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Who else reads their PS now and cringes?

Applied for English and have heard nothing back yet. The PS is all right on the whole but there are a few cringe-worthy jokes which probably weren't worth making.

Am a bit nervous about my opening line as well where I reference Harry Potter.

Reply 41

NoHands

17

*hand up* god some parts of mine were cheesy. Can you come accross as overly keen ? I sure as he'll did.

Reply 42

F1 fanatic

16

necessarily benevolent

Oh God. I just read back over it for the first time in ages, and I can't believe some of the stuff I said. :p:

Corn.

I think it's more a case of who reads it and doesn't cringe! Mine was awful, if I were hypothetically to review my own PS now I'd tear it to shreds. Still, thats experience for you and at the end of the day it did its job.

Reply 43

Oogamy

13

I do. And I only submitted it a month ago.

Reply 44

annarchy

10

I read it and I don't cringe but I am positive - despite how happy I was with it back in October - that 99% of people applying with me have better personal statements. (Not to mention grades, but let's not even go there, the wounds are still pretty raw) :no:

.

Reply 45

annab1684

15

If you want you can PM me. I should know anything you want to know about Tsarist Russia and the Soviet Union between 1812 and 1990.

really? :O

Reply 46

dragon20

1

annarchy

I read it and I don't cringe but I am positive - despite how happy I was with it back in October - that 99% of people applying with me have better personal statements. (Not to mention grades, but let's not even go there, the wounds are still pretty raw) :no:

.

same here

it's even worse that i've only heard from 1 uni even though i applied in november

Reply 47

faber niger

17

charlyc3

How about "I will not only bring success for myself but also the univers~~ity~~e". Not sure how the university saw it, but everytime I read it, it makes me cringeee!

Reply 48

oldrafiki

9

Actually, now I think about it there was one fail in mine. I knew I needed to name-drop some philosophy books and since we're doing Camus in French anyway I thought I'd go for existentialism as my specialist subject. Quick amazon search, 'Ooh, Being and Nothingness by Sartre, that'll do.' Ordered it and put it in my PS. Sent everything off.

It was a few days after this that the book arrived and I looked at all 650 tiniest-print-size-imaginable pages of dry, stuffy philosophy. Cue immense panic that a) I wouldn't finish before interview and would be immensely humiliated by some smug Oxford tutor and b) my other choices wouldn't believe that any sane person would have read such a book and would reject for either being a liar or a twit. It took me about a month to finish.

It all turned out alright in the end though. Yikes.

Reply 49

Immz

2

I'm happy with mine, though I only applied a couple of months ago. I've been out of education for 9 years until now anyway so mine is very honest about what it means to me to get back into education, rather than filling it with stuff to make me sound good.

Reply 50

charlyc3

jismith1989

"universe"

oh dear

Reply 51

StandingOnAir

There's a typo in my personal statement, a few lines in. It says "[...] for those do who believe [...]" rather than " [...] for those who do believe [...]", and I still feel slightly queasy every time I see it.

I have offers, though, so it can't be that bad. And I quite like the rest of the PS - I don't think anything is phrased in a particularly cheesy way. It's just that one line that haunts me...

Reply 52

rubyjane

6

mines not cheesy i just felt like i couldve done a much better job of it now! lol... oh well too late

Reply 53

faber niger

17

charlyc3

oh dear

Reply 54

rubyjane

6

Chris#1

Applied for English and have heard nothing back yet. The PS is all right on the whole but there are a few cringe-worthy jokes which probably weren't worth making.

Am a bit nervous about my opening line as well where I reference Harry Potter.

i was soooo tempted!
i love those books, but my teacher was like 'no youll shoot yourself in the foot! grr'
so i didnt :frown:

but it depends what you have to say about it it could be really good!

Reply 55

magic_box

I'm generally happy with mine, although I did it in something of a rush and it was nowhere near as good as last years one... but the last line makes me cringe to even think about:

"...it (literature)transports the reader into another world, and I want to spend the next three years exploring these worlds." :o:

Reply 56

cactus_c

1

I think I overdid mine. It sounds too pretentious, I should have put down less activities coz they'll think "he's not focusing enough on his work"

Reply 57

Grapevine

13

ha! I cringed at mine before I even sent it off!

To be honest, I don't think anyone's personal statement is a 100% true reflection of who they are and what their interests are and for that reason alone, I think everyone will always cringe at it when reading it back to themselves.

Reply 58

mcd0well

1

never mind now...
i was cringing when i was writing it in the first place.

Reply 59

Grapevine

13

cactus_c

I think I overdid mine. It sounds too pretentious, I should have put down less activities coz they'll think "he's not focusing enough on his work"

In a similar way to you, I think I over did mine but in the sense that I tried to make myself sound too interested in the subject than is possible for the average 17 year old!

It would be interesting to see what the admissions tutors actually thought of it though. I don't think getting the offers I have done so far necessarily means it was a good personal statement. Mainly because I applied for a course which isn't uber competitive (geography) and because my grades, thus far, are decent.

Who else reads their PS now and cringes?

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