A Personal Statement for Baylor College of Medicine

I wrote the following personal statement for my application for the PhD program at the Baylor College of Medicine. The deadline for the application was January 1, 2015 and the program starts in August 2015. I will update this post when I receive the results of my application (admissions offers are usually made in February to April).

Update 1.17.15: It got me an interview! Since I'm currently in Chile, we'll be doing the preliminary interviews via Skype sometime in February. Wish me luck!

Instructions

Please provide an approximately one page description of why you want to pursue a Ph.D. in the biomedical sciences including your motivation and both long and short term goals.

Personal Statement

I am terrified to write this personal statement. In these words I am supposed to convince you that I am the ideal candidate for your program, that I will be a successful student if you elect me. But I don’t know if I can assure you of that, because I am not yet convinced myself.

Why do I want to pursue a PhD in biomedical sciences? I’ll let Steve Jobs explain this one for me: “The biggest innovations of the 21st century will be at the intersection of biology and technology. A new era is beginning.” I will be a key player in this new era; I’m already in the game. In the two and a half years since graduating with a BA in biology, I’ve helped launch 6 technology startups, two of which are now valued as multimillion dollar companies.

What else have I done in those two and a half years? I taught myself 7 computer languages and a second spoken language, consumed 44 books, lived in 5 major cities, traveled through 4 foreign countries, surfed an uncountable number of couches, and created 9 websites, 12 paintings, 3 blogs, and 21 articles. As Einstein said, “Life is like riding a bicycle. To keep your balance, you must keep moving.” I've been moving. I've been honing my abilities in business and technology - now it’s time to focus on science.

Here’s my main short term focus: immerse myself in an academic environment rich with people who love biology and technology, a place where I can expand my knowledge of biomedical sciences, an environment where ideas flow like lightening and learning is achieved every day by experimenting with the elements of the world with the same sense of curiosity and wonder as a child contemplating the night sky. My dream is to one day create a modern day Menlo Park – a laboratory where the brightest minds in science and technology can gather to bring new and world-changing innovations into being every day. Baylor is the environment I am craving.

And my long term goals? Besides the Menlo Park dream, I would like to continue launching businesses, but now in the biomedical field. I want to create value with my life and my projects, and I feel one of the best ways to use my talents would be to find commercial applications for the discoveries we make in the laboratory. I want to use my life to continue exploring the world through a scientific lens and sow the seeds of innovation and grow new fruits of medical technology that make others healthier, happier, and more alive.

One day we will program biological life as simply as we write a computer program. I want to help make that one day into someday soon, because with it will come a tsunami of biotechnological advances, a universal fluidity to the meaning of “life”, and a new era that we may call the biological revolution.

I am young and foolish, yes, but I am also the future. I am the next Benjamin Franklin, full of curiosity and life, always running experiments and documenting better ways to live. I am the next Richard Feynman, pulling pranks on my peers while making Nobel Prize winning discoveries. I am the next Steve Jobs, nerdy and a bit socially awkward but working tirelessly to bring visionary new technology into the world.

And right now, you are God. You are the supreme deity of this moment in time with the power to forever change my future, the future of Baylor College, and even the future of the world. I am no longer afraid of the words on this page. Through reflection and contemplation, I have found the strength in me to know that I can achieve a PhD in biomedical science and go on to help create biomedical technologies of which we are now only just dreaming. Will that path include Baylor College?

You decide.