http://www.hsph.harvard.edu/
career-services/
WRITING YOUR ESSAY
• First Paragraph: Use this to introduce and identify yourself (MD from X; MPH (and field of study) at Harvard Chan since Y),
providing your reader with your overall big picture. You may want to start your essay with something you believe will
immediately pique the reader’s interest, such as a critical experience that moved you to study public health or a particular
health concern of importance to you. No matter how you arrange this paragraph, by the end it should be clear what your
long-term career goal is and how admittance into this program would allow you to achieve this goal.
• Middle Paragraphs: The next several paragraphs should support your decision to pursue this long-term career goal by
describing the experiences and learnings that made you understand the importance of a public health (and/or other)
perspective and forged your long-term career goal. If this is a personal statement, you may want to reach back into history
to explain how you arrived at where you are now before moving on to detailing your future goals.
o Link these paragraphs together to tell the story of how you learned and realized your goals
o Writing in chronological order (from past to the present) often works best
• End strong: End your essay with a conclusion that refers back to the intro and restates your thesis. This helps unify your
essay as a whole, connecting your experiences back to the reason you are writing this essay in the first place—to detail your
career goals and show your qualifications for your graduate program of choice. Return to how this doctoral program will
give you the skills and tools to become a leader/mover in this field to improve the health of populations (or other goal).
FINAL TOUCHES
• Write well: Your essay is a sample of your writing abilities, so it’s important to convey your thoughts clearly, effectively, and
grammatically well. Be succinct - you don’t need to write out your full autobiography or resume - and only include sentences
that support your thesis.
• Revising: give yourself enough time to step away from your draft. Return with a fresh pair of eyes to make your edits. Plan
on making a few rounds of revisions. Most importantly, ask for help! Have your essay critiqued by friends, family, educators,
and our staff (make an appointment via CareerConnect).
• Proofread: Proofread your statement carefully and try reading your essay out loud to help catch any mistakes or poor
phrasing. Finally, ask others to review it one final time to check for spelling, grammar, and punctuation errors – do not rely
on your computer to catch everything!
Some additional tips for composing your application essay/statement:
• Demonstrate motivation, enthusiasm, maturity, and personal uniqueness, while articulating clearly why the program is a
good match for your interests; explain your passion for the field and note any connections to the department or program.
• Articulate long-term goals, why you want to go to graduate school, why you’ve chosen this particular institution and
department, and, if applicable, any specific faculty member(s) with whom you hope to work.
• Cite any previous work you’ve done in the field and/or discuss past research projects completed or papers published.
• For research-intensive degrees, propose specific questions that intrigue you, how you might approach them, and why
pursuing this line of inquiry would contribute new knowledge to the field. You will likely not pursue this particular project
for your thesis, but this mini-proposal illustrates your ability to think independently and creatively and allows you to
demonstrate how your research interests fit with the department.
• Do not overstate or understate your qualifications and try to support general statements with examples.
• Ask yourself if the statement is interesting and provides a compelling argument to the committee for your admission into
the program – ask your friends if upon reading your essay if they are convinced that you are a good fit!
• Keep your statement(s) concise; if provided, stick to the word limit or page length – do not go over! If there are no
instructions on length, keep your essay to two pages, double-spaced.
Some information adapted from: https://gecd.mit.edu/grad-and-med-school/apply-graduate-school/graduate-school-application-essays; http://ocs.fas.harvard.edu/ma-phd-
arts-sciences, & Donald Halstead, Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health Writing Instructor.