What Not To Put In A Personal Statement

Are you wondering what not to put in a personal statement? If you are, then this is the guide for you!

A personal statement can be thought of as an essay that you write to describe who you are. The content of a personal statement is one of the most critical factors in determining if you have a chance to be accepted to your chosen university.

It’s no secret that there are particular phrases and styles of writing you should avoid putting in your personal statement. A single badly-written sentence can potentially ruin your personal statement!

So, if you want to avoid that from happening, pay close attention to this list of what not to put in your personal statement.

Let’s crack on!

Claims With No Evidence

You might be thinking, “What could possibly go wrong if I simply list down what I’m good at and all my incredible attributes?”

In fact, listing down your strengths without evidence is a fatal mistake.

Related Read: How To Write A Personal Statement

If you say you have good leadership skills, why not write down the awards you received to back up your claim? Mentioning prominent positions you’ve had in your organisations is also an excellent way to prove yourself.

Listing down your strengths without evidence shows poor credibility on your part. But this is less of a “What not to put in your personal statement” and more of a “If you’re including your skills, show them off properly!”

Skills Or Extracurricular Activities Irrelevant To Your Course

You’ve listed down your strengths with sufficient evidence to back up your claims. Now ask yourself the question: do your strengths relate to your course?

Sure, you have outstanding leadership skills, but how will you use that in the field of chemistry? Say you’re an excellent debater; will that give you an edge when applying for engineering? The answer could definitely be yes – but whoever reads your statement will want to see you make that link. Perhaps, once a chemist, you want to lead on a project to research and develop a new material. Or maybe you’re aware of how much ‘debating’ and discussion can help an engineer to problem solve within a team.

Make sure you tie your strengths back to the course you’re applying for. If you don’t, you might as well not put them in. You only have 4,000 characters to convince the panel that you are worth accepting. 

Make each word count!

Poor Grammar And Spelling

Poor grammar and spelling are essential criteria when talking about what not to put in a personal statement. Spelling and grammatical errors can ruin decent content for a personal statement. 

They show that you didn’t care enough to go over your personal statement and improve the quality.

Are you a budding medic? Here’s how to write a medical personal statement.

If you want to prove that you are a worthy applicant for your course, demonstrate your careful attention to detail by eliminating spelling and grammatical errors. Make it easy and pleasant for the admissions committee to read.

Doing so increases your chances of admittance by a hundredfold!

Failures And Regrets

Failures and regrets are some of the biggest things to remember on what not to put in a personal statement.

Why? Because your personal statement is a personal essay that sells you to universities for acceptance. Not an autobiography for you to inspire somebody like self-help books often do.

Mentioning how you failed your statistics class or regret not trying out for the football team doesn’t accomplish very much when convincing the admissions committee that you’re potential student material.

But there is an exception to this rule. If your failure contributed significantly to developing your relevant skill, you may go ahead and write it down. As long as you make the connection explicit, you’re good to go! For example, if you failed to win a prize one year and then doubled your efforts to secure it the next, you could link this to your resilience and persistence – hugely essential skills when it comes to, for example, degrees of many years like medicine.

Keep this progression in your mind: failure, skill development, tie it back to your course. This narrative structure demonstrates your grit and determination to try harder.

Sentences That Lead Nowhere

Avoid one-liners or sentences that don’t fit the context of your personal statement. If you’re writing about what inspired you to study engineering, don’t just mention inspirations and leave them hanging. Did a particular invention spark your interest? Discuss why it sparked your interest. Could it be that the invention helped lift thousands of people from energy shortage? Perhaps it has helped alleviate global warming?

If so, how is that invention relevant in the 21st century? Then, if given the opportunity, what improvements would you make to enhance its usefulness in society? Perhaps this is the perfect opportunity for you to discuss your ideas for developing new technologies. You may want to pursue it if the universities accept you.

From the universities’ point of view, they’ll be thrilled to accept a student who plans to invent a potentially groundbreaking tech. Do you see where this is going?

Each sentence in your personal statement has to build upon one another to come across as coherent. One sentence that leads nowhere will leave your reader hanging and perplexed. You can quickly lose the momentum you’ve worked so hard to gain. Plus, if you think about it, if your sentences have nothing to do with each other, you may as well write out a load of bullet points. And I think we can all agree, that’s not what admissions officers are looking for!

So “sentences that lead nowhere” should be in your “what not to put in a personal statement” list!

Quotes That Don’t Fit

Quotes can be powerful, authoritative, and timeless. They can easily lift your personal statement to a higher level. But you need to know how to use them to their fullest potential, or they may end up ruining your personal statement!

So if you want to use quotes, make sure they fit the context of your personal statement. You cannot drop in a random quote by Theodore Roosevelt with no connection to your story and how your experience relates to your determination to study the course.

The best ways to make a quote work is to integrate it seamlessly into personal statement. What did the quote make you think about? What action did you take as a result of hearing it? Would you build on or change any aspect of the quote in light of your own experience?

Because of the need to integrate a quote into your narrative, it might not work to go and research “inspiring quotes relating to my subject” and shoehorn them in. If you have a bit of time before writing your statement, start to read works by inspirational figures in your field now. Then, the likelihood is that relevant quotes will flow from your pen (or keyboard!) when the time comes to write.

You could say, “Einstein’s belief that ‘imagination is more important than knowledge’ resonated with me when I was designing an educational website for my school. Rather than using a standard dropdown menu for navigation, I created an interactive ‘choose your own adventure’ style guide that helped students explore different subjects based on their interests.” You could even build on this in your conclusion by mentioning how you’re looking forward to boosting both your imagination and knowledge on the course!

Related Read: How To Conclude Your Personal Statement

Overexplaining Facts

By now, you have substantial know-how on what not to put in a personal statement. But there’s more – facts and explanations that the admissions officer will already know.

Whilst it’s a great idea to reference topics and even specific books that excite you, you don’t have to demonstrate your knowledge by discussing facts or histories. Chances are, the admissions already know what you’re talking about. They probably know more than you do!

So steer clear of textbook-type explanations. Your personal statement is not a research paper! It’s a personal essay aimed at showing the reader why you should be admitted as their student. That’s why you need to get to grips with mentioning facts, histories, books or other subject-specific information briefly and in context by explaining how these helped you in your personal development. What realisations did you have that urged you to hone your skills? 

For example, instead of writing, “Marie Curie’s pioneering work in radioactivity revolutionized modern physics and chemistry,” you could say, “Reading about Marie Curie’s relentless pursuit of discovery despite societal challenges inspired me to approach my own scientific inquiries with resilience, leading me to undertake an independent research project on radiation safety in medical imaging.”

Don’t forget to tie your skills in with your course, writing why they’re essential for you to succeed in the field. 

Made Up Stories

Making up stories is an absolute red line you must never cross. But it’s not easy to resist when you feel the pressure to impress and stand out. When you do feel the pressure, think of the effects down the road.

How would you prepare for a university interview if they were to ask you a question about the made-up story? Slight exaggerations, no matter how believable, can still knock you out cold when caught off-guard!

Say you mentioned that you read a particular journal article. Here comes an up-to-date professor who knows the latest research papers like the back of their hand. They ask you a question about it, but your poor answers reveal the truth that you made the story up.

Do you feel the chills crawling down your spine at the very thought? Good! Please don’t do it! It’s not worth it.

Not only can it ruin your chances of being admitted, but it can also potentially damage your career options years later!

Childhood Aspirations

Childhood aspirations carry little weight in personal statements. Why? Because you didn’t have the knowledge, experience, or skills yet to make an informed choice of your course.

The admissions committee is not looking to know your whole life story. What they want to know is if you’re a great fit as a student of your course.

Do you have the necessary experience and skills to succeed in your chosen field of study? What’s your purpose? What are your long-term plans?

Mentioning your childhood aspirations will only waste much-needed space in your personal statement. Replace what’s not needed with what’s necessary. Choose only the best and most relevant of your experience and strengths to include in your personal statement.

Conclusion

If you want the best chance of gaining admission to your university of choice, knowing what not to put in your personal statement is a great starting point.

The main idea is to nail down each sentence in context. Every line should support the main points of your personal statement and contribute to the goal of convincing the admissions committee that you are qualified to be their student.

Keep your personal statement clear of these common errors, and you’ll have greater chances of succeeding!