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Do personal statements have to start with "when I was young"?

Hi i'm writing my personal statement. Do personal statements have to go a long way back or can you start at any point you feel is relevant? Especially if your GCSE wasn't so hot?

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Reply 1
Starting it with 'I've wanted to be so and so since i was very young..' is possible the worst way to start it.

Start it with a quote, and make reference to that quote. Everyone who has done that that i've seen has been pretty good :smile:
Reply 2
l0l
Phew lol. Thanks a lot for your advice Tommyjw. Starting with a quote sounds like a good way to get me going. :smile: Do you have one? Lol just joking :tongue:
Reply 4
Original post by Baffledagaintoo
Phew lol. Thanks a lot for your advice Tommyjw. Starting with a quote sounds like a good way to get me going. :smile: Do you have one? Lol just joking :tongue:


Well if you tell me what your applying for i could help (:
But wait...actually I just watched a guide video on youtube and they said they wouldn't recommend beginning or ending one with a quote.

The video in question
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cFTYCV9wPEw&feature=related
(edited 13 years ago)
Don't start with a quote unless you can actually relate it to both you and your subject. "Since I was young" is one of the worst cliches you can use in a personal statement - focus on why you like your subject now.

If you look here there are example statements and advice on how to write a personal statement. Once you're pretty happy with your draft, you could ask our team of PS Helpers to review it here.
Reply 7
That sounds like the worst possible way to start a PS. You still are young. :lolwut:
Reply 8
Original post by Baffledagaintoo
But wait...actually I just watched a guide video on youtube and they said they wouldn't recommend beginning or ending one with a quote.


You could find a video on youtube saying not to begin and end with anything.

It's up to you, obviously 'works' for some, and not for others. I was told by a head of business at both Warwick and Birmingham that if done right can be a very good start :smile: . I suppose as long as you then make reference to the quote properly it will be good.

For example, i saw my ex's PS. For a drama course. It essentially started like this
"random drama quote"
When i was young i did this, then i did this.

She made no reference to the quote, she just put it there. Which is probsbly the bad way :P. If i could remember how mine started i would help ><
^^haha.

Thanks Becca-Sarah. Checking out that library...
Original post by Tommyjw
You could find a video on youtube saying not to begin and end with anything.

It's up to you, obviously 'works' for some, and not for others. I was told by a head of business at both Warwick and Birmingham that if done right can be a very good start :smile: . I suppose as long as you then make reference to the quote properly it will be good.

For example, i saw my ex's PS. For a drama course. It essentially started like this
"random drama quote"
When i was young i did this, then i did this.

She made no reference to the quote, she just put it there. Which is probsbly the bad way :P. If i could remember how mine started i would help ><


Thanks a lot. If I can't find a "gripping" way to start I might have to reconsider starting with a quote. But then as you as mentioned that will require some backing up...my head is so clogged right now :eek: And I can't think about sleeping, deadline is soon.:cool:
A personal statement is about you. It isn't about Einstein, Plato, Aristotle, Wittgenstein or any of the other random people applicants enjoy quoting in their personal statement. I've seen hundreds and hundreds of them and I'm yet to see one starting with a quote which is actually any good and the quote was a useful use of characters. Aristotle is not applying for your place at university so the admissions tutors do not care what he happened to say about the law, they only care about what you think about law and why you want to study it at university.

Similarly, they also do not care as to whether you've loved law and been destined to study it at university since the age of five when you were "reading" the aforementioned Aristotle text. They couldn't care less if you'd decided to study it yesterday as long as you had a concrete argument about why you did want to study it. Its unrealistic that aged 5 you were even aware of what the law was, let alone that you planned to study it at university, so why try and pretend that it is the case?
I think "From an early age..." is the most cringe start I've heard of lol
Reply 13
Don't start with "When I was young" - the uni doesn't give a crap that you've 'always loved maths since the age of 3'. They want to know why you want to do it now.

Don't start with a quote. That is also one of the worst things you can put in your PS. It adds absolutely nothing to your PS, and 9 times out of 10 will make it worse. Not to mention that tonnes of other people that will have put the same quote as you in their PS. Use your own words, don't steal someone else's then comment on them to try and 'look deep' or whatever. When we were writing ours, we were all told not to put in quotes on pain of death.

Just start with explaining why you want to study the course, and with a decent reason about what the course offers you etc. Not "Oh, I've always loved it". Why have you always loved it??
(edited 13 years ago)
Reply 14
I always correct PSs that start with quotes or allude to the manifest destiny of student x studying subject y - especially if they go on to name a university that they're applying for.

Just say why you want to study the subject and why you should get a place.

Simples!
Reply 15
i also started with a quote. I think its a good idea, and in my interview my interviewer said he liked it :]
Thank you for all the replies everyone. Very helpful.

I have one last question though-how long does a personal statement have to be? Does length matter?
People who use quotes don't have enough to say about themselves.
The length of a PS is very strictly controlled. UCAS clearly states how many characters it can be. Once you see you few words they actually allow you won't have room for flowery crap like quotes or "when I was young!"
(edited 13 years ago)
No please do not! My first draft of my PS began with "When I was young" it's so common it's stupid do not use it it lacks creativity to begin one of the most important work you'll do as a teenager. I changed mine a lot and in the end my first draft looked nothing liked my final draft.
Original post by Baffledagaintoo

Original post by Baffledagaintoo
Thank you for all the replies everyone. Very helpful.

I have one last question though-how long does a personal statement have to be? Does length matter?


Maximum of 4000 characters or 47 lines, as measured by the UCAs formatting when you put it into the form. Usually this line limit hits first, so around 3300-3500 characters including spaces is a good length to aim for. This will also allow you to include line breaks between paragraphs which is worthwhile for readability/structure.

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