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jettison63
- Posts: 434
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Last edited by jettison63 on Wed Dec 09, 2015 6:35 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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debdeb2
- Posts: 66
- Joined: Sun Aug 16, 2015 2:21 pm
Re: Final Draft! Thoughts?
Hi - It's a serviceable draft - definitely read it aloud once, I think there is a typo or two to catch still.
The impression you leave is that you are eager and ambitious. You step up, you volunteer, and you inhale new information. This is all good - you leave the reader with a positive impression of your character, and that you are up to any challenge.
It is true that there isn't a strong narrative arc. That does reduce how memorable this essay will be in a pile of essays. There is also not a lot of sensory detail - summary is favored over specifics. Images, smells, sounds - details that create a sensory picture help make a story more real for the reader.
What caught my attention was the conclusion. You rely on some standard cliches which can be taken out back and put out of their misery - "stay with me throughout my lifetime, fight for a better tomorrow, positive mark on the world". But then you surprisingly reverse course and tell the reader that what you just described is not the career you're interested in pursuing. Instead, you imply that you want to help the voiceless. That is noble, but unfortunately too vague for the purposes of a law school personal statement.
Who do you want to help? For example, if you're interested in immigration law, and you are applying to law schools that specialize in that, good grief do mention that. If your plan is to be a public defender, you'll want a school with a robust criminal justice program, and possibly an LRAP program if you're counting on salary to repay student loans. Civil Liberties? Environmental Health? Human Rights? The list goes on. You should be looking at specialties, at clinics, at law reviews, and really digging into 1) the real options that are out there and 2) where you will fit. For your top1-3 schools, you should definitely plan to emphasize how you are a fit for their program in your conclusion. Harvard has a public interest page that covers different areas if you're looking for a comprehensive summary: http://hls.harvard.edu/dept/opia/what-i ... erest-law/
The reason this is important is because a large percentage of applicants think the adcomms want to hear that you're interested in public service, so applicants slap that on the end of their essay and pray that it's enough. Based on your background and essay content, I do actually believe that you're sincere - but without specifics, the adcomms may not read your conclusion as sincere. It is likely to come across as just another applicant throwing the 'public service Hail Mary'.
A personal statement is not a contract. Don't lie in it, obviously, but allow yourself to dream big for a minute. If you're interested in 3 or 4 different areas of law, and you're not sure which you're most likely to choose yet, that's fine! Think about focusing your conclusion for each school on the areas that are the best match between you and that school. No one is going to hold you to a career plan that you proposed in your personal statement - but having an actual idea of a career plan in your personal statement will go a long way to illustrating that you are thinking about your future seriously. Best of luck -
The impression you leave is that you are eager and ambitious. You step up, you volunteer, and you inhale new information. This is all good - you leave the reader with a positive impression of your character, and that you are up to any challenge.
It is true that there isn't a strong narrative arc. That does reduce how memorable this essay will be in a pile of essays. There is also not a lot of sensory detail - summary is favored over specifics. Images, smells, sounds - details that create a sensory picture help make a story more real for the reader.
What caught my attention was the conclusion. You rely on some standard cliches which can be taken out back and put out of their misery - "stay with me throughout my lifetime, fight for a better tomorrow, positive mark on the world". But then you surprisingly reverse course and tell the reader that what you just described is not the career you're interested in pursuing. Instead, you imply that you want to help the voiceless. That is noble, but unfortunately too vague for the purposes of a law school personal statement.
Who do you want to help? For example, if you're interested in immigration law, and you are applying to law schools that specialize in that, good grief do mention that. If your plan is to be a public defender, you'll want a school with a robust criminal justice program, and possibly an LRAP program if you're counting on salary to repay student loans. Civil Liberties? Environmental Health? Human Rights? The list goes on. You should be looking at specialties, at clinics, at law reviews, and really digging into 1) the real options that are out there and 2) where you will fit. For your top1-3 schools, you should definitely plan to emphasize how you are a fit for their program in your conclusion. Harvard has a public interest page that covers different areas if you're looking for a comprehensive summary: http://hls.harvard.edu/dept/opia/what-i ... erest-law/
The reason this is important is because a large percentage of applicants think the adcomms want to hear that you're interested in public service, so applicants slap that on the end of their essay and pray that it's enough. Based on your background and essay content, I do actually believe that you're sincere - but without specifics, the adcomms may not read your conclusion as sincere. It is likely to come across as just another applicant throwing the 'public service Hail Mary'.
A personal statement is not a contract. Don't lie in it, obviously, but allow yourself to dream big for a minute. If you're interested in 3 or 4 different areas of law, and you're not sure which you're most likely to choose yet, that's fine! Think about focusing your conclusion for each school on the areas that are the best match between you and that school. No one is going to hold you to a career plan that you proposed in your personal statement - but having an actual idea of a career plan in your personal statement will go a long way to illustrating that you are thinking about your future seriously. Best of luck -
