Your personal statement is the one place in your application where you get to sound like a person instead of a spreadsheet.

In this webinar I walk through how to actually write it. Start with brainstorming, not with a blank page and a deadline. Answer the prompt CASPA gives you. Use your own stories, because nobody else has them, and that's the whole point. Then get real feedback from someone who knows what PA programs are looking for.

The essays that don't work usually aren't badly written. They're just generic. If I could swap your name out for someone else's and the essay would still make sense, it needs work.

What I cover:

• How to brainstorm before you start writing
• Answering the CASPA prompt instead of writing around it
• Using personal stories without turning it into a diary
• Showing that you understand the PA role
• Phrases and cliches to cut immediately
• How to get useful feedback and what to do with it

Resources:

Free personal statement worksheet: https://www.thepaplatform.com/services/free-personal-statement-worksheet-download

Free personal statement email course: https://www.thepaplatform.com/services/free-personal-statement-email-course

Personal statement guide: https://www.thepaplatform.com/pa-school-personal-statement-guide

Essay review: https://www.thepaplatform.com/services/pre-pa-essay-review

Today, in episode 45 of the Pre Pa Club podcast, we're talking about personal statements and how to make sure yours is perfect for your PA school application.

Welcome to the Pre PA Club Podcast.

If you want to learn how to become a physician assistant, you're in the right place.

I'm your host, Savannah Perry.

Let's get to it.

Hey, guys, my name is Savannah.

I am the host of the Prepa Club Podcast.

Thank you so much for joining me on episode 40.

So we made it this far.

And if you aren't already subscribed to the podcast, if you want to get episodes downloaded straight to your phone, you can subscribe on itunes.

They also upload each week to the PA platform, so make sure you don't miss that.

And if you've enjoyed the podcast, go ahead, give us a review on itunes.

It helps more people find it, but I'm really excited for what we have coming up for the next few weeks.

If you're just tuning in, then I should inform you that I am very pregnant.

If you've been following me on Instagram, you have probably seen that.

But in the next few weeks, I. I will be having a baby girl and going on maternity leave.

But I don't want to leave you guys hanging because you guys need information.

And luckily, I have some really cool stuff for you.

So we'll jump into that and I'll explain in just a second.

But first of all, I want to thank our sponsor for the podcast, mypa.

All right, so for the next few weeks, as I am preparing for this baby, I am going to share some content with you that I've actually created.

Over the last year.

I did some webinars on YouTube, and they're still there.

The links will be in the descriptions for each of these, but.

And if you've listened to other ones, you can probably jump ahead a little bit.

But I've done different topics ranging from pre PA stuff, talking about PA school, talking about being a dermatology pa, and there's some really good Q and A's at the end and just great information.

So I wanted to integrate that into the podcast.

So for these next few weeks, you're going to hear those webinars and.

And if you'd rather watch them on YouTube, you can do that.

Like I said, it's in the description.

But they're a little bit long.

They're longer than normal episodes.

They're about an hour.

I say that, but a lot of my interviews are an hour or two.

But anyway, I try to keep it at 30 minutes.

I know that doesn't really happen.

If y' all need me to do better, let me know.

But if you need to break it up, just know they are a little bit longer.

And yeah, so I just wanted to share these with you and I felt like it was a good time to introduce them since I'm going to be a little preoccupied.

But I hope you enjoy and we'll just jump right in and then I'll still hopefully be around on social media and reachable by email and those types of things.

So if you need me, I'm there.

And I hope that y' all get a lot out of these webinar episodes and then we'll be back with interviews and all kinds of stuff.

Really actually fun stuff this summer.

So I'm excited.

But let's jump in.

Ready to get going.

Talking about personal statements for your PA School applications today.

So if we've never met before, thank you for joining me today.

And my name is Savannah.

I'm a physician assistant and I'm also the founder of a website called the PA Platform, which helps anyone interested in the PA profession.

It's basically a blog where I talk about all kinds of advice for gaining admission into PA school and how to succeed, whether that's in the application process, personal statements, interviews, all kinds of things.

So I decided that monthly webinars would be a fun thing to do, just to be able to provide information and value and also to be able to interact with you guys a little bit more and answer your questions live.

So I'm in my kitchen, as you might can tell, but I am going to be happy to answer any questions.

I'm actually going to go ahead and enter my email into the chat.

You're welcome to ask questions there.

Or if you want to email me questions if you don't feel comfortable asking in the chat, that's fine too.

So we're going to jump in, we're going to talk about personal statements today.

I'm going to give you a lot of information about how to go about writing your personal statement, what you should include, what you should not include, mistakes that people make, and just how to make your personal statement as effective as possible.

Because when it comes to your application, the personal statement is what's going to get you an interview.

At that point.

That's what shows the admissions committee, whoever's reading your essay, who you are as a person and essentially who you're going to be as a PA student or as a pa. And so that's your chance to shine and really provide the information that they're looking for.

So we're going to go through that.

I've got some questions that people submit that we'll talk about.

But also, if you have any questions, feel free to ask throughout the presentation and then we'll come back to those afterwards.

All right, this is just kind of the first slide for March.

We're talking about personal statements.

I'll tell you all what we'll be going over in April towards the end.

All right, so let's talk about the logistics of what is involved in your personal statement.

So the personal statement is entered into caspa.

So most of the.

The PA programs now are using Casper, which is basically a universal application, I guess, software.

And so the way that works is there's a space you enter your essay.

Keep in mind when you're doing that that Casper does not have any formatting in it.

There's no italics, no bold, no underlining.

There's not even a tab in there.

So if you want to put a space between your paragraphs, you just need to click enter twice.

And you don't really know that until you get in there.

The other thing to keep in mind is that you only have 5,000 characters.

So that comes out to about.

About a page and a little over a page, single spaced.

And so that's not that much space to really provide all the information you're looking to provide.

So the prompt is usually something along the lines of discuss your motivations for becoming a pa.

It can vary a little bit, but essentially they're asking you, why do you want to be a pa?

Now, when you are answering that or responding to the prompt, you want to make sure that you're actually going over what it's asking you for.

So a lot of times people will get off topic or they will just kind of not really get back to the point, or they'll never even mention the word physician assistant throughout their essay.

I think that's one of my actually biggest pet peeves is you need to address the fact that you are applying to PA schools and that you want to be a pa. And so that's really important that you're able to do that and show that effectively.

And we'll talk more about how to get it in the character limit a little bit later.

So what are the steps to creating a great essay?

I think a lot of people have trouble with just the process of getting started and getting to writing it.

You know, it's something that needs to be done and it's very important, but it can kind of get pushed to the back burner because it's a little intimidating.

I mean, it's an important essay.

And CASPA actually opens a month from today.

So if you're applying this cycle and you haven't actually started on your essay, now's the time so we can work on that together.

So the steps to a great essay, you want to take some time and kind of brainstorm, Think about what you want to include.

You want to write your essay, and we'll go through these steps.

You do have to actually write it, and then you need to edit it, and then you need other people to edit it.

So you want to make sure you have time to do all these things so that you can get your application in by the time that you have decided, which hopefully is very early, because that will increase your chances of getting in.

But basically it shows the aspects that people talked about in their personal statement.

So a lot of accomplishments.

Experience was a huge one, which makes sense because experience is what's going to prove to the school that you've done what you need to do.

Other things, challenges, role models.

There's lots of stuff to include.

So how do you get started with that brainstorming phase?

I recommend sitting down with 30 minutes with no distractions.

Just turn the Internet off, turn your phone off.

Just sit there and really think.

Think about why you want to be a pa. What has influenced your decisions?

What has gotten you to this point?

What have you done?

Just make notes of that.

I have some worksheets on my website that I'll show you at the end that kind of walk you through these questions and help you to think about that.

And so that may be something that you want to use or at least look over before you start brainstorming to kind of guide you and what should be included in your essay.

So these are the questions that you want to talk about in your PA School personal statement.

What made you interested in medicine?

A lot of people in their essays will jump right into when they started shadowing PAs, but there's a lot that happens before you get to that point, before you even decide you want to be a pa. You have to be interested in medicine.

So where does that come from?

Is it something that you just have always had?

Are you just innately interested in medicine?

Or was there a big event that caused you to be interested, a family member?

And it's okay if you don't have a large, dramatic story of why you became interested in medicine?

Personally, I think I was always interested in it.

My sister went to the doctor A lot.

When she was little.

She has something called fapa.

And so I was around medicine a lot, but it really wasn't until high school and I started thinking about what I wanted to do, and it was just always medicine.

And so you have to think about where that came from for you.

And you want to discuss that.

You want to show that this passion has a background.

How did you find out about the PA profession?

So, again, there's a lot of healthcare jobs out there.

I know when I was in college, I think I considered every single one before I settled on pa.

But how did you find out about the profession?

I mean, was it shadowing, working?

Someone told you about it personally?

My dad was the one who suggested that the PA profession might be a good idea for me to look at.

And I am very grateful for his advice, and I think he was right.

But you just have to know where you're coming from to be able to explain why you want to do this.

So what is appealing to you about the PA profession after you found out what it was?

Why did it connect with you?

How do you see yourself in that role?

What about you fits in well with the profession?

Is it the flexibility?

Is it the time you get to spend with patients?

Is it having the supervising physician and being a part of a team and being able to speak to other people about patients and kind of have multiple opinions?

You want to, again, think about you and what's appealing to you.

You don't want to have a generic answer if it's something that anyone could write in their essay and it's not really specific to, not strong enough.

Do you have a good understanding of what PAs do?

This is where you show that you've done your homework.

This can be through shadowing.

It can be through working, talking with PAs, having a family member who's a PA. You want to show that you really understand what you're getting yourself into and that you have put the work in that's necessary and that you have really done your research about everything that's involved with being a pa.

So the admissions committee will feel confident that you have what it takes and that you're not going to back out because this isn't what you thought it was.

How have you prepared to be successful as a PA student or as a pa when you're writing your essay, keep in mind you're applying for a position as a PA student.

I think that's another big mistake that people make, is they just discuss what kind of PA they'll be, but you're Applying to be a PA student.

And so you need to show that you're going to be successful in an academic sense because they're going to teach you how to be a successful pa.

It's great to show your confidence and your strengths, but also you want to address academically what you've done and experience wise.

Having patient care experience is such a huge part of applying to PA school now that you want to show what you've learned through the experiences you've been through and how that will impact you in your future, whether in school or when you're working.

So once you've thought about those questions, it's time to write.

So I think it's best if you just start writing.

Don't worry about having the words perfect.

You can always edit it.

Just get some words on paper and start writing your story down.

And don't even worry about your introduction at the beginning.

The introduction is important and we can talk about that for a minute because you want to hook your reader and so you really want that to be a story, to be your most interesting story.

Shelby on Instagram commented that she's about to start PA school in January.

But she said, shouldn't we include examples and stories?

And she's absolutely correct.

You do want to include stories.

And so your introduction should be your most interesting story.

And what's really going to make the reader want to finish your essay?

And so if you can't come up with something right at the beginning, that's okay, just come back to it later once you have some words on paper and you can put it all together.

So once you, you've kind of got everything down, you've answered the questions, then you can start to organize your essay.

Ask yourself, does my essay make sense?

Is it confusing?

Does it jump all over the place?

You kind of want it to flow and it should be a story from beginning to end.

It shouldn't make you ask questions.

So are you raising more questions than you're providing answers?

You don't want to do that.

So those are things to kind of look at.

And then with your conclusion, you want it to be a sum of your strengths.

So you shouldn't be introducing new information.

It should just be the last summary of this is what I have to offer.

This is why I'm here, this is what I want to do.

So that's kind of the organization part of things.

And then you edit.

So when you're editing your essay yourself, you want to look for grammar mistakes, you want it to be easy to read.

You don't want any distracting errors.

So punctuation, word choice, spelling, anything like that you want to just take a look at.

And if you're finding that your essay is too long, which tends to be an issue, you can use one space instead of two.

And also see if you can take out words.

You don't really need multiple descriptors.

So if you're talking about a clinic that has hundreds and thousands of patients, you really don't need to say hundreds and thousands.

Pick one.

You just need one so you can get rid of words and characters very easily that way.

Content did you answer those questions we talked about?

Really ask yourself if your essay is addressing all of those in some way.

Not all of them have to be long and drawn out, but you just don't want those questions to remain unanswered.

Then look at your flow.

Is your story easy to follow?

Again, just avoid being confusing.

Some of my favorite essays to read are the ones that just make sense and are cohesive and don't leave me kind of confused about what's going on.

Then look for outside opinions.

So family and friends, they will probably be very eager to read your essay, and that's great.

Let them.

They'll be able to give you opinions at least they they'll be good to let you know if your essay sounds like you and is showing who you are because they know you best.

But also take their opinions with a grain of salt because they are people who love you and they will probably just tell you how great you are.

You want a PA to read your essay, so that can be someone that you've shadowed or worked with, but preferably it's someone who reads essays a lot.

So if somebody you work with reads a lot of essays and their people are successful, then go for it.

Let them read your essay.

But if not, you may want to look into an editing service.

One recommendation I have is to avoid unknown eyes.

I'm a Reddit a lot.

In the pre PA section on other websites, the PA forum, there's a lot of times people say, hey, can somebody read my essay?

And I would really only recommend letting someone you trust read your essay.

You don't want to risk someone copying you, plagiarizing you, stealing part of your essay, and then that coming back on you somehow.

And you just don't know who's asking for your essay so or who's offering to edit it.

So it's probably fine.

Most people probably have great intentions, but at the same time just be very, very cautious with who you're showing your essay to, because that's a huge part of your application.

You don't want to jeopardize that in any way.

Let's talk about addressing discrepancies in your essay.

This is something that comes up a lot.

Should I talk about the C I got in Ochem, or should I talk about when I withdrew from calculus?

Whatever.

You.

It's up to you.

You don't necessarily have to address any discrepancies.

The only time that you would really want to is if you feel like it's going to prevent you from getting an interview and you feel like you need to explain it.

1C is just not really that big of a deal.

Or even a few Cs.

But if you had a semester where you got all Fs, you probably need to address that and say what happened.

You don't want to have any excuses for it.

You want to be really positive, show what you learned from that situation.

But that's your one chance to explain yourself.

So if you feel like there's something that really needs explaining on your application as a whole, go.

This is your chance to do that.

And it should not be the full focus of your essay, but it's something that you can discuss.

All right.

Mistakes.

These are some things I see a lot.

The main one that you should not do, and I am very embarrassed to say, I recently found my essay and I'm hoping it was not my final draft, but I'm really not sure.

And I did this and I'm so embarrassed.

I'm going to actually post my essay on my blog in a couple weeks so that everyone can see it, and I'm going to edit it for what I would do now differently.

But physician's assistant.

That is not the name of this profession.

It is physician assistant.

No apostrophe s. So you should be able to spell the name of your profession that you're applying to.

And like I said, I'm really hoping mine was not my final draft because I was so embarrassed.

But yeah.

And then after you've written out physician assistant once, you can then shorten that to pa.

So you want to write out physician assistant without the apostrophe s and parentheses pa. And then you can continue and then you can just refer to it as PA throughout.

And that helps you save on characters, too.

Another mistake is just being confusing.

That's just a huge pet peeve for me.

I hate when I'm reading an essay and I just find myself asking more questions and getting really confused about what's going on.

I'll be like, wait, did you want to go to med school?

Or when did you become an emt?

I just don't understand.

So, yeah, you want it to be understandable.

Grammar, punctuation, spelling unnecessary.

In your essay, just take the time to really review that or have someone who's good at that to review it.

Losing the focus from you.

So when you are including stories and examples in your essay, you want the focus to stay on you and to really be about what you learned and what you took away from a situation.

A lot of times when people are telling a story, they can let the focus become about the patient or about the PA they were working with without really relating it back to themselves.

So make sure in your stories, you're keeping that focus on yourself, using cliches or quotes.

Sometimes I'll get the essay that starts with a quote, and it's just so random and just not related to anything.

So it's not personal.

It's generic.

Just avoid that in your essay.

It doesn't help anything.

Same thing with rhetorical questions or referring to the reader as you or trying to insert them into the story.

It just comes off as strange.

This is a time to be straightforward, be direct, be concise.

Don't try anything strange.

Okay, I got a lot of questions about RE applicants and how to.

How to stand out and how to write your essay for the second time.

When it comes to this, you do not want to use the exact same essay.

Well, if you're applying to the same programs, I guess if you're applying to new programs, you could use the same essay, but only if you're applying to completely different programs.

You want to show how you've improved.

So what have you done differently?

What have you done as far as shadowing experience, classes, gpa?

What has made you better than you were last year?

And then you can kind of go with the same things because obviously you're the same person.

You have the same motivations, using different stories or kind of revamping your stories and coming at them from a different angle.

So those are ways to reassess your essay.

And actually have an article on my blog from Megan in Medicine, because she talks about being a reapplicant and reapplying and how she kind of polished her essay for the second time and also how helpful it was to have a PA work with her on it.

All right, time for questions.

So I'll get in the chat, and then I just want y' all to know that that's my email, and then you can Find me on Instagram if you don't already follow me there.

Okay, let's see.

Can y'.

All.

Yeah, y' all should be able to see me.

All right, anyone have any questions?

Y' all can put those in the chat now.

And real quick, I'm gonna show you, actually, where'd my worksheets go?

Here they are.

Okay, let me screen share these again.

Okay, so these are the worksheets that you can find on my website.

And so basically, they just go through a lot of those questions we just talked about so that you can guide yourself in addressing what you need to on your essay.

And you can type in these and do whatever you need to do.

That's something that you can download pretty easily if you want to use those.

Okay, there we go.

Let me pull up one question I had here.

I'm not seeing any questions in the chat, so if y' all have any, put them in there.

Here we go.

So Carly sent a message on the website, kind of addressing feeling that she has a standard entry to medicine.

Her grandma was a paramedic, and she was just around medical stuff from an early age.

And so she said that she really hasn't had time to shadow, but she's worked with some PAs, and so she was wondering how to describe her lifelong desire without sounding generic.

And so a lot of people have this fear that they sound generic in their essays and that if you're talking about yourself and your story, you're not going to sound generic.

You really just have to talk about you.

And just because you don't have an amazing story or you saved someone from drowning or something crazy like that doesn't mean that you don't have a great story.

And so, okay for you to just tell about your grandma, that's interesting that you.

That she's a paramedic and that you were able to be around that and then talk about working with PAs and what that looks like and how you see them interact with patients or with physicians or with other healthcare workers.

Go into detail about those things so that it just gives you more.

More credibility once, really, once you get your essay submitted here.

Yeah, so, yeah, that would be my.

My response to you, Carly.

But if anyone else has any questions, go ahead and put them in the chat.

And if not, I am happy to answer questions through [email protected] and if you need any help with your personal statement, let me know.

I've been doing a lot of posts recently this month about personal statements about all different kinds of things.

So y' all can find those on my website.

And then next month.

Oh yeah, I need to talk about next month.

So the next webinar will be on Wednesday, April 19th at 8pm Eastern.

And I'll be talking about CASPA and the application process for PA school.

Beyond the personal statement, what all does CASPA entail?

Letters of recommendation, how to go about getting those, breaking down patient care experience, healthcare experience.

All the different aspects of caspa.

It can be quite confusing.

So, yeah, CASPA opens in a month and so I'll give you a little time before to get everything ready.