Stupid Question Forum

[sempersexy]

Do I include a title with my PS?

[rinkrat19]

In the header:
Name
LSAC Number
Personal Statement for X Law School

In the footer:
Page number (e.g. 1 of 2)

Don't give it a creative title. This is not Writing 101.

[michaelwoo]

.

[ms9]

I am not a source but I have read thousands upon thousands of law school admissions files and worked at the director and assistant dean level for three law schools. I also do this (consulting for law school prospective students and law schools) full-time now, so I hope this provides some insight. I certainly can not speak for all law schools but here is my take:

1. 99% of the Personal Statements I read did not have a title.

2. In respect to the sub-header suggesting "Personal Statement for X Law School" I would not include this. Why?

I can not tell you the number of times people wrote the wrong law school name in either the text of the PS, e.g. "all my life I have wanted to go to Teletubbie School of Law" when they are applying to Hannah Montana School of Law. (I have no idea what messed of neural sequence I just went through to come up with those two examples) So there really is zero value-add here, and the opportunity to mess things up big-time. When you get the school name wrong admissions officers assume either, 1. you are so arrogant you do not care, or 2. you have very poor attention to detail. Both are, politely stated, not good.

3. if you are really on the bubble, or this school is a stretch, and you think you have the wittiest, Sports Illustrated worthy play on words title I say go for it. You need to positively differentiate. If not, I would skip the title.

[rinkrat19]

The value added is in case a page of your file falls on the floor. They know whose it is, what it is, and which page it is, and can instantly put it back where it belongs. It's also helpful when you have pages upon pages of fairly generic text. PS, DS, Why X, Optional essays, Addenda...

Some page of unlabeled whatever falls out of your file and you just annoyed some adcomm who now has to figure out where to file it.

Don't fuck up the school name, obviously.

[ms9]

I'm not saying take your name off the header--I agree you should have it. And your LSAC #, page #. I'm pretty sure if your page falls on the floor (given that most offices are now paperless I don't see this happening) the law school still knows their own name.