PS-Please Critique (First Draft) Forum

[Anonymous User]

Delete

[txdude45]

OP, PM this to me and I'll make edits.

[erik the viking]

This is a great topic. I have the utmost respect for your circumstances and intentions. I want you to be a lawyer. However, any responsible adcomm at a competitive school would reject your application out of hand. You have lots of problems with grammar and if you honestly think that this is ready to be submitted, there is no way anyone editing your essay is going to solve your problems for you. Completely aside from the grammar, your essay seems to lose focus when you stop talking about the riots. I suggest you cut out the part about volunteering and the part about Ruben Carter. Focus on the riots and on why that made you want to be a lawyer.

You need to work on your writing. Maybe start by looking up some writing guides:

https://www.amherst.edu/system/files/me ... ridged.PDF

[Anonymous User]

Thank you for the feedback erik the viking. It's a first draft so at this point I was merely trying to focus more on getting the ideas laid out and then going from there. You're completely right in regards that it has a long way to go but I suppose everything has to have a starting point.

[mmbt123]

Also this feels more like a history lesson. You spend so much time describing a historical event that large chunks of the PS doesn't seem like it's an essay about you.

Mentioning your activities in LA feels a little out of place when you devote so much early space to the LA riots. And it's not effective to pretty much jot them down in list format.

I think right now, the main problem is that your essay is centered around two poles to which you have a very tenuous personal connection, the LA Riots and the film you mention. It just doesn't feel like you're involved enough in either events for this to be an effective personal statement. Might be better off to begin w/ your actual experiences in the hospital and to use the LA Riots & film to illuminate or emphasize lessons you learned from your hands on experiences. This ordering will also make sense for the LA Riots since you are only really understanding the significance of the events from a retrospective perspective since you were only four at the time and couldn't really grasp the entirety of the event.

[Anonymous User]

Thank you for the feedback mmbt123. Appreciate it very much!

[lastsamurai]

Seems to be very little talking about you. It should focus more on the personal elements instead of history and the generic elements of the law that make it effective

[Anonymous User]

Thanks to everyone who helped give feedback. I'm grateful. Back to the drawing board!