The Challenge Secondary Prompt

[HarryPotter1]

I think everyone knows the challenge prompt: describe a challenging circumstance and the methods you used to cope with and overcome the challenge (something like that).

I have searched through my life and discovered that I have never been challenged. Ever. You know about underprivileged kids? I am the complete antithesis of that - rich, white, straight, smart, handsome (haha ok maybe just average looks). I've never had an illness worse than a cold. Some of my family members have died, but I wasn't close with them and didn't really get affected. I guess I got rejected by some colleges when I applied, but doesn't everybody? Plus, I still got into a top 15 school.

I really don't know what to do because I don't have any meaningful challenges (besides writing this essay) and I'm probably just going to make up an illness - maybe where the docs said I would never walk again, but I vowed to prove them wrong and look at me on the track team now! It's not like medical schools have access to my medical records so they could never find out. If there was anyone in this position before I'd like some advice so I can spare them the inspirational story/outright lie.

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[Ursa]

write about how never having any problems will help you relate really well to your future patients. no wait, don't.

&inb4ultraflame

 

[Melissa2011]

I don't normally reply to threads, but I just needed to say that don't you think it is unwise to LIE? Especially about something so grave as an illness?

The response to the challenge question doesn't have to be so dramatic- not everyone has recovered from a life-threatening illness. It is really your response to the challenge and how it has shaped you/ what you have learned/ how you have grown that medical schools are interested in my opinion.

 

[SFO-IST]

I think everyone knows the challenge prompt: describe a challenging circumstance and the methods you used to cope with and overcome the challenge (something like that).

I have searched through my life and discovered that I have never been challenged. Ever. You know about underprivileged kids? I am the complete antithesis of that - rich, white, straight, smart, handsome (haha ok maybe just average looks). I've never had an illness worse than a cold. Some of my family members have died, but I wasn't close with them and didn't really get affected. I guess I got rejected by some colleges when I applied, but doesn't everybody? Plus, I still got into a top 15 school.

I really don't know what to do because I don't have any meaningful challenges (besides writing this essay) and I'm probably just going to make up an illness - maybe where the docs said I would never walk again, but I vowed to prove them wrong and look at me on the track team now! It's not like medical schools have access to my medical records so they could never find out. If there was anyone in this position before I'd like some advice so I can spare them the inspirational story/outright lie.

One angle you could do is to actually say what you said above, but do it in a way that shows that you understand people who had challenges. If you think about it, the reader of the prompt will likely find it refreshing to get someone with a different essay. This will show empathy.

 

[juliedi]

OP, I do feel for you a little bit; I had a bit of writer's block when I was first faced with this question too. That being said, I think you need to dig deeper and really think about your life thus far and find something truthful but meaningful to write about. It doesn't have to be an earth-shattering personal catastrophe, but I'm sure you can think of something. Any conflicts or tough relationships with a family member? Any sports-related challenges you've overcome? Maybe you tutor kids and overcame the challenge of a child who just didn't think he could learn long division but you helped him be successful. Who knows. Whatever it is might sound lame when you first think of it, but what really matters is how you describe the experience and how you portray what you've learned about yourself. Good luck!

 

[Elpenor]

Write about how when you were an infant a dark wizard murdered your parents and you grew up an orphan.

 

[gujuDoc]

I think everyone knows the challenge prompt: describe a challenging circumstance and the methods you used to cope with and overcome the challenge (something like that).

I have searched through my life and discovered that I have never been challenged. Ever. You know about underprivileged kids? I am the complete antithesis of that - rich, white, straight, smart, handsome (haha ok maybe just average looks). I've never had an illness worse than a cold. Some of my family members have died, but I wasn't close with them and didn't really get affected. I guess I got rejected by some colleges when I applied, but doesn't everybody? Plus, I still got into a top 15 school.

I really don't know what to do because I don't have any meaningful challenges (besides writing this essay) and I'm probably just going to make up an illness - maybe where the docs said I would never walk again, but I vowed to prove them wrong and look at me on the track team now! It's not like medical schools have access to my medical records so they could never find out. If there was anyone in this position before I'd like some advice so I can spare them the inspirational story/outright lie.

A better way to approach it is to talk about a potential challenge you may face in medical school. and how you will handle it. Be honest and say that to this point you have not had many serious challenges to deal with but you anticipate that xy and z aspects of medicine will be challenging for you in the future and why.

I think that would be ok. And don't tell me you anticipate no challenges in medical school because believe me even the smartest kids question why they went to med school at some point in med school or career. Noncompliant patients, hazing nature of the old boys club that hs been medicine for generations, rude and abusive patients who don't care if you are trying to help them, etc.

 

[Forthegood]

I have searched through my life and discovered that I have never been challenged. Ever. You know about underprivileged kids? I am the complete antithesis of that - rich, white, straight, smart, handsome (haha ok maybe just average looks). I've never had an illness worse than a cold. Some of my family members have died, but I wasn't close with them and didn't really get affected. I guess I got rejected by some colleges when I applied, but doesn't everybody? Plus, I still got into a top 15 school.

Write about how challenging it is to write these ridiculous essays. After all, you already got in a top 15 school right?

I really don't know what to do because I don't have any meaningful challenges (besides writing this essay) and I'm probably just going to make up an illness - maybe where the docs said I would never walk again, but I vowed to prove them wrong and look at me on the track team now! It's not like medical schools have access to my medical records so they could never find out. If there was anyone in this position before I'd like some advice so I can spare them the inspirational story/outright lie.

Wow, that is a remarkably stupid idea! Yeah, let's lie to people whose job is to observe people for a living and have to access their patient's stories for credibility every day. You'll probably sneak right by no problem.

Seriously man, it is hard to feel for you on this. Write about how you've never been challenged and the sure response is you've never had any real world experience. Go out and get a job tutoring inner-city kids or work with some mentally-handicapped adults. Do something that you can't fix. Sounds like you need the experience more than they need you.

 

[Evergrey]

I wrote about struggling with the fear of mortality. It's a pretty personal struggle though and it's been of the highlights (or, lowlights I guess) of my life. Just make it personal.

But yeah, you should do something to challenge yourself. Don't do it for medical school, do it for yourself. I don't think it's possible to understand the depth of the human spirit without understanding, yourself, what it's like to fail really really badly. And then move forward from it.

 

[phltz]

I think everyone knows the challenge prompt: describe a challenging circumstance and the methods you used to cope with and overcome the challenge (something like that).

I have searched through my life and discovered that I have never been challenged. Ever. You know about underprivileged kids? I am the complete antithesis of that - rich, white, straight, smart, handsome (haha ok maybe just average looks). I've never had an illness worse than a cold. Some of my family members have died, but I wasn't close with them and didn't really get affected. I guess I got rejected by some colleges when I applied, but doesn't everybody? Plus, I still got into a top 15 school.

I really don't know what to do because I don't have any meaningful challenges (besides writing this essay) and I'm probably just going to make up an illness - maybe where the docs said I would never walk again, but I vowed to prove them wrong and look at me on the track team now! It's not like medical schools have access to my medical records so they could never find out. If there was anyone in this position before I'd like some advice so I can spare them the inspirational story/outright lie.

Honestly, I think a med school application essay is the least of your worries. You need to take a step back and take stock of your life.

I pole-vaulted in college (something, by the way, that I worked my ass off at, despite being pretty lousy). Our coach used to tell us that if you never fail, you're not pushing yourself, not challenging yourself, you're just playing it safe. That's no way to grow, to improve your skills, or to live your life. You'll never even know what your full potential could have been.

I don't want to get all Courage Wolf on you, but you need to step up your game. Bite off more than you can chew, and then chew it. Find a class that's glaringly too hard in a subject you don't do well in, and take it. Do you have stage fright? Take a class that involves performing on stage. Are you sometimes uncomfortable around poor brown/black people? Volunteer at a free clinic in the poorest, ****tiest part of your town. Get involved in the lives of some of the patients. Don't like to ask for help? Put yourself in a position where you have to ask for help. You were never close to someone who died? Volunteer for a hospice organization and befriend a terminal cancer patient.

You don't get to your twenties without some sort of challenge unless you systematically avoid challenges, unless you always play in your safe zone, unless you're satisfied to be comfortable. Keep going down this path, and you're gonna lead a sad little excuse for a life. Is that what you want? If it's not, you need to take responsibility for where your life is going. Come up with a plan for how to turn this thing around, and take action.

 

[NickNaylor]

If you seriously haven't experienced some sort of challenge in your life by this point, what the hell have you been doing?

 

[HarryPotter1]

Honestly, I think a med school application essay is the least of your worries. You need to take a step back and take stock of your life.

I pole-vaulted in college (something, by the way, that I worked my ass off at, despite being pretty lousy). Our coach used to tell us that if you never fail, you're not pushing yourself, not challenging yourself, you're just playing it safe. That's no way to grow, to improve your skills, or to live your life. You'll never even know what your full potential could have been.

I don't want to get all Courage Wolf on you, but you need to step up your game. Bite off more than you can chew, and then chew it. Find a class that's glaringly too hard in a subject you don't do well in, and take it. Do you have stage fright? Take a class that involves performing on stage. Are you sometimes uncomfortable around poor brown/black people? Volunteer at a free clinic in the poorest, ****tiest part of your town. Get involved in the lives of some of the patients. Don't like to ask for help? Put yourself in a position where you have to ask for help. You were never close to someone who died? Volunteer for a hospice organization and befriend a terminal cancer patient.

You don't get to your twenties without some sort of challenge unless you systematically avoid challenges, unless you always play in your safe zone, unless you're satisfied to be comfortable. Keep going down this path, and you're gonna lead a sad little excuse for a life. Is that what you want? If it's not, you need to take responsibility for where your life is going. Come up with a plan for how to turn this thing around, and take action.

Hey man great post! I actually have a lot more experience than you think. I've volunteered with inner-city kids for years and "befriended" people who were going to die/have died. I really don't have any fears. The problem is that everything works out for me in the end and it's just really boring/cliche to read these things. I take a hard class, I work hard, I get an A. I start running for exercise, it's hard to keep up the routine, I do it anyway and a year later I run a marathon. My dad loses his job, I don't do anything, months later before severance pay runs out he gets another one that pays more. I want a pony really bad, my parents say no, I beg, they give in, etc. I guess I can talk about how hard it was to tutor the inner city kids...

I liked the post by that forthegood - was really sarcastic/funny. I still think I could get away with it if I wanted to. It's not that difficult to find a disease and research it. Doctors are not as all-knowing as you think and the human tendency to believe others is very strong.

All in all, I think we're good here. I have a good topic now. Thanks a bunch!

 

[gujuDoc]

Hey man great post! I actually have a lot more experience than you think. I've volunteered with inner-city kids for years and "befriended" people who were going to die/have died. I really don't have any fears. The problem is that everything works out for me in the end and it's just really boring/cliche to read these things. I take a hard class, I work hard, I get an A. I start running for exercise, it's hard to keep up the routine, I do it anyway and a year later I run a marathon. My dad loses his job, I don't do anything, months later before severance pay runs out he gets another one that pays more. I want a pony really bad, my parents say no, I beg, they give in, etc. I guess I can talk about how hard it was to tutor the inner city kids...

I liked the post by that forthegood - was really sarcastic/funny. I still think I could get away with it if I wanted to. It's not that difficult to find a disease and research it. Doctors are not as all-knowing as you think and the human tendency to believe others is very strong.

All in all, I think we're good here. I have a good topic now. Thanks a bunch!

Yeah I think talking about inner city kids and putting some spin on it about how you struggled to see that and what they go through etc. is a good approach.

 

[YouNeverKnow22]

Hey man great post! I actually have a lot more experience than you think. I've volunteered with inner-city kids for years and "befriended" people who were going to die/have died. I really don't have any fears. The problem is that everything works out for me in the end and it's just really boring/cliche to read these things. I take a hard class, I work hard, I get an A. I start running for exercise, it's hard to keep up the routine, I do it anyway and a year later I run a marathon. My dad loses his job, I don't do anything, months later before severance pay runs out he gets another one that pays more. I want a pony really bad, my parents say no, I beg, they give in, etc. I guess I can talk about how hard it was to tutor the inner city kids...

I liked the post by that forthegood - was really sarcastic/funny. I still think I could get away with it if I wanted to. It's not that difficult to find a disease and research it. Doctors are not as all-knowing as you think and the human tendency to believe others is very strong.

All in all, I think we're good here. I have a good topic now. Thanks a bunch!

karma is a bitch,just saying

 

[gujuDoc]

Write about how when you were an infant a dark wizard murdered your parents and you grew up an orphan.

Clever soooooooooooooo very clever. made my day and made me

 

[phltz]

Hey man great post! I actually have a lot more experience than you think. I've volunteered with inner-city kids for years and "befriended" people who were going to die/have died. I really don't have any fears. The problem is that everything works out for me in the end and it's just really boring/cliche to read these things. I take a hard class, I work hard, I get an A. I start running for exercise, it's hard to keep up the routine, I do it anyway and a year later I run a marathon. My dad loses his job, I don't do anything, months later before severance pay runs out he gets another one that pays more. I want a pony really bad, my parents say no, I beg, they give in, etc. I guess I can talk about how hard it was to tutor the inner city kids...

Congrats, it sounds like you're kicking ass and taking names. Keep escalating. Find your limits, and then try to push them back. Marathon too easy? Try an ultra-marathon.

Personally, the hardest things I've done were the Peace Corps (it's emotionally exhausting being almost completely cut off from the culture one grows up in for months on end), biking solo halfway across Africa on a heavy mountain bike with very limited funds and patched-together equipment, and spending weeks slowly dying of an extremely hard-to-diagnose disease in one of the top hospitals in the world.

I hope you won't experience that sort of illness yourself, but whenever you tackle something big and it's easier than you expected, you should think "What next?"

 

[Ursa]

 

[HarryPotter1]

Congrats, it sounds like you're kicking ass and taking names. Keep escalating. Find your limits, and then try to push them back. Marathon too easy? Try an ultra-marathon.

Personally, the hardest things I've done were the Peace Corps (it's emotionally exhausting being almost completely cut off from the culture one grows up in for months on end), biking solo halfway across Africa on a heavy mountain bike with very limited funds and patched-together equipment, and spending weeks slowly dying of an extremely hard-to-diagnose disease in one of the top hospitals in the world.

I hope you won't experience that sort of illness yourself, but whenever you tackle something big and it's easier than you expected, you should think "What next?"

Dude, that's great stuff! Seriously though, you should be one of those life coaches - this is really good advice.

 

[Forthegood]

Doctors are not as all-knowing as you think and the human tendency to believe others is very strong.

That is how I know you have no real clinical experience...

 

[STAT EKG]

I think everyone knows the challenge prompt: describe a challenging circumstance and the methods you used to cope with and overcome the challenge (something like that).

I have searched through my life and discovered that I have never been challenged. Ever. You know about underprivileged kids? I am the complete antithesis of that - rich, white, straight, smart, handsome (haha ok maybe just average looks). I've never had an illness worse than a cold. Some of my family members have died, but I wasn't close with them and didn't really get affected. I guess I got rejected by some colleges when I applied, but doesn't everybody? Plus, I still got into a top 15 school.

I really don't know what to do because I don't have any meaningful challenges (besides writing this essay) and I'm probably just going to make up an illness - maybe where the docs said I would never walk again, but I vowed to prove them wrong and look at me on the track team now! It's not like medical schools have access to my medical records so they could never find out. If there was anyone in this position before I'd like some advice so I can spare them the inspirational story/outright lie.

Sounds like you're being challenged by the secondary prompt. Write about how it can be challenging to write about challenges having never been challenged.

 

[gujuDoc]

To HarryPotter1 the original poster,

Do keep in mind to make it real and not make up a medical condition because interviewers will see through it. this question has not just been asked on secondaries but at some schools in interviews.

You are better off saying something about working with the inner city kids being challenging because you had to learn how to communicate on a different level then you were used to and it was out of your comfort zone then you are by making up a story of a fake illness that will seem so over the top to a real interviewer esp. when going from say paralysis to learning to walk again is not exactly an easy thing and no one would be so stupid to literally believe that.

But they would believe you if you put some spin on your tutoring or other stuff and take you seriously if you do.

The other thing you could do is say that up to this point you have not been seriously challenged much but you could talk about challenges you expect to face in medical school.

And believe me when I say that even the brightest and most talented medical students I've known have had their moments when they've struggled in med school. Maybe not academically but it could be the first time you see a patient die, or when you see that many patients will be rude, grumpy, and cold to you despite you trying to do your best by them, or when you see patients refuse treatments over and over despite you trying to do the best by them (noncompliance issues here). it could be when you are struggling to make time with your family because medical school and patient care will take precedence over your fun time quite a bit more then you realize and reuqire major sacrifices.

You may lose friends, may lose significant others (divorce happens to married ones, breaking up with significant others happens a lot too) along your journey to being a doctor.

You may find out that working a 30 hour shift is no joke. You will be so tired when you go home you will stop caring what your friends have invited you for sometimes and they won't get it if they are not in medicine. And it happens.

These are just the tip of the iceberg of what I've seen over the years. And I think my friends in medical school talk to me still because I'm one of the few that get them and what they are going through to not harass them when they don't have time and be there for them when they do. But some of their other firends just don't get it and it sometimes affect sthem.

You will encounter some if not all of this through the years. You will find frustration with the beauracracy in medicine with paper work that takes up valuable time that can be spent in seeing patients for a little bit longer or seeing more patients.

You will find working with teams there will be people who you get along with and those who you don't and sometimes nurses and other healthcare professionals in your training will make or break you because if you get on their bad side you will see them making your life hell and if you are nice they will help you. You will see the hazing nature of medicine that sometimes occurs with residents and physicians who you may not agree with in terms of their treatment plans but yet will be sometimes powerless to do something.

You will see a lot in medicine that you don't agree with but you will choose whether you let it get to you or not. But challenges do exist.

And even at the ugrad level, maybe a challenging class has come easy to you but you can write about how it was challenging but how you made it less challenging by what you did to overcome the possibility of it affecting you and becoming too challenging.

The whole point of this question when asked at an interview or in an essay is to see how you deal with difficult situations and challenges that may be thrown at you.

If you have a busy schedule talk about how that is challenging but what you do to make it less so.

 

[Rapha]

Honestly, I think a med school application essay is the least of your worries. You need to take a step back and take stock of your life.

I pole-vaulted in college (something, by the way, that I worked my ass off at, despite being pretty lousy). Our coach used to tell us that if you never fail, you're not pushing yourself, not challenging yourself, you're just playing it safe. That's no way to grow, to improve your skills, or to live your life. You'll never even know what your full potential could have been.

I don't want to get all Courage Wolf on you, but you need to step up your game. Bite off more than you can chew, and then chew it. Find a class that's glaringly too hard in a subject you don't do well in, and take it. Do you have stage fright? Take a class that involves performing on stage. Are you sometimes uncomfortable around poor brown/black people? Volunteer at a free clinic in the poorest, ****tiest part of your town. Get involved in the lives of some of the patients. Don't like to ask for help? Put yourself in a position where you have to ask for help. You were never close to someone who died? Volunteer for a hospice organization and befriend a terminal cancer patient.

You don't get to your twenties without some sort of challenge unless you systematically avoid challenges, unless you always play in your safe zone, unless you're satisfied to be comfortable. Keep going down this path, and you're gonna lead a sad little excuse for a life. Is that what you want? If it's not, you need to take responsibility for where your life is going. Come up with a plan for how to turn this thing around, and take action.

Wonderfully summarized LIFE tip.

 

[Crayola227]

Wonderfully summarized LIFE tip.

I will say I don't recommend taking the hardest class you possibly can because of GPA. Find a not-accredited course you don't have to report to AMCAS and sure. Even audits and they'll ask why you audited. Just avoid.