For the 2023-2024 application cycle, Harvard Medical School has several secondary essay prompts that applicants need to address. Here are the details and some tips on how to approach each one:
Harvard Medical School Secondary Essay Prompts
- Post-Graduation Activities:
- Prompt: If you have already graduated, briefly summarize your activities since graduation. (4000 characters)
- Tips: Detail any work, volunteer activities, research, or other experiences you have engaged in since completing your undergraduate degree. Highlight your responsibilities, the skills you developed, and how these experiences have influenced your goals and prepared you for a career in medicine.
- Personal Background or Identity:
- Prompt: If there is an important aspect of your personal background or identity not addressed elsewhere in the application that may illuminate how you could contribute to the medical school and that you would like to share with the Committee, we invite you to do so here. (4000 characters)
- Tips: Discuss significant challenges related to access to education, socioeconomic factors, cultural background, or any other personal experiences that provide context to your journey in medicine. Focus on how these aspects have shaped your perspectives and prepared you to contribute to the medical school community.
- COVID-19 Impact (Optional):
- Prompt: The Committee on Admissions understands that the COVID-19 pandemic has impacted applicants in various ways. If you wish to inform the Committee as to how these events have affected you and have not already done so elsewhere in your application, please use this space to do so. (4000 characters)
- Tips: Explain how the pandemic has affected you personally, academically, or professionally. Highlight any challenges you faced, how you overcame them, and any positive outcomes or lessons learned.
- Interview Availability:
- Prompt: The interview season for the 2023-2024 cycle will be held virtually and is anticipated to run from mid-September through January 2024. Please indicate any significant (three or more weeks) restriction on your availability for interviews during this period. If none, please leave this section blank. (1000 characters)
- Tips: Simply state any periods when you would not be available for interviews.
Harvard-MIT Health Sciences and Technology (HST) Program Specific Prompt
- HST Essay:
- Prompt: Please focus on how your interests, experiences, and aspirations have prepared you for HST. (4000 characters)
- Tips: Describe your background in quantitative and analytic approaches, research experiences, and how they align with the goals of the HST program. Emphasize your preparation for the unique preclinical curriculum and your aspirations to innovate in the field of medicine.
MD/PhD Program Specific Prompts
- Research Interests:
- Prompt: Briefly list your research interests/areas using keywords only. (100 characters)
- Tips: Use concise keywords to indicate your research areas of interest.
- Publications:
- Prompt: Please list publications, indicating for each whether it is published, submitted/under review, or in preparation. (1000 characters)
- Tips: Clearly list your publications, providing the status of each.
- Statement of Purpose:
- Prompt: Describe your reasons and motivations for pursuing a graduate degree in your chosen program of study at Harvard. Include past work, research ambitions, and career objectives. (1000 words)
- Tips: Outline your research experiences, what drew you to your field, and your long-term goals. Connect your past work with your future aspirations and how Harvard’s program will help you achieve them.
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