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American Writing Personal Statement

Hi I will be applying to Cass, Bath, and Exeter for the 2016-2017 year in a finance or investment program. I could use some help in regards to my personal statement. Below is an outline of what I will include in my statement. If you help advise what I should add or subtract it would be much appreciated!

- Have lived in 5 continents (making me adaptable, culturally sensitive, diverse)
- 16 year old senior at highschool
- Self teaching myself for 3 AP exams
- How those classes have taught me about the field of study
- I begun to invest in stocks, forex, ETFs at the age of 15
- I have made successful returns
- I run my own financial website (reached over 60,000 people)
- I am a published author for a financial book
- Last year I broke a 33 year old record at European Championships in the 4x400m relay, (I lived in London until June of 2015, when I moved to Texas)
- Sports have taught me work ethic and team work skills
- I have a high knowledge in finance

These are my main points to include in my personal statement. If anyone could offer suggestions that would be great.
Most of this isn't really relevant to why you want to do the course, why you're suitable for it, what your specific interests are and how you've developed them. This is what admissions tutors are interested in. Extra curriculars should only be in a short para of about 100 words which focuses on relevant transferable skills. UK unis requirements are very different from US uni requirements and your uni websites will have some info on what they're looking for.
Original post by abrierty15
Hi I will be applying to Cass, Bath, and Exeter for the 2016-2017 year in a finance or investment program. I could use some help in regards to my personal statement. Below is an outline of what I will include in my statement. If you help advise what I should add or subtract it would be much appreciated!

- Have lived in 5 continents (making me adaptable, culturally sensitive, diverse)
- 16 year old senior at highschool
- Self teaching myself for 3 AP exams
- How those classes have taught me about the field of study
- I begun to invest in stocks, forex, ETFs at the age of 15
- I have made successful returns
- I run my own financial website (reached over 60,000 people)
- I am a published author for a financial book
- Last year I broke a 33 year old record at European Championships in the 4x400m relay, (I lived in London until June of 2015, when I moved to Texas)
- Sports have taught me work ethic and team work skills
- I have a high knowledge in finance

These are my main points to include in my personal statement. If anyone could offer suggestions that would be great.

As the poster above states a lot of this is not suitable for inclusion in a UK academic personal statement. Awards and particularly good achievements are something you should speak to your referee to include in your reference. From you it sounds like boasting - from them it sounds like a recommendation.

Try working your way through the PS builder: https://www.thestudentroom.co.uk/personal_statement_builder/make_some_notes it should help you get a feel for the sort of content and information you need to include.
I would say these parts are relevant:
I begun to invest in stocks, forex, ETFs at the age of 15
- I have made successful returns
- I run my own financial website (reached over 60,000 people)
- I am a published author for a financial book

BUT only to back up a paragraph stating your passion for the course and why you want to do the course. these should then follow in one line saying what you've done already to prepare for the future career you want, they SHOULD NOT form the majority of your personal statement as they read more like a cv(resume) and as the above posters say theyre just boasting (they are very impressive though).
your personal statement needs to include your work ethic (for mine I wrote that I was a workaholic and I was a serious student who was focused on building my skills for a career rather than using university as an opportunity to party - I got into all 5 unis I applied for), I wrote about my passion for the conservation sector, my future career goals and what I hoped to achieve in my field/what I wanted to specialise in.
Original post by abrierty15
Hi I will be applying to Cass, Bath, and Exeter for the 2016-2017 year in a finance or investment program. I could use some help in regards to my personal statement. Below is an outline of what I will include in my statement. If you help advise what I should add or subtract it would be much appreciated!

- Have lived in 5 continents (making me adaptable, culturally sensitive, diverse)
- 16 year old senior at highschool
- Self teaching myself for 3 AP exams
- How those classes have taught me about the field of study
- I begun to invest in stocks, forex, ETFs at the age of 15
- I have made successful returns
- I run my own financial website (reached over 60,000 people)
- I am a published author for a financial book
- Last year I broke a 33 year old record at European Championships in the 4x400m relay, (I lived in London until June of 2015, when I moved to Texas)
- Sports have taught me work ethic and team work skills
- I have a high knowledge in finance

These are my main points to include in my personal statement. If anyone could offer suggestions that would be great.


I disagree somewhat with previous posters. The sections about investment are very impressive, and you should go into quite a lot of detail about them. However, you should minimize generic claims about a good work ethic (since anyone can make them) and provide evidence for them instead.

The sections about investment sound very good, and you should expand on them. You should also definitely mention self-teaching AP exams. It may be worth mentioning your sporting achievement (along with the transferable skills you learnt from sports) at the end of the statement, but don't go into any more detail than you have done here. Try to avoid making generic claims like "I have a high knowledge in finance", instead give specific examples (as you have done with mention of your investments, website and book). It is also worth putting the titles of your website and book in (as long as you are confident admissions tutors will think they are high quality). I wouldn't bother mentioning having lived in 5 continents - while interesting, it is irrelevant to your suitability to the course.

Finally, as a foreign applicant, you might want to include evidence that you have the necessary academic skills to cope with the course, despite not having done British exams. For example, if the courses require A-level Maths, you might want to put evidence of your strong mathematical skills in. It might also be worth writing it in British English rather than American English, but that is a very minor point.
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abrierty15
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Original post by sweeneyrod
I disagree somewhat with previous posters. The sections about investment are very impressive, and you should go into quite a lot of detail about them. However, you should minimize generic claims about a good work ethic (since anyone can make them) and provide evidence for them instead.

The sections about investment sound very good, and you should expand on them. You should also definitely mention self-teaching AP exams. It may be worth mentioning your sporting achievement (along with the transferable skills you learnt from sports) at the end of the statement, but don't go into any more detail than you have done here. Try to avoid making generic claims like "I have a high knowledge in finance", instead give specific examples (as you have done with mention of your investments, website and book). It is also worth putting the titles of your website and book in (as long as you are confident admissions tutors will think they are high quality). I wouldn't bother mentioning having lived in 5 continents - while interesting, it is irrelevant to your suitability to the course.

Finally, as a foreign applicant, you might want to include evidence that you have the necessary academic skills to cope with the course, despite not having done British exams. For example, if the courses require A-level Maths, you might want to put evidence of your strong mathematical skills in. It might also be worth writing it in British English rather than American English, but that is a very minor point.


For work ethic I am using how sports taught me it. I am showing that a strong work ethic led me to breaking a 33 year old record in the 4x400m relay at European Championships last year.
Original post by abrierty15
For work ethic I am using how sports taught me it. I am showing that a strong work ethic led me to breaking a 33 year old record in the 4x400m relay at European Championships last year.


Yes, that is a good approach. My point about generic comments was more directed at the previous poster than you.
Over half of these things are not something anyone in their right mind would ever mention on a personal statement. My suggestion would be to write:

"Pls"

Include 100$ to be sure.
Original post by abrierty15
Hi I will be applying to Cass, Bath, and Exeter for the 2016-2017 year in a finance or investment program. I could use some help in regards to my personal statement. Below is an outline of what I will include in my statement. If you help advise what I should add or subtract it would be much appreciated!

- Have lived in 5 continents (making me adaptable, culturally sensitive, diverse)
- 16 year old senior at highschool
- Self teaching myself for 3 AP exams
- How those classes have taught me about the field of study
- I begun to invest in stocks, forex, ETFs at the age of 15
- I have made successful returns
- I run my own financial website (reached over 60,000 people)
- I am a published author for a financial book
- Last year I broke a 33 year old record at European Championships in the 4x400m relay, (I lived in London until June of 2015, when I moved to Texas)
- Sports have taught me work ethic and team work skills
- I have a high knowledge in finance

These are my main points to include in my personal statement. If anyone could offer suggestions that would be great.


its great youve done all that but not all of it is relevant to your course and dont forget you have a word count to stick to..
UK PSs are very different to American PSs - you want to focus more on your academic interest (for academic courses, vocational ones like medicine are different), so you should focus mostly on things you've read, or relating your experiences to the theoretical stuff. As alleycat said, only a small portion of your PS should be on the extra curricular stuff (i.e. non-academic interests)

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