Kevin's Opinion
Although not explicitly stated on school websites, I venture to say that it's probable that personal statements generall count to approximately 5-10% of your application. Of course, the weight vary from school to school (i.e the personal written responses for McMaster counts for 32% of the pre-interview mark). However for most school, it's difficult to imagine it to be worth more than 10%. At schools where personal essays are accessible to interviewers, they may play a much larger role as they can influence the interviewers' first impression of you and hence affect your interview mark. Whether it's 5% or 32% of your application, needless to say, you should tackle it with all seriousness.
Firstly, put your feet in the shoes of the admission committee. With all the GPA, MCAT, extracurriculars, research, and with the interviewing system shifting to MMI, how can admissions get an insight to who you really are as a person? The personal statement is as personal as it gets. Here is an opportunity for you to demonstrate your human qualities and make a case for your place in medicine. This essay is really about answering two questions - "why do you want to be a doctor" and "why will you make a good doctor". Before beginning your essay, you should carefully think about how you can address these two questions effectively, as all essay content should be tailored to answering these two questions. No matter what content you have, a good rule to follow is "show, not tell". Its easy to say what kind of a person you are and state why you want to be a physician, but without concrete examples, why should anyone take your word for it? If you say you are an honest and altruistic person, demonstrate it with personal examples! After all, it's a personal statement.
As for answering "why you want to be a doctor", ideally (but not necessarily) you would want to demonstrate:
- That you have experience in the healthcare field and have a good understanding of what medicine is.
- Clear understanding of yourself and what you seek in a career.
- A logical progression from your first exposure to medicine to how you've decided to commit yourself to a life in medicine.
As for answering "why you would make a good doctor", you would want to demonstrate a myriad of qualities such as maturity and altruism. Furthermore, you should keep in mind of what's known as "CanMEDS competencies" for physicians. This is a framework established by the Royal College of Physicians and Surgeons of Canada that describes the core competencies that a physician should possess. The seven core competencies are:
- professional
- communicator
- collaborator
- manager
- health advocate
- scholar
- medical expert
As you can see, being a good doctor is much more than simply being a medical expert with the sheer desire to help people. You must also be a collaborator who can work well in a team, a relentless advocate for the health of your patients, a manager who can manage and organize his/her surrounding resources, and much more. So take your time to think about what it means to be a good physician, and then evaluate yourself accordingly. By understanding the official criteria that is set up by the guys who actually license physicians (RCPSC) for what physician competency means, you can better tailor your sales pitch to the ears of the admissions committee. For an in-depth explanation of the CanMEDS roles, take a look at CanMEDS2005
If you can answer the two mentioned questions in a genuine and convincing way, then you've written a successful personal statement. Since each applicant has a different story to tell, there is no single preferred approach. However, two common approaches are chronological and thematic. The former is a organized chronological narration of important events that depict your life story, while the latter focuses on themes that you wish to discuss and are supported by examples from any time in your life.
After reading innumerable personal statements from friends and books, I found that the good essays always had a genuine tone, a personable story, a simple/elegant use of language, and a sense of maturity in the conveyed messages. Too many writers try to flex their vocab with impressive words, jampack the paragraphs with superflous literary devices, and make themselves sound like saints. A word of advice - be genuine. The people who will be viewing these are professionals. The can smell BS from miles away, so don't even try it. Even if your content is 100% legit, if your writing has anything that sounds like it may belong to the realm of BS, your credibility will be destroyed.
Writing the personal essay is no easy task, so give yourself ample time for writing and editing. I gave myself about 3 weeks to complete it, and had friends and professors to edit them. If you have friends already in medicine or as physicians, definitely ask them to help you out. You might even want to invite them out for coffee so you can ask them for feedbacks. Whatever your story may be, I am sure that you have a interesting tale to tell. So don't be stressed about writing this mammoth of an essay. The hardest part is starting, so get to it!
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