With less than half of the applicants getting accepted to medical school every year, there are obviously a lot of reapplicants during each application cycle.
Several schools will ask if you’re a reapplicant in your secondary application. And a lot of times, they will ask a follow-up question about what you’ve done to improve your application.
How much have you improved?
This isn’t just an opportunity to say you’ve taken more classes and that you got A’s or that you’ve retaken the MCAT and got a better score.
This is a time to reflect on where you fell short last time.
Highlight what you’ve done to overcome those shortcomings.
How much have you grown as a person?
It’s not just as simple as not having a good MCAT score and you’ve improved it, therefore, this makes you a better candidate.
Instead, reflect on your application, but also the underlying growth you’ve had to do as a person.
Usually, improved grades or a better MCAT score is made possible by improvements in study habits or self-discipline, for example.
What was that underlying growth that allowed you to improve your application?
How has your understanding or perspective changed?
If you’ve added more extracurricular activities, physician shadowing, or clinical experiences, how have these expanded your perspective or understanding of medicine?
