Your advice on every video I watch of yours is the absolute best. Concise, organized and informative. Praying med school is going well for you! Thanks for giving back to future medical students in this way
Wonderful and precious advise Rex, the best video I have seen so far about personal statement. Wrote down everything and will write my personal statement based on your guide.
Haha, love it! Probably don't need to start writing yet, but going through and self-reflecting is always something I would recommend and just use it as motivation!
Hey! Some advice I’ve heard is to have a cohesive theme throughout your personal statement and your application, what are your thoughts on that? Do you think it helps?
Thanks for the question! I'd just clarify the use of the word "theme" to make sure we are talking about the same thing. I'm guessing I know what you mean, but in case we aren't I don't think you should try to have like a literary theme such as "hard work pays off" or "no man is an island" throughout a personal statement and application. However, I think an incredibly important thing to have across your personal statement and application is to build a consistent narrative/story/picture of who you are. You shouldn't repeat yourself in different parts of the application, but they should all work together to built on each other and knit the narrative/story/picture together. After reading your personal statement, a reader of the rest of your application should see a lot of your activities and say "ah, that makes sense why this applicant would chose to spend their time on this specific activity given what I learned in the personal statement" if the overall personal statement and application have that consistent narrative/story/picture. Bad Example: You don't want to have an awesome personal statement about how you want to become a doctor to serve cancer patients where you have a beautifully written, personal story related to cancer, but then you never shadow an oncologist, never volunteer with an organization that serves cancer patients, survivors, or their families, never join a club that helps raise money or awareness for cancer, or never do any research related to cancer. Good Example (hopefully): In my case, I tried to build a story of someone who has a deep connection with the elderly and wants to dedicate his life to serving them through orthopedic surgery because he sees the impact of losing mobility on autonomy/independence/quality of life/feeling like a burden while recognizing the incredible gift of my own mobility as an athlete making me extra cognizant to populations who have lost their mobility. My personal statement, volunteering, clinical experience, time as a D1 wrestler, and even biomedical engineering major all tied into and built upon different aspects of this story without ever repeating myself.
