Hi folks
I am writing this now as you people are anonymous to me; I rarely mentioned this to my friends. Talked about growing up in poverty. I grew up with an alcoholic father in a tiny 1-room flat (there were 6 of us) in a slum area. My neighbors were prostitutes & drug addicts. We were so poor that my mother had to pawn all her wedding jewelry to buy rice for us. Wedding jewelry is very important to a traditional Chinese woman. That hurt me to this day. I studied hard and paid my own way through medical school by giving tuition even when I was exhausted . Hence my passion in helping the less fortunate as I have experienced personal suffering and bitterness. A significant part of my time and money now is spent running free medical clinics in the Myanmar border areas where the medical conditions are truly appalling and there are many child prostitutes. My daughter has also helped me in these medical mission trips.
Regarding my daughter. The broader issue is the advantages that a wealthier parent can give her child and the unfairness of this compared to a child who is disadvantaged. There have been many debates over this.
I used to feel guilty about this and hence we made it a point to never spoil our kids. Unlike many here in this affluent country with their own maids, my kids are the rare ones without maids and who washed bathrooms, mopped the floors, do all the dishes etc.
Someone pointed out to me that my kids have never squandered any of the opportunities we gave them. My daughter plays both the violin & piano at Diploma levels. She was the Concert Master of the country's National Orchestra, plus Concert Master of her school Orchestra. She is a black-slope skier, Captain of her school badminton team. Presidents of 2 very busy societies. She is also predicted 45/45 for her IB. She did many medical internships across 3 different countries, different hospitals and clinics. She was also involved in a complicated hospital heart research project. Her many testimonials from her doctor-mentors/teachers all universally attest to her extremely warm, generous & responsible personality. Like me, she has always been a giver, not a taker. And equally her passion for medicine shone through. Interviewers can see this clearly.
So did my daughter get into so many medical schools based on my coaching?
When I first started practicing interviews with her, I noticed that although she was eloquent, yet her answers were not well structured and she was not sure of some medical terms, hence coming across as somewhat gauche. Let me give you an example ( for future applicants reading this please do NOT use this example next year as I can imagine many applicants giving the same type of answer !). When asked what health-related things students read, most students tend to say BBC Health News etc. However, for my daughter we talked about these journals that discussed the medical lawsuits and mistakes made by doctors and how doctors can avoid these mistakes. It is obviously a very interesting publication and we enjoyed frightening ourselves with these real-life examples of errors made by doctors and the harm brought to patients as a consequence of these errors ! In 2 of her interviews, she mentioned these medical negligence cases and the interviewers were obviously impressed.
So yes, please do practise for your interviews in a sensible way. You do not necessarily need a doctor to help you but I would strongly suggest an older, more mature adult who can help you with your flow of words/ideas. As for reading materials, there are many publications on health issues, interview questions. We just downloaded 100 medical school interview questions off the Internet and those questions were a good place to start.
I am sorry that this comes out only at the end of this cycle. I am very busy, rarely goes onto TSR and actually almost everything I said about interviews have been discussed ad nauseum in this Forum and elsewhere.