To end up with a competitive application, it takes a lot of revisions on your first draft. It takes more than 10 drafting and re-drafting to get the competitive edge in your personal statement. It is also advisable to have professional advisers or experts to read your work and ask them to pose questions about your personal statement. This will help you to think further and add more content to your work. This is a very helpful tip if you want to be confident that your work is proofread.
Look for grammatical flaws
Before thinking of passing your primary application, the most important thing you should never take for granted is the grammatical errors you might have committed. It is very common to see grammatical errors in essays, which have not been revised thoroughly. This could give the admissions officers a bad impression about you. They might think you?re not really interested in becoming a doctor. It is a very small error that applicants take for granted. But this small error could cost them their admission.
Check if each sentence is clear
Read and re-read your sentences. Make sure that they convey your point and that they are simple enough to be understood by a lay person. Don?t make a sentence too long. It will be confusing to the reader. Ask one of your friends to read it for you and see if he or she understands your point in every sentence. Organize the sentences so they show an organized timeline of events. This will prevent your personal statement from becoming a big jigsaw puzzle.
Make sure that all ideas are cohesive
The final thing to check is if all the ideas are telling the admissions committee one thing. It will be a mess even if your essay is grammatically incorrect or if the sentences cannot be understood easily. It all comes down to the essay as a whole. Ask yourself this: Did my essay convey the same message all throughout? It will make a great difference if the admissions committee sees nothing wrong with the grammar–all sentences are clear and concise and they all say the same thing to them. If you find there are discrepancies or irrelevant ideas, don?t be afraid to revise your quotations, words, sentences, paragraphs, or even rewrite the whole essay. Take your time and be determined to give them a perfect essay.
Related links:
Medical School Application ? Using a personal approach for med school admission essays
Personal Statement Guide ? Tips on writing a personal statement
Journalism experience – Using your journalism experience as an edge in writing personal statements
Specialization in Medicine – why discussing specializations in admission essays are important
Foreign Med Students – Guide for foreign students in applying to US med schools
