Peterson's Crafting Your App Page 11
acceptance. It should give the reasons to accept you. Second, the
personal statement is the one aspect of the application over which you
can exercise any real control. Your GPA is already settled; your work
experience was accumulated over years; your GMAT has been scored.
Those are aspects of the application that cannot easily be manipulated.
The personal statement, however, is under your control.
Writing an Effective Personal Statement
What should go into a personal statement? Include arguments that
interpret your academic, employment, and personal history in such a way
as to indicate that you have the ability to do business school studies and
that you are committed to studying. Importantly, the personal statement
must not be a simple restatement of facts already in the application.
Imagine, for example, a personal statement that reads as follows:
I went to State University where I got a 3.5 GPA. I was a member of the
Associate Dean's Committee on Student Life, and I worked as the assistant
manager on the night shift at Billy's Burger Barn. Then I took the GMAT
and got a 600. I know I will make a really good b-school student and later
a fine manager.
Not very interesting. Furthermore, all of that information is already
included in your answers to the standard questions on the application.
There is no point in simply repeating it.
Instead, your personal statement should interpret the facts of your life to
make them reasons why you should be accepted. Let's start with the GPA.
Try to bring out facts that suggest that the GPA is really better than it
looks. Did you have one particularly bad semester during which you took
physics, calculus, and Latin that pulled your average down? Was there a
death in the family or some other difficult time that interfered with your
studies? How many hours did you work in an average week? What
extracurricular or family commitments took time away from your studies?
