To Premeds: General Advice on Personal Statements (2024)

Okay, so I’m exhausted as heck but had a chance to go through about 10 personal statements recently, and I can say that here are some common issues that we see in essays (as I’ve talked to peers, other admissions members, and the like):

1) Numero Uno: On SDN: If a reader says they are UNABLE to read your PS, DON’T SEND THEM A MESSAGE!

I keep the thread updated saying, I cannot read it. But you still send it. What does that mean? 1) You don’t keep good attention to detail. I have checked that thread multiple times to confirm i’m on the unavailable side. 2) You’re just plain rude. If I had known this about you if I interviewed you at my school, I’d immediately cut the interview. Simple as that. Please be professional and respect the time of us readers. Please. (I’m taking time out of my board study time to read essays…and I wish there would be a baseline level of respect here.) If i'm wrong here, please let me know. I've seen the thread over 3 times with my update and i seriously thought i was delusional when people kept sending me stuff when i saw myself as unavailable.

2) Please stop saying, it has been a dream of mine to go to medical school, or I’ve always wanted to be a doctor when I was little. It is unbelievably tacky because: Every. Single. Person. Writes. This. I’m going to barf. (when I’ve talked to people who sit on admissions committees complain about this, I thought they were lying. OMG NO THEY WEREN’T)

3) Show, not tell. HOLY COW this is so important. When you talk anything about yourself, like “you learned to be empathetic,” or “learned to be compassionate,” don’t say that and instead, SHOW how you became empathetic and or compassionate. Talk about a patient encounter you had where you interacted with him/her and you two connected well. Or how you helped someone in their time of need. Reflect on that experience. If you are too concerned that ‘omg I can’t put everything in then,’ chill out. Your personal statement is not supposed to be a resume dump. (Per @Avocado8 : Show your experiences without reciting your resume (no need to give the 15-word-long name of your research internship and hospital...), and REFLECT on experiences: what did you take away from them? Unless there's a significant answer to that question, the experience doesn't belong in your PS. Lots of PS's bring in random research or hospital volunteering and become VERY obvious that the writer did them only to check off boxes.)

4) Going from the last point—do not resume dump. What do I mean by this? I don’t want you to just write that you volunteered at a hospital, gave people blankets and the like. And then you volunteered at a clinic and helped with paperwork. And then you received this award. THAT IS WHAT AMCAS IS FOR. YOU LIST YOUR ACTIVITES AND DESCRIBE WHAT YOU DID. YOU HAVE LIMITED REAL ESTATE FOR YOUR PERSONAL STATEMENT, AND ITS YOUR CHANCE TO TALK ABOUT WHAT IS PERSONAL OR REFLECTIONS ABOUT A FEW EXPERIENCES THAT CONVERGE ON A COMMON THEME/THESIS FOR WHY YOU WANT TO GO TO MEDICAL SCHOOL. WHY WOULD YOU WASTE THAT ON BEING REDUNDANT?

5) Please do not write literally a life story. So I'm going to clarify here (per @Australopithekus ): having chronology of what you wrote, is good. However, writing a play-by-play of everything you did that is not relevant to a theme, is bad. I've read essays where a person will be writing about working with the underserved, etc etc...and then on a last sentence, it'llbe like, and then i got involved in a research lab. And then they'll write that their grandfather died. Yes, it's chronological and sensible because one happened after the other. BUT IT HAS NO RELEVANCE AND ITS COMPLETELY LEFT FIELD! Focus on a theme and run from it there. Without any meaningful reflection, its worthless. However, how does one have space to write a meaningful reflection? Choose a few parts and write more deeply about them, instead of just writing every single life event possible in chronological fashion. The moral of the story, is I'm sure many of you have lots to write about...you did more than say...8 significant things or something as a premed. But you don't need to write about all of them. Write about like, 3 of them, that all share a common theme or principle and leave it as that. We'll learn more about you in your secondary essays TOO! Don't forget to save some thoughts for those!!! (@Australopithekus ) I don't think there's anything wrong with telling a chronological story, so long as it focuses on significant experiences that demonstrate a progression of personal growth and a maturation of one's interest in medicine. I tell my research students that their personal statements should tell a story, communicate a theme, or both. Of course, one's story alone isn't enough, but it can provide an excellent scaffold for highlighting important personal qualities. It is also a very good format for non-traditional students and applicants with unique backgrounds.

6) Please write professionally. Use the word physician, probably more frequently than doctor (although its fine). But more importantly, refer to people as individuals, people, persons, but never write ‘guy’. Its just too casual for this purpose.

7) PLEASE ADDRESS WHY MEDICINE. (@tick_tock400 )
I CANNOT STRESS HOW IMPORTANT THIS IS. SOOOOO many of the personal statements I've been receiving do NOT ADDRESS THIS. Why medicine? When did your interest start? How did it cultivate? Why medicine as opposed to any other field? For instance, you may say you have an interest in healthcare disparities, but then why not become a healthcare advocate or study public policy? You may say you like helping people-- but then why not become a teacher or a nurse?
PLEASE ALSO DO THIS FROM THE START. Too many PS's don't even address this until midway through or (gasp) NOT AT ALL!

8) PLEASE BE CONSISTENT. (@tick_tock400 )A lot of people are starting off saying they wanted to go into medicine for such and such reason, but then NOTHING in their personal statement ever hints back to that idea again. Have a theme (or several themes-- i.e. compassion, service, leadership, etc) and follow through on those ideas THROUGHOUT your PS.

9) TALK ABOUT YOU. (@tick_tock400 )In many of the PS's I keep reading, the author just talks about someone they admire or something-- I've read ENTIRE PS's where the author does not address himself/herself EVEN ONCE! This WHOLE PS is supposed to be about you. Don't tell me what a doctor does. Don't tell me what you admire in someone else. Don't tell me how you hated a doctor for doing this. TELL ME ABOUT YOU. WHY SHOULD I WANT YOU. WHY ARE YOU SPECIAL.

10) NO AMCAS ACTIVITY SECTION REPEATS!!!! (@tick_tock400 )I'm saying what Alejandro already said, BUT I CANNOT STRESS THIS ENOUGH. You already have space in your activities to talk for TWO paragraphs about why a certain activity was significant to you or special! If you don't have two paras, you at least have one! Most of the writers I've read have wasted soooo much space on their PS writing this-- and when I cross this off-- it's like their entire PS is gone!

11) MAKE ME WANT YOU. (@tick_tock400 )PLEASE MAKE ME WANT YOU. Please show me that I want YOU-- not your mom, your teacher, a doctor you shadowed, a patient you had, etc. Please show me what makes you special. Please don't tell me a sob story, unless you are a vital player in that story and how you overcame something. I want to see YOU. You as RELIABLE, CARING, INTELLIGENT, REFLECTIVE, ADMIRABLE. Remember, adcom members only interview up to ~10% of all applicants max out of thousands of applications-- make yourself be in that special percentage! (@Australopithekus) Define yourself by what makes you unique. I don't care that you did well in pre-med coursework; we all did. I don't care that you love science; we all do. You want to help people? That's fantastic, but so does every other pre-med. Write about something that sets your statement apart from the other 15 sitting in my inbox. I should want to meet you after reading your statement.

12) Please no bad analogies, or some wild hyperboles! (@CaliforniaDreamer) I would also recommend not trying to shoehorn in some torturous analogy, like about how the time you got sunburned on vacation made you realize how much pain the people of the world are in and thus motivated you to become a doctor.

13) Have a nice introduction! (@TheRhymenocerous) people should spend more time on their introductions. I read a lot of statements that start off with a jumble of thoughts or anecdotes that don't give the reader any sense of where the piece is going. The first few lines set the tone for the whole statement, so they should be as strong and as clear as possible. Don't try to cram your family history, your research experience, and a memorable interaction with a patient into one paragraph. Choose the strongest one, or whichever leads into the rest of your essay best, and flesh it out.

14) The poor man's spell check (@TheRhymenocerous): Read your statement to yourself out loud! You'll catch a lot of grammatical errors that way and should be wary of writing anything you feel uncomfortable saying out loud. It's much better to sound like yourself (albeit the best version of yourself) than to use impressive words and it's usually pretty obvious when someone is using words they aren't used to using. That can also help you identify issues with flow and continuity – if it feels jumpy to you, it's going to be even jumpier to your reader who doesn't have any of the context. (And its better for us readers since we'll have less to correct! )

To my fellow peers, any other pieces of wisdom that you would generalize to share? or any opposing opinions? Feel free to add to this!
@benmarker , @PlaqueBuster , @onceawolverine , @eatingcake , @MPB , @TheRhymenocerous , @moonjelly , @Australopithekus , @Avocado8 , @hellanutella , @canuckinusa , @tick_tock400 , @slippytoad , @Gsb653 , @soccerusa , @Hippogriff , @CaliforniaDreamer , @Relax!