How To Plan Your Personal Statement

The earlier you start planning your Personal Statement, the easier you will make it for yourself. There are four key reasons why you should start sooner rather than later. Find out what they are and how to plan the perfect Personal Statement.

Author: Emmanuel Morpurgo

Table of Contents

The best time to start planning Your Personal Statement is today.

As cliché as it sounds, the earlier you start, the easier you will make it for yourself. There are four key reasons why you should start sooner rather than later:

Personal Statement Research

You need to establish two things: What course? and What university? Start off by speaking to teachers about the subjects you enjoy. They will have detailed knowledge of course requirements, but they will also know you personally. They can talk about the course in the context of your personality.

The next step is talking with your parents, then moving onto university open days. Your choice of university is completely personal – it will need to be somewhere you can see yourself spending the next 3-6 years of your life.

Talk to current students of that university, they will give you the most unbiased information. On the open day, tour the university – and speak to tutors and other peers who are considering applying to the university. Once you have shortlisted several universities and courses, your personal statement preparation can begin.

For more inspiration, take a look through our other successful Personal Statement analysis articles:

Enrolling on our Oxbridge Premium Programmes will give you access to Personal Statement redrafts. 

Your tutor will give you actionable feedback with insider tips on how to improve and make your Personal Statement Oxbridge quality for the best chances of success.  

Gather Topics To Include In Your Personal Statement

Before you start writing, it’s important to have things to write about. Spend a bit of your time brainstorming what you think the universities want you to include in the personal statement. Later down the line, you will be glad you did this! Here are some examples:

Answer all of these questions and you will get a good baseline to start writing your personal statement. 

How Will Universities Use My Personal Statement?

This can change how you write your personal statement. For courses that don’t interview, your personal statement is directly bidding on the course. If this applies, then your statement is simplest to write but just be aware that this is your only opportunity to say what you want to say.

If your course uses the statement as a segway to interview, then it requires more thought. This is because you want to have enough to allure the admissions tutor in the statement, but also enough to speak about in the interview. This means striking a careful balance.

Some tutors will go through the entire statement with you in the interview; which means withholding enough information on your personal statement so that you can speak about your experiences with the interviewer. This also means the structure of your personal statement will dictate the structure of your interview.

Final Comments

Creating a plan for your personal statement is the best way to ensure you create a great piece. By having a clear structure and knowing exactly what you want to include, you will find yourself spending less time questioning your decisions. 

We hope this article gave you a good overview of the things you need to consider before you start writing your personal statement. Check out our other personal statement articles and successful examples on our Free Personal Statement Resources page.

Looking for Personal Statement support to strengthen your application?

Students enrolled on our comprehensive application support Programmes will get access to Personal Statement redrafts.

 

Your tutor will give you actionable feedback with insider tips on how to improve your statement for the best chances of success. With UniAdmissions, you can triple your chances of success. Want to find out how?

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