Personal Statement Writing: Get It!
Personal Statement Writing: One of The Most Serious Challenges in School
A personal statement is a serious challenge for every college applicant indeed. You have a fixed amount of characters to convince the admission board that you are the perfect candidate and that it is you their school wants. This is your only chance, so your statement cannot be “OK,” it needs to be really great. Here is our step-by-step guide to personal statement writing that will get you to your dream.
1. Start preparing early and don't rush
Remember that haste makes waste. Self-confidence is a good thing, but it is wrong to expect that you will write a really good personal statement in a matter of hours or even days. The ultimate time one normally needs to complete their personal statement may be a little over a month. At times, you might want to take a several day break, then give it a fresh look, and go on. Your personal statement needs to be written in a considerate manner and this demands a relaxed pace.
2. Choose the ultimate style and vocabulary
It goes without saying that your personal statement is a way for you to present yourself to the admission board at your university of choice. Think carefully about which words and phrases you would like to use in your personal statement, which tone you would like it to have.
There is, however, one general recommendation: use synonyms and “fancier” words - for example, “presumed” or “assumed” instead of “thought” or “accomplished” instead of “did” or “done.” If necessary, use a synonym dictionary. If you are applying from abroad, you might use Google Translate because when you translate just one word, it always offers you a bunch of synonyms.
Mind, however, that it is important to know when to stop and avoid being too fancy-looking. This will make your statement difficult to read and irritate the reader, and you don't want that.
3. Engage your reader with the very first line
The importance of the first line in a personal statement is difficult to overestimate. It is the very beginning of the first impression that you make on the decision-making people, so it really needs to be worked hard on.
It is a good idea to start with something funny and unusual to put your individual personality on the front line (no pun intended). But you need to remember that you don't know the person who will be reading this, it will most probably not be your next door buddy. This is why avoid being over the top.
Also, it is probably not such a good idea to overthink your opening line trying to squeeze it out of your brain before you write the rest of your personal statement. Your perfect punchline to start your statement with will just pop up in your head when you will be working on the main part, be sure of it.
4. Make it about yourself
Keep it in your mind at all times that you are selling your beautiful personality to the university. So, whatever advice you may receive from someone or find yourself is but a recommendation which you are free to follow or not to follow. Also, restrain from reading examples of other people's statements – it will only make your end result of a statement less individual. This is not what is expected from a PERSONAL statement and this is not what you want.
Remember that you are in the center. Speaking of which...
5. Put your strengths in the center
As mentioned before, you are selling your personality to the responsible authority at your dream university. And a good seller always puts the good sides to the front, so you have to adopt this attitude when putting together your personal statement. Concentrate on your successful experiences and your plans for your bright future.
For example, instead of writing “I started to learn Spanish but I quit after one month”, you can write “I have only been learning Spanish for one month and then I could already buy some groceries using Spanish.” Instead of “I hate maths”, write “I find maths exciting but I prefer to concentrate on other subjects.”
6. Be truthful
University professors are not stupid and they are trained to see any possible fraud. So don't try too hard to advertise yourself. You need to stay honest. This means that you should be able to back up every word of your personal statement if it comes to that.
For example, don't write that you are fluent in Spanish if you only know what Spanish lines in Pitbull lyrics mean and you can quote them. And teaching your grandparents how to use Skype in not an outstanding experience in pedagogics and problem-solving.
You sure have some really good sides to you that you don't have to lie about. So, there should be no need to make up your good features.
7. Get your statement proofread
Ask everybody to proofread your personal statement and share their opinions, everybody you can get to. Get as much feedback as you can, the more, the better. The more opinions you have, the better end result you will ultimately have.
However, as mentioned before – this is YOUR personal statement, so you should not take all the feedback that you get too seriously. It will need to be analyzed. But collect those opinions first and then evaluate them to see which advice is good and which can be safely dismissed.
8. Once done, don't return to it.
After you send your personal statement to the university of your choice, you will most likely be tempted to read it again. And no doubt you will find one or two flaws or just details that could have been written better. But what's done is done, and you cannot change it anymore, no matter how much you want to. So, re-reading your statement will only upset you and this sadness may undermine your positive mindset and the excitement about entering your dream school. This will be the only outcome. Therefore, there is no sense in doing it, restrain from that.
As you see, personal statement writing is not as hard as it seems. You just need to pay close attention to what and how you write, never lie about your achievements, and have a positive mindset. Use the tips provided above and you are sure to succeed in getting into the college of your dreams. Good luck!
By Richard Nolan