Diversity Essay: How to Get Started

I've had several questions on how to approach the secondary essay diversity prompt. In considering your strategy and content, I'd recommend you ask yourself the following question: 

What ethnic, religious, racial, gender, language, socioeconomic, or sexual orientation aspects of me, my family, or my experience make me distinctive?   

Please note that experience is part of the question I have posed. An applicant I mentored a few years back wrote me concerned that she did not fit into a minority category and thus, could not answer the prompt effectively. I suggested she consider an experience that targeted the prompt's theme, and she wrote a strong essay about her successful efforts to increase diversity during sorority rush. I crafted one of my secondary essays on my experience hearing Spike Lee speak in person. Don't be afraid to think outside the box.

How to Get Clinical Experience Safely During the COVID Pandemic

I've written before about the importance of premeds' getting clinical experience. Not only is robust clinical participation critical to obtaining a medical school acceptance, it's also important to ensure you like working with patients before heading down the long medical training path. 

During this pandemic, working as an EMT, scribe, or certified phlebotomist can be risky. So how can you get clinical experience without being in the clinic?

Here are three ideas:

1. Become a contact tracer -  I tweeted last month about a great Johns Hopkins training opportunity. Working as a contact tracer is a way to do a good deed, learn to convey difficult information to lay people, and make some money. 

2. Work on a crisis hotline (phone or text) - Many people are, understandably, in distress right now, and learning to assist those having emotional challenges will help you as a future physician.

3. Work on a COVID information hotline - There is a lot of misinformation floating about. Conveying accurate scientific concepts to the public is, again, an excellent skill to have in your tool box as a future doctor. 

Check out my goofy, less-than-one-minute video about the importance of getting clinical experience here. 

Brevity is the Soul of Wit

As William Shakespeare so wisely pointed out, being concise is critical for good writing.

I've been editing a lot of personal statements over the last few months, and I deliberately recommend a word count of 750 or fewer for my advisees for a couple of reasons:

First, I've found that that number is just the right balance of content and streamlining: Over 750 words for an admissions essay lends itself to meandering writing.

Second, your reader is likely reviewing tens or even scores of applications in a short period of time. S/he is looking to spend as little time as possible on your written materials, while still getting a good flavor for your candidacy. Don't burden your reader with verbiage.

Having trouble being brief? Here's a helpful trick: Imagine AMCAS, AACOMAS, or ERAS is charging you $10 per word. How would you keep costs down?

Choosing the Right Category for your AMCAS Experiences

AMCAS provides 18 categories in which you can classify your experiences. They are

Artistic Endeavors
Community Service/Volunteer – Not Medical/Clinical
Community Service/Volunteer – Medical/Clinical
Conferences Attended
Extracurricular Activities
Hobbies
Honors/Awards/Recognitions
Intercollegiate Athletics
Leadership – Not listed elsewhere
Military Service
Other
Paid Employment – Medical/Clinical
Paid Employment – Not Medical/Clinical
Physician Shadowing/Clinical Observation
Presentations/Posters
Publications
Research/Lab
Teaching/Tutoring/Teaching Assistant  

Sometimes an activity can match two categories. When that happens, lean on the clinical categories, if applicable. (For example, if your activity is both Leadership and Community Service - Medical/ Clinical, chose the latter.) If clinical is not relevant, then choose the category in which you have the fewest activities. 

A client who came to me as a re-applicant told me that a school from which she was rejected indicated that they had not counted a clearly clinical activity as clinical because she had classified it differently. Be sure you consider the categories deliberately in crafting your AMCAS.  

Strategic Tips for the AMCAS Most Meaningful Paragraphs

Back in 2012, seemingly out of blue, a significant, new addition appeared on the AMCAS®. Applicants were being asked to identify their most significant extracurricular experiences (up to three) and support their choices with more writing. The instructions stated:

This is your opportunity to summarize why you have selected this experience as one of your most meaningful. In your remarks, you might consider the transformative nature of the experience, the impact you made while engaging in the experience and the personal growth you experienced as a result of your participation. 1325 max characters.

Now the Most Meaningful Paragraphs are par for the course, but applicants routinely make a few avoidable errors in crafting them. Here are tips to craft your best work:

1) Don’t merge the descriptors with the Most Meaningful Paragraphs because they are separate sections: You can complete descriptors for up to 15 activities with up to 700 characters each, plus up to three Most Meaningful Paragraphs of up to 1325 characters each. The fact that these are two different tasks might seem clear to some, but every year, I get AMCAS drafts to edit that include this error.

2) Do not use patient anecdotes in your Most Meaningful Paragraphs: Most medical school applicants have patient vignettes to share, which means that a patient story does not distinguish an applicant from the masses of other candidates. Also, these patient stories can sound trite or even condescending.

3) Don’t repeat what you have written in your descriptor. The Most Meaningful Paragraphs are an opportunity to delve deeper into your achievement. Let’s say you are showcasing your experience as a biochemistry teaching assistant. In the Most Meaningful Paragraph, give concrete examples of what you taught, to whom, how often, using what techniques. If you were promoted to head TA or asked to come back the next semester, showcase teaching achievements that propelled you to get the position. Did you get excellent teaching reviews from students? Did you offer an unconventional way of learning the difficult material? If so, what was it? By delving deeper, you can truly demonstrate the “transformative nature of the experience, the impact you made while engaging in the experience and the personal growth you experienced as a result of your participation.” Make sure to pick at least one of those three topics and answer it in the Most Meaningful Paragraphs. 

Bottom line: The Most Meaningful Paragraphs are an opportunity for you to demonstrate your distinctiveness and worthiness for medical school. Don’t waste this chance to further your candidacy.