{"id":393,"date":"2019-02-19T20:53:24","date_gmt":"2019-02-19T20:53:24","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/emu.edu\/now\/ma-biomedicine\/?p=393"},"modified":"2019-03-27T13:30:38","modified_gmt":"2019-03-27T13:30:38","slug":"8-tips-for-writing-a-stand-out-personal-statement","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/emu.edu\/now\/ma-biomedicine\/2019\/02\/19\/8-tips-for-writing-a-stand-out-personal-statement\/","title":{"rendered":"8 Tips for Writing a Stand-Out Personal Statement"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p>-by Adeola Adesuyi<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Writing a personal statement is arguably one of the most important parts of an application to a variety of programs. These statements give applicants the opportunity to be creative and express themselves beyond the numbers. Here are a couple of tips for writing, given to me by former pre-health advisors and professors.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<ol class=\"wp-block-list\"><li><strong>Find the perfect opening statement.<\/strong><ul><li>In any piece of writing, captivating your audience in the first few sentences can be very helpful in keeping them interested. Try using a hook, or a catchy sentence &#8211; or perhaps an influential story that you feel is important to your profile. <\/li><\/ul><\/li><li><strong>Highlight your strengths.<\/strong><ul><li>While in some cases it can be appropriate to explain shortcomings in other aspects of your application, your personal statement is a tool that you can use to really concentrate on and show admissions committees what you do\/did well!<\/li><\/ul><\/li><li><strong>Use examples!<\/strong><ul><li>In focusing on your strengths, try giving concrete examples of how you were able to demonstrate those characteristics in a variety of situations<strong>.<\/strong><\/li><\/ul><\/li><li><strong>Don\u2019t overdo it!<\/strong><ul><li>It\u2019s important to be as honest as possible when discussing yourself and your experiences\/achievements in your statement; try to avoid excessive exaggeration or, conversely, being self-deprecating. <\/li><\/ul><\/li><li><strong>Get someone to proofread.<\/strong><ul><li>Having a second (or third&#8230;or more) eye can be super helpful in catching things like grammatical errors and other mistakes you might not have picked up on yourself. However, it\u2019s important to maintain your own voice.<\/li><\/ul><\/li><li><strong>Read it aloud.<\/strong><ul><li>Make sure it makes sense! Reading things out loud can put sentence construction into perspective, and you may find that you need to re-word certain aspects in order to get your point across. <\/li><\/ul><\/li><li><strong>Go beyond academic experience.<\/strong><ul><li>Don\u2019t just put your resume in narrative form &#8211; it can oftentimes be helpful to explain non-academic experiences that may contribute to your overall profile. <\/li><\/ul><\/li><li><strong>Stop re-reading after you\u2019ve submitted your application! <\/strong><ul><li>Trust in yourself that you\u2019ve proofread, done everything necessary to make your statement awesome, and take a deep breath!<\/li><\/ul><\/li><\/ol>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>-by Adeola Adesuyi Writing a personal statement is arguably one of the most important parts of an application to a variety of programs. These statements give applicants the opportunity to be creative and express themselves beyond the numbers. Here are a couple of tips for writing, given to me by former pre-health advisors and professors.....<\/p><div> <a href=\"https:\/\/emu.edu\/now\/ma-biomedicine\/2019\/02\/19\/8-tips-for-writing-a-stand-out-personal-statement\/\" target=\"_self\" class=\"more-link\">Read more <span class=\"screen-reader-text\">about 8 Tips for Writing a Stand-Out Personal Statement<\/span><svg class=\"svg-icon\" width=\"16\" height=\"16\" aria-hidden=\"true\" role=\"img\" focusable=\"false\" xmlns=\"http:\/\/www.w3.org\/2000\/svg\" width=\"24\" height=\"24\" viewBox=\"0 0 24 24\"><path d=\"M0 0h24v24H0z\" fill=\"none\"><\/path><path d=\"M12 4l-1.41 1.41L16.17 11H4v2h12.17l-5.58 5.59L12 20l8-8z\"><\/path><\/svg><\/a><\/div>","protected":false},"author":269,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[12],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-393","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-m-s-biomedicine","entry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/emu.edu\/now\/ma-biomedicine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/393","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/emu.edu\/now\/ma-biomedicine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/emu.edu\/now\/ma-biomedicine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/emu.edu\/now\/ma-biomedicine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/269"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/emu.edu\/now\/ma-biomedicine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=393"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/emu.edu\/now\/ma-biomedicine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/393\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":394,"href":"https:\/\/emu.edu\/now\/ma-biomedicine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/393\/revisions\/394"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/emu.edu\/now\/ma-biomedicine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=393"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/emu.edu\/now\/ma-biomedicine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=393"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/emu.edu\/now\/ma-biomedicine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=393"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}