Writing personal statement essay for transfer to UC?

Question

On the UC guidelines, it is good to be honest and real.

so I was thinking about writing about my highschool.

Well, I was a troublemaker in high school and got expelled during senior year for getting trouble with the law. I ended up doing 90 days of community service program PAWWS (for probationers, and that's 720 hours of community service) and i've been going to junior college after that.

I got expunged, meaning i no longer have anything on my record. And I am majoring in sociology with 3.7 GPA right now. So I wanted to explain to them the reason why I want to major in sociology is because of my experience in doing service at junvenile colleges and going to "ghetto" areas and clean up streets etc and wanted to learn sociology deeper in a good environment like berkeley and maybe help the society.

Am i pretty much shooting myself in the foot for saying I was a probationer and trouble maker in the past? should i omit the whole community service I did?

Answer 1

Absolutely go with your first instinct

By being honest you are showing the person reading your essay what you are really all about. And especially if you are trying to tie in a past experience with why you are choosing a particular major, that is important.

Good luck, hope this helps :D

Answer 2

Go with your first gut reaction- be honest. I think that is very wise of you.  You certainly don't want them to find out from anywhere else- than they'd never trust you.  We've all made mistakes, they should understand that.