Lesson Five: The Personal Statement
When we meet a new person, our first question is not, “what are they doing?” We don’t care about them yet. The first question we ask is, “Why are they here?”
That fundamental human curiosity is precisely what makes the personal statement so important. Without the why, the reader doesn’t have any reason to learn about you.
Your GPA score shows what you have done in your undergraduate years. Your LSAT score suggests what you might do in your law school years. Your résumé shows what you have done in your professional career, or at least what you have done outside the classroom.
Your personal statement shows why you have done these things, and most importantly, why your application is on the admissions staff member’s desk.
If you were making a case in court, would you present the facts without first giving a compelling, persuasive argument to the context or importance of said facts? Similarly, you would not expect your quantitative accolades and résumé to carry you on their own merit into your dream school. You need to share your story of how you decided to attend law school.
Law schools are not just admitting data, they are admitting individuals, and unless they understand your story, your motivations, and your goals, they may turn your “Accept” into a “Reject.”
With your GPA and LSAT already set, nothing matters more than the personal statement. Get it right, and you can turn a marginal application into a successful one. Get it wrong, and the admissions committee will only give you a cursory review before denying you.
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“A personal statement works best when it gives the reader a clearer idea of who you are. We work with so much paper in admissions, and the personal and optional statements are where we get a glimpse of you as a person.” -Monique Atkinson, Harvard Admissions Officer
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Brainstorming for the Personal Statement
An Ounce of Planning is Worth a Pound of Production
Regardless of your writing style—whether you meticulously outline everything beforehand or just have a general idea and let the words flow—you need to know what the right starting place is before you type your first sentence. And how do you brainstorm this starting point?
Ask the right questions.
No article can provide you the exact right answer for what to write about, for each personal statement, done right, is truly personal. Community service may make perfect sense for one candidate but come across as inauthentic for another one. Similarly, discussion about a family tragedy may feel compelling for one candidate but seem like a stretch for another. However, knowing what questions to ask to find an authentic topic can lead you to the right answer.
Although you may want to ask yourself different questions, the top three we have found that help applicants the most are:
What moment in time led me to want to become a lawyer? This is pretty straightforward—for many applicants, they can pinpoint a moment or at least a period in their life where they figured out they wanted to become a lawyer. Using this as the basis for your story can help you narrow down your story and your message.
Why do I want to become a lawyer? For some applicants, wanting to become a lawyer has either always been instilled in them, or it was a gradual process. But there is always a “why” behind it—and understanding this can help. Note, however, that if you ask this question, you will want to make it as personal as possible—talking about an issue you have no personal experience in risks coming across as preachy or cliché. The more personally relevant you can make it, the better.
What specific change do I want to see in the world that I have failed to bring about so far? Some applicants are less driven by a moment in their past and more for an outcome they want to bring about. Describing previous attempts to bring about this change, only to fail because you lacked the platform, knowledge, or experience to succeed, can work well. However, again, you need to be specific here— “criminal justice reform” does not work nearly as well as “changing the length of jail time for drug offenses in my home state of North Carolina.” And, again, keep your experiences and your story the focus.
How Not to Write your Law School Personal Statement
Write what you think law schools want to hear. They only want to hear your authentic story and experience—anything else is unnecessary at best, a false assumption at worst.
Start your essay by saying “I want to attend law school because…” This is telling us instead of showing us. Make it compelling—just like a good story doesn’t start with “This is a story about…”, you shouldn’t tell us everything in your story in the first sentence.
Write your resume in paragraph form. The best essays may have, at most, only a tangential connection to an applicant's list of accomplishments. Repeating information from the resume is a fast way to get the reader to skim—and when this happens, you have all but already lost.
Claim you are pursuing a public interest legal career when your record is pointing elsewhere.If your résumé shows your background is in for-profit business and you majored in a marketable field, don’t simply write that you intend to join Legal Aid. To do so, you must explain why you are changing tack.
How to Write your Law School Personal Statement
Jot down at least 10 topics you could write about. Your goal is not to have every idea be great, or even good; your goal is to just put thoughts on paper. Sometimes, your first instinct is right, but even then, you may wind up merging ideas you had not considered before!
Don’t be afraid to be vulnerable. You don’t need to share every moment of your life, but if a personal tragedy or difficult period of your life played a major role in inspiring you to attend law school, writing about it can add gravitas to your application and make the admissions committee understand how serious you are about a career in law.
Understand how this connects to law school and your career goals. Although it may seem obvious, it is not enough to write a story and just say “this compelled me to make a difference”—something that we have seen before! Explain how the narrative has led you to apply to the particular school and pursue a career in your particular niche or industry.
Once you know what to write about, you can use the tips from “General Writing Advice” to start writing your drafts. However, it can help to see examples of personal statements. And more than that, it can help to understand what worked and what did not in personal statements.
General Tips
If it works, don’t be afraid to open with a “cinematic opening” or “inciting incident.” That is, if you have a highly visual opening of the moment you were drawn to law, that could be an excellent way to begin.
A chronological story is often the most comprehensible way to outline your journey. If you have a different structure, don’t be afraid to use it. Many a good essay opens with a brilliant idea. However, if you’re facing a blank piece of paper, there is usually no harm in just beginning with the beginning, and letting the words flow from there.
After answering the question of “why law,” you can now answer questions such as your short- and long-term goals or aspects of the particular program to which you are applying. However, make sure not to simply duplicate material between essays.
The middle section of the essay is an opportunity to expand upon details of your career. If you stated that your first exposure to law was Atticus Finch of To Kill a Mockingbird, your interest in law might be expanded by exposure to prisoners during work at a correctional facility. Perhaps your interest in contract law began when you first worked side-by-side with your company’s legal team. Whatever the experience, each experience developed and refined your interest in law.
Finally, close with a bang showing your ultimate life work or farthest long-term accomplishment.
After writing your essay, put it aside for a day or two to let it simmer, and then read it over or hire a professional essay editing service.
Sample Law School Essay
Growing up and attending college in the birthplace of the free speech movement, I was no stranger to alternative lifestyles and attitudes. After 9/11, when most of the country discovered its patriotism, the youth of Berkeley embraced a stark antiwar stance. NO BLOOD FOR OIL stickers plastered the hallways of my high school, as well as my own books. My interest in international conflict was born during rallies that drew me out of class to march down the streets, carried along in a surging mob. I found comfort in a collective naïveté, invariably coupled with the heartfelt belief that we could change the world by protesting the epitome of evil: war. However, as I began to study politics I found the attitude of “us” versus “them” a gross oversimplification. I wanted to effect change, not simply voice my grievances. I spent my college career searching for clarification, but my research only exposed deeper questions. I had the intellectual framework to understand the reasons behind conflict, but found myself lost in applying this knowledge toward a palpable goal.
The basic difference between my own understanding of the world and that of my peers was exposed when my involvement with the military struck an ideological nerve. During my senior year, I met and formed close friendships with a platoon of airborne infantrymen returning from the front lines of Afghanistan. Witnessing firsthand the manifestations of post-traumatic stress disorder, listening to the ideological debates that raged among them, and watching personal camera clips that would never be aired to the public, I discovered the fundamental aspect of my studies. Directly confronted with their shared memories, I finally understood the human cost of war. The extreme difference between what they had lived through and my neat understanding of conflict put everything I had learned into perspective and inspired me to use my education to serve in my own way. After graduation, in an effort to further understand the system I was intent on improving, I immersed myself in a military community.
Although I lost lifelong friendships for empathizing with “killers,” I moved to the largest military base in the conservative South with the aim of contributing in a concrete way. I was hired by the military housing office and have since been a counselor, advocate, and friend to countless people I would otherwise never have met. Every positive effect I have had on someone else’s life has inspired me to continue with the goal of eventually doing so on a larger scale. By pursuing a legal career, I believe I can increase my contribution from the personal to the farther-reaching, tangible policy level. It only takes one victory to set a precedent.
Despite a pause in my formal education, I spent the last year learning some of life’s most important and profound lessons. I now know a deeper strength within myself I would never have discovered had I not thrust myself into a new environment, where the most life-changing events are daily occurrences. I am confident this strength will sustain me in my continued efforts to serve my community.
Analysis
The author doesn’t simply offer an interesting experience. She explains how her experience is situated in the broader narrative of her own personal development. And she also does so in a way that fully engages the reader word by word.
One of the best assets of the essay is its ample supply of vivid, tangible imagery and examples. With every assertion that she makes, the author supports the claim with multiple experiences and interactions that she encountered during her time at Fort Bragg, a U.S. Army installation. From her high school years to the present, she details every feeling and every emotion so that the reader can step into her shoes and live the world through her eyes. Her prose flows so smoothly that it mimics the style of a vignette or a story, rather than that of an academic essay.
That said, this essay sample doesn’t quite connect the applicant’s experience to law. Although the connection is easy enough for us to see, it is still weaker when left unstated. Can you imagine a gymnast who performs an incredible floor routine, only to finish with a cartwheel, rather than one of those impressive jump-flips? Bring your thoughts together with a resounding finality that will stick with your reader well after they begin the next application.
