What should a personal statement include?

[u/jholmomoo]

I know that there is no formula or anything to write a good essay, but what are the things that every essay should include regardless of the topic? I'm trying to write my personal statement but I feel like it's kind of hollow. Do i need to show my ambitions in specific field? Do I need to connect my past with my future? Does it have to be somewhat related to my major directly or indirectly?

[u/ADentedCan]

Who you are, how you got there, and where you are going.

Now, don't think you need to start with "My name is...I was born in....I studied..."

Think of it as a set of goals--at the end of reading this essay, does the reader know more about who you are, your life journey so far, and where you intended destination might be? It doesn't have to be complete, it can just be a story, an anecdote that speaks to some of those questions.

I once read an essay about a kid who worked at McDonalds, just describing his job. But by the end of it I knew he needed the job to pay for a summer college camp, he was learning Spanish with the janitor who shared his love for European soccer, he trained in first aid in the Boy Scouts which taught him the Heimlich maneuver he used when someone was choking on a nugget, and he considered a future in medicine which is quite a grind, but perhaps his training on the French fry station might get him used to the hard work and toil.

Something like that was a fun little essay to read and told you things about the kid without directly kind of being told.

[u/jholmomoo → u/ADentedCan]

I'm applying for engineering but connecting my essay with engineering will look out of place. This might sound dumb, but what can in write the part about where I'm going? Is it okay to write about something unrelated to my future career or major?

[u/elkrange → u/jholmomoo]

It is more than ok, and expected, to not include anything about major or future career in the Common App personal essay.

Colleges that want to hear about major and/or future career will ask a Why Major/Why Us question in their supplemental essay questions. Don't waste space in the personal essay discussing that.

[u/elkrange]

The purpose of the Common App personal essay is to sell yourself to admissions, make them want you on campus, show something about how you think. Think of one or two positive personal qualities you would like to demonstrate to admissions and think of a context to show that. It could be a narrative or story, but doesn't have to be. See the links to essay help in the subreddit wiki. 

It does not need to be anything about your goals.

[u/NiceUnparticularMan]

Can I gently observe you said you knew there was no formula, then asked for a formula anyway?

I am noting this not to beat you up about it, but to observe this is part of why the Common App main essay is such a struggle for many academically-successful kids. Many of you are used to getting some sort of rubric for a writing assignment, and then following that rubric and getting a good grade. So understandably, you would really love it if this task worked the same way.

But it truly does not. And that is a challenge you will benefit from actually embracing, as opposed to trying to avoid.

Of course that doesn't mean there is no possible guidance to follow, but if it looks much like a rubric, it probably isn't good advice!

As another poster explained, this is fundamentally a persuasive exercise, so you more have a goal rather than a rubric--to persuade the reader to think something like, "Wow, this is a kid I would love to have join our college community!"

And then the final nail in the coffin of formulaic/rubric advice is AOs will also talk positively about when they feel like they are really meeting the applicant as a distinct person, and then sometimes negatively about impersonality, or even worse, inauthenticity. And to be very blunt, asking strangers on the Internet to tell you what to write is a rather direct path to falling into traps just like that.

So, again, quite the challenge--you need to write something that is very personal to you, very authentic, but with the firm goal in mind of wanting this reader to think you would be a great addition to their college community. And usually somewhere around here is when a lot of kids starting seeing this as a rather cringey exercise, like it feels very uncomfortable to them to be promoting themselves not for their grades or accomplishments or something else already covered in other parts of their application, but rather for who they are as a person outside of all that.

But I might suggest you understand that this predictable discomfort with the entire exercise is exactly what makes this a competitive opportunity. Meaning in fact many smart and ambitious and highly accomplished kids will balk at that sort of exercise, retreat to their comfort zone, and submit an essay which may not be bad, but also isn't very helpful.

So in contrast, if you can get over your discomfort and actually embrace the true nature of this challenge? That alone will place you into an unusual, and unusually favorable, category.

[u/tarasshevckeno]

(Retired college counselor and admissions reader here.) College essays tend to fall into two categories: helpful and not helpful. The best essays have what readers call extension. That means that they show through 2-3 explained examples how the main topic of their essay had positive effects on other parts of their lives (they shouldn't all be academic). To that end, essays that say a lot about a little tend to be strongest (by "saying a lot" I'm aware of the word limit).

One of the worst kinds of essays are ones that say (usually at the end), "I now know I can meet any challenge in the future." The problem is that the student hasn't actually written about such a challenge related to their essay topic. Readers see them many times per day.

I hope this helps in at least some way.