Writing a personal statement for university

Getting started

All students and writers experience 'blank page syndrome' at some point in their lives. Don't worry if you're not sure the best way how to write a personal statement for university; the best way to deal with it is to avoid obsessing over the opening line during your first draft. Write something – anything – and then you can add to it and improve later on.

There are example personal statements online, which can be useful to get an idea of effective structure, but do not copy chunks or whole passages. Universities take plagiarism very seriously, and use software to detect it.

It's useful to make a bullet-point list of the main areas you want to cover in order of importance. This will help to organise your thoughts and check them off as you go along, so you can reassure yourself that you haven’t missed anything important.

The UCAS website will automatically log you out after 35 minutes of inactivity. Working in a separate word processing document, saving regularly, and then copying the text into the UCAS form afterwards means you are less likely to lose your work.

What should I include?

Around 80% of your statement should relate to academic studies, work experience and how these contribute to your interest in the course and potential to do well. The rest can be used to cover extra-curricular activities.

When writing a personal statement for university it's best to include specific examples of activities and achievements that make you suitable for the course, and explanations of how these will help you to succeed. It's also preferable to select a few of the most relevant examples with details, rather than a long list of your attributes and interests.

Your skills, achievements and experience should be explained in terms of relevance to your course. For example, if you are applying for a course in business with entrepreneurship, you should mention any work experience you gained in industry or any entrepreneurship competitions you entered.

Admissions tutors will be looking for evidence of your interest in a subject. If you are applying to study journalism, for example, you could mention your own media habits and preferences or your experience of blogging.

After every new point you make, ask yourself if the information you have given supports your application. It's better to pick a couple of your activities – the more recent the better – and discuss how they have contributed to your skills. For example, what did being captain of your netball team help you develop? Your organisational skills or time management, perhaps?

Demonstrate your knowledge and enthusiasm of the subject area, what you will take from the course, and where you see it leading in your academic or professional life after university.

Don’t waste words explaining why you haven’t done something. Focus on the positives.

Evidence of your interest in a subject could include:

• Attending seminars or lectures on the subject outside of school
• Seeking out work experience relevant to the area
• Voluntary work
• Reading journal papers or relevant books
• Listening to radio podcasts (you could give an example of one which especially contributed to your interest or understanding of the subject)
• Entering competitions, for example writing competitions or young enterprise schemes

So you’ve written your first draft…

If possible, re-read the whole personal statement the day after you finish writing it. This means you will be able to read with fresh eyes and more easily see where there is missing information or where you have rambled. Admissions tutors are often flooded with personal statements. For this reason they prefer clear and concise language – have you used ten words when two will do?

Proofread

Even if you pride yourself on your writing skills, it is still easy to overlook mistakes when the writing is your own. It is helpful to ask a friend, family member or tutor to read through your personal statement and look for spelling mistakes that a spellchecker may miss.

Be yourself!

The tutors want to know about the real you, so don't try to be somebody else. Humour can fall flat if you aren’t used to writing in that style. When writing a personal statement for university avoid unnecessarily elaborate language and long sentences, these can be hard to follow and could obscure your message.

You may need to condense your personal statement to comply with the UCAS character limit. This is up to 4,000 characters, or 47 lines – whichever comes first. It is possible to substitute words and change the word order of sentences to decrease a word count without losing content.

Before you submit your statement:

• Get a friend or family member to proofread it for you
• Make sure sentences are not overly long
• Check that everything you write is relevant to the course
• Give specific examples
• Focus on the positives