How to Write a Personal Statement Which Best Reflects You Just by hearing the term personal statement for medical school (e.g. AMCAS personal statement), potential students might begin shivering to their spines, not mentioning a majority still does not know how to arrive at a good personal essay that best reflects them. But if you would just consider the main purpose of this essay, perhaps you would change the way you see it. And instead of feeling nervous and panicking, you may start feeling relieved, thinking that this paper is one of the most important documents to do well at so that you can enter the university. And if medicine is your passion and you are determined bagging one of the slots, then you may start accepting the challenge of coming up with an excellent essay that tells about you—what you are made of and what your reasons are for wanting to enter the medical school. How to Write a Personal Statement Residency That Reflects You With the school application in full swing, you should be able to prepare your personal statement, but just like other students, you may not realize how much introspection and reflection to prepare, edit and polish your paper. For the best results, you should check out the following tips for your guidance and for easing any uncertainties that you have about your personal statement. See to it that your personal essay is able to address the most important points, which are the reasons you are pursuing medicine and are the appeal you are making to the medical school. Cover these two points, not answer only one of them. If you want to avoid your essay from being lost in the shuffle, you should be able to shine through with your personal statement by answering these two important points. Aside from looking into the online word count, one of the most important things to remember when writing your personal statement is to avoid choosing a subject just because you think it will impress the readers or the ad com in this case. (E.g. I want to make a difference). Instead, write your story, your personal growth and learning, no matter the topic. Along these lines, think of the reasons you want to go to medical school. Perhaps, it is because of an experience you had when you were in school, or it is because of an activity that changed your way of thinking. Or maybe, it is due to a summer job that has helped reaffirming your passion for medicine or science. You can make use of anecdotes and vignettes to make your story engaging and pleasurable. After all, an ad com might be able to relate to one of your stories if it also happened to him or her. But even if you are trying to come up with a unique personal story and relate things that happened to you to show your love for the field, do not use controversial topics, as much as possible. Do not also sound preachy or dogmatic, even if you are trying to opening up a topic in medicine that you want to address or perhaps provide a solution for in research. Do not use a controversial topic, which may not be interesting for the readers who do not share
your politics, and after all, it may also alienate the reader. Politics isn’t acceptable in a personal statement. Avoid being too creative. Even if it’s mentioned that your medical school personal statement must be able to highlight a personal story on how you reached this point or what made you as a person who wants to pursue medicine, you should avoid being or sounding creative. Know that this important piece is a formal paper, not a poem. Remember that the medical school is a scientific community, even if many of the people here may also be passionate painters, musicians…. Avoid being boring and trite. Do not use lines, such as “I want to be a doctor because….” You are not in elementary/primary school to answer this way. Aside from following the prescribed personal statement length, follow your heart but do not apologize if you included your poor grade in physics, for example. If you feel the need to write a C grade in physics, write it. However, you should not make excuses, unless you believe that certain things have to be mentioned. And how to end a personal statement? To reach at the end of your essay, you may want to mention that you want to serve in a meaningful way, you love research or you want to be a teacher or leader in the medical field.
Additional tips See to it that it meets AMCAS personal statement length or required word count based on the school you are applying. You may use a word counter online to perform word count online. Write down potential themes of your paper. It may also be the time to reflect on certain aspects of your life that you may have to use to relate a story to the readers about what you are as a person and how you reached this point in your life, your motivations and inspirations. Do not ever rehash the CV or resume and write them in the personal statement. Otherwise, you will just waste precious space. Aside from checking your paper’s length with the online word counter, you should be able to write only the most important things in your essay and make sure that every word has a reason to be there. And when you are done with the personal statement, do not forget proper check writing to ensure that your essay contains no typos or mistakes in grammar and spelling that would turn off the admissions committee. Read your paper a couple of times and edit it. Follow these tips when writing a personal statement that best reflects you, your personal growth and your experiences that brought you to where you are now. Show your passion and love for medicine and research, but avoid writing about controversial topics in the field. See to it that your essay follow the word limit and structure as prescribed by the school where you are applying. Finally, check your paper for mistakes before submission.