I'm having trouble writing my personal statement for university application... anybody able to help?

Question

This is hard... i don't want to sound arrogant :P lol

Answer 1

A personal statement is your opportunity to tell the admissions committee how you are different than the other applicants for the school or program.

You've forwarded your GPA - big deal. Let's say your GPA is 3.7 or 3.5 or 3.9. Lots of people who applied to that school have the exact same GPA. They're not all getting in.

You've forwarded your SAT or your SAT score. Again, big deal. Either your score is high enough to make you competitive for admission or it's not. You're not getting into this school because you got 5 more points than that other guy.

Maybe you submitted a letter of recommendation or two. That proves someone likes you. I would hope so.

Now it's time for your personal statement, and it's your best opportunity to shine.

What's special about your life story? Did you overcome something? You don't have to survived 5 forms of cancer - maybe you overcame the painful shyness that had you terrified for the first two years of high school. You don't need to have captained the state championship football team - maybe you experienced some academic success.

Did you help your dad and mom get their business off the ground? TELL A STORY. Admissions committees love stories. You broke down on a deserted highway the first day you borrowed your parent's car. You walked into a convenience store after it had just been robbed, and you stayed and called the police. Your best friend's father was arrested for stealing from his business, you saw your friend's whole life changed, and that taught you some important lessons.

SOMETHING must have happened to you in your life.

You use a personal statement to tell the admissions department the most compelling reason you can think of to accept you, as opposed to anyone else.

Are you compassionate? Don't say "I am compassionate and loyal and honest and dedicated." PROVE IT. Describe a specific situation that demonstrates those things. Everyone is compassionate and loyal and honest and dedicated (ha!), but only some people can prove it.

Focus on the opening paragraph. That's where you "get them" or where you "lose them" (the reader, that is). They won't get to the "good stuff" in paragraph three, if you put them to sleep in paragraph one.

If you can't think of anything else to say - praise the university.Tell them why it's important to you that you go there. You won't get away with generic b.s., so take the time to research the program that you're interested in, and demonstrate that you're REALLY interested.

Bad: "I have always wanted to go to the University of Backwaterville because I think that UB has the best psychology program in the United States."

Good: "I am particularly attracted to Backwaterville because of the research work of Professor Schlickenhausen in the Department of Psychology. When I was working on my 11th grade science fair project, I came across his article on the fascinating relationship between paper clip collecting and schizophrenia amongst the indigenous Aboriginal people of Australia. Though many of the judges thought that my project was quite unusual, I did win a special award for...."

The personal statement is the place to say something interesting about yourself without listing your wonderful qualities. I'm sure you are (reminder to self: go back and insert 10 thesaurus words describing positive qualities), but the statement is not a laundry list of the wonder that is you. You don't want to be adopted, you want to paint yourself as different than the other applicants, and you want to give the admissions committee a reason to accept you, and not the 123 other people who submitted near identical applications.

Good luck - I hope that helped.