How to: write a good Personal Statement

Hello, Reader!

I might not have gone to uni last year but, boy, do I know how to write a bomb Personal Statement. The first time I found myself writing a PS was two years ago; fresh out of AS exams, still unaffected by the stress of year 13 lurking around the corner. I took all the information I was given at a “Personal Statement Workshop” at the University of Oxford and all the tips I gathered from thorough online research and wrote my first draft. And then my second. And the third... I think it took about 7 drafts in total because I kept improving on it up until the actual day I was sending it off. I asked all of my most trusted teachers and friends to read it and tell me if there are absolutely any other details I can fix after every draft. Meanwhile, I was reading over and giving feedback on my friends’ PSs- I honestly don’t know how many of them I’ve read over those few months at the beginning of year 13. Then, as I mentioned in my Life Update, I wrote another PS when reapplying to university last year. Point is: I’ve dealt with many PSs and I feel like I’ve got a pretty good idea of how to write a good one. 

You need to open with a strong introduction: something that will intrigue the reader and make them want to continue reading it. This is a pretty tough task so if it’s something you’re stuck on, it’s better to just start writing another part and come back to it. After you have other elements of the PS, it might be easier to figure out how to introduce it in an interesting way. A good idea for the intro is to write about the moment you found your passion for your subject; perhaps it was something that you learned or somebody that infected you with their passion for it. It shows the reader why you want to study this subject and why it’s important to you. However, remember that even if you’re mentioning a person that inspired you, make sure it’s very brief and still focused entirely on you since after all, it is your (personal) statement. Under no circumstance start with anything along the lines of “I’ve always been…”; “From a young age…”; “As long as I remember....”. These openings are extremely overused so just avoid them at all costs. Same thing with quotes. Opening with a quote is not a good idea, especially if you don’t refer to it at all for the rest of the PS or if it’s not relevant at all. If you have a quote that you really want to use, try to include it later on in the PS where it ties in with a point you’re making- I’ll talk about this a bit further on. My introduction was about the way I understand Mathematics in relation to the world around us and Sophie Germain, a female mathematician not recognised during her lifetime due to being a woman. This sounds a bit scattered, but through this, I conveyed why I’m dedicated to studying Mathematics which is what the admissions tutors want to know. 

The next two main body paragraphs can go in either order, depending on what sounds better. A good idea is to simply write both and then decide which makes more sense to go first. The two paragraphs are about: extracurriculars related to your subject and your A-Levels subjects. Your extracurriculars can be absolutely anything; online courses, sample lectures you’ve attended, books you’ve read… it really doesn’t actually matter all that much what it is, within reason. What matters is not what you did but why you did it and what did you get out of it. What skills did you learn from that online course? How will these skills help you at university? Make sure this paragraph is not a list. If you’re lucky enough to have a lot of things you can include here, choose a few that you can expand on the most, or that will impress the admissions tutor the most. Just to reiterate; it doesn’t matter if you’ve babysat a royal baby- if you can’t relate it to your subject and explain what skills you’ve learned then they will not care. 

Outlining your independent effort outside of the classroom is really important because it shows that you take interest in your subject outside of your A-Level. However, how you use what you learn within the classroom is also quite significant. Another one of your paragraphs should be about how your other A Levels relate to the subject you’re applying for. For most people, this is quite straightforward since the A-Levels you choose usually make sense to be put together. If you’re like me, you might end up with a funny set of A-Levels and really struggle to tie them all together. I had a pretty hard time figuring out how to relate English Literature and Art to a Maths degree. In the end, I decided to relate them all together with a quote by GH Hardy: “The mathematician’s patterns, like the painter’s or the poet’s, must be beautiful; the ideas, like the colours or the words, must fit together in a harmonious way.” This allowed me to create a bridge between Art, English and Maths in terms of creativity. This is what I meant by using a quote to support a point you’re making: I didn’t simply include an inspirational quote and forget about it, I used it to build a point to convince the reader that I know what I’m doing. Another thing you can do is talk about skills these subjects helped you develop that will make you a good uni student in general, not necessarily directly in relation with your course- anything from organisation skills, time management, dealing with a heavy workload etc.

The last paragraph should be your extracurriculars which might not necessarily relate to your subject directly. This includes things like your other interests or projects within which you use all those skills you’ve learned or develop those skills further. Again, the value is in why and what you’ve learned rather than what you’ve actually done. Show the reader that you’re not just a good student for the subject you’re applying for, but that you have more to offer than just good grades. What will you bring to your university apart from your academic abilities? Additionally, if you’re taking a gap year - this is where your plans go. Of course, it’s difficult to talk about things that haven’t happened yet however you can justify why are you planning to do these things? Why is it important to you? What are you hoping to get out of them? What are you expecting to learn? It still shouldn’t just be a list. I also wanted to mention that the size of this paragraph will depend on the universities you’re applying for. I remember that, for example, Oxbridge is pretty clear on the fact that they don’t really care about what you do in your spare time if it’s not related to your subject so this paragraph will be smaller if you wish to apply there. In that case, it’s better to use more of that word count to convince them why you’re the perfect student for the subject specifically. Some universities really want to see how well rounded you are and what you will bring to the community, therefore, you can make this paragraph a little larger. It’s always a great idea to research the university and visit it if you can to hear a talk on admissions which will give you a clear idea of what your specific university is looking to hear. 

After your first draft, make sure to ask somebody whose opinion you respect to read over it and give you some pointers. It’s good to get a few points of view but try to not overdo it because eventually, you’ll get conflicting opinions and rather than helping you, it will just stress you out. It’s a good idea to read your PS out loud at every draft to make sure it sounds like you because as I said before, it’s your *personal* statement so it has to be in your voice and not your teachers’ or your friends’. 

Happy writing!

Love,

Agnes xo