Please Review PS and rip it appart Forum

[arkman]

This version is after a couple of drafts so I am now ready to have it reviewed. Please let me know what you think and areas where I could improve. Thank you in advance.
I am not your typical law school candidate, if there is such an individual. I am a husband, father, and successful Business Manager in my mid 30’s. So why would a father of five children forego a six figure a year income to live on student loans for the next three years in order to attend law school? This is a question posed to me by many close friends and colleagues over the past year since I came to my decision. It was due to that single sentence uttered by my young daughter which stopped me in my tracks.
My life completely changed twenty months ago. Had I heard her correctly? It was not possible. How could I have let this happen? After the initial shock wore off, I realized there was nothing I could have done to prevent this. If a person is determined, they will discover a way to commit a crime. This is exactly what happened. Over the next twelve months I was able to witness the entire judicial process and saw just how overtasked the county criminal prosecutors were. They were subjected to juggling multiple cases at once while trying to see that justice was served and keep the victims informed of the proceedings. The events leading up to the trial were quite taxing on my daughter, which only increased my desire to do more. This is when my decision of what to do became clear. I needed to dedicate myself to completing my college education then matriculate to law school and become a criminal prosecutor. By devoting my second career to work for a district attorney it won’t enable me to prevent what happened to my daughter or inhibit the actions of other criminal. I will, however, be able to litigation those who have been accused so justice can be served.
I stood up for what I knew was right. Though I was alienated by my family, I couldn’t simply stand aside and because of my determination to seek the truth, justice prevailed. For the past 14 years of working in the telecommunications field, always having to prove my abilities since I never completed an undergraduate college degree, whereas all my peers had Master’s degrees. I am tenacious and find a way to persevere. When challenges are placed before me I rise to the occasion and excel. I have a lengthy and distinguished job history which provides me the maturity necessary to graduate and become an alumnus your school will be proud to have.

[jessie]

"I am not your typical law school candidate."

I really dislike that opening sentence. It doesn't add anything to your statement, since this is something that should be apparent from the rest of your statement. There are many people who are not "typical" and many different ways to be atypical. Show what make you different right off the bat.

Your story about your daughter and the justice system is very confusing. It gives us this vague idea that something happened to her, and I understand why you might want to avoid details, but it makes it hard to feel strongly about the story. You also talk about being alienated by your family, but never explain what happened.

" I am tenacious and find a way to persevere. When challenges are placed before me I rise to the occasion and excel. I have a lengthy and distinguished job history which provides me the maturity necessary to graduate and become an alumnus your school will be proud to have."

Show, don't tell. That statement says what you think about yourself but doesn't show your reader anything about a time where you demonstrated tenacity or what you have done in your career that has been distinguished (you only vaguely mention working in the telocommunications field).

Overall, I think your statement includes a lot of general statements but I don't think it's very convincing about any of them.

[AntipodeanPhil]

I agree with what the previous poster says. The PS is extremely confusing because you don't say what happened to your daughter, or what she said to you. Obviously, we understand why you might not want to provide details, but if you can't fix the problem you need to pick a new topic.

The last paragraph is just a disjointed collection of sentences.

Lastly, there is a lot of awkward phrasing here, and a good number of grammatical mistakes. The grammatical mistakes MUST be fixed.

I think this has real promise, but it needs a LOT of work.

[CanadianWolf]

Overall, as noted above by other posters, this personal statement is not as well written as it should be.

Are you sure that you want to give up a six figure job for a position as an ADA ? Your reasons for wanting to practice law seem to be more emotional than rational, in my opinion.

[llachans]

I agree that your PS is extremely confusing. If you don't want to disclose your daughter's situation, find a way to make the rest of it a little less vague. It is difficult to follow and therefore seems really disjointed.

[CanadianWolf]

Not sure, but I think that OP's daughter may have been the victim of a violent crime.

[arkman]

Thank you for the feedback. I have learned a bit from the feedback thus far and modified my PS a little. The issue with my daughter involved a crime with my father. I want to keep it vague since it was really bad. Any thoughts on that?

[AntipodeanPhil]

Thank you for the feedback. I have learned a bit from the feedback thus far and modified my PS a little. The issue with my daughter involved a crime with my father. I want to keep it vague since it was really bad. Any thoughts on that?

Can you do more to describe what happened and what she said without indicating that it was your father? You could just descibe the perpetratror as to "someone close to her," or describe the crime without mentioning the perpetrator.

[houng89]

too cliche and trite

[auntjulia]

I actually liked this PS, although I had to read over it three times to understand it fully. It was confusing at first, I kept reading the first paragraph and beginning of the second and thinking I had missed something. I think something along these lines would be better for the last sentence of the first paragraph. "It all started with my daughter telling me she had been the victim of a horrific crime." Not that exactly, but something along those lines would make the following sentences intelligible.
Really though, the substance of this PS is great. Adcomms will not forget you. Contrary to what someone else said you have excellent reasons for wanting to go to law school. But the writing, as mentioned, is a problem. You need to clean it up, fix the grammatical mistakes and, most importantly, organize your thoughts.
One thing you could do is to make a list of all the ideas you want to incorporate in their most basic forms. Number them in the order which you think is logical then put them in paragraph form, make them pretty and add transitions.
If you take your time and nail the writing I think you'll have an incredible PS on your hands. I'm pulling for you to get into your target schools. PM me if you want me to read your next draft.

Good luck