I just got my secondary from Temple University. They ask the following question:
“Describe a personal experience which resulted in a substantial moral or ethical dilemma. What was the outcome? We are reluctant to accept assertions that you have never encountered such a situation. Please do not address cheating in an academic setting.
(Limit your response to 250 words or less.)”
My question is: do you think it would be bad form to write about a situation where you made the wrong decision?
I’ve had something of this nature hanging over my head for a while - it relates directly to medicine and patient care, and so it seems like a good topic. However, in this situation I clearly made the wrong decision. I spent a month beating myself up over it (heck, I still beat myself up over it), and I definitely learned from it, but would it be poor advertising for me to inform the school of such a thing?
Erica,
It’s probably OK, particularly if you describe what you learned from the experience and how you might do things differently in the future. We all make mistakes; there’s a saying about this, something about better to make mistakes and learn from them than to never make a mistake at all.
If you are uncomfortable discussing a decision you made, perhaps you can recall something else, like how you discovered your boss was cheating on his wife or a coworker was stealing from the cash register. Even if you did nothing and said nothing, that’s still a decision, and you can explain how you might do things differently or the same if it came up again.
For my essay, I wrote about chairing a grants committee where I had the unpleasant task of deciding to give a scholarship grant to a very unlikeable and mean person. I voted to give the grant, for the greater good of the community.
Hmm…that’s interesting. I got secondary from Temple some time in August and I don’t recall answering such a question. I went to my file when I keep all the papers from all the med schools and this question was not on my Temple Secondary application…
To answer your question…I have similar thoughts to Terry’s. Only if you feel totally comfortable with that decision, and you accepted it and can explain what how it changed you as a person. If you don’t quite know how to write about it choose something else.
Good luck,
Kasia
This is from the Pitt secondary, not Temple.
- Skeeter Said:
"Describe a personal experience which resulted in a substantial moral or ethical dilemma. What was the outcome? We are reluctant to accept assertions that you have never encountered such a situation. Please do not address cheating in an academic setting.
(Limit your response to 250 words or less.)"
My question is: do you think it would be bad form to write about a situation where you made the wrong decision?
I've had something of this nature hanging over my head for a while - it relates directly to medicine and patient care, and so it seems like a good topic. However, in this situation I clearly made the wrong decision. I spent a month beating myself up over it (heck, I still beat myself up over it), and I definitely learned from it, but would it be poor advertising for me to inform the school of such a thing?
Ok from someone who is an RN I say no, do not send in a negative, why? Cause it sticks in the mind of the reader, they could react well this person is great and human and learned something and grew or they could be synical and think WOW I would have never done that why should we accept this person when so many have never done something like that ( I do not know what it was that you did) in my opinion you always want to be positive with these things since you are not in person to "Read" the people your communicating with.