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Sorry for the clickbaity title, but this really needs to be said.
It's getting to be that time of year again. Yet again I have mutiple people asking me to read over their personal statements. And get again, they are almost all terrible. (Harsh, yes, but also true.) And yet again it's basically all for the same reason.
The root of the problem is some common personal statement advice that I'm sure most of you have heard before:
Before I get into how students tend to misinterpet this advice, let me temporarily ignore my own advice and show, not tell you what I mean.
Essay Version A:
Essay Version B:
Okay, maybe I was going overboard with the last sentence there, but you get my point. I think most of us would agree that version A reads much better, even though it is not story-based and version B is.
So back to those two pieces of advice:
"Start by telling a story. It creates an interesting hook for the reader." Every applicant hears this, so basically every applicant starts by telling a story. Nothing wrong there. But, most applicants eventually get to a point where they want to describe why they want to go to medical school. (Which after all, is what the personal statement is supposed to be about.) The logical thing would be to wrap up the story and then segue into a section where they talk about their reasons for going to medical school a more traditional essay-style format. But because they were told "show, don't tell," a lot of applicants instead stick with the story format for the rest of the essay and shoehorn their reasons for going to medical school into that format. So instead of just saying statement X, then statement Y, then statement Z. Applicants attempt to "storify" them by rephrasing along the lines of "After doing P, I came to realize X, which was shortly followed by my prompt realization of Y. The next day, it occurred to me that Z."
This narration of internal thoughts leads to a repetitive rhythm that feels stilted and tedious to read. (See Elements of Style by Strunk & White, Section 3.14 for an excellent example and explanation of exactly why reading prose like this feels so tedious.)
It also feels robotic and unnatural from a semantic standpoint. I mean who thinks like that? We all hope that your reasons for going to medical school are logical and well thought out. But the way individual events affect us is often emotional, not logical. The logic is a synthesis of many events and many emotions that happens over a long period of time, not an instant. Which means that it doesn't fit neatly into a story format.
So yes, starting by telling a story can be a good hook. But if you don't continue to tell that story well, it will quickly turn into a big turn off.
And "show, don't tell" doesn't mean that you have to tell everything in story-based narrative format full of foreshadowing and character development. (You aren't writing a novel.) It means that you should have evidence for anything you claim about yourself. Do you say that you are caring and compassionate? Do you say that you love research? Well anyone can say that. How does the person reading your personal statement know? Well maybe you showed care and compassion by volunteering at a clinic. Maybe you showed a love of research by working very hard in a lab and presenting at a conference. If so mention it.
(Some people will probably overextrapolate from what I just said, so just to be clear, your personal statement shouln't be a regurgitation of your extracurriculars. Instead it should be a synthesis. How did your experiences affect you? How did they shape your desire to go into medicine? Did you have any other life experiences that made you want to go into medicine?)
And I'll take this opportunity to rattle off a few other common mistakes in no particular order:
Don't feel forced to write in a story-based format just because someone told you it works well. If you do chose to use a story-based format, make sure that it's actually a story, not an narrative of your thoughts that is awkwardly fitted onto a scaffold of events to create the superficial semblance of a story. And if you do chose to start with a story, that doesn't mean that your entire essay has to be a story.
It's getting to be that time of year again. Yet again I have mutiple people asking me to read over their personal statements. And get again, they are almost all terrible. (Harsh, yes, but also true.) And yet again it's basically all for the same reason.
The root of the problem is some common personal statement advice that I'm sure most of you have heard before:
- "Start by telling a story. It creates an interesting hook for the reader."
- "Show, don't tell"
Before I get into how students tend to misinterpet this advice, let me temporarily ignore my own advice and show, not tell you what I mean.
Essay Version A:
"Jean, never forget that sometimes something as simple as holding a patient's hand can be as potent as the most powerful medicine."
I heard that statement as a freshman, from Dr. Jones, one of the pediatricians that I shadowed at the local clinic. It has resonated with me ever since.
My interest in medicine began in high school biology class, where I developed a fascination with the science of human physiology, but it was my time shadowing Dr. Jones and volunteering at the local soup kitchen that taught me that there was another dimension to medicine as well. And ultimately I believe that it is the power of care and compassion that drives me to pursue a career in medicine more than anything else.
Essay Version B:
As I listened to the lecture in Biology 101, it dawned on me that medical science is truly a modern wonder. These thoughts were still resonating with me several hours later, after I had taken to bus downtown to shadow Dr. Jones at Community Pediatrics. While I was perusing the printout on pediatric physiology that Dr. Jones had given me, she said "Jean, never forget that sometimes something as simple as holding a patient's hand can be as potent as the most powerful medicine." As Dr. Jones finished her sentence, I came to the realization that the wonder of medical science was not the only thing of importance in my life. I was reminded of my time volunteering at the local soup kitchen, where I handed out sandwiches while contemplating how this was an example of human compassion. The conversation with Dr. Jones illustrated to me that these two things are an important part of the medical profession. After performing a multivariate analysis with high statistical power, I rejected the null hypothesis and concluded that compassion is a valid reason to pursue a career in medicine.
Okay, maybe I was going overboard with the last sentence there, but you get my point. I think most of us would agree that version A reads much better, even though it is not story-based and version B is.
So back to those two pieces of advice:
- "Start by telling a story. It creates an interesting hook for the reader."
- "Show, don't tell"
"Start by telling a story. It creates an interesting hook for the reader." Every applicant hears this, so basically every applicant starts by telling a story. Nothing wrong there. But, most applicants eventually get to a point where they want to describe why they want to go to medical school. (Which after all, is what the personal statement is supposed to be about.) The logical thing would be to wrap up the story and then segue into a section where they talk about their reasons for going to medical school a more traditional essay-style format. But because they were told "show, don't tell," a lot of applicants instead stick with the story format for the rest of the essay and shoehorn their reasons for going to medical school into that format. So instead of just saying statement X, then statement Y, then statement Z. Applicants attempt to "storify" them by rephrasing along the lines of "After doing P, I came to realize X, which was shortly followed by my prompt realization of Y. The next day, it occurred to me that Z."
This narration of internal thoughts leads to a repetitive rhythm that feels stilted and tedious to read. (See Elements of Style by Strunk & White, Section 3.14 for an excellent example and explanation of exactly why reading prose like this feels so tedious.)
It also feels robotic and unnatural from a semantic standpoint. I mean who thinks like that? We all hope that your reasons for going to medical school are logical and well thought out. But the way individual events affect us is often emotional, not logical. The logic is a synthesis of many events and many emotions that happens over a long period of time, not an instant. Which means that it doesn't fit neatly into a story format.
So yes, starting by telling a story can be a good hook. But if you don't continue to tell that story well, it will quickly turn into a big turn off.
And "show, don't tell" doesn't mean that you have to tell everything in story-based narrative format full of foreshadowing and character development. (You aren't writing a novel.) It means that you should have evidence for anything you claim about yourself. Do you say that you are caring and compassionate? Do you say that you love research? Well anyone can say that. How does the person reading your personal statement know? Well maybe you showed care and compassion by volunteering at a clinic. Maybe you showed a love of research by working very hard in a lab and presenting at a conference. If so mention it.
(Some people will probably overextrapolate from what I just said, so just to be clear, your personal statement shouln't be a regurgitation of your extracurriculars. Instead it should be a synthesis. How did your experiences affect you? How did they shape your desire to go into medicine? Did you have any other life experiences that made you want to go into medicine?)
And I'll take this opportunity to rattle off a few other common mistakes in no particular order:
- Not having a clear point/conclusion. Remember that the point of the PS is to explain why you want to be a physician. The reader should have a clear understanding of that by the time they finish reading your statement. If you wander between topics, you might leave them confused about what the point of your PS. Give your PS to three or four friends and ask them to tell you why you want to do medicine. If they all tell you something different or if they can't tell you at all, it's a sign that you might need to rework your essay.
- Writing by thesaurus. English is a strange language. It has a 50 words for the same thing where a lot of other languages only have one or two. But these 50 "synonyms" all actually have very subtly different implications and/or are used in slightly different contexts. If you reach for a thesaurus and misuse a word because you aren't aware of these subtle differences, you will sound less intelligent, not more. Good writing comes mostly from prose that has good rhythm and content that is delivered in a clear and concise way, not from the use of fancy vocab words.
- "Savior complex." Don't use your PS to show off when it comes to community service. If an experience you had while volunteering really affected you in a particular way, then by all means write about it. But be wary of painting yourself as some type of Mother Theresa figure who rushes from place to place to feed the hungry and care for the poor. Odds are you aren't. Odds are you're just a college kid who spent two afternoons a week at the soup kitchen - commendable, but not something to brag about.
Don't feel forced to write in a story-based format just because someone told you it works well. If you do chose to use a story-based format, make sure that it's actually a story, not an narrative of your thoughts that is awkwardly fitted onto a scaffold of events to create the superficial semblance of a story. And if you do chose to start with a story, that doesn't mean that your entire essay has to be a story.
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