Personal Statement Critique Forum

[Anonymous User]

PS

It’s a typical day on the [Redacted] road. The air is thick with exhaust smoke and the cars are lined up in bumper to bumper gridlock for miles. My mother, brother and I are in the middle of it in our rickety red Toyota, on the way to the airport to begin our new life across the ocean. Three men with AK-47’s over their shoulders and matching black bandannas over their faces weave between the cars, stopping only to bang on windows and demand payment. My mom is in the drivers seat, both hands firmly on the steering wheel, she trembles, breathes deeply and attempts to maintain her composure. “Today is the last day we have to deal with this… the last day” she murmurs. On this occasion the armed robbers leave before they get a chance to extort my mother, however she was not always so lucky. Months earlier she had been bloodied by an encounter with traffic robbers in which he refused to give up her phone. Later she would tell me that the assault was the final straw, she loved her country but she could not live there anymore.

I always wondered why [Redacted] was the way it was. Whenever I saw images of the West on television, it seemed safer, richer and better than [Redacted]. I wanted my country to be that way too but before i could do anything, I had to understand the causes of the problems and gain the tools necessary to help fix them. My journey led me to the International Development program at the [Redacted]. Where my undergraduate experience provided me with many of the answers I had sought since my time in [Redacted]. I learned about colonialism, the impact of structural adjustment and many of the other factors that contribute to underdevelopment and insecurity. I was also able to work on an independent research project based on citizen action by indigenous people in [Country i'm from]. This project was my way of contextualizing my understanding of development in my home country but it was also my introduction to the importance of the law. My research helped me learn about the legal rights of indigenous people in [Redacted] and how those rights are realized in practice. It led me to explore the relationship between human rights, constitutional rights and legal rights, more specifically I looked at how they can be linked together in order to create practical enforceable mechanisms for change.

My time as an undergraduate was also filled with tremendous personal growth. I met my best friend Mak, a refugee student from Sudan that [Redacted], a student organization i was Vice-President of, had sponsored. I had requested that he be placed in the same residence as I, since previous refugee students had encountered some trouble adjusting and I was working as a Residence Advisor. While I shared Mak’s experience of moving to [Redacted] from [Redacted], our circumstances were much more different than I expected. He told me stories about growing up in a war zone, hiding while rebels rifled through his home. Stories of his village being attacked and having to sleep in the forest in order to avoid capture and death. His stories served not only as a reminder of the level of privilege I possessed but also a reminder that my interest in development is more than an intellectual curiosity. It reminded me of my duty to do work that has real world consequences, work that makes people’s lives safer and better.

My life experiences as a [Redacted] have shaped the way I see the world, my experiences with Mak served to reinforce what I have known was my purpose in life. Law school is the next step for me in fulfilling that purpose. As we drove to the airport on my last day in [Redacted] my mother said “Today is the last day we have to deal with this”. She was referring to dealing with difficulties that are emblematic of life in a developing country. She was right, however many in [Redacted] still have to deal with the issues we left behind. My family left [Redacted] to escape from the problems that plagued it. I spent my time as an undergraduate learning about the causes of those problems, now I am applying to law school to gain the tools to fix them.

[CanadianWolf]

Reads well. Sincere, convincing, stays on topic & interesting.

A minor correction: CHANGE "between" to "among human rights, constitutional rights and legal rights" if you want readers to view these as three, rather than two, categories of rights. ( Constitutional rights are legal rights so you may want to revise that sentence.)

[LSATclincher]

Great statement and very impressive how you bring in other characters to to the play while still making yourself the star of the PS. That's really tough to do. Good luck!

[cbbinnyc]

Yeah, I agree with the other posters. Top notch statement. A few grammatical things, so have somebody proofread for grammar (if you don't have somebody to do it, PM me and I can give you some edits), but you're in good shape.