 Searching online for a ton of personal statement examples without the analysis or the breakdown as to kind of the journey that personal statement took to get to where it is is fighting against the iceberg effect right. On iceberg you see kind of a big block of ice on top of the the water but you don't see all of the ice and it's like a way larger structure beneath the the water right. So kind of searching for those final drafts you're only seeing the beautiful final product and not really all the blood, sweat and tears that happened underneath or behind the scenes. So you want that analysis you want that breakdown stick around for some of that. Hi I'm Dr. Josie this is Write Your Acceptance. I've worked with hundreds and hundreds of students on personal statements for medical, dental, residency and so on. This is what I focus on so that you can focus on delivering the most compelling personal statement for your application. Make sure you subscribe and you won't miss a video. Let's get started. First and foremost your first draft should never be your final draft. I tell students always to honor their process but it's difficult when you kind of do this word vomit and then all of a sudden you have two pages and it's like you know writing is hard even for someone who loves it and isn't of it like I am. It's hard for everyone but you want to stay nimble and not be as committed to content because you want to pick the most important topics like experiences the most important lessons and reflections how to connect too many times I'm working with students and they're like I tell them okay what if we go this direction for a lesson because you've already had this lesson on translating and cultural competency for the first experience what about this direction for experience two or three and they're like oh but I only have 200 characters left so I don't want to write more I'm like don't worry about characters right go over the characters make sure you have everything written once you say everything you want to say then you cut and that way you guarantee that you have the strongest content making it onto the page and not losing it on the chopping block so make sure that you are really coming back to your personal statement multiple times that that first draft is not your final draft so let's chat the different sections of your personal statement because there should be a sense of beginning middle and end not so much I mean yes in and of itself but there should be this kind of growing and deepening wisdom throughout the essay that really kind of catapults or that really kind of not catapults that really kind of captures your journey right because it is why do you want to kind of what is your journey to medicine so that's kind of that beginning middle and do you want that deepening wisdom number one for me is as you are discussing or as you're brainstorming and reflecting which examples you're going to use make sure you are showing yourself in action that is super important too many times students will talk about someone else doing something and then they just kind of admire that and move on and then they don't show them in action and it doesn't have to be really you know big flashy loud examples but you know the kind of patient-centric you adapting to someone's needs very important show these experiences anchor them in patient experiences show your values and traits and then reflect on them so this is a student example they wanted to show community building right and so then after they kind of listed off all the different examples and experiences that they had they settled on a body paragraph where they introduced a free kind of like call tree service where they were volunteering at a clinic and patients who were it was during covid kind of they were commenting that they were feeling very lonely and isolated and so the student basically kind of put patients together to chat and kind of would schedule a call tree would schedule you know thursday's at three so and so and so and so we chat together and you know people were kind of developing friendships and so it was something like i remember my nervous butterflies when i asked if rosa was available to chat as i handed the phone to esmeralda i wasn't sure if they would hit it off but as soon as they started chatting about the late villain in the latest villain in atel novella i knew i just helped them spark a new friendship it was through this friendship that i was able to convince esmeralda to begin exercising at the clinic pull again and during her follow-up with dr m found her brighter demeanor refreshing and a positive for her blood pressure levels then the student would go into the reflections on you know community building and how they that is part of their brand of medicine and how medicine is good and how medicine is about curing but it's also about healing the body and the soul so that's one example here's another example from a student this student was struggling with kind of length brevity was their best friend and they basically wrote a paragraph and they were like i've written everything that i want to say this was their paragraph for me medicine is the only path i have dedicated my undergraduate career on excelling in my courses and taking on leadership positions in student organizations while volunteering in my community this has helped me to get to know my neighbors and how i could be of service my experiences shadowing a primary physician and a dermatologist have taught me the importance of individualized patient care since every patient deserves tailored attention you have volunteering at a mobile medical clinic after the hurricane helped me realize how truly committed i am so yeah basically they have the entire essay in a very compact way right so what we did was we broke up each section and anchored that in a very specific experience so that we bring we weave in anecdotes like stories images sensory driven language right and then we add a little bit more to the lessons so when i started working with a student we only had a paragraph which is great some students start with zero which is also great but they started with this and basically we took it apart as if it were a jigsaw puzzle with each puzzle kind with each piece becoming larger so for me medicine is the only path i've dedicated my undergraduate career to excelling in my courses and leadership positions i asked the student for examples on leadership positions very specific leadership moments during those leadership positions right and kind of moments in class where there was discussion group work and exam that really sparked their scientific curiosity so they kind of came up with their work with the neighborhood help for local students it's a kind of multidisciplinary social service apparatus so like let's say a physician a nurse a social worker student volunteers they all come together to kind of care for and offer service to families and and patients nearby and so they were part of this multidisciplinary group as a volunteer and then they settled on a specific story so that's still resume level right now they settled on a specific story of a teenager and their family and how they kind of helped that teenager specifically the i believe it was the team was there to see the mom but it was the mom son the teenager that the volunteer kind of zeroed in on and and helped out with additional resources so that was a great transition to this has helped me to get to know my neighbors and how i can be of service and then they added another patient-centric experience there and so they talked about kind of the call center then went into kind of the call center that they were volunteering at it was like a covid tracing call center so and then it went into how like when she heard that 81 year old lola was having suicidal ideations she began a protocol she never expected to use but after remaining with lola online and then connecting her with the right mental health professionals she realized how medicine is an act of humanity a neighborly love and it is her fascination with the psychological neurological dimensions of depression combined with the urge to care beyond what is expected that brings her to medicine so that was like kind of like the paragraph that the student kind of fleshed out a little bit more when they said that they wanted to get to know and be of service a bit more for their neighbors so then the next line in that really compact paragraph was that they're shadowing a primary physician a dermatologist was really kind of formative for them i told i advised the student to kick that to their activity section and then maybe a secondary but i would not put the shadowing in the personal statement and then we've all we started to flesh out so much that you know they didn't really need the space or like the characters for that um if anything we wanted to create a little bit more space for more active engagement so we jumped into the mobile medical clinic which was the last experience the last line in that compact paragraph so the essay culminated in the experience in the mobile health clinic after a hurricane which was like such a foundational moment in their journey to medicine when they anchored it with 72-year-old frank who was really kind of you know helped in helping him it helped the student clarify their why medicine and so then the conclusion which they kind of paired it with a new intro was a Spanish saying that their family would use and it was so what's your destiny or what's your fate no one can take from you and they brought this in as a dimension of their Puerto Rican heritage and how they speak Spanish and they connected that on the patient level as they reflected on the line kind of saying how you know it is there or they believe it is their destiny to serve others and so they brought in so much more from that one paragraph we were able to bring so much more kind of dimension on who they are their lessons how they connect with patients if this was helpful please give us a like comment below if you want any kind of you know brainstorming or you know development tips for your own personal statement and if you want to know how I work with students please schedule your free 15 minute call and we chat about how I work with students and we'll see if we're a good fit to work together talk soon take care bye