Being in medical school has opened up many doors and presented a vast number of opportunities. As a medical student, it is very easy to say get an opportunity to shadow any type of physician in an affiliated teaching hospital – something much harder to do as an undergrad or high school student. The same goes for research opportunities. It is much easier to approach medical researchers for opportunities to work with them if you are already a medical student. I think it’s because as a medical student, it is more likely that you will remain in this field, and thus your contributions become valuable both in the short term as well as potentially leading to long term contributions (e.g. a medical student doing cardiology research is more likely to end up being a cardiology researcher than an undergrad or high school student, since they have already made it through into medical school).

That being said, securing these types of opportunities and getting people to say “yes” are still challenging, no matter who you are. When emailing potential researchers to work for, it’s not uncommon to be rejected – let alone ignored completely (yes, this does happen to everyone!). I myself have had emails ignored, and trust me, it can be frustrating.

The wrong way to look at it is to let the frustration get to you mentally and emotionally and discourage you from asking again. However, the way you should react is simply to ask more. Get rejected? Ask someone else. Keep asking over and over until you get what you want, and be willing to search for new opportunities and new people to work with if you have to.

I call this the planting seeds method. You shouldn’t expect to get a yes on the first, second, or even third attempt. You should be willing to plant a lot of seeds if you have to. Realize that in the end, all you might need is one or two yes’s. Sometimes that will take a hundred seeds, but if you’re ‘willing to put in the work, it isn’t that hard.

So you got a rejection. How long does it take to just copy and paste your email to someone else? Realistically, not very long. If you send enough emails, ask enough people, you’re bound to find people who will say yes.

And this goes beyond asking for research opportunities. Looking for a job? Be willing to plant many seeds and send out many resumes and job applications.

Moreover, realize that your probability of success goes up when you plant more seeds not just because you are planting more seeds, but because every new seed you plant is likely a better seed than the previous – that is, you are likely to learn from your previous method and become better at asking/applying or whatever it is you’re planting.

So please don’t give up, don’t get discouraged. If you’re thinking of giving up, don’t – just plant more seeds.

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There is a ton of diversity across Canada (let alone the world) when it comes to medical school admissions processes. The following is what I would do if I ran a medical school. If there are any medical school admissions committees seeking advice, you know how to reach me .

GPA / MCAT

I’ve said before that if I were forced to only use one item for selecting candidates, it would be GPA. So there’s no way I could leave it out if I got a chance to re-design the entire process. GPA is useful because it shows a candidate’s academic ability over a fairly long period. Due to the nature of GPA calculations, you need to be consistent to score well. You need to be able to work hard for several years. Qualities like intelligence, work ethic, organizational skills, etc. are highly suggested from a good GPA, and you need those skills to be a good medical student, first and foremost. If you don’t have the ability to learn well and study hard, you won’t be able to acquire the knowledge you need to be a competent doctor. GPA is one of the only ways for students to prove that.

Of course, one of the problems with GPA is that everyone takes different courses from different programs in different institutions. This is where the MCAT comes in, to standardized the process a bit. The MCAT allows us to compare certain abilities of students from many different programs and backgrounds. The drawback to the MCAT is that it only represents a single event, which students study a few months for – which does not tell us much about the student’s ability to be a learner for a much longer period of time. In addition, the material tested on the MCAT and its relevance to medicine are debatable, and it is problematic in the sense that it is organized by someone else and limits the medical school’s ability to control what type of skills should be tested.

As such, I think using both GPA and the MCAT is important. However, I disagree with the strict cutoff method that some medical schools use. It doesn’t make sense to me for someone scoring 14/14/8/T with a 4.0 GPA to not have an interview, while someone with a 10/10/9/Q and 3.7 GPA to be guaranteed one.

I think it makes much more sense to use an algorithm that combines the GPA and MCAT into a single score, and then rank applicants that way for the interview.

Scrap Personal Essays and Autobiographical Sketches

The problem with personal essays is that they are subjective (because you wrote it and of course you will say good things about yourself) and they are often only as good as they are written (that is, people who are better at essay writing will be graded better – the problem, however, is that you want to find doctor candidates, not essay candidates). Not to mention that no one really knows how much of the writing is yours versus that of your family, friends, or any other outside help. You can write that you are a great leader and that you’ve developed good communication skills, but committees shouldn’t just blindly accept that as true.

Autobiographical sketches (that is, lists of your experiences) are similarly problematic. Someone listing that they were the president of X club does not tell the admissions committee anything definitive about the skills actually developed – the only thing committees can conclude with certainty is that you won the election. Two individuals with the same item on their list could have vastly different experiences (i.e. one person could’ve worked their tail off, while the other could’ve done nothing). What skills and traits you actually possess now is what committees need to know, not what skills/traits you “might” have based on the experience you “might” have.

In a perfect world, committees would see candidates in action, and evaluate them on traits like compassion, problem solving, communication, etc. Unfortunately, admissions committees aren’t going to waltz into your club or volunteer program to see exactly how you are in your environment (and even if they could, unless they could become invisible, what they see of you would obviously be a biased sample).

So, what can we do? The closest thing I can see for a medical school’s own evaluation of a candidates traits at this moment in time is through the Multiple Mini Interview, which is why I think that should be used, and essays/lists, etc. should be scrapped completely.

Multiple Mini Interview

I would probably interview a number of candidates around 2.5 times the number of seats in the class. Interviews would be made automatically to the top X candidates based on the GPA/MCAT algorithm. Once you make the interview, I wouldn’t make GPA/MCAT count anymore because in my opinion, once you’ve meet that standard of academic scrutiny, it’s more than good enough to be a good doctor. From here on out, I would want to see whether you possess the skills, traits, and potential to fulfill the other aspects of being a physician (the non-academic side).

The traditional interview style has a lot of variance (since you are often only evaluated by 2 or 3 individuals, who are just a few of many interviewers – so how do they fairly compare all the candidates?). While variance still exists in the MMI format, it’s reduced because each candidate is being seen by 10 to 12 different evaluators. In addition, the ability to test specific traits in the traditional interview is very limited. For these reasons, I would go with the MMI format all the way.

Unlike with personal essays or autobiographical lists, the MMI allows evaluators to evaluate various traits in real time. While the MMI is based on a smaller sample size, it gives medical schools a closer, more objective look at your traits than an applicant saying what they know medical schools want to hear. Given two individuals with identical autobiographical sketches, the MMI will provide some information on which applicant actually has the traits they claim to and which don’t. It is of course not perfect, but I think it is both better and more relevant than relying on essays and item lists.

I personally would suggest MMI stations that focused on problem solving, decision making, compassion, empathy, and ethics/professionalism. I wouldn’t want stations testing specific healthcare and medicine knowledge because, well, isn’t that what medical school is for? (I have actually heard of Canadian medical schools asking candidates about factual medical knowledge and I think that’s pretty “huh”?).

In addition to that, I would want one longer station with the simple question “Why medicine?”. The focus of this station will be to tease out the candidates motivations for pursuing medicine, find out whether they have actually attempted to explore the profession, and etc. It will be a bit more intense, challenging the applicant’s motivations to get down to what’s real. Do they really want to be a doctor? Are they actually ready? The answers to these questions will likely affect the type of doctor they would be.

Reference Letters

I think reference letters are somewhat useful because I think if you can find 3 individuals to say you would make an awesome doctor, that’s saying something. Of course, it too has the problems of variability among letter writing skills of referees. For those reasons, I wouldn’t weigh the reference letters to highly, but I’d way them a decent amount because I think there is good value in them.

Cliff Notes

In short, I would use a combined GPA/MCAT score to select interviewees, and then I would choose the medical school class primarily based on MMI scores, with a touch of reference letters.

But those are just my thoughts. What do you think? How would you do the admissions process, and why?

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Disclaimer: We are in no way affiliated with McMaster Medical School nor with anyone involved with the development or implementation of CASPer (Computer-based Assessment for Sampling Personal characteristics). We have also never seen or participated in any CASPer session. All information in this article is publicly available through a simple Google search. Furthermore, this article provides links to all of those resources, and we encourage you to read them for yourself. The purpose of this article is to simply consolidate publicly available information on an interesting and innovative medical school admissions tool and promote discussion.

Here at MedHopeful, we are constantly striving to provide new insight and information to readers as the admissions process changes, and with that present this article on CASPer.

Why CASPer?

The assessment of non-cognitive skills is a crucial component of any medical school admissions process, and is usually done through the evaluation of personal essays, autobiographical submissions, and interviews. However, interviews are resource intensive (need interviewers, rooms, etc.) and cannot be done for all applicants. In addition, while all applicants can write personal essays/autobiographical submissions, it is hard to know how much of application is the writing of the applicant or that of outside help.

In recent years, McMaster has performed studies (see here and here) analyzing the effectiveness of its five question Autobiogaphical Submission (ABS) pre-interview tool. These studies have shown the ABS to be limited in both reliability and ability to predict future candidate performance. As a result, they developed a “Computer-based Multiple Sample Evaluation of Noncognitive Skills (CMSENS), which eventually became CASPer. More information about the CMSENS and the original research article can be found here.

CASPer Basics

As quoted from the McMaster’s official webpage on CASPer, “CASPer, the Computer-based Assessment for Sampling Personal characteristics, is a web-based assessment of interpersonal skills and decision-making, to be completed at a computer.” All applicants to McMaster medical school are required to complete the CASPer beginning in fall 2010. Please see here for more official information.

Being used for the fist time, CASPer consists of twelve sections. Each section involves providing short-answers to two or three questions. Eight of the twelve sections begin with a one-minute video-clip showing a certain situation, followed by a few questions. The other four sections involve “self-descriptive questions”, also followed by a few questions requiring short answer responses.

You will be allowed five minutes to provide answers for each section, and you are also allowed up to 15 minutes of break time halfway through the session. After last and 12th section, you must complete an exit survey to finish. The CASPer will takes approximately 90 minutes in total.

What to Expect on CASPer?

As we have never seen or used CASPer, we cannot be certain. However, the resources publicly available have given us a basic idea of what we might be able to expect. From that, we can develop some ideas on how to best prepare for CASPer given the limited information we do have.

The article on CMSENS mentioned previously provides some brief information on the type of concepts being tested for with the videos, and it’s possible (and rather likely) the same or similar concepts will be assessed on CASPer.

The video clips used in the CMSENS presented “ethical dilemmas and group dynamic challenges, all lacking an obvious response”. The topics in the videos covered issues like professionalism, confidentiality, communication, and collaboration. These scenario video clips were followed by a few questions.

The self-descriptive questions used in the CMSENS were “similar to traditional interview questions”, and one example provided was “What makes your heart sing?”. These self-descriptive questions were also followed by a few questions requiring short answer responses.

Do we have any idea what an example section on CASPer might look like?

Surprisingly we do, thanks to a presentation given by McMaster at AACRAO’s 96th Annual Meeting in April 2010. You can find a copy of the slides for this presentation here. You can skip to slide 22 if you want to go straight to the CASPer information.

To summarize the important points from the presentation, there is an example CASPer section. In it, there is a video clip showing some sort of situation involving a surgeon, followed by the following three questions posed to the applicant:

1. You must make the decision now (as the surgeon). What is your answer? Why?
2. Should insistence for this surgery relieve the surgeon of all liability? Explain.
3. Should a patient be allowed to sue if the surgeon refuses to operate in these circumstances? Defend your response.

You are allowed up to 1024 characters for each short answer (which is about the size of a decent paragraph). Although we can’t watch the video-clip, it seems pretty clear that it is an ethical dilemma revolving around a surgeon’s decision to operate in a situation where there is no obvious answer.

In addition, it may be worth nothing that the marking scheme for each question is on a 9 point scale ranging from unsatisfactory to superb.

So how should I prepare for CASPer?

Again, it’s hard to say given that there is very little public information on what an example CASPer would look like. But based on what we’ve learned so far, there are a few things we suggest you keep in mind.

First, based on McMaster’s published research studies, it seems very likely that the eight video clip sections will ask for your approach to situations involving ethics, professionalism, confidentiality, communication, and collaboration. It might be worth doing some research into theory and concepts relating to these areas, as well as common problem types that arise and how to approach them. For example, when it comes to communication and collaboration, ideas surrounding conflict resolution would be good to know. I would personally suggest forming a group of friends to research these topics and possible scenarios to discuss and debate (keep in mind that you must complete the CASPer alone, but teamwork can be very valuable during preparation time).

As for the self-descriptive sections, there is very limited information available. The best advice I can suggest is to know yourself as well as possible. What are your experiences and what did you learn from them? Why medicine and how have you prepared for it? What are your goals for the future? What are your strengths/weaknesses? What do you enjoy doing? What motivates you? What annoys you? How do you deal with failure? Just really look into yourself, so these ideas are on the tip of your tongue (or rather, tips of your fingers).

A Reminder

We want to remind everyone that we do not have any inside knowledge regarding CASPer, and all that we do know and the ideas we have discussed are simply the combination of publicly available information on CASPer and our own thoughts. Take everything we have written with a grain of salt, please read all of the resources we have mentioned for a more complete understanding, and good luck!

References

1. Hanson M, Dore K, Reiter H, Eva K. Medical school admissions: revisiting the veracity and independence of completion of an autobiographical screening tool. Academic Medicine 2007;82:S8-S11.
2. Dore K, Hanson M, Reiter H, Blanchard M, Deeth, Eva K. Medical school admissions: enhancing the reliability and validity of an autobiographical screening tool. Academic Medicine 2006;81:S70-S3.
3. Dore K, Reiter H, Eva K, et al. Extending the interview to all medical school candidates–Computer-Based Multiple Sample Evaluation of Noncognitive Skills (CMSENS). Academic Medicine 2009;84:S9-S12.
4. CASPer — Computer-Based Assessment for Sampling Personal Characteristics. 2010. (Accessed July 11, 2010, at http://fhs.mcmaster.ca/mdprog/casper.html.)
5. The Multiple Mini-Interview: Origins and Opportunities. 2010. (Accessed July 12, 2010, at http://handouts.aacrao.org/am10/finished/R0115p_H_Reiter.pdf.)

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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!

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In case you weren’t familiar with the MCAT Writing Sample, here’s a quick rundown. You are required to write two essays, with 30 minutes each, and you are given a score from 1 – 6 on each. The possible total score of the two combined then makes 2 – 12, which is converted to a letter. 12 = T, 11 = S, … and so on. What is a solid score? I would say that a “R” or higher (total score of 10) is solid and competitive.

That being said, here are some examples of writing sample essays that were scored by my MCAT prep course instructor. Essays with scores of 3 – 6 are included. I hope that it’s a good resource, allowing you to gauge what level of writing is required for a good score. Comments (in italics) from my instructor are also included.

A 3/6 – Bare Pass

Developed nations have an obligation to provide aid to the underdeveloped nations of the world.

Write a unified essay in which you perform the following tasks. Explain what you think the above statement means. Describe a specific situation in which a developed nation might not be obligated to provide aid to an underdeveloped nation. Discuss what you think determines when developed nations have an obligation to provide aid to underdeveloped nations.

Throughout human history, there have been countries that stand out to be one of the most powerful nations in the world – Mongolia, the Roman Empire, France, Britain, and, in modern times, the United States of America. Part of the G7 (should be G8), the US stands as one of the developed, wealthy and privileged nations in the world. Through the United States’ efforts, the United Nations has been created, with the goal of ensuring that all peoples have their basic human rights, including food, shelter, education, and justice. The United Nations have focussed its efforts in helping underdeveloped nations, since these are the countries that often do not have the means to provide privileges to its people. As a representative of the developed nations in the world, the United Nations represents their intentions to aid humanity. This intrinsic helping nature becomes an obligation for more privileged countries because of the common thread of humanity between all peoples, as the difference in between nations’ peoples is much smaller than the similarities. Another reason for obligations to aid is due to the shady fact that countries’ wealth have been often been accumulated due to exploitation of other nations in the past. (This is your explanation. Everything before this is background, everything after is example. This is what your essay will be evaluated on. Less background and more explanation will net you higher scores.) Such was the example of Britain’s oppression of India and African countries. As a result, Britain now feels an additional obligation to help these underdeveloped countries. (Overall paragraph comment – Good explanation. But you could be more focused. Just because aid has been provided doesn’t mean that there was an obligation, nor does it explain why there would have been one. All this can be valuable for the example, but doesn’t help the explanation. First task: 4/6)

However, as demonstrated in the mission statement of United Nations, the organization’s goal is to ensure basic human rights. If an underdeveloped country’s administration acts to eliminate or neglect these rights, not only will the United Nations not provide aid, but the organization might consider taking steps to counter this country. It is important to keep in mind that the goal of aid is to help peoples in countries to live richer and fuller lives, and not to destroy them. In providing aid to an administration that does the opposite, the goodwill of the United Nations, and thus of developed countries, is destroyed. (Overall paragraph comment – Adequate. Use specific historical examples to add strength.)

An example in which a developed country does not have an obligation to provide aid to an underdeveloped country is exhibited by the actions of many countries towards Zimbabwe. Recently, a new President has been elected into position in Zimbabwe. However, this President had gotten this position by using rigged elections, brutality towards any citizens with opposing views, and completely controlling the country’s media. In addition, certain groups of people now suffer discrimination and injustice under his rule, and genocide, alongside other crimes against humanity, have been reported. As a result of this new change in administration, many developed countries have decided to no longer provide aid to Zimbabwe unless there is a positive change in the administration. The developed countries no longer have an obligation to provide aid to Zimbabwe because such aid will only go towards furthering the destruction of human rights. Developed countries thus only have an obligation to provide aid when such aid will be beneficial to the furthering of humanity and its rights. (Overall paragraph comment – ? Is this your Task 2 or Task 3? Is this your resolution or your counter-example? Everything here but the very last sentence is counter-example, thus I will give this paragraph two marks. Second task (cont’d)-5/6. Third task -3/6)

Despite your strong counter-example in the third paragraph, you mixed up the tasks somewhat and this hurt you in the end. Your resolution simply was inadequately explained. Stay focussed and you will be able to complete all the tasks.

Overall-3/6

4/6 – Decent

Voters should not be concerned about a political candidate’s personal life.

Write a unified essay in which you perform the following tasks. Explain what you think the above statement means. Describe a specific situation in which voters should be concerned with a political candidate’s personal life. Discuss what you think determines whether a political candidate’s personal life is a public concern.

It is said that a man should be judged by his actions and not what is told of him. This has been the age-old problem with political candidates – a lot is promised, vouched for, and said – but how much of it is actually the truth? Voters want to know what their decision entails, who are they supporting, and most importantly, what are they actually supporting? In the past, all that was heard of a candidate was the public speeches he gave and the few newsprints. Nowadays, there is a wealth of easily accessible and worthy information about a candidate such as the platform, beliefs, and past accomplishments. However, the information available is abundant and at times, superfluous. For instance, is it truly necessary to know that Lincoln was born in a log cabin? Or that your state governor has had a divorce in the past? It is hard to draw the line as to what is really necessary information for the voter to draw an informed decision. Most of the time, the candidate’s personal life (life outside of office) should not be a concern of the voters. The candidate’s personal life should not affect how he acts in office nor how he takes the best decisions for the people. (Overall paragraph comment – Barely adequate. You ask a lot of rhetorical questions, but you seem to struggle to link all the ideas in your paragraph together. Make sure your ideas are connected and expand on your ideas further.
Task 1-4/6)

The issue of personal information has been seen recently with the Democratic Party’s elections for presidential candidate. Barack Obama made headline news when it was discovered that his Reverend had made racist comments. The facts were clear that Obama had been closely associated with this Reverend in the past. In the United States, equality for all men is and always will be a most fundamental cornerstone in the country. Since these values are of utmost importance to most voters, voters should be concerned about this part of Obama’s personal life. There were many doubts and unanswered questions. It is at times like these that voters should be concerned and make it their duty to learn more. (Overall paragraph comment – Good relevant and specific example, well explained. Be careful not to reveal your criterion early.
Task 2-5/6)

A candidate’s personal life is often made public and brought to the attention of the voters. A voter’s duty is to make the most informed decision in their best interests. It is then that the voter has to decide whether or not the information is of concern: whether it contradicts what the candidate has been vouching for publicly, whether it sheds light onto a candidate’s private beliefs. Personal information should be of concern when it is not superfluous – when the information is of relevance to the candidate’s office and work. Lincoln’s log cabin is not as much of a concern than a candidate’s values on equality. (Overall paragraph comment – What is your criterion here? You meander and stumble, but you do not clearly identify one straightforward factor by which we can judge whether we need to be concerned about a candidates personal life. The closest it comes is “whether it contradicts what the candidate has been vouching for publicly”. This will do, but only just. Task 3-4/6)

You have good ideas, and your Obama reference is quite strong. However, you need to structure your paragraphs in a stronger way as they often seem to be a little disconnected, and this detracts from your score.

Overall – 4/6

5/6 – A Good Essay

In business, competition is superior to cooperation.

Write a unified essay in which you perform the following tasks. Explain what you think the above statement means. Describe a specific situation in which cooperation might be superior to competition. Discuss what you think determines when competition is superior to cooperation in business and when it s inferior.

Profit is usually the main goal of the business and businesses are started with the intention of creating profit. With this goal in mind, businesses are often in the market to compete with other businesses in order to increase their profits. Competition can be as simple as lowering relative prices or creating deals, or involving more complex plans such as creating a good image for the company in comparison to others. Such competition can push other businesses out of the way as one business reaps the reward of being able to sell to the majority of the consumers’ want for a certain product or service. For example, Starbucks and Tim Hortons are two separate coffee chains. If these chains were to cooperate and work with the other’s chains best interests in mind (such as combined sales), there would be no significant increase in profit for one chain or the other. Rather, competition is the path that can potentially bring more profit and thus superior, and such is the path that these chains have chosen. (Overall paragraph comment – While your explanation has some good ideas, you don’t actually mention cooperation until your example. This is almost sufficient to cost you the completion of your task. Good specific example. A more robust and complete explanation would increase your score. Task 1-4/6)

Even though the goal of businesses is to achieve greater profits, there are businesses in the market that do cooperate. Notable examples are shown in umbrella companies such as General Electric. GE is one of the world’s biggest companies because it is actually built on the cooperation of many smaller companies. GE provides services and products in a diverse range, including military products, energy provision, automobiles, and real estate. In such a company, the amount of resources and manpower works to GE and each smaller company’s advantage. The companies are financially capable to execute their plans and further themselves as the top in the market. The success of GE proves the superiority of cooperation in this case. (Overall paragraph comment – Good specific example, well explained. Task 2-5/6)

Each business chooses between cooperation and competition. Both can bring financial superiority to the businesses. However, what ultimately distinguishes between these two choices is the consumer market. If the businesses in question are dealing with the same market, as in the case with the coffee drinkers, it would be advisable to choose competition over cooperation. This is because the consumer market and potential money earned is fixed for this particular market sector. Cooperation will only serve to thin out the money earned per company. On the other hand, umbrella companies are a market phenomenon because of their cooperative values. In General Electric, the cooperating companies are companies from different sectors, and thus would not compete amongst themselves, even if they cooperate. The consumer market is different for each company, and thus cooperation can only bring power and increased resources. (Overall paragraph comment – Great resolution. Task 3-5/6.)

This is a strong essay. While you have some weakness in your explanation, the rest of your essay compensates for it. Still, make sure you are careful to address the tasks in the future so that you don’t run the risk of not completing your tasks.

Overall-5/6

6/6 – “Perfection”

Only those politicians who have learned the art of compromise can achieve their political goals.

Write a unified essay in which you perform the following tasks. Explain what you think the above statement means. Describe a specific situation in which a politician might achieve a political goal without compromising. Discuss what you think determines when politicians should compromise to achieve a political goal.

The idea of a democracy has often been heralded as the genius of mankind in the realm of government administrations. A democracy allows for steady changes to the country, a high quality of life, and most importantly, that the citizens have a say in how the country is run. However, inherent in a democracy is the fact that there will always be people who raise their voices on the two opposite sides of an issue: yes or no, this candidate or another, pass a bill or veto it. At the same time, this is the beauty of a democracy – that the majority will have the say in a matter, and that at least, the majority will be satisfied in how things are taking place. Nevertheless, this is not enough for a politician’s success and completion of their political goals, as the majority of people will have different views on different matters. Simply taking one side is not enough to ensure a political success as there are always many votes to be garnered from the other side. Therefore, in a democracy, the art of compromise is of utmost importance to a politician. In order for a politician to achieve their goals of prominence and leadership, the politician must appeal to the two populations separated on an issue by making a compromise. Only through a compromise can both sides be pleased and the most votes garnered.

However, there are notable cases in which a politician can achieve a political goal without compromising. For example, Ho Chi Minh, the politician that eventually led Vietnam after the Vietnam War did not offer many compromises. The country’s administration was turned into communism and many Northern Vietnamese laws were enforced that Southern Vietnam did not approve of. These included changes in currency, business laws, government, and the Vietnamese capital city. No compromise was offered at all for the Southern Vietnamese. In this case, Ho Chi Minh was able to achieve his political goal of leader as the country without any compromise at all. In fact, his unchanging decisions in face of any opposition contributed to his success and helped forge his identity as a strong leader.

The question then remains: should compromise be used in order for a politician to be successful and able to achieve their goals? The answer lies in what kind of governmental system the politician is working in. Inherent to a democracy is that both sides must be satisfied because a popular vote is needed for a politician to be elected into office. Therefore, it is very important for a politician to know how to compromise effectively and please as many citizens as possible with their platform. However, if the politician is in a system where votes are not needed, such as a socialist or communist government, the art of compromise can be unnecessary for a politician.

Overall – 6/6

How to get the 6?

See Josh’s article here!

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Today I got an email from a reader asking me for some advice on which referees he should ask to write his three letters for medical school admissions. If you haven’t read my first article on reference letters, I urge you to do so before reading this one. If you’re too lazy, the cliff notes of that article are that you should pick referees who know you very well and who you know genuinely want to support you in your quest to become a doctor. Simply put, unless your referee has known you for a long time, he will have nothing of substance to say about you. And unless your referee really wants you to become a doctor, then he has no reason to producing something with substance.

Of course, the question that remains is: “but what if my three strongest references are too similar”?

Why Diversity is Good

We have established that the strength of the letter is more important than who wrote it. It’s easy to see that what is written is significantly more important than who it is written by. For example, a one page letter written by your research supervisor is probably going to be better than one paragraph written by the dean of your faculty. However, one clear exception would be if your strongest possible letters would end up being too similar in content.

Reference letters can become redundant if they are focused on the same thing, and worse, they can leave out important information. For instance, if your three referees were all professors / researchers you worked with, chances are a lot of the same traits will be mentioned (e.g. intelligence, work ethic, problem solving, etc.). While these are most definitely traits necessary for a good physician and traits you want highlighted by your referees, you want to ensure that your reference letters hit on as many relevant traits as possible. You also want one or more of your referees to evaluate your abilities in compassion, empathy, etc. – traits less likely to be seen in a research environment, but commonly utilized in various community/volunteer experiences (which many of you are bound to have).

One quick way to think about this (at least for Ontario medical school applicants) is to check the OMSAS reference form and see what traits the referee is supposed to rate you on: intellectual capacity, initiative, leadership capabilities, maturity, cooperation, integrity, problem solving, fluency in spoken/written English, ability to communicate, ability to relate to others, ability for self-directed learning, and critical thinking ability.

Knowing that you are being rated on these qualities, you want to select referees whose relationship/experience with you is diverse enough to achieve high ratings across all of these traits, even if those high ratings don’t necessarily come from the same referee. The point is to prove you are strong in all of these categories in some way or another, and it may be hard to do that if all of your referees are commenting on the same few traits. Two referees saying you are smart and one saying you are compassionate is way better than three referees saying you are just smart (That being said, it would be even better if all three said you were both smart and compassionate, so let’s aim for that when picking our referees!).

Long story short, physicians are multi-dimensional and therefore, you want your reference letters to reflect the same about you. It can be hard to do this unless your referees themselves come from diverse backgrounds and have different experiences with you.

So how should we go about obtaining diversity? The 2+1 Rule

To make it easier, let’s start by simply dividing up all possible referees into two groups: academic vs. non-academic. Academics would be individuals like course professors, research supervisors, etc – basically anyone who has seen you in an academic setting and can comment on you as a scholar and student. Non-academics would be individuals like volunteer supervisors, club facilitators, team coaches, etc. – anyone who has seen you in a non-academic, and more extra-curricular capacity.

We’ve established that if possible, we don’t want all three referees as academics, and nor do we want all three as non-academics. In that case, the only satisfactory solution is what I will now name as the 2+1 Rule of reference letters: you should aim for at least one academic and one non-academic reference letter, with the third letter being anything that you want (leading to 2 academic/1 non-academic or 2 non-academic/1 academic, and hence, the 2+1 Rule).

Personally, I had one academic (research supervisor) and two non-academic (two volunteer/community experience supervisors). While my research supervisor could most definitely account for my intellectual capacity, problem solving and critical thinking ability, there’s no way he would have been able to comment on my cooperation and ability to relate to others to the extent that my choir director was able to, and vice versa. But taken together, all three reference letters were able to create a complete picture of me, as a candidate with all of the traits sought for.

In the story I referenced at the beginning of the article, the student who emailed me listed all of his potential referees, and it was clear that he felt his strongest three letters would come from three academics. But once I saw that he had a volunteer supervisor who he had worked a fair bit of time with and whose strength of letter he predicted would be almost as good as the other three, in my mind, it was an easy decision to pick the two best academic letters and include the volunteer supervisor as the third, even though the three academic letters would each have been better in a vacuum. The key point here was deciding on which three letters work together best in combination, and that is best achieved using the 2+1 Rule as a foundation.

What if I can only find 3 strong references of the same type?

One caveat to the 2+1 rule is if you feel you lack a strong reference in either the academic or non-academic field – if this is you, it might be important to ask to what degree you are exploring both your academic and non-academic aspects of your life, and if there is something you should explore further. However, sometimes you may simply have to go with three academic or three non-academic referees – and that’s fine. There are most definitely medical students who had three academic or three non-academic referees.

That being said, I would ask your referees to comment on as many traits as possible, beyond what they normally would (e.g. if you have three academic references, ask them to comment on more than the usual academic-related traits). Bring up specific experiences of yours that you think they should keep in mind. For example, if you have three academic references, ask them if they know of your experiences beyond the academic setting. Have any of them see you do things in the academic setting that would demonstrate compassion or empathy, for instance?

Who writes your letter isn’t as important as the letters presenting you as well-rounded, complete candidate. As long as they can do that, I think it’s fine if your referees are all academic (or all non-academic).

To sum up, you want to pick referees who have known you the longest, who genuinely want to help you get into medical school, and who as a group, can positively comment on all of your different qualities.

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*Please turn up your volume

Thanks a bunch to Shelly, Jess, and Roy for the awesome surprise.

And an extra special thanks to Shelly for organizing and producing the video! =)

Oh and I’m sorry for ruining the ending guys…

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About a year and a half ago, I wrote an article on my thoughts about what to keep in mind when applying to university, using my personal experience as an example.

In that article, I focused mostly on figuring out which university fits you best based on program, location, opportunities, etc. However, there is one more important question you need to ask yourself when thinking about your education that I completely failed to mention.

In short, that question is: what do I want out of my education?

At first glance it may seem like an odd question to ask, but it’s really not. It seems odd because many of us have our own ideas about what the purpose of your educational experience is or should be – but the truth is that your educational experience is whatever you want it to be. There is no one right way to view your education, and it’s important to always realize that, despite what people may argue.

Some people just want to learn. Very often they are genuinely and strongly interested in the topics at hand, and want to sponge up as much as possible.

On the other hand, some people go to university purely for the degree. Usually this in terms of job prospects or further education requirements (e.g. professional schools, graduate schools, etc.).

Of course, if you’re applying to professional school (such as medical school), marks matter. So some people go to university primarily to get the grades required to move on to something else.

In my opinion, these are all legitimate. It bothers me when people try to act as if there is some universal agreement as to what we should want out of our education (e.g. “You shouldn’t be picking your school just for the sake of getting good marks!” There are reasons why doing so is often not a good idea, but it has nothing to do with a right or wrong way of looking at education). Quite often, what we want out of our education will be some combination of 2 or 3 of these views, and there’s nothing wrong with that.

When you are thinking of where you want to go to university, you need to reflect on all of these issues, because different undergraduate programs will be more conducive to one of these aspects than the others.

So take the time to figure out what you want out of your university education – it’ll save you a lot of head ache down the road!

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On the first class of my MCAT prep course, the course instructor wrote on the board:

“The MCAT exists to _________ me.”

He then asked us to fill in the blank. There was silence at first, and then one student bravely said “to screw me”. Funny chaos ensued for a few minutes as others piped in “to kill me”, “to ruin me”, and so forth.

The instructor stopped our laughter by shouting “Wrong!”, and then said, “The MCAT exists to help you.” He explained that since it was May, we only had one summer before med school applications were due. Extracurricular activities and good reference letters often require long-term commitments, so there’s not much you can do in these last few months. The school year is over, so is any chance of changing your GPA. The only thing left that you can use to improve your application at this point is the MCAT.

This post is the first of two personal heart-to-hearts on how to prepare for the MCAT. I admit that the downfall of this article is the fact that it is derived from the experience of a sample size of just one. I managed a 37R with this advice though, so I hope it helps!

Psyching yourself

Why are you doing this? Before you start ruining your summer with MCAT studies, it’s important to remind yourself why you are writing the MCAT. Other than the fact that hitting the cut-offs will complete your application, you should still aim to get the best score that you could. There are 3 reasons for this: 1) having an amazing score gives some kind of “wow” factor, which may come in handy in your application; 2) it feels great to have a score that you can be proud of and say “this is what I gave up my summer for”; 3) it’s good to have some leeway to make sure that you do make the cut-offs. The MCAT is important.

40 hours per week is the number of hours you should ideally be spending on MCAT studying. (Yes, you heard me right.) For a lot of us, a MCAT “full-time” job is very hard to pull off, and you will have to be prepared for the fact that you may not hit your best score possible. I wrote my MCAT in the summer of my second year while doing full-time research. On the rare good week, I’d get my 40 hours per week by studying 20 hours on the weekend and the other 20 over three weekdays. It depends on you, really. If the MCAT is not that bad for you, it’s definitely a good idea to continue doing extracurricular activities and research on the side. If you find the MCAT to be very tough, it may be a better choice to concentrate on it full-time.

It’s hard. I’ve heard some people say that the MCAT is easy, or that there’s a “trick” to the MCAT. The fact of the matter is that the MCAT is hard (of course, I am discounting exceptionally smart students when I say this) and there is no easy trick. The MCAT fits all its test-takers into a bell-curve and it’s mathematically easy to fall on the curve’s bad side. I realized this when I got a score of 22 on my first mock MCAT, and that motivated me to take the MCAT very seriously.

Content

Just to get a feel for what the MCAT was all about, I wrote my first mock test (with no studying whatsoever) in the summer of first year, where I got my 22. I didn’t touch the MCAT until the summer of second year, when I got a 29 on another mock test. The second year of undergraduate courses was enough to buy me an extra 7 points, which were purely based on content knowledge in biological and physical sciences. My point is that content knowledge matters.

My background in biochemistry prepared me extremely well for certain content portions of the test. In particular, my 2nd year courses in genetics, organic chemistry, physical chemistry, and metabolism gave me an extra edge over test-takers who weren’t in my biochemistry program. First year physics also helped a lot. On the other hand, I had never taken a course in anatomy or physiology – so I was learning completely new material for the test.

Verbal Reasoning

Verbal reasoning is usually the most feared section of the typical science student. This is the section where you most often hear horror stories like “Oh, I know a guy who got 15-6-14”. Not only is Verbal Reasoning scary, but it is also one of the hardest to improve in. Simply becoming more familiar with the format and timing will often result in a 1 or 2 point increase from your baseline (score that you get with no studying whatsoever). Baselines reflect your innate reading comprehension skills, which are affected by how much you’ve read and what type of materials that you often read.

Improvements in 3 or more points from baseline are rare unless you adopt and perfect a strategy – different prep courses encourage different “tried and true” strategies. Strategies frequently involve learning a new way of approaching passages, taking notes, and tackling questions. Often they feel unnatural and are time-consuming to adopt. You’ll find that your score actually drops when you first try using the strategies, but will pick up again later, leading to an overall improvement.

Personally, my baseline score was a 9, which improved to 10/11 after a couple of weeks of practice. To get to that point, I did one timed full verbal reasoning section per day, and went over the questions that I got wrong. I was frustrated with my prep course’s strategy, and as I was content with a 10/11, I simply didn’t seek to improve it further. However, I have friends who had baseline scores of 7s, and after an intense summer, got 11 or 12, so it’s possible!

Stay tuned for Part 2 – writing sample, study tips, and test day.

Deciding when to write the MCAT? Check this article here.

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