How I got a T on the MCAT Writing Sample

When I took the Princeton Review Prep Course three years ago, I got a N on my first diagnostic exam writing sample (i.e. from my full length online practice exams). After that, I got T’s on all of my subsequent diagnostic exam writing samples. I went on to get a T on my actual MCAT.

You don’t need to be a great writer to get a T on the MCAT writing sample – in fact, you can be a great writer and not score high on the writing sample. Rather, what you need is a combination of things: be a competent writer, have enough knowledge to come up with good examples, and be able to think critically about those examples and how they relate to the overall theme of the prompt. The MCAT writing sample section can be solved with a systematic approach, and in this article, I hope to impart some specific strategies to help you do just that. While I won’t tell you how to attack the writing sample section from scratch, I think there are a lot of tid bits in this article that will help you significantly improve your score from where it currently is.

Before we begin, it is probably a good idea to review the writing sample section overall. I will go ahead and quote what the AAMC has to say about the writing sample:

Each Writing Sample item consists of a topic statement (printed boldly) followed by instructions for three writing tasks. Your first task is to explain or interpret the topic statement. Because the first two sentences of the instructions are the same for all items, they are stated once here rather than beneath each item. These instructions are: Write a unified essay in which you perform the following tasks. Explain what you think the above statement means.

The instructions for the second and third writing tasks vary from item to item and are printed immediately beneath each topic statement. When using this list for practice, you should be sure to follow the instructions for all three tasks in writing your essay.

So the first task is clearly to explain the statement/prompt. In general, the second and third tasks are some variant of providing a counter example to the prompt, and then designing a “rule” (or guideline) to explain when the statement is true and when it is not.

Now that we’re all on the same page, here are some specific things I did that I think helped in me getting a T.

Find an Example to Both Support AND Oppose the Prompt

The MCAT writing sample prompts only require you to explain the prompt, but not provide an example to support it. Rather, they ask you to explain the prompt and provide one counter-example.

I’m going to go ahead and ask you to do more than that. I’m telling you to also provide an example to support the prompt.

While it isn’t necessary, it’s what I was taught to do and it worked for me. Having an example that proves and supports the prompt makes your essay that much stronger. It also makes task 3, the rule, much stronger because the reader will be able to see how the rule was applied to derive both an example to support the prompt and an example to go against it.

Use Specific Examples

When I say specific examples, I mean events that have actually happened (and if possible, elaborate and include details about them). What I don’t mean are hypothetical or generic examples. If you want to use a computer software company as an example, don’t say “a computer software company” – say Microsoft (or any other real software company). It doesn’t even matter if you don’t elaborate further about Microsoft – at the very least, use it instead of “generic computer software company”. Of course, an even stronger example is to write about a real computer software company and something that actually happened to them. In any case, just don’t use generic examples.

Don’t fret too much about how popular or well-known the example is – the most important thing is that it is real, and thus, provides a more vivid picture. On my actual MCAT writing sample, the four examples I used were Mothers Against Drunk Driving, Stephane Dion and the Liberal Party of Canada, Google, and my father’s old computer software company. As you can see, I used examples that ranged from well known (Google) to unknown (my dad’s local computer software employer). In the end, the important thing is that my examples were specific and real, and thus, vivid in the mind of the reader. Moreover, real examples (as opposed to hypothetical ones) are stronger for the very fact that they have happened and are thus evidence (whereas hypothetical examples are, at best, theoretical).

Oh, and if you’re Canadian, use Canadian examples! The markers are American and this has two main implications. First, your Canadian examples, while “local” to you, will seem “international” to the reader (which is a plus). In addition, since your Canadian examples will likely be unknown to the American marker, it’s okay you get some of the facts wrong. Contrast that with well-known American examples, where a fact mishap might hurt your score!

Come up with the Rule First

It is natural instinct for us to do things in the order tasks are presented to us, and the writing sample is no different. In fact, many MCAT prep courses teach us to do the tasks in order. That is, think of the required examples first and then create the rule to bridge them. However, I don’t think this is the best way.

Consider the following writing sample prompt:

Education occurs when the student has a desire to learn.

Describe a specific situation in which education might occur without the student’s having a desire to learn. Discuss what you think determines when education requires that the student have a desire to learn and when it does not.

One example of when a student has the desire to learn is when he enters into a program (e.g. MBA) to improve his knowledge/understanding of his career field and, therefore, his job prospects. One example of when education doesn’t require the student to have a desire to learn is when premeds take certain prerequisites just to satisfy medical school requirements. Say you were to attack the writing sample prompt by coming up with these two examples first before doing anything else. Sure you might have the first two thirds of the essay now written, but then you get to task three and… can you come up with a rule to connect these two examples (as well as a rule that can be used to evaluate future examples)? I think it’s rather difficult to come up with a good rule/guideline to connect these two specific examples.

In cases like this, you suddenly realize you cannot think of a rule/guideline to bridge the two examples! (or even if you do, the rule is rather weak) Without this rule, your essay is incomplete, and you scramble to make up something that barely connects the two examples.

Instead, I think it makes much more sense to think of the rule/guideline first(that is, first determine when the prompt is true and when it is not), and then use that rule to derive the supporting example and counter example – this way, you know for sure that the two examples can indeed work together.

So for this prompt, I would first come up with a rule like: “What determines whether or not education requires a desire to learn is at what time point of his education the student is in, with high school graduation being the dividing line”. From there, the examples are easy to derive: If the student is in high school or below, then education is mandatory and doesn’t require his desire to learn (supporting example). However, after graduating from high school, university/college is not mandatory, and thus post-secondary education requires the students desire and initiative to learn (counter-example).

By developing the rule first, you ensure you don’t waste time writing an essay that can’t be united by the end. Moreover, once you have the rule, the examples become very easy to derive.

Write A LOT

Each of your writing samples is graded by a human marker, as well as a computerized scoring system. It’s important to consider the implications of how the writing sample is graded, especially since this is the only section of the MCAT where marking isn’t an exact science.

Let me preface this by saying that I don’t know how the computer marks the writing samples. But if I had to speculate (which I love to do), I’d guess that the computer marks you on spelling, grammar, and length. I don’t think it’s a proportional marking scheme (i.e. I don’t think the more you write, the better, since writing too much is bad too), but I do think there might be a certain range of word length that is looked for. But given the time restrictions, I think it’s near impossible for someone to overwrite. The fact is that a one word essay is probably not very good, and neither is a 10 word one, and nor a 50 word one. Longer is probably better.

In addition, a decently long essay is impressive at first glance, and could sway a human marker in your favour. So feel free to write a lot, elaborate on your ideas, and make sure what you’ve written is clear to someone who knows nothing about the subject.

Practice, Practice, Practice!

This should be obvious, but yeah, practice doesn’t hurt. Looking for prompts? Look no further than the official AAMC Writing Sample Prompts – many of these tend to show up on actual MCAT tests (I know mine are on there!).

I don’t think it’s necessary to write a lot of full length writing samples, unless you feel the actual writing part is your weak point. For many students, the problem is in coming up with the ideas, examples, and rules. I was in this boat, and I found it helpful to just pick random prompts and discuss/debate them with friends to get into the habit of generating examples and prompts (as well as learning from the thought processes and ideas of others).

Well, that’s all I have to say. Hope this helps!