work experience in personal statement?

[pupsingh]

is the personal statement an appropriate place to describe your work experience and how it helped shape the person youve become? or can this be explained somewhere else?

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[dmd2011]

is the personal statement an appropriate place to describe your work experience and how it helped shape the person youve become? or can this be explained somewhere else?

yes, the personal statement is the place you can describe your work experience and how it influenced your life.

 

[pupsingh]

but isnt the prompt for the personal statement :" why do you wanna be a dentist?"?

 

[Snahster]

you talk about your work experience if it is relevant to the prompt. E.g. you discovered your work ethic and business skills and feel those talents would enable you to open your own dental practice someday.

 

[Mstoothlady2012]

like snahster said if your work is somehow related to dentistry or if you developed skills that would help you in ur future career (dental) then only talk about work...otherwise i would say it is not appropriate to talk about work in PS

 

[dmd2011]

you could talk about work if you needed to work your way through undergrad or something like that. there is no set format for your personal statement and there are thousands of different directions you could take when writing it but like it has been said before make sure you talk about why you want to be a dentist.

 

[Ex_EE]

I used my personal statement to explain how working as engineer influenced my desire to be a dentist. I think it was very important for me to talk about in my personal statement.

 

[messenger]

OP, yes, the PS is basically for "why you and why dentistry"

talk about that in WHATEVER way you want...and just make sure it is unique/stands out, not "oh, i like people and stuff"...adcoms know you like people and want to help..make it an original and interesting read

at one interview, i was complimented about my writing skills, but thats all she said, "you are a wonderful writer" ....didnt talk about specifics in the essay. dont know if that was good or bad actually.

 

[SugarNaCl]

ABSOLUTELY. It is funny how much everyone agonizes about what is appropriate to put in the essay or say in the interview. ADCOMs somehow seem to see through B.S. probably through experience. As long as you are honest and relevant you will be fine. I never mentioned once in my personal statement or interviews that I enjoy working with people because it sounded too cliche. They somehow can just see those things in writing and in person.