Writing secondaries

[625233]

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How long are most secondaries, and how long does it take to write secondaries for 25 schools?

 

[Ismet]

1. Varies by school. I've had some that were 50 words max, some 5000 characters, and everywhere in between. Some even no limit.

2. Varies by person. How fast can you think and write?

 

[625233]

How long after sending your primary should you aim to be completed by?

 

[Ismet]

How long after sending your primary should you aim to be completed by?

You need to be verified first before receiving secondaries for most schools. You should aim to complete secondaries within 2 weeks of receiving them.

 

[625233]

Do interviews get sent out based on who turns in their secondaries first or primaries?

 

[BeornBear]

Do interviews get sent out based on who turns in their secondaries first or primaries?

It's based on who turns in their primary and secondary first.

 

[Afford]

The problem with secondaries is that I got burned out after finishing half of them in a week. The remaining secondaries took me 2-3 days each. People here recommend that they should be done within 2 weeks, but writing secondary essays for 25 schools is not easy. I would recommend that you try to prewrite secondaries because it's hard to write a lot of quality essays in 2 weeks because the secondaries all arrive when you are verified as most schools do not pre-screen secondaries.

If you are complete earlier, you are more likely to be looked at earlier, but whether you get an interview earlier depends on a lot of factors. I received interviews anywhere from 2 weeks to 4 months after completing my secondary to schools.

 

[Ismet]

Do interviews get sent out based on who turns in their secondaries first or primaries?

Secondary. You're not complete until your secondary is in (along with verified primary, MCAT score, and LORs). That said, most schools do not do a "first come first served" style of invitation. More things go into it than that.

 

[ridethecliche]

I applied to 45 schools and completed 42 secondaries.

I made google documents for everything and got the prompts from school specific threads so I could pre-write them. The best advice I can give is to categorize every essay into a 'themes' which for me included: Personal growth, research interests, career in 10 years, health disparities, etc etc etc. When you get your secondaries, break up the essays into those themes and see how many of your secondary essays fit that bill. As you write, re-write, edit, and re-edit all the essays for all the different secondaries, you'll definitely get better results so go back to the ones you completed at the start early on and make sure to give them a once over before submitting.

It took a really long time, but this cycle was it for me and I don't regret it.

 

[cactus8910]

If I remember correctly, most secondaries I completed had 2 to 4 ~500-word questions. Some had no required questions, and one required a full page response. You can look up the secondaries for specific schools in the 2014-2015 school-specific thread.
I didn't prewrite any, which I don't entirely regret, but prewriting probably would have helped me avoid the essay burnout that kept me from submitting my last few secondaries until late August. I'm not sure when most people pre-write, but the time between submitting your primary and getting verified would be good.

 

[sunflower18]

I applied to 45 schools and completed 42 secondaries.

I made google documents for everything and got the prompts from school specific threads so I could pre-write them. The best advice I can give is to categorize every essay into a 'themes' which for me included: Personal growth, research interests, career in 10 years, health disparities, etc etc etc. When you get your secondaries, break up the essays into those themes and see how many of your secondary essays fit that bill. As you write, re-write, edit, and re-edit all the essays for all the different secondaries, you'll definitely get better results so go back to the ones you completed at the start early on and make sure to give them a once over before submitting.

It took a really long time, but this cycle was it for me and I don't regret it.

This is exactly what I did as well. I started pre-writing around a month and a half before June 27th (which is the first day secondaries could be released from schools), and that gave me enough time to write and edit all of my essays (I applied to 30 schools, and I think that ended up being something like 40 unique essays, some shorter than others). A lot of the essays could be reused between schools, so I just made a note of that on my spreadsheet and made sure to change school names and any school-specific details.

 

[llamasarefuzzy]

I wished I had known about pre writing. I sent in 22 secondaries. Since I was enrolled in graduate school and working while also interviewing, I didnt finish until Thanksgiving break. It's worked out fine for me, but if I had to do it again I would definitely pre-write