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Successful Personal Statements?
Started by DCSB6
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NickNaylor has his personal statement posted on his MDApps profile and he was accepted to many great schools. Several others on the non-trad personal statement reader thread also did the same on their profiles. From what I've been told, the personal statement should first and foremost explain "Why medicine?" If the reader isn't able to understand your motivation and/or goals after reading your statement, you should probably re-write it. Just my thoughts
If you or a close family member has had medical issues in the past and that was a driving force behind your interest in pursuing a career in medicine I'd make that process a central theme of the essay because schools eat that up. It's what I did for mine and had several of my interviewers comment on how much it stood out and that they enjoyed reading it. I've heard similar stories from several other applicants, both in person and from posts on this site.
The trick, IMO, is not just providing a paper but a story that grabs a reader's attention. If you can either move the admins and interviewers or give them something that holds their interest through the read then it will go a long, long way. Medical life stories are things that will typically hold their attention.
The trick, IMO, is not just providing a paper but a story that grabs a reader's attention. If you can either move the admins and interviewers or give them something that holds their interest through the read then it will go a long, long way. Medical life stories are things that will typically hold their attention.
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When I was working on my personal statement, I read quite a few essays from the book "Essays that Will Get You Into Medical School" My personal statement didn't end up really sounding like any of the ones I read, but it was nice because it shows you a variety of personal statemetns and gives strengths and weaknesses of each one and also lists where they got in and ended up going. Maybe your school library has it? 
IMO there isn't a single format that screams "exceptional PS." I would also caution seeking advice from a random person unfamiliar with reading PSs. In general, these are the things that I think that make a great personal statement:
-Well-written (mature syntax, varied sentence structure, diction isn't forced, tone sounds natural, etc.)
-Addresses the issue of why you want to become a physician; some anecdotes might be fine here, but don't overdo it - this is a professional essay, not a dramatic story
-Your reasons for entering medicine should be "backed up" with "evidence;" rather than simply saying that you like serving the community, for example, you should point to examples of you serving the community and why you enjoyed those experiences; this will make your arguments more legitimate to those reading your application
-Safe is better; more than likely you won't be able to write a truly outstanding PS - be conservative and simply aim to have a solid PS. Unless you've had some truly unique and outstanding experiences, your PS probably isn't going to be the critical piece of your application that gets you rejected vs. invited to interview/accepted
Every individual is going to approach the PS differently - this is just my opinion, and I'm sure plenty will disagree. I really want to emphasize the importance of making the PS your own, though; there really isn't a template that results in an excellent statement that you can simply follow and fill in with your own experiences.
-Well-written (mature syntax, varied sentence structure, diction isn't forced, tone sounds natural, etc.)
-Addresses the issue of why you want to become a physician; some anecdotes might be fine here, but don't overdo it - this is a professional essay, not a dramatic story
-Your reasons for entering medicine should be "backed up" with "evidence;" rather than simply saying that you like serving the community, for example, you should point to examples of you serving the community and why you enjoyed those experiences; this will make your arguments more legitimate to those reading your application
-Safe is better; more than likely you won't be able to write a truly outstanding PS - be conservative and simply aim to have a solid PS. Unless you've had some truly unique and outstanding experiences, your PS probably isn't going to be the critical piece of your application that gets you rejected vs. invited to interview/accepted
Every individual is going to approach the PS differently - this is just my opinion, and I'm sure plenty will disagree. I really want to emphasize the importance of making the PS your own, though; there really isn't a template that results in an excellent statement that you can simply follow and fill in with your own experiences.
