UCAS
Writing your personal statement is one of the most important things you’ll do when applying to university – it should be personal, engaging, and most importantly, written by you.
It’s extremely important to write your personal statement yourself. This might sound obvious, but you shouldn’t rely on websites or other people to write one for you.
Remember, your personal statement is all about you, so you should use it to showcase your personality, experience, achievements, and future ambitions. Universities want to get to know you, and why you’d be an asset to the course – they don’t want to read something that’s written by someone else.
While it’s good to get inspiration from previous personal statements, make sure you don’t just copy and paste someone else’s work. We put all personal statements through our Similarity Detection Service to test for similarities or plagiarism.
During an interview or audition, universities might want to discuss certain aspects of your personal statement, so you don’t want to be caught off-guard or end up being stuck for an answer. Imagine you’re having an interview about an English literature course, and the interviewer asks why you like gothic fiction – if someone writes your personal statement for you, you’ll have no idea what they’re talking about! This could ruin your chances of getting a place on the course, so make sure you know your personal statement inside and out.
If you’re stuck or have no idea how to start your personal statement, we have a huge number of resources available – you can use our personal statement tool and personal statement worksheet to start jotting down some ideas, or you can watch our personal statement video for top tips and advice.
While there’s lots of helpful advice and information on our website, you can also ask your teachers, parents, and friends for help if you’re stuck on what to write. Tell them why you’re passionate about studying a specific course, as it’ll help you to write down your thoughts and ideas, and create a brilliant personal statement that you’re proud of.