​What is the purpose of a personal statement and what are its characteristics?

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•      The personal statement is a tool by which the members of a selection committee can get a sense of who you are as a person: your personal history and background, goals, academic and intellectual interests, and your character as illustrated by examples related to community service, leadership roles etc.  They also want to know what motivates you to succeed and what your long terms goals and aspirations are.

•      The goal of a personal statement is to persuade the readers to select you over other qualified candidates in the applicant pool.  Part of this task of persuasion is to offer concrete evidence that you are likely to persist and successfully receive you bachelor's degree in the normal amount of time.  You also need to make clear that given your background and life experience, you can make good use of the support services and financial aid provided by the scholarship.

•      With this in mind, it is extremely important that the opening paragraph of your personal statement have a hook, i.e. that it is written in such a way that the reader wants to learn more.  One way to do this is to provide an anecdote that focuses on a specific event, interaction, experience etc. that set you on the academic and personal path on which you now find yourself.  The more visual it can be the better.

•      In addition, a personal statement should include targeted and focused supporting evidence with reference to important individuals, events, experiences that have shaped your values and aspirations.  It is not enough to simply make assertions as in: "I am an excellent candidate for this scholarship because I am highly motivated to succeed no matter what the obstacles are."  Simple declarations of positive attributes do not persuade.  It is for the selectors to decide if you are qualified and fit the profile based on the evidence that you provide.  So, it is much better to show your qualities of character with reference to specific situations than to merely tell the selectors what your positive qualities are in a series of assertions.

•      Selectors are also trying to determine if you have the qualities of character and personality to adapt to new surroundings, to deal appropriately and openly with individuals who may not look like you, may come from very different backgrounds, communities etc. and who may have belief systems that are quite different from your own.

•      On the other hand, a personal statement is not a mini biography that includes everything that has ever happened in your life or that simply reiterates the items of your resume.  You should also avoid providing too much detail on the obstacles that you may have faced.  Instead, the emphasis should be on how you overcame any obstacles; it is the story of your triumph over adversity that should be emphasized and not the details of the challenges that you may have confronted.

•      Personal statements should avoid negative information unless this can be used to demonstrate character and persistence in overcoming serious difficulties or impediments.  In any case, it is the overcoming that should be emphasized and not the difficulties themselves.



In summary, a personal statement is:



•      A picture:  It provides a snapshot of who you are as a person

•      An invitation:  Your job is to invite your readers to know you in all of your uniqueness and complexity.

•      An opportunity to persuade the selectors that you are a good risk i.e. that you are the kind of candidate with the skills and qualities of character to succeed.

​Skills that you will be required to develop as you prepare your personal essay:

•      How to choose and develop personal anecdotes.
•      How to define and present your academic and professional goals.
•      How to write an introduction that will capture your reader's attention.
•      How to structure your essay so that it builds a compelling portrait of you.
•      How to tailor your essays to specific schools.
•      How to avoid overly general, vague, and clichéd language.
•      How to use tone appropriately.

Brainstorming Questions
Your answers to these questions will inform the content of your personal essay.  At the start of your transfer essay writing process (the Fall before you plan to begin at a 4-year college), use these questions to brainstorm and freewrite.  Do not expect to produce the final version after the second or third draft.  Instead, understand that this is a process, and do yourself a favor by beginning early and staying persistent.

•      What is special, unique, distinctive and/or impressive about you or your life story?
•      What details of your life (personal or family, history, people or events that have shaped you or influenced your goals) might help the committee better understand you or help set you apart from other applicants?
•      When did you become interested in this field and what have you learned about it (and about yourself) that has further stimulated your interest and reinforced your conviction that you are well suited to this field?  What insights have you gained?

WAIT!  There's more:

•      If you have worked a lot during your college years, what have you learned (leadership or managerial skills, for example), and how has that work contributed to your professional goals?
•      What are your career goals?
•      Have you had to overcome any unusual obstacles or hardships (eg. economic, familial or physical) in your life?  (Note that the emphasis is on how you overcame the obstacle.  Avoid sob stories.)
•      What personal characteristics (eg. integrity, compassion, persistence) do you possess that would improve your prospects for success in the field or profession?  Is there a way to demonstrate or document that you have these characteristics?  (Just stating that you have a specific characteristic is not enough.)
•      What skills (eg. leadership, communication, analytic) do you possess?

​We will be sharing more information about the personal essay over the coming months, including posting sample personal essays.  You can also go to the transfer service (B215) to read their books on personal essays, and research the web for resources that focus on this topic​.  Note that many sample personal essays that you may come across are admissions essays by high school students.  Personal essays by a community college transfer student (like yours) will naturally be informed by different life and academic experiences.



Even as we research and gather sample essays for this section, we want to share some wise words from a LaGuardia Honors alumnus.  We understand that writing the personal essay is a stressful and demanding exercise, even for the best writers amongst us.  Reading outstanding sample personal essays can also be stressful for some of us because it may feel that our work will never measure up to others'.  Or we may feel that we have to produce essays just like the ones highlighted in guidebooks and on websites.  So we hope that the following words will be of some encouragement to you:



"Writing models are helpful, but they also may stifle the vigor of student's story.  Sometimes students get hung up on what works for others.  They may want to replicate a similar story they've read from a fancy writer, and so they burden their stories with florid language.  When they look at their crisp sentences, they heap them with modifiers or colorful words; they burrow their prose in a forest of verbiage because they assume that is how smart people write.  Instead of writing about concrete experiences such as a typical workday, a commute to LaGuardia on a scorching summer day, they write as though they were stuffy bureaucrats discussing a contract.  I too struggled with these issues when going through the admissions process.



Yet a student writer can avoid these issues.  They can write naturally.  They can write sentences with clear subjects performing actions.  They can choose concrete details like eating a tuna sandwich for dinner.  They can write as though they were telling their story to a friend.  After writing the essay, the student writer can ask the friend: Where did your attention lag?  Where were you moved or interested?  Often students become discouraged when they read an essay someone else has written.  In part, students feel that they cannot capture the sensibilities of another student.  And that is correct.  What makes one essay flourish makes another flounder.  Writing is subjective.  Therefore, write from the self to the world.  But remember to make the world less frightening than actually it is.  Write to a friend, even if strangers will be reading your essay.  Writing to a friend does not mean mushy personal notes.  It means sincerity and intimacy, however you define these.



My best advice for transfer applicants is to have faith in the intelligence of their stories.  Once applicants write their stories, it helps to look at models in terms of structure and voice.  However, this should come at the end.  If the student reads often, she or he can revisit an essay or story that had a distinctive voice or hook and try to see how the writer makes that work.  But models are just that, models.  There are plenty of choices.  However, the best one is the one that comes from the student's own intellectual and emotional exertions.  Students need to believe in themselves and their stories in order for an admissions committee to see them from a pool of hundreds, if not thousands of applications."   (Luis K. Feliz, LaGuardia; Amherst)

The Transfer Admissions Writing Process

Jonathan Chavez (Honors Program LaGuardia 10; Bard College 13; Kaplan Educational Foundation Leadership Program Scholar) shared the following guidelines based on the strategies that he learned as a Kaplan Scholar.

A WORD ABOUT SAMPLE PERSONAL ESSAYS