Hello! I am new to posting on sdn but have been browsing forums throughout this whole application process. I am almost done all of my secondaries but have been struggling with the basic diversity essay. I completed undergrad in the US but I am not a US resident/citizen and are planning to do med school in the US aswell. I am a white female who grew up in the suburbs of Canada and have really been struggling with how I can add to the diversity of the campus. These are some of the ideas I had:
1. I come from Canada, a country with free healthcare. My family experienced a plethora of medical problems (sister had cancer, father had cancer twice, mother had a stroke) but not once did we ever have to worry about figuring out how to pay for it. Then going to school in the U.S. I realized this was not the reality for most people - this sparked my interest in public health (decided to double major). The more I learned, the more I became passionate about addressing barriers to healthcare through education and providing resources. I was going to tie in all of my volunteer work with promoting childhood health literacy, providing BP screenings to homeless, doing research to create targeted tobacco cessation practices for marginalized patient populations, etc. and then tie in how I wanted to continue that work at said school, etc.
2. I am a twin and as the shy one of the two I often found myself in her shadows/struggled to find my own voice. Talk about how I overcame this and now I work to make sure other people learn to find their own voice, etc. (idk this ones kind of a reach )
3. I love to travel. Have traveled to Australia, bunch of European countries, Guatemala, Costa Rica, Thailand, Turkey etc.) Was going to talk about everything I learned along the way, how it taught me to be very open to trying new things/meeting new people, how I am now more conscious of other peoples customs etc and how these could be valuable when interacting with so many different people on campus and working as a physician.
4. I played a ton of competitive sports growing up (soccer, hockey, basketball, track). It taught me discipline, how to be focused, sense of camaraderie, how to work in a team, etc.
As you can probably tell, I've thought about the first one the most just because I found it the easiest to tie into all of my experiences. Honestly, Im just looking for advice on whether these are trash or not and if I need to go back to the drawing board and think a little deeper.
Thanks in advance for your insight!
1. I come from Canada, a country with free healthcare. My family experienced a plethora of medical problems (sister had cancer, father had cancer twice, mother had a stroke) but not once did we ever have to worry about figuring out how to pay for it. Then going to school in the U.S. I realized this was not the reality for most people - this sparked my interest in public health (decided to double major). The more I learned, the more I became passionate about addressing barriers to healthcare through education and providing resources. I was going to tie in all of my volunteer work with promoting childhood health literacy, providing BP screenings to homeless, doing research to create targeted tobacco cessation practices for marginalized patient populations, etc. and then tie in how I wanted to continue that work at said school, etc.
2. I am a twin and as the shy one of the two I often found myself in her shadows/struggled to find my own voice. Talk about how I overcame this and now I work to make sure other people learn to find their own voice, etc. (idk this ones kind of a reach )
3. I love to travel. Have traveled to Australia, bunch of European countries, Guatemala, Costa Rica, Thailand, Turkey etc.) Was going to talk about everything I learned along the way, how it taught me to be very open to trying new things/meeting new people, how I am now more conscious of other peoples customs etc and how these could be valuable when interacting with so many different people on campus and working as a physician.
4. I played a ton of competitive sports growing up (soccer, hockey, basketball, track). It taught me discipline, how to be focused, sense of camaraderie, how to work in a team, etc.
As you can probably tell, I've thought about the first one the most just because I found it the easiest to tie into all of my experiences. Honestly, Im just looking for advice on whether these are trash or not and if I need to go back to the drawing board and think a little deeper.
Thanks in advance for your insight!