Writing Your Personal Statement PART 2

Writing Your
Personal Statement
PART 2
Remember
Most people find writing personal statements quite daunting so the easiest
way to tackle it is to plan and write individual paragraphs then put it all
together.
There are 3 main sections to a Personal Statement:-
o Explain why you want this vacancy/ a place on this course.
o Tell them more about the subjects you have studied at college
(Covered last lesson – ask for notes if you missed it!)
o Extra information about you eg part time jobs, hobbies, work
shadowing, extra activities you do in college and anything else you feel
is important.
Next Paragraph - Extra Information About You
The content of this will vary for each student. Part time jobs and hobbies
might seem as if they don’t directly link with what you are applying to do but
they can show commitment, responsibility, motivation; teamwork etc and that
you are an interesting person so it is important to include them.
Use the prompts below to plan first for each section first then write a short
paragraph. Again, select the prompts that are most relevant to you.
Prompts – Part-time jobs
1. Tell the reader about where you work, how long you’ve worked there,
how often you work.
2. Explain exactly what you do in your job and outline the employer’s
business.
3. Write about any equipment you use and any training you’ve completed
to use this.
4. Have you gained or are you working towards any qualifications or other
recognition in your job?
5. Explain how you make sure you balance work and your studies.
6. Tell the reader about the people you work with and the context. Eg
face to face with customers, as part of a team with colleagues etc.
7. Write about what you find most enjoyable about your job (apart from
getting paid!)
8. Tell the reader about what challenges you in your job and how you
meet the demands.
9. Explain what you plan or organise in your job.
10. Is there more than one job you want to tell the reader
about?
1

Prompts – Hobbies
This can include whatever you do in the time that you are not studying,
working, travelling, eating or sleeping. The reader wants to know that you are
an interesting and varied person so tell them about what you do in your spare
time even if it isn’t what you’d usually label as a hobby like ‘stamp collecting’
for example.
1. Tell the reader about what you do with your friends/ different groups of
friends.
2. What do you do with family or to help out at home?
3. If you are a member of any clubs or organisations tell the reader what
this involves.
4. Apart from college and home, where do you go and what you do when
you get there?
5. Tell the reader about what you may get the opportunity to do only
occasionally in your spare time.
6. Tell the reader about any certificates or awards you have achieved
outside college.
Prompts - Work Shadowing / Work Experience/ Voluntary Work
1. Tell the reader where you went and for how long.
2. Explain the nature of where you went for your placement, business/
service/ education/ healthcare etc.
3. Describe who you worked with and what you did or observed.
4. Give details of the equipment you used or observed in use.
5. How did you know what you did or observed being done was worth
doing?
6. If you were only allowed to observe, explain that you understand the
reasons for this.
7. Tell the reader about anything unexpected.
8. Tell the reader about what you found challenging.
9. Tell the reader about anything you did for the first time.
10. Give details of any feedback you got and how you know what
impression you made.
11. Were there any codes of practice or regulations you had to take into
account during your placement?
Anything else you feel is important
1. Explain why if you have changed subjects/ had an extra year at
college.*
2. Explain if you are hoping to improve on grades and how you intend to
do this.*
3. Is there anything else to add that makes you stand out from the crowd?
* This can be tricky to include but acknowledging difficulties and showing
you’re overcoming them is usually a better approach than ignoring them.
Seek advice if you’re not sure whether to include something.
2

Final Paragraph – Why do you want this vacancy/ a place on this
course?
This paragraph would usually be at the start of a personal statement but it’s
been left until last for two reasons. Firstly, it is often the paragraph student’s
find most difficult and secondly, after writing the rest of the personal
statement, you should now find this paragraph much easier.
Through this paragraph you need to show
1. You fully understand the key aspects of course/ job and how you will
meet the requirements.
2. You have genuine motivation to do it.
3. You have considered how this course/ job will fit in with your future
career.
Look over what you have already written for the other sections. You might
want to briefly mention something you have written about in detail in the other
paragraphs. Use the prompts below to help you, picking out a few points that
you think are most relevant to you.
Prompts – Why?
1. Tell the reader what opportunities you hope this course/ job will lead to.
2. Briefly outline what you have already done that is similar to aspects of
this job or course.
3. Tell the reader what you are looking forward to about this job or course.
4. If this is a completely new area for you, explain how you have
researched it and what makes it suit you.
5. If there are difficult aspects to this job or course, explain you are aware
of this and how you will tackle this.
6. Tell the reader how you will be building on current skills, qualities or
knowledge through this job/ course.
7. Briefly explain what happened to make you think ‘This is for me.’
8. Explain what you will get out of doing this course/ job to make it
worthwhile.
Put it together
Most people will begin their personal statement with the ‘Why this’ section but
the best order for your other paragraphs will depend on what you are applying
for. It’s up to you to decide on the best for you e.g.
A good order for applying for a Geography Course at University
o Paragraph 1 - Why Geography
o Paragraph 2 - Studying geography in college and other subjects.
o Paragraph 3 - Part- time job and hobbies.
3

A good order for applying for a Nursing course at University
o Paragraph 1 - Why Nursing
o Paragraph 2 - Work experience and work shadowing relating to nursing
o Paragraph 3 - Subjects studied in college.
o Paragraph 4 - Part- time jobs and hobbies.
A good order for applying for a job in banking
o Paragraph 1 - Why Banking
o Paragraph 2 - Part- time job in a customer service environment
o Paragraph 3 - Subjects studied in college.
o Paragraph 4 - Hobbies.
Checking your Personal Statement – Does it say what it needs to say?
Selecting who to interview from a number of applicants for a job or university
course is difficult to do fairly so many admissions tutors and employers have
their own set of criteria they will be checking for in your personal statement.
Some even have a scoring system and they only interview the applicants with
the highest scores and reject the rest. Check your personal statement against
all the information they have provided on what they are looking for and add
information if necessary.
For university courses
o Check against all the information provided in the course profile on
www.ucas.com
o Check against any additional information on the university website, the
course department website and in the prospectus
o NB if you have applied to 5 different universities, you will need to do
this for each.
For jobs
o Check your statement against all the information provided about the
job. This could be titled ‘Person Specification’ or ‘Essential Criteria’.
o If the information isn’t very detailed, look the job up on Kudos or jobs4U
and look through the ‘skills and qualities’ sections there for ideas.
o You may need to adjust your Personal Statement slightly, even if
applying for the same kind of job with different companies to ensure
you always meet the criteria.
And Finally
o Use the spell check facility and proof read carefully
to ensure your spelling and grammar is perfect.
Remember For UCAS
a maximum of 47 lines
Times New Roman
12 pt
4