Part 2: The medical school diversity essay
However, my post-graduation plans changed dramatically. I was set to take a gap year, during which time Id planned to complete my medical school applications while working full-time in the genetics lab Id been a part of for the past year. Because the lab shut down along with the rest of the university, my position was paused and then a few months later cancelled entirely. As a result of losing this additional research experience, I decided to delay applying to medical school for another year. If your med school primary application, with your personal statement and activities descriptions, is your chance to explain your unique motivations for a career in medicine, your secondaries give you a greater opportunity to make an impassioned case for a specific medical school. Secondaries can include any number of essay prompts; one such essay, becoming increasingly more common, is known as the diversity essay. Ah, the diversity essayperhaps one of the most feared, and most misunderstood, medical school admissions secondaries. Its a prompt thats given many med school applicants a good deal of anxiety! But it doesnt have to be this way. The first step to writing a strong diversity essay for your secondaries is understanding what it isand its purpose in getting you into medical school.
To cite an example, let us say reading about Barack Obama had a great influence on your life. Further, you felt fascinated by the manner in which he went on to be the first African-American President of the United States of America. So, reading about his journey and his rise to power changed your perspective towards black Americans forever. Not only this but it also made you realize why the world needs to find a way around racism and discrimination so that real talents can come to the forefront. Hence, it reshaped your perception of humanity and made you believe in equality and diversity more than ever before. Furthermore, you can add, because of this influence, you now look at all individuals with equal respect and try to exclude any form of discrimination from your behavior. Also, you see potentials, kindness, and creativity in people and not their race or skin color. In this manner, you can represent how your demeanor has great acceptance for diversity. Many students think diversity, must apply primarily to individuals or groups that are underrepresented in medicine. Some students think that diversity, must refer to ethnicity, race, or sexual orientation.
Instead, consider the purpose of this essay as sharing your perspective or philosophy on diversity issues and choose one or two themes to discuss in depth. Examples of themes include intersectionality, managing differences and/or similiarities of identities with clients, visible vs. invisible identities, transference and countertransference issues, privilege and oppression, identity development, etc. This will include ethnicity/race, class, gender, or sexual orientation. When they ask about diversity this is what they are most likely referring to and talking about other types of diversity might dilute your statement. For example, while you might have had to navigate different environments moving to New York from the Georgia, this is probably less meaningful to the readers of your statement unless it it was connected to your experiences or being a ethnic minority in that new environment. As a medical school applicant, youve worked hard on your submitting the best AMCAS application you can. Youve written a compelling medical school personal statement, a detailed AMCAS Work and Activities section, and more. Now med schools are sending you school-specific secondary applications that require you to write additional essays? (WARNING:Make sure to always answer each school's specific prompt, especially when secondary application fatigue inevitably kicks in.
Application sample diversity essay - Example 1:Share with us a difficult or challenging situation you have encountered and how you dealt with it. In your response, identify both the coping skills you called upon to resolve the dilemma, and the support person(s) from whom you sought advice. (University of Chicago Pritzker School of Medicine)
While those are legitimate (and important!) things to consider in a diversity essay, really this simplified understanding of the term leads to all the confusion. When schools ask you to answer this question, they are really asking how you will contribute to a diverse student body. They want to know what is unique about you; so that you can add, in a meaningful way, to their school community. Because the verification process can take several weeks, it's important to submit your primary application as soon as possible after AMCAS opens submission on June 1. Students who submit AMCAS in early June can expect to begin receiving their secondary applications in late June to early July, positioning themselves to take full advantage of rolling admissions. Bottom line: You want your readers to feel like that they are meeting you not someone else, not a scripted piece of shallow PR devoid of personality and humanity, and not some phony combo of you and the author of an essay in a guidebook or on a website. They really and truly want to meet you! The reality is that most application reviewers do not really want you to answer the first part of this essay question they can see your client demographics on your AAPI. This topic is broad, and it can feel overwhelming to try to capture all your thoughts into 500 words.
Log into your ETS account and select Stanford Law School as a recipient of GRE results using the school code 4993. Scores received on tests taken prior to June 2016 will not be considered valid. I graduated with a BS in Mechanical Engineering in [GRADUATION YEAR] and spent my first 3 years out of college working as an operations consultant. It was my job to walk into a manufacturing plant and drive significant operational change for example, I once spent 3 months walking the sticky floors of a milk plant in [MID-SIZED U. S. SOUTHEASTERN CITY] helping plant management boost throughput by 30 in order to take on a new customer. We accomplished this goal with zero capital spend, a feat many had believed was impossible. In our projects, the biggest challenge was almost always convincing managers to reach for that extra tad of unseen opportunity hiding within the operation, because oftentimes it was very difficult to look beyond the daily struggles that plagued their operations. I worked directly with 5-8 person rapid results teams, coaching them on how to think about operational improvement, motivating them to sprint towards it, and leading them through the analysis required to capture it. Ileft those milk, water and oil sands plants with many enduring friendships and inspiring operational victories borne from our journey from ambitious goals to concrete results.
(If youre not an immigrant but your parents immigrated to the U. S. ) A thoughtful account about the values/perspectives/goals your parents tried to instill in you, how they may have clashed with your values growing up in a bicultural environment, and how you resolved these differences I believe that the answers to these questions and others will come from the Community Health Program at the University of Washington (UW). The year-round lecture series on topics, such as Health Disparities:An Unequal World's Biggest Challenge, will allow me to engage closely with faculty and students to work towards developing holistic community-based solutions. Furthermore, the UW PEERS clinic and Friends of UW provide an opportunity to work closely with urban Seattle neighborhoods similar to those I have worked with in Boston. GRE. If you choose to apply with the GRE, you should take the exam no later than February 1, 2022. This deadline is based on the time needed by the Educational Testing Service (ETS) to get scores to us by our application deadline of February 15, 2022. You must arrange with ETS to have your GRE scores sent directly to us.
Moving further, during my high school days, I have worked on various voluntary projects on gender roles, women self-help groups, and have also won many debating competitions. Most of these debates and declamations were based on womens empowerment and the rise of feminism. Besides, I have always seen diversity and ending discrimination as a way of life. Also, in the pursuit of my ambition to become a leading business lady and a fine example of feminism, I have enriched my personality with various essential skills. So, I have what is a prerequisite to take up leadership roles in a community. The good news is that these types of essays allow you to highlight something about yourself that isnt well represented elsewhere in your application, and you may even be able to use one of your pre-writes to do it. Remember that colleges not only learn about who you are, but also what you might contribute to their community. Take your essay the final step and show admissions officers how your diversity impacts the way you approach your life.