GTown Acitvities Essay- Summer Shadowing

In the space available discuss the significance to you of the school or summer activity in which you have been most involved. 500 words.

When I entered an operation room for the first time two summers ago, I saw the fireworks you hear about in movies when soul mates have their first kiss. My heartbeat raised to a point of a questionable heart attack. Every single neuron in my body experienced an explosion of adrenaline and dopamine that originated at my spine and rushed towards my extremities. My smile showed every single tooth in my mouth, but, thankfully, I had a light blue face mask that concealed my creepy smile so as to not scare the other doctors and nurses away. It was that day that I was able to enter the world of a surgeon and that precise moment that I knew that I belong in an operation room. (how can I fix this last sentence, it seems awkward but I don't know how to fix it)

I prepared myself mentally and through research for the first operation I had ever seen: a face-off brow lift. It was performed by Dr. Sandy González, a plastic surgeon whom I admire for his meticulous and awe-inspiring art work in the operation room. His surgeries are not merely for aesthetic purposes; they have, in my opinion, the most emotionally impactful results out of any other type of surgery (I also watched surgeries in other specialties and plastic surgery is the one with the most emotional impact on its patients).

With Dr. Gonzalez I observed a few more than forty surgeries. I have also observed clinical work and assisted in some minor procedures. Despite the length of the surgeries, whether it be forty five minutes or ten hours, I would stand in the operation room excited to observe every step Dr. Gonzalez took and answer the "quiz" questions he would ask me.

I not only watched the surgeries, but I also got the opportunity to interact with the patients at Dr. Gonzalez's practice before and after their surgeries. One breast cancer survivor who had undergone a mastectomy (the surgical removal of a breast) and breast reconstruction two years ago narrated with joyful tears in her eyes about how, despite going through all the "bad parts" and losing *a lot* physically, emotionally, and abstractly (i.e. healthy time), thanks to Dr. Gonzalez she can now have the self-confidence she thought she would never gain back.

It is because of experiences like the ones each patient told me and because of admirable surgeons like Dr. Gonzalez that I wish to become an exceptional surgeon and allow more people to feel the satisfaction and happiness Dr. Gonzalez's patients feel.

dBres, while you got busy discussing the world of surgery that you entered, you started to fall off in describing the reasons why this particular activity of shadowing a surgeon became a significant event during that particular summer. The opening paragraph was off to a good start with the reference to how you were eager to get into surgery and how you got that adrenaline rush, then nothing.

You began to delve into the background of the activity and your preparation for assisting in the surgery room. Your vivid description of your preparation, from reading relevant material, to preparing yourself to assist during surgery told us that you did your home work and made sure that you would be able to perform any task thrown your way in that room. However, nothing in the paragraphs that you wrote, save for the first paragraph, actually told us why you considered this particular situation a significant event during that summer. All you did was tell us at the end that the exposure you had here led you to desire to become a surgeon.

What your essay needs is more emphasis on the significance of the surgery. That seems to be the highlight of your essay at this point. So it should be dealt with in a special manner. Point us in the direction of the specific events during the surgery itself, that led you to this conclusion. All of the prep work is too technical and intellectual for those activities to have actually made a huge impact upon your career decision. Normally, those types of influence are found within the performance of the activity itself. It is during your actual participation in the activity that you find yourself suddenly realizing something important about your future. If you can just reflect upon those and share it with the reviewer, the essay should become stronger and more prompt responsive.

By the way, since you shadowed a surgeon, you need to set up your background that led to that. Don't just start in the middle of your shadowing, we need to know why you ended up shadowing that summer. It will help explain why you find this activity quite significant as well.