel like I need to write about it very carefully.


What do you think?

 

[LizzyM]

I prefer #1 as EMT is something you chose, then stepped away from, then went back to knowing that it would require facing a challenge adjusting to the expectations inherent in that role.

In contrast, I'm assuming you did not choose to grow up in a family with conservative religious values (your family happened to be Muslim but, believe me, there are similarities with other faith traditions, too) so choosing to stay or go was not really a challenge, unless you had to choose family/faith or your own integrity/values and you risked losing any contact with your family.

That's my thinking on why 1 is better than 2. I also see 1 as an example of how you might deal with a difficult situation /challenge in medical school. Not that you would quit but that based on lessons learned, you'd find a way to get through the discomfort of being shy and embrace the work.

 

[Mr.Smile12]

Present the prompt.

Neither is controversial. #1 is better than #2, but both are not great options.

A challenge is about setting goals and trying to meet them. Failing means you couldn't hit the goal.

Saying you "quit" a class but then decided to buck up and try again doesn't really give me a sense of what the challenge was, or if it's going to represent all the ways you handle challenges. Saying you quit because of your cultural upbringing or your personality doesn't put you in a good light. Again, what is your goal, and what made you fail or fall short?

#2 involves no goals. True, we don't choose our families, but I need a better defined goal, because not getting along with your family... are you arguing this is a failure or a challenge?

 

[fillyme]

Sorry, I abstracted details because I remembered that I knew some people that spend a lot of time on SDN and was worried about being recognized, here's the prompt:

Medicine demands humility, self-awareness, and resilience. Describe a significant challenge or failure you have faced. What did you learn about yourself, and how has it shaped your approach to working with others and handling responsibility?

I was a little worried about blaming it on my cultural upbringing as well.

I'll keep brainstorming.

 

[LizzyM]

• I volunteered as an EMT but was uncomfortable due to shyness due to my cultural upbringing. I quit and let my certification lapse. During COVID, I re-earned my certification and embraced that discomfort by returning to my old EMS squad where I flourished. Learning to face my earlier failure and work through my discomfort has made me a stronger person.

 

[fillyme]

For #1 here was my initial plan,

I could talk about how I volunteered as an EMT in high school, but I did not feel welcome because I was shy and outside of my comfort zone. I learned this from my family, who generally kept to themselves because they were immigrants in a new country and everything was unfamiliar to them. We had a large family, and there was never a need for “friends” because there was more than enough family to fit that role.

My failure/challenge: I quit because I didn't feel like I belonged, and this became a persistent regret of mine.
My comeback: After covid, I remembered EMS and wanted to give it another try, and I reacquired my degree, started volunteering and explicitly involved myself in every possible activity through the ambulance corps.
My lesson: often discomfort is a sign of growth. When I returned to EMS, instead of stepping away from discomfort, I embraced it, which allowed me to grow as a person (something like that)

Do I need to specify a goal to answer this question properly? I feel like this was a failure/regret that I learned from and overcame, and can still answer the prompt properly with it.

 

[LizzyM]

I think it is fine to see dropping EMS as a HS student because you didn't feel as if you fit in and you didn't know how to handle the emotions you felt as an outsider who was new to the group and then growing and maturing and getting outside of your comfort zone and going back to it, particularly because COVID helped you see the need in your community for EMS volunteers. I think that it is a reasonable response to the prompt and the lessons learned can certainly apply to experiences you may have as a medical student and physician-trainee.

 

[Goro]

Hello,

For my secondary, I was thinking about the following two paths I could take:

• I volunteered as an EMT but was shy due to my cultural upbringing. I quit and let my certification lapse. During COVID, I re-earned my certification and embraced that discomfort by returning to my old EMS squad.
• I grew up in an conservative muslim family, but gradually stepped away from organized religion. Not seeing religion as an excuse or blaming it, but just a part of my journey, and how leaving it has shaped my values and patient care.

Option two is more controversial, and I feel like I need to write about it very carefully.


What do you think?

#1 all the way.

 

[Mr.Smile12]

Here's the prompt:

Medicine demands humility, self-awareness, and resilience. Describe a significant challenge or failure you have faced. What did you learn about yourself, and how has it shaped your approach to working with others and handling responsibility?

I will point out the last call to action. How would you answer this?

 

[fillyme]

Thank you for pointing that out,
I was thinking about that when I was deciding on these stories, maybe something along the lines of:

• I formerly left EMS due to discomfort, but I now see discomfort as a sign of growth and I pursue it by taking initiative.
• I initially felt shy, so I strove to include others, a.k.a. be the type of teammate that I wanted.
• I showed responsibility by owning up to my failure (giving up on EMS and that community) and addressing it (re-certifying as an EMT and getting involved in my community again).

Are these fine, or are they insufficient in answering the question? Would I need a small anecdote to prove each of these?

 

[LizzyM]

Answer the prompt. Be succinct. Don't add an anecdote unless you are well under 50% of the word count after you've said what you have to say.