Detailed description of work in personal statement

**Maria87** · 12-08-2012, 05:10 PM

I'm not planning on lying in my statement. But I want to know how Meds School can check if you have actually done what you said you did, apart from catching you when you fail to answer legitimate questions at your interview (apart form Soton which don't interview graduates). Do they actually call the folks you did the w/e with or ask your referee to confirm everything? Like I said I’m not planning on making up any experiences, but just for the sake of composing my statement, I want to know whether to include things I did back in 2003 when I was in High School when I decided to study Medicine but unfortunately did not meet the academic requirements. I recently have been very busy with my studies but managed to get involved in several charities and did 5 months of voluntary work at an elderly ward in a hospital (3 hrs on a Sunday). I think my statement would read better if I included w/e since I decided medicine was for me (age 18, now age 25).

Also, do you have to say how long you did the experience and for how many hours and the exact name of the place? I mean do you put every single detail? There isn’t enough space for this anyway. I have seen PS with detailed description of the place and hours worked, and others with less detail. Which approach should I take? I personally prefer more details because it sounds more honest.

E.g. I volunteered at xxxx for xxx hours on Sat/.... for xxx year/month.

PS: If I'm not mistaken, you have to fill in a sheet of all the experieces as part of the interviewing procedure. Is that right?

**jcak** · 13-08-2012, 02:28 AM

Depends where you go for interview, I'm not sure everywhere does that but I wouldn't know.

In regards to specifics, be broad. If you say "I worked in an old peoples home for 2 hours every friday and 2 hours every saturday where I did xxxxx and spoke to so and so, it was called xxxxxxx and it was walking distance to home" they'll think you're wasting characters and padding out very little experience into a lot. They just want to know: "I volunteered weekly in a care home for elderly, where I helped with menial tasks. From this I learnt xxxxx" They don't need to know where it was, just how long for and what you took from it. They might check if they think something's off at interview stage, but not before that.

I think it would be best to include the initial reason for medicine (personal preference though), but not say you didn't get the grades the first time. They'll know that from other aspects of the UCAS anyway.

Good luck writing!

**Maria87** · 13-08-2012, 04:43 PM

Thanks jcak. Anyone else have something to add to this?

**Zedd** · 13-08-2012, 05:09 PM

Just my opinion but I honestly don't see how you could fit in any amount of detail regarding work experience. Say what you have to say ("For the past X years I have volunteered for Y which involved Z. From this I have realised that...") but no more.

How many characters (inc. spaces) do you currently have?

**Profanius** · 13-08-2012, 06:28 PM

I seem to remember you only get about 4000 characters in your PS, and that runs out very quickly. As Jcak says, keep it concise but informative. You don't need to give details of hours and minutes, they can ask for details after application or at the interview. Some unis like Notts send out a work experience record that you have to fill out with details, others like Warwick, NCL, Imperial just take your word for it. My Warwick interview was full of questions like "give me an example of when you did xxxxx...", and that gives you the chance to embellish. It also gives them a chance to spot someone who clearly doesn't have a lot of experience. The more experience you have, the easier it is to come up with a strong answer.

I started my PS with an anecdote about a call I attended as a CFR. I didn't bother explaining what a CFR was or the hours involved as anyone reading it could discern this from the anecdote or look it up. Times and places weren't relevant to the experience. I mentioned the month it happened so anyone reading the PS could decipher that I'd been a CFR from at least that date. I could then dedicate most of what I wrote to what happened and what I learned. The admissions staff want to learn about you, and they'll learn that through a personal narrative - not a meaningless list of place names and rotas.

**monkeymedicine** · 02-09-2012, 06:55 PM

I'm in a similar position - so far, I've only got WE from 2007, but I'm still including it in my application as I feel I've gained something from it, although I won't be mentioning when it occurred or the duration.

For volunteering, did you guys all commit to a role regularly? I've applied to many different volunteering organisations, and most roles are extremely flexible, e.g. if I had important assignments/exams or when I returned home for the holidays, then there would be weeks/months when I wouldn't volunteer.

I don't think any university actually specifies the duration (in hours) of WE/volunteering required, so I think it's quality over quantity.

**jcak** · 03-09-2012, 02:33 AM

It's most definitely quality over quantity, however they do want to see a long term commitment so they know you can be committed to your course/medicine as a whole. If you've done something regularly then 1 year weekly is almost enough. Some uni's don't want to look past 4 years ago as they claim it's out dated and you could have changed, so things from 2007 might be looked on not too brilliantly.

I've been volunteering weekly apart from uni term times for the last 4 years (2 of them I've been at uni) at an old peoples home and I've been informed by admissions that even if this was low quality (most certainly taught me a lot, so one of the things to get me past that particular hurdle!) the duration makes up for a fair bit of that. Long story short, they want you to do as long as possible in various roles. I wouldn't put emphasis on the fact that you've done work experience BEFORE 2007 unless you've done it SINCE 2007.

**monkeymedicine** · 03-09-2012, 05:07 PM

Thanks jcak for your advice

(so jealous that you’re much more informed than me). If unis say that 4 years is enough for a significant change to occur, aren’t they taking a risk when accepting applicants presently

? I won’t be applying to Cambridge, so fingers crossed I won’t be asked to explicitly state the times and duration of my experience.

To the OP: another reason I won’t be including the times of my volunteering is because of my immense irregularity e.g. when I’ve helped at Age UK, there have been weeks where I would be there for 10 hours compared to others for 1 hour.

**jcak** · 04-09-2012, 12:21 AM

There's always an attrition rate, thats what the interview and general application process is designed for - to weed out the candidates they think won't quite complete the course!

The reason for not including your hours is similar to mine, I'm using an average, if I can say I was there for 2 hours each week, that's enough for it to be 4 hours some weeks and none the next.

**blondibabe** · 07-09-2012, 03:09 PM

I agree, don't go into details, that is what the interview is for, you can keep things vague in the PS about exactly when & much volunteering you did e.g. For a year I did volunteer work at X where I learnt etc. should be good enough, they are more interested in what you learnt from your experiences than details of your timetable etc.