Persoanl statement advice

You can use the same one I think

Posted from TSR Mobile

So i made a personal statement for maths & i underachieved in my a levels! Now i am either retaking year 13 resitting specific units or taking a gap year! How am i going to make this years personal statement different to last years? & am i going to have to change it all?

I am by no means a PS expert but since you asked I will reply.

I'm under the impression that your PS is not hugely important for maths in that, if you've got experience with maths like BMO etc then great, that's worth putting down, but otherwise there's not a huge amount of value you can add, apart from going through the usual things of reading around your subject, what books have interested you in particular and why, what public lectures you've gone to, whether you've had any work experience that highlights any areas of maths for you (contrived, I know) but you may have seen some coding things or applications of data/maths in action, so you know.. write about what interests you in maths and why you want to study it. You've done this last year already no doubt so see if there are any extra things you can do.

The first and last paragraph can also be difficult to write (as you may have found) so write the middle bits out again, change as necessary, then mull over something that doesn't sound silly or pretentious but at the same time, not boring either and avoid cliches or quotes in general, I would say. For example I saw one online that said "....., and I can say that I understand this quote more than anyone else ....." and it was just horrible to read.

The thing is ive made a personal statement about Maths already last year! I got offers so it wasnt too bad , its just how am i supposed to edit it from last year to this following year as im applying to some of the same Unis! Im going to write an extra para about what ill do in my gap year!

I am by no means a PS expert but since you asked I will reply.

I'm under the impression that your PS is not hugely important for maths in that, if you've got experience with maths like BMO etc then great, that's worth putting down, but otherwise there's not a huge amount of value you can add, apart from going through the usual things of reading around your subject, what books have interested you in particular and why, what public lectures you've gone to, whether you've had any work experience that highlights any areas of maths for you (contrived, I know) but you may have seen some coding things or applications of data/maths in action, so you know.. write about what interests you in maths and why you want to study it. You've done this last year already no doubt so see if there are any extra things you can do.

The first and last paragraph can also be difficult to write (as you may have found) so write the middle bits out again, change as necessary, then mull over something that doesn't sound silly or pretentious but at the same time, not boring either and avoid cliches or quotes in general, I would say. For example I saw one online that said "
The thing is ive made a personal statement about Maths already last year! I got offers so it wasnt too bad , its just how am i supposed to edit it from last year to this following year as im applying to some of the same Unis! Im going to write an extra para about what ill do in my gap year!

Hi English-help,

You could re-use some parts of last year's PS making sure that you incorporate your experiences from your gap year, and how they might have change or add to your expectations to study maths. Even if you re-apply to the same Unis, I don't think they will go through previous PS to see if they are the same or not. They have already enough to do with the current year applications.

Hope this helps,

UniAdmissions

Universities often worry about maths students, especially, getting little rusty over a gap year so emphasise any maths you'll be doing this year.

If you haven't already taken A2 Further Maths then that'd be a great idea, or maybe Additional FM if you've already done that.