twiptophan789
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Instead of writing secondary essays, I've been trying to find out why they exist. I decided to write this post to procrastinate some more. Here are the 4 main ideas I found.
1. Secondary applications give admission committees valuable information
This is the explanation that medical schools themselves give. There are many attributes that contribute success as a physician and schools use the essays to assess those attributes. The Associate Dean of Admissions at Duke said, "We learn so much from their life experiences, how they think, how they’ve matured, and how they will be looking at taking care of people." This sounds great! Does it work though? USU found that essay scores didn't correlate with anything in medical school or in fist year of graduation. I did find one study that found empathetic language used in admissions essays could predict about 7% of the variance in an empathy questionnaire. I don't know how well the questionnaire predicts actual empathy. It is also important to note that the authors used code to classify the essays, they were not read by adcom members.
Determining if an applicant is a good "fit" is also a common explanation for the value of secondary essays. The people saying fit is very important usually don't explain any more, but if they do, the explanation is so vague that it fits half of all applicants. I still don't understand what "fit" really means in medical school admissions, so I'll just leave it at that.
I think lots of smart adcoms really do value secondary essays. That being said, if you think that you know who a person is after reading a couple things they wrote, I have a bridge to sell you.
2. Money
Pretty self-explanatory. A school like Loyola will receive about 10,000 secondary applications a year. At $115 an app that works out to $1.15 million coming into Loyola's coffers every year. If I had the choice to get $1.15 million years I would do it.
3. Applicants will self-elect out/demonstrate interest
Continuing to pick on Loyola, they get about 15,000 primary applications a year. That is truly ridiculous number of people applying for 170 seats. Almost 90 people per seat. They cut that number by a third just by having an expensive and difficult secondary. Schools with less burdensome secondary's might still cut 20% from the jump. The applicants who actually complete the secondary will likely be very interested in the school. If schools value yield, that could be driving decisions.
4. Inertia
Secondary apps became popular sometime in the past and because big academic institutions have tons of inertia, they stuck around. New schools like Kaiser Permanente having secondary essays would argue against this. Schools adding COVID essays also says schools continue to see value in essays.
So what can I do with this information? I don't know man, I'm just tired of these essays.
1. Secondary applications give admission committees valuable information
This is the explanation that medical schools themselves give. There are many attributes that contribute success as a physician and schools use the essays to assess those attributes. The Associate Dean of Admissions at Duke said, "We learn so much from their life experiences, how they think, how they’ve matured, and how they will be looking at taking care of people." This sounds great! Does it work though? USU found that essay scores didn't correlate with anything in medical school or in fist year of graduation. I did find one study that found empathetic language used in admissions essays could predict about 7% of the variance in an empathy questionnaire. I don't know how well the questionnaire predicts actual empathy. It is also important to note that the authors used code to classify the essays, they were not read by adcom members.
Determining if an applicant is a good "fit" is also a common explanation for the value of secondary essays. The people saying fit is very important usually don't explain any more, but if they do, the explanation is so vague that it fits half of all applicants. I still don't understand what "fit" really means in medical school admissions, so I'll just leave it at that.
I think lots of smart adcoms really do value secondary essays. That being said, if you think that you know who a person is after reading a couple things they wrote, I have a bridge to sell you.
2. Money
Pretty self-explanatory. A school like Loyola will receive about 10,000 secondary applications a year. At $115 an app that works out to $1.15 million coming into Loyola's coffers every year. If I had the choice to get $1.15 million years I would do it.
3. Applicants will self-elect out/demonstrate interest
Continuing to pick on Loyola, they get about 15,000 primary applications a year. That is truly ridiculous number of people applying for 170 seats. Almost 90 people per seat. They cut that number by a third just by having an expensive and difficult secondary. Schools with less burdensome secondary's might still cut 20% from the jump. The applicants who actually complete the secondary will likely be very interested in the school. If schools value yield, that could be driving decisions.
4. Inertia
Secondary apps became popular sometime in the past and because big academic institutions have tons of inertia, they stuck around. New schools like Kaiser Permanente having secondary essays would argue against this. Schools adding COVID essays also says schools continue to see value in essays.
So what can I do with this information? I don't know man, I'm just tired of these essays.
