supplemental? I don't get it!!!

[DATpharo]

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🙁 Okay, so this is a general question directed towards supplemental essays. I tried searching for tips, but haven't really found any threads that gave great advice. How am I suppose to approach this? For my AADSAS personal statement, I told a story. Should I do the same for my supplemental essay? Or should I just be more direct?

For example, University of Minnesota asks "Write a description of your orientation to dentistry." Should I...
(1.) Basically just list and talk about my experiences like "I researched etc....I volunteered etc...I was an officer in a club etc...and these experiences confirmed I want to be a dentist!"?

OR

(2.) Tell a lovely story like, "I walked into the clinic to get my molars removed. Before I knew it, I became lost in the wonderful world of dentistry..."


Also, how long should my supplemental essays be if I don't see that the school specifies a certain length? Is more than 1 page too much?

 

[Omenino]

Yea....i was confused with minnesota also...i ended up just being more direct with my essays on the supp..

🙁 Okay, so this is a general question directed towards supplemental essays. I tried searching for tips, but haven't really found any threads that gave great advice. How am I suppose to approach this? For my AADSAS personal statement, I told a story. Should I do the same for my supplemental essay? Or should I just be more direct?

For example, University of Minnesota asks "Write a description of your orientation to dentistry." Should I...
(1.) Basically just list and talk about my experiences like "I researched etc....I volunteered etc...I was an officer in a club etc...and these experiences confirmed I want to be a dentist!"?

OR

(2.) Tell a lovely story like, "I walked into the clinic to get my molars removed. Before I knew it, I became lost in the wonderful world of dentistry..."


Also, how long should my supplemental essays be if I don't see that the school specifies a certain length? Is more than 1 page too much?

 

[DATpharo]

Yea....i was confused with minnesota also...i ended up just being more direct with my essays on the supp..

Yea that's how I initially wrote the essays. But then I got feedback that I should incorporate a story. Argh the frustration! Thanks for your input omenino.

Any other advice would be much appreciated!

 

[smiles123]

I think that if you have an interesting story to tell...go ahead and tell it because it will be more exciting for adcoms to read it. For minnesota, I wrote a story for the first essay but not for the second...both essays were about as long as my personal statement. For upenn, I wrote a paragraph or two with more direct responses. Hope that helps a little. Good luck!