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why should we pick YOU?
Started by AbujaMan
No one else will toot it for you. They asked for a little ditty, so serenade away.
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The idea is to toot your horn and their horn simultaneously (as bizarre as that sounds). You want to sell your good qualities and also show that you love their school, so present your traits in the context of their university. Tell them how you love doing X which is why you'd love to take advantage of their Y Program, etc.👍
Put yourself in the interviewer's position.
Assuming it's an open-file interview, they ALREADY know [roughly]:
Your academic/intellectual [performance] track record
Your experience in the clinical setting
Your involvement in community service and volunteering
What your superiors think of you (via LORs)
So what might they want to know about you when they ask "why should we pick you?"
They want to know if you can convince them aloud (reflecting that you are convinced yourself) that you will give it your all, that they can count on you to pull the late-nighters if need be, that you've carefully thought out your decision to go into medicine and that you feel you are a person designed for being compassionate toward others while being faced with pressure and extreme time-constraints.
In short, they want you to say something that conveys:
1) You will put your studies first for the four years you spend at their institution.
2) You have the right combination of courage and compassion to make a great physician.
Assuming it's an open-file interview, they ALREADY know [roughly]:
Your academic/intellectual [performance] track record
Your experience in the clinical setting
Your involvement in community service and volunteering
What your superiors think of you (via LORs)
So what might they want to know about you when they ask "why should we pick you?"
They want to know if you can convince them aloud (reflecting that you are convinced yourself) that you will give it your all, that they can count on you to pull the late-nighters if need be, that you've carefully thought out your decision to go into medicine and that you feel you are a person designed for being compassionate toward others while being faced with pressure and extreme time-constraints.
In short, they want you to say something that conveys:
1) You will put your studies first for the four years you spend at their institution.
2) You have the right combination of courage and compassion to make a great physician.
Make a list of things you hear your friends tooting about you, when it comes to academics. Then, make your own tooting list of what you want people to know. And, see what qualities are specific to the school you are applying to, with all this material play a tooting song. 🙂
Make sure to do this with other things that aren't academics, too!
What the question really means:
If we pick you, how will you make us proud to have you as a student/alumnus? (why are you a good fit for us?)
If we pick you, why would you choose to come here? (why are we a good fit for you?)
If we pick you, how will you make us proud to have you as a student/alumnus? (why are you a good fit for us?)
If we pick you, why would you choose to come here? (why are we a good fit for you?)
You could always give a generic response along the lines of hard work, dedication...etc
Oops.
I just included a nice crisp george washington. Since some schools required electronic secondaries, I uploaded a jpeg of a nice crisp washington. You think they got the message?
In all honesty, this is another chance to sell yourself
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Was it a passport sized photo?
I gave the worst possible answer to that question to my top choice... 🙁
"I try my best, but if you find someone better, then you should pick him/her."
🙁🙁🙁
I've yet to receive an answer back from the school, but I really really hope the rest of my interview covers for that one statement. 🙁
"I try my best, but if you find someone better, then you should pick him/her."
🙁🙁🙁
I've yet to receive an answer back from the school, but I really really hope the rest of my interview covers for that one statement. 🙁
If you don't toot the horn no one else will.
D@mn! That's probably why!
Honestly, when you get accepted and become a physician, you'll probably laugh at that.
That's only if I get in. If I don't, I'll probably be crying instead of laughing 😳
Well, not crying. I'm not allowed to cry. 😛
1
175961
theres a lot of tooting going on in this thread....stinky!
i was waiting for someone to make that joke!
Excellenuria is a surprisingly common symptom around here. Fortunately for me, my properly functioning kidneys reabsorb my excellence so I'm always in peak form.
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I'm not a doctor, but I did read the wikipedia article on retrograde ejaculation one time. So there.
2
202781
I was asked this a couple times and it always caught me off guard... To one of my student interviewers at USC I just said, "I know this suit makes me look like a real stiff, but I am pretty laid back and think I would fit in well at your school".
This was probably the dumbest thing I said, but I think he actually really liked it. He was dressed in flip flops, shorts and a tank top. And he just started to laugh and said "Sweet" or something.
This was probably the dumbest thing I said, but I think he actually really liked it. He was dressed in flip flops, shorts and a tank top. And he just started to laugh and said "Sweet" or something.
I mumbled some sort of 'I don't know, I'm sure you've got a lot of qualified candidates' the first time around. When I had to reapply, I used this as my chance to point out how committed I was to becoming a doctor, as in, 'you should pick me because I didn't get in the first time and I just tried harder to make sure I could get in this time around. I know how hard med school is (which, reflecting back, I was unaware of just exactly how hard it is) and I know that being a doctor is that it isn't all rainbows and butterflies and I still want to do it.' (only in smarter sounding terms) I don't think everyone is all that informed that there is a dark underbelly to medicine and I think pointing out that you know about it is a good idea. I imagine everyone on SDN knows about the dark side b/c we constantly read peoples complaints about it.
What makes me different?
I'm the ****.
I might not say "I'm the ****" but that'd be the theme of my overall response.
I'm the ****.
I might not say "I'm the ****" but that'd be the theme of my overall response.
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