Which universities don’t read personal statements?

[User2975976427]

Or does it just depend on the course?

dc is struggling writing hers. It would be good if I could reassure her if a couple of her choices dont use them!

To avoid drip feeding. She obviously knows she has to do it but is getting stressed because she doesn't think she has enough to say about herself despite having good predicated grades.

Can't you just help her with the personal statement? I don't think the right course of action is to say 'they don't read them so you'll be grand'. Much better option would be to help her with her confidence and ensure she's actually happy and confident with her personal statement.

Bristol don't in the mass majority of courses and situations. Exeter don't for many. Other places it depends by course a lot more, so if you can say what she's applying for I can be more specific.

of course I’ll help her but she’s stressing out about it and I want to reassure her that even if she doesn’t think it’s any good it isn’t the be all and end all.

Shes applying for history

exeter
warwick
bristol
york
lancaster

Help her? Why isn't her 6th form helping,ds's got lots of pointers.

** sorry, I meany why don't you help her?

Did she go to Open days at any of those Unis? There's often a talk at the open day on personal statements and what they're looking for.

Rather than focusing on applying to somewhere that doesn't really read them (because it is often subject specific) this is a skill she needs to learn and now is a good point.

With my DC we sat down together and brainstormed ideas then she went away and put them all together. it's not nearly as onerous as people think but it's important to get over where her passion for the subject stems from and tie her points back to how they apply to chosen subject.

In 6th form they have sessions specifically on this and she will have access to someone to help/give her feedback. The 6th form tutors have loads of experience of this and they will be able to provide the reassurance that hers is perfectly fine as they've seen hundreds of them.

• Introduce self and where the interest in the subject emerged from
• What she has learnt from her current history studies, e.g. through studying History A Level, I have learnt to be critical of sources and question what is presented to me. This has furthered my interest in....x..... parts of history in particular so recently I visited (enter historical place or museum) to learn more about...... add further details of how this impacted her interest in studying History in higher education.
• What skills she has developed from her other A Level studies, e.g. I have developed teamwork skills from studying Physical Education because...
• What other skills and qualities she has as a person and how she has demonstrated these (any clubs/hobbies/volunteering)
• Round off by making it clear how this range of skills and personal qualities will make her a great student in higher education to study history

Then pass to form tutor/pastoral leader to check as part of their job!

If she is doing History A level she is likely to have a good command of English and so the personal statement should be within her reach. Maybe she is a perfectionist and is finding it hard to start. I think you should encourage her to get a few ideas down even if not in full paragraphs and take the draft into school and speak to her tutor, Head of sixth form or a teacher. If your daughter applies to places like York she will probably have to go through interviews and if she has got her ideas together for the personal statement it will be easier for her to do the interviews. If she is genuinely struggling for content for the statement maybe she needs to reconsider her course and change to a subject she can write more enthusiastically about.

This is so poor. Why isn't school helping. As pp suggested, each uni had different wants and often release great videos for what they are looking for.

School will help her once she's put her draft together and of course I will help her, she's just a perfectionist and getting herself into a state about it. I had read that some places don't rely much on personal statements and so I was hoping to be able to say "look its good but even if you don't think so don't worry because some places don't place much emphasis on them anyway".

Ds1 wrote his. They had sessions about in in year 12, then 13. It was good to start with. He'd investigated and watched all the videos he could about it. And used all the uni videos about what they were looking for. I checked it. My mum. My best friend. My husbands work had a session about it! Then it went to his tutor. Then admissions tutor.

Why is your school not supporting her more. Plus why haven't they been doing all the above in September, October, prior to the Oxbridge candidates submission deadline. It's just poor.

I always appreciated what a supportive school ds1 was at. Now thread stinkers like this thread make me really cross that more schools are so poor.

Ok. We'll just calm her then. Get a draft done. To start with.

Btw I don't think any of ds choices read his. Durham, Southampton, Nottingham. Queen Mary, Reading.

Last year DS sat down with the UCAS website and there was a section on how to write your PS.

It listed questions/points for discussion in a logical order. He basically went through and wrote a few sentences on each bit. He put each section together in the same order. We discussed it together and he tweaked the bit..

Sent it to school. I thought they might refine it or go over it with him but head of sixth read it and waved it through unaltered.

It wasn’t history, but politics and international relations. He applied to both York and Lancaster on your list. He got five offers. I don’t know if York and Lancaster read it, however Aberystwyth definitely did as he got a personal letter back discussing his PS and saying why they thought he’d be a good fit.

@CocoonofDavid DD is applying this year for the same course, she is predicted A* AA but very anxious; would you mind telling me where your DS applied / got offers from and if he is happy with his choice?

Ultimately she needs to show what she loves about history, what in particular interests her, what she has read, seen, visited, listened to to further her interest. She could say I learned about X in school which led me to Y on the internet, what she discovered from that, what she found interesting. This is about demonstrating that you are doing more than just your A levels, ie what is required of you. That you are reading/learning outside of school. They want to know that you are so interested in your subject you are happy to be housed a 30 minute walk away and you will get up on a cold, dark winter morning and trudge through the rain for a 9am lecture. So show the love in the personal statement.

They may just skim read it but they may well still read it. There are plenty of YouTube videos of people talking about their personal statements and plenty of examples online of actual personal statements. It is the reason Ds did not upload up personal statement to any website except UCAS to check length.

Of OP's DD's 5 choices my DS applied to Exeter and York for History a few years ago and received offers from both pretty quickly; I wouldn't have thought they had the time to look at the PS in any depth (if at all). He didn't have any interviews.

If she is doing History A level she is likely to have a good command of English and so the personal statement should be within her reach.

You'd think. But as a parent of a perfectionist muddler here (never a great combination), I can sympathise. Somehow the words don't always seem to make it onto the paper.

I resorted to recording mine, sometimes, and then saying 'Well, you seemed to be explaining it pretty fluently when you said XX.'

Warwick read the PS… carefully.

On the basis that offers were received within 24 hours of submitting UCAS for my 2 kids these places cannot possibly have read their perfectly formed and rewritten 653 times Personal Statements. Both humanities subjects, hith had predicted grades the same or in excess of advertised requirements for the courses

UEA
Southampton
Essex
Kent
Sussex
Nottingham
Birmingham

she doesn't think she has enough to say about herself despite having good predicated grades.

My dd is in her first year doing history and got five offers. She hardly said anything at all about herself, it was all about history. What I mean is she didn't say she was on the debate team or that she played basketball or anything like that.

Her predictions are A A A (hoping the formatting works on that ) so above all of the requirements for all of her choices.

Lancaster seem to offer quickly, to those whose predicted grades meeting the standard offer .

Ok so the formatting didn't work!

She's predicted

A star history
A star English Lit
A Economics