Anyone Here Have Experience Reviewing/Selecting Med School Applications?

Nobody cares about personal statement.

All that matters is MCAT, GPA and the college you went to

Yuge bonus points if you are a minority (not asian)

Then act like a normal well adjusted person during interview.

Join a blackjack team, go to Vegas and count cards, then make money, then lose all that money. That will make a great personal statement.

Also helps to have an interesting resume showing a lot of positive life experiences.

I do. I always pick the diverse applicants with 2.0s and the girls that want to be full time mommies

White boys have to overcome a lot of diversity to get into med school

It’s not a job. It’s a calling that must show through in every thing written and said.

Be sure to include “Ive wanted to be a doctor since I was a kid” if you really want to stand out.

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Left out one of the biggest, who you know.

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This is like 50% of the battle. You’re fighting for the left over spots after they fill the ‘who you know’ seats in the class.

Personal statements for Med school and then residency almost never are a deciding factor for getting an applicant in, but can certainly be a reason to get an applicant placed in the “hell no” pile. I know the programs I’ve been involved with didn’t care so much about what the personal statement says as long as it was well-written and not off the wall. Very few people can truly set themselves apart with details in the PS that weren’t readily available elsewhere such as the CV.

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Very few people can truly set themselves apart with details in the PS that weren’t readily available elsewhere such as the CV.

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See, that’s where my son is potentially different. But he is very hesitant to discuss a very big part of who he is and why he wants to be a doctor. I have no clue whether he should include it or not. I could see it helping him, hurting him, or making no difference, depending on the reviewer.

He was born with a very rare congenital heart defect: Non-Williams Supravalvular Aortic Stenosis. No real issues until 3 years ago, and then out of the blue we found out he needed surgery after doing a stress test to see if he could be cleared to play football his senior year of high school. He had to undergo two STAT Level 4 open heart surgeries within four days in March of 2017. Pretty much a miracle he had not dropped dead before the surgery, and pretty much another miracle that he has recovered without any adverse effects (save the mechanical aortic valve, Dacron patched aorta, and extensive work on both coronaries). Went on to be Salutatorian of his high school class. Currently a sophomore at Auburn with a 4.0 in Biomedical Sciences. Tons of hours of volunteering, including volunteering at summer camps for heart patients. Led research project last summer at Emory about blood pressure readings in obese pediatric patients. Just submitted article and abstract (as first author...2nd author is an Associate Professor of Medicine at Harvard and 4th author is Director of Cardiac ICU at Emory/CHOA’s Egleston Children’s Hospital) and he has already been asked to present the abstract and poster at a Pediatric research conference in June. They all feel pretty sure that the article will be published in leading pediatric publications.

For a current sophomore in undergrad, he already has one hell of a resume. He is quite outgoing and will interview very well. Don’t know how well he will do on MCAT, but I suspect he will do just fine. So, the big question: Should he include his heart journey or not in the personal statement? He doesn’t really want to ask the doctors that he has gotten to know at this point, but I suspect that will be where he will get his best advice.

Sorry for the shameless flex about my boy, but none of us really know what to do, and he wants to get started on the personal statement soon, because it will be needed for most internship applications.

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He doesn’t really want to ask the doctors that he has gotten to know at this point, but I suspect that will be where he will get his best advice.

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With the journey he's been on, I would imagine ya'll/he have a decent relationship with at least some of his doctors. If he expresses his desire to become a doctor, I would think that his doctors could possibly be a valuable resource to tap in to for advice.