In this series of articles, I will be sharing excerpts of case studies on several of my former students (with their permission, of course). Names and other identifying information have been changed, but the material facts — MCAT score, GPA, etc. — are unchanged. The full case studies are published in my book, Pre-Med Success Stories.

I’ll present each case study in three parts — an introduction of the student, followed by an in-depth assessment of the student’s profile and chances for admission to medical school, and then finally I’ll explain what happened to the student once s/he applied.

• Part 1: Introducing Aziz
• Part 2: Personal Statement and Core Themes
• Part 3: Aziz’s Acceptances

In this article, I will be finishing a three-part series on a client of mine who I shall call Aziz.

Part Three — What Happened to Aziz?

I enjoyed working with Aziz and was even more pleased when he came back to me with his acceptances. He was accepted to three schools out of the eleven he applied to — the Keck School of Medicine at the University of Southern California, the Chicago Medical School at Rosalind Franklin U-Med and Sci, and the University of Vermont College of Medicine. Aziz was also waitlisted to the Jefferson Medical College of Thomas Jefferson University.

Aziz is a very bright student and I could see he had a passion for social justice and helping others. Even during his undergraduate years, despite it being so difficult, Aziz showed promise. He simply lacked the direction to take it the next level, and he did so while he was in graduate school. He found his direction while working with others that were as overwhelmed and broken as he was during his undergrad years — and these experiences allowed him to reevaluate his own life too.

I think his personal statement played a major role in reorienting his application into something the application committees could easily piece together. His “comeback story,” after all, made sense. All it needed was a central theme to tie everything together. I think through working together we were able to achieve that and I am happy Aziz succeeded and was accepted into a medical program.

Want to Learn More?

I hope you enjoyed this three-part case study on Aziz. Hopefully, you take Aziz’s story as helpful advice for your own application because I think Aziz’s problems are not just his own — many other pre-meds have similar issues in explaining themselves. You can read the full story — including decisions around letters of recommendation, experiences, secondaries and interviews —  in Pre-Med Success Stories.