Write a Personal Statement for an Undergraduate Application

Every year, hundreds of thousands of graduating seniors apply to many of the same universities hoping to get in. In order to choose a well-rounded individual who stands apart from the crowd, the universities often have students submit a personal statement. The personal statement is a place for students to show admissions officers their true selves and explain why they would be a perfect match for the school they are applying to.

Steps

Doing Your Research

  1. Read all the materials that you are provided. These personal statements often include specific references to a portion of your life, and are evaluated based on how well you answer the given question. You don’t want to waste precious space addressing a question they didn’t ask, so take the time to make sure you understand the prompt clearly.
  2. Research your desired school’s statement of purpose. Each school has a specific statement of purpose that indicates what kind of institution it is, what skills the university values and promotes, and what they expect from their students. Peruse your school’s website and read all of this information so that you can reference it in your letter.[1]
    • Usually, you can find this kind of information on a university’s homepage or on a page on which the university’s president discusses his/her vision for the school in an open letter to the student body and prospective students.
    • You want to make the school think you will be a perfect fit as one of their students. This is a great way to do that.
  3. Read other personal statements. Ask your older friends, relatives, or teachers if they have examples of personal statements that you can read. Or you can search for examples on the internet. It is very helpful to see what a successful personal statement looks like before you begin crafting your own.

Deciding What to Include

  1. Be selective. In a personal statement, you will have a word limit or page limit. This means that you can only include what fits within the maximum allowed characters. So, you can’t afford to waste this precious space on filler or unnecessary information. Decide what is absolutely crucial for you to say in your personal statement and then you can add more if you have the space.
    • Include the elements that illustrate your commitment to academic and community involvement, as well as other things that will make the committee believe you are a good candidate for their school. Avoid things that could be viewed negatively or misinterpreted.
  2. Be strategic. The personal statement is the perfect place to include things that won’t be obvious in the rest of your application. So, if you are able to list all of your volunteering experience elsewhere in the application, don’t focus on that so much in your personal statement. You don’t want to waste the limited space you have repeating yourself.[2]
    • Remember, the personal statement is usually the only place where you have free reign to decide what information to include. So take careful stock of what you have listed elsewhere in your application and focus on other things in your statement.
  3. Provide explanations when necessary. If you feel like there were extenuating circumstances that caused a certain outcome, this is the place to explain it.
    • For example, if you had some kind of illness that caused you to miss a lot of school days and, thus, your grades weren’t as good as they would have otherwise been, you can mention that here. However, be careful not to make it sound like a sob story or like you are looking for sympathy.
  4. Avoid controversy. There is no way to predict who will be reading your personal statement or what their values and beliefs will be. The last thing you want to do is alienate your reader right off the bat by including something that they vehemently disagree with.[3]
    • A good rule of thumb here is to avoid religious or political topics in general because they are often controversial subjects.

Crafting Your Response

  1. Focus on the introductory paragraph. You want to grab your reader’s attention from the beginning.[4] Begin your personal statement with a complete sentence readdressing the original question but providing your own answer. (e.g. if the question was “What was the best experience in your high school career?”, the answer might be phrased “The best experience of my high school career was ...”).
    • Consider starting with a personal anecdote or clever story that draws the reader in right away.
  2. Provide details. Continue throughout the statement giving very specific and detailed reasons or justifications for why you feel the way you do. Just answering the question outright isn't enough of a reason for them to believe you, so you should spend the majority of your personal statement giving specific life experiences that justify your position or personal feeling on the given subject. This will also help your reader remember more specifics about your application.[5]
    • For example, say that you volunteered at the Fulton County Humane Society rather than just your local humane society. Or that you won the Norman Mailer Student Writing Award instead of just saying you won an award for writing. Providing specific details like this will help your application stick out more in the minds of the review board members.
  3. Finish with style. Just stopping after some reasons and life experiences isn't enough; you must make the reader understand that you weren't just rambling. Tie together all of the fundamental elements you've written about so far, and summarize your main point.
    • Try coming full circle and referring back to something you mention at the beginning of your essay. For example, if you begin by discussing a particularly transformational moment in your life, you could close the personal statement by referring back to that experience and how it has helped prepare you to be a successful college student.

Finalizing Your Personal Statement

  1. Spend time editing. Applying to college can be a very competitive process. Some of the top tier schools receive so many applications from qualified students that they have to look for any reason to throw out an application. Often, this can happen from simple grammatical or spelling mistakes in a personal letter. Poor editing in something as important as a personal statement reflects poorly on the student who writes it. You don’t want the admissions board thinking you don’t know how to spell things properly or, worse, that you are a careless student who couldn’t be bothered to re-read their personal statement before submitting it.[1]
  2. Think about your diction. Word choice is important in a personal statement because you want to sound educated and elegant. The personal statement is no place for slang or curse words. But also, try to use better descriptive words.[6]
    • For example, if you say you “accomplished something,” it sounds much more intelligent than saying you “did” something.
  3. Ask someone else to read it. As with most written projects, it is always a good idea to ask someone else to read your personal statement for you. When we write, we get so caught up in what we intend to say, that we often lose sight of what we actually say. An outside party will be able to catch mistakes that your brain simply skims over. They will also be able to see the bigger picture more clearly.[6]
    • It would be especially beneficial to ask someone who has strong writing skills. This could be a parent, a particularly studious friend, or even your English teacher.
  4. Use your school’s resources. Many schools employ people whose job it is specifically to help students who are applying to college. It may be your guidance counselor, or it may be someone with a more specialized position regarding college placement. Either way, this person will have a lot of experience with personal statements and they will be an excellent resource for you. Schedule an appointment with them and ask them to read your personal statement. Ask them for specifics about what you can do to make your letter more impressive.

Tips

  • Colleges really do use and read these personal statements, so make sure to put some real effort into it.
  • Speak from the heart. It is important to sound genuine and not manufactured.
  • Consult with your college counselor and/or English teacher if you are having trouble.
  • Get personal. Be honest about your life and experiences. Colleges nowadays are looking for people who both think and feel.
  • Check your work. Don't be happy with just the first draft. Find someone you feel comfortable and qualified letting revise your personal statement and give it to them.

Warnings

  • Make sure to use proper grammar. Nothing looks worse to an administrator than a potential student saying "Thank you for considering excepting me into your college."
  • Be careful disclosing crimes you may have committed; you are not legally protected from self-incrimination through these personal statements.
  • Remember that if you are trying to be funny, sarcasm doesn't translate well in written form – so try to use outright humor instead.

Related Articles

Sources and Citations

  1. ↑ 1.0 1.1 http://www.cws.illinois.edu/workshop/writers/tips/personalstatement/
  2. ↑ http://www.admission.ucla.edu/prospect/perstmt.htm
  3. ↑ https://owl.english.purdue.edu/owl/resource/642/01/
  4. ↑ https://owl.english.purdue.edu/owl/resource/642/01/
  5. ↑ http://www.scholarships.umd.edu/advicestudentwriting.html
  6. ↑ 6.0 6.1 http://www.topuniversities.com/blog/10-tips-writing-personal-statement-university-applications
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