Because personal statement is not like other documents you need for college admission, it’s easy to struggle with understanding its primary objective. That’s why it’s necessary to define the term first. Statement of purpose, or personal statement, is a paper or document wherein a student is meant to give concrete evidence of his/her promise as a member of the academic community and depict an image of their personality to the committee. The personal statement goes by many names including application essay, admission essay, personal essay, reflective essay, and narrative essay. Regardless of the term provided in the application materials, your goal is to represent...
Because personal statement is not like other documents you need for college admission, it’s easy to struggle with understanding its primary objective. That’s why it’s necessary to define the term first. Statement of purpose, or personal statement, is a paper or document wherein a student is meant to give concrete evidence of his/her promise as a member of the academic community and depict an image of their personality to the committee.
The personal statement goes by many names including application essay, admission essay, personal essay, reflective essay, and narrative essay. Regardless of the term provided in the application materials, your goal is to represent your full potential, describe hopes, goals, and talents that make you a perfect fit for that college. When writing the statement of purpose, it is necessary to demonstrate how your values, non-traditional educational background, and other factors have influenced the academic career.
There is no one size fits all rule for personal statements. Every student can use their own unique approach to show what makes them ideal for some particular institution.
In writing, there is no such thing as one, generic form of anything and personal statement isn’t the exception. We can divide these statements into two forms:
The general or comprehensive personal statement – gives a student the maximum freedom regarding the things they want to write. Also referred to as the open topic essay, this type of statement only has formatting rules you have to follow, everything else is up to you. You just have to create a perfect way to represent yourself and start writing;
The response to a specific question – unlike the type mentioned above of a statement of purpose, this form requires students to answer adequately to a certain question in order to demonstrate their knowledge, expertise, skills, and plans for the future. We can also divide personal statements based on the programs, undergraduate and college graduate.
