a personal statement writing guide

a personal statement writing guide

A Comprehensive Guide to Writing an Effective Personal Statement

1. Introduction to Personal Statements

Personal statements are an essay that is part of a college application. Personal statements are given to application readers and used to narrow down the many applicants from being admitted. Personal statements are becoming increasingly more popular, therefore it is getting harder and harder to get accepted. The line between a personal statement being about yourself and a college or university application essay is getting to be very thin. The goal of the personal statement is to show the academic institution that the applicant possesses something that the academic institution desires, such as good character, the ability to prioritize, etc. Personal statements bring out the personality that the application readers and admissions offices would otherwise not have known from completing an application. They also explain what and why you want to study a specific field, and how this chosen field fits your character and career aspirations.

One significant difference between a personal statement and an application is that a personal statement uses the pronouns “I” and “me” to further nurture attention toward oneself. In an editorial piece, a journalist must be aware of how much to further or utilize those pronouns. A statement is the result that you give, answers that encourage a message, and rely on the viewers reading your piece to actually notice you, in hopes of them remembering you. With tips on how to write a perfect paper, one must first question, why are personal statements read? Personal statements are important because not only do they give a first impression to college admissions offices, but they are the only time to show who and what a person applying actually is, as well as what they want to be.

2. Understanding the Purpose and Audience

Understanding the purpose of a personal statement can best be accomplished by researching the requirements for admission in one’s own field. Determine what you would expect a personal statement to deliver were you in their position. Delivering what they expect means specifically addressing the questions or criteria that are emphasized in their instructions. If they ask that your personal statement “submit a focused essay discussing and reflecting upon three significant extracurricular activities,” then provide that, expanded where possible outside of a listing format. The following will only be a small sample of the many possible personal statement prompts one may encounter.

Considering the purpose of personal statements also calls for some understanding of the audience—an admissions committee, an internship director, a fellowship or scholarship board—and mastering the technique for viewing your situation through their eyes. Your audience will admire and appreciate your statement primarily through your communication style: clarity, emphatic conviction, and enthusiasm can move your reader. At the same time, your audience someday will make professional decisions based on what they’ve seen of your character. What you choose to say in your statement reflects not so much what actually happened in your life, but how you have “seen” your life, events, and experiences through your own unique perspective. I will provide some conceptual details for you to ponder, or not, as you develop a diverse portfolio of possible opening concepts to help you apply yourself to the task at hand.

3. Crafting a Compelling Narrative

When you think of personal statement strategies, you are thinking about it in the wrong way. You don’t want to merely state things – you want to tell a story. Yes, telling a story can sometimes be stating things, but they must be a specific type of thing told in a specific context. You wouldn’t merely want to paint a detailed picture of what you did while volunteering at a hospital for ten months. You must instead paint a more detailed picture of, before volunteering at a hospital, what it was like to first decide to finally volunteer and how you organized it right on up to your last day there. The difference between the two choices? The first would be plain and uninteresting, the latter at least a little interesting because of the weaving of a few arc pieces to help with tension. If a Q&A were hosted with the director of a medical research program and one of the students asked if he absolutely must tell a story in his personal statement, the director might just say, “Only if you want anyone to take the time to read it.” As we can see, telling a story is useful not only in personal statements, but in doing any type of writing work. It is helpful for grabbing and maintaining the reader’s engagement in turning the page.

“I have learned that administrating the hospital is just as important as the caring of its patients.” This sentence is a direct quote from the first time a ten-year-old expressed his aspirations to his parents. The same boy in this story grew up to cure his mother’s lycanthropy with the help of wolf-sized restraints and a loving father who didn’t run. If “I have learned that administrating the hospital is just as important as the caring of its patients” isn’t interesting with or without a transformation detail, including one does only one thing: waste space. The “administrating the hospital” bit is quite general and empty, supplying no actual information and only an inaccurate, dictatorial air of the essay writer having successfully bossed a hospital all on his own with that kind of experience. Writing about something interesting from your past and moving on to writing about the modern, real implications of that past is writing a personal statement full of examples. A more detailed or connected example of the quoted sentence will do. A modified example of some kind could be, “That was when my fascination for hospital administration began to become more apparent to my parents. I wanted to do something sort of sciencey in the future, but other than that, kids aren’t really into that stuff. Instead of talking about diseases, I flashed forward to the medicine-tech involvement in the problem, the ultrasound and the MRI squares I had seen while visiting my beloved, motherless aunt in her hospital prison.

Of course, as I furthered my understanding in chemistry, I fell in love with its problem-solving. So now I want to delve into the root causes of those problems and possibly treat even more than diseases: infrastructural, psychological, and social challenges blended into an imperfect solution soup.” The personal statement can be about anything at all, so long as it pertains to at least one aspect of medicine or, conversely, to whatever the reader would like you to study or do for them personally. Exploring one topic to a depth and resolution is what makes the personal statement doable and avoids the “vague processor” traps of essays that are heavy on word count and light on content. The personal statement can be about anything whatsoever, as long as it contains any relevant or interesting medical truths from your past. For example, if an applicant has played the clarinet since the age of six, “instrumental music” will likely be mentioned in whatever rec letter or resume format a given college wants, and, as a rule of essays, “do not write about anything contained in another essay.” This is completely false. Writing a personal statement about music would captivate admissions, amuse them – music is certainly considered in a few admissions schemes as a perfect relaxation activity, the best in fact.

4. Showcasing Your Achievements and Skills

Finally, show that you can hack it. Many writers have a hard time showcasing their own achievements, but they needn’t worry! The key to this issue is to pick an achievement from their CV which is both impressive and relevant. If they consider an accomplishment which is not relevant or less relevant, they have an even trickier job of material to demonstrate their suitability. Asking this idea of how their work is demonstrating their suitability over again because they will also know what you present here to relate to what you say in the future of personal statement. If there’s a work experience which demonstrates that relevance, then the essay about this work experience can be especially excellent.

Your successes, this part of the application is very important as it gives you the chance to show the Universities what you have achieved and the extent of your abilities. Some positions even have the following sections: skills and strengths, hobbies and interests, and objectives. These are guideline questions that each require a brief response to allow time for you to pull things out. What part-time, voluntary work or work experience have you done in the last two years? Outline the skills gained – management, communication, working in a team, staying calm under pressure, multi-tasking. What are the biggest achievements in your life? What are the skills and qualities that you have developed as a result? What are your career goals? What is it about this type of job that appeals and what skills and strengths do you see this role requiring.

5. Structuring and Editing Your Personal Statement

Structuring your personal statement

The personal statement should follow a chronological structure based on a “candidate profile” of you as an emerging professional. Use each paragraph to highlight professional experiences, projects, research pursuits, or academic interests and accomplishments. Section headers are optional but can be a helpful roadmap for the reader. Sometimes, for some topics or themes, you don’t need a lot of space to give the detail you think is required to tell your story effectively. In those cases, you might try combining a few paragraphs or being more selective about what details you share.

Editing your personal statement

There’s a difference between the personal statements that need polish (to enhance clarity or add more vivid examples and anecdotes) and those that give evidence of the need for work on writing mechanics. Below are some tips for editing:

Organizing ideas: Look for paragraphs or parts of the piece that are not in chronological order or reflect the professional development of your chosen field. Highlight the part of the overall message that reveals your passion for your chosen field or career choice and see if you can emphasize that part as you revise the statement.

Revising for clarity and speech: Review the personal statement for unclear writing, awkward sentence structures, or pronoun reference. Use the active voice whenever possible to enhance clarity. Keep adjectives to a minimum. Don’t use a complex word when a simple one will do. Use language that is familiar to you. The goal is not to impress the reader with your vocabulary, but rather to effectively showcase who you are. Look for repetition and obviousness, and answer the “So, who cares?” question.

Revising for word limit: If the personal statement exceeds the word limit, determine what is most important to include, and begin to cut off the least necessary or least interesting segments. Furthermore, review grammar and style, sentence structure, spelling, and punctuation. Test the power of the final draft by reading it out loud. If people close to you are available, ask them to read the final draft and offer comments. Always submit the personal statement formatted according to application directions.