It’s time to get personal

Queen’s Personal Statement workshop – January 28, 2017

 

“Toward the end of the year, Lakeside senior classman Bill Gates took on a different marketing project: the selling of William Henry Gates. Potential customers? College admissions officers. Bill had scored 800 on his math SAT and five achievement tests (although only in the low 700s on the verbal SAT), and he put it, “I wanted to know which personality of mine would appeal to the world at large.”

masteringthepersonalstatement

Witness the transformation! To Harvard, he was Bill Gates, son of a prominent lawyer, someone with connections, “the guy who was into politics… so my whole page experience was the central part of that application.” For Princeton, “I positioned myself as a computer nerd,” the programming magician who could hypnotize a minicomputer or mainframe into doing anything he commanded. For Yale, he was a consummate do-gooder and sensitive artist with thespian aspirations, “the guy who did drama, the guy who was a Boy Scout.” It was one of the earliest displays of his chameleon like, Thomas Crown-like ability to change his skin, to transform his persona – and eventually, his company’s – in order to “do business.”

Excerpt from a recent biography of Bill Gates by Stephen Manes and Paul Andrews

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The personal statement and autobiographical sketch are controllable and afford the most opportunity for “direct applicant input.” They should be targeted to meet the requirements of specific schools.

Welcome to  Personalstatement.ca

Personalstatement.ca has been created by the Richardson Prep Center in Toronto, Canada. We have been running test preparation programs since 1979 including: LSAT, GMAT, GRE and MCAT and SAT.

Our mission is to help our students achieve their academic and career goals.  Our “Personal Statement Seminars” and books are to assist in this mission.

Chances are that if you trying to further your academic career, that there is a “personal statement in your future”.

The personal statement is a  vital part of your application …

If a personal statement is required, it will be a vital part of your application. Every year thousands of applicants are accepted and thousands are rejected. In many instances applicants are rejected because of their applications.

The personal statement is the one part of the application that is under your complete control …

A personal statement (or statement of intent) is the one part of your application that is under your complete control. You must take great care in writing, developing and constructing your personal statement.

You would apply differently for different jobs. Therefore you should apply differently to different schools ….

Consider the following excerpt from Mastering The Personal Statement by John Richardson:

“Effective applicants treat the application file as a “marketing tool” which is targeted to the specific requirements and personalities of different law schools.

The personal statement and autobiographical sketch are controllable and afford the most opportunity for “direct applicant input.” They should be targeted to meet the requirements of specific schools.”

Let’s begin.

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