Which universities don’t read personal statements?

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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!

@MmeArnault She's got much better predictions than DS- She'll be fine!

He was ABB. He applied to:

York - AAB
Lancaster - ABB (BBB if firm)
Cardiff - ABB
Aber- BBB standard, offered BBC as they liked his PS.
Hull - BBC standard, dropped to UC if put as firm, put it as his insurance and then they dropped to UC (Possibly due to longwinded conversations with lecturer in charge of admissions but I also don't think they're over subscribed).

He got offers from all of them.

He put Lancaster as his firm and Hull as insurance. He was really torn about whether to put Hull first. However, in the end he went with Lancaster as higher ranking.

He visited all except Cardiff as decided after applying he wanted a campus uni.

He quite liked York but was put off due to accommodation. We were told there was a real scrabble for it and some of it was beyond our budget and would have put us in a very difficult position if he'd been allocated the expensive type. When he went for offer holder days in early feb they had already opened and were saying you need to apply NOW to have any hope of getting your preference. He didn't want to make a decision till he'd seen the others. He wasn't keen on the idea of two campuses and possibly having to travel between them every day.

Aber was ok... the guy in charge was fabulous (the one that wrote back to all offer holders with why he liked their PS). It has a good rep in the league tables for the subject. But one of the other speakers who did a mini lecture and q and a wasn't as good, and didn't have answers to a few of the questions about her talk (you would think you would be super prepared for if it was an open event and trying to make a good impression). Plus, for us it was a good 5.5 hour drive away. The student guide was perfectly nice but I didn't get the welcoming atmosphere that we got from other places - eg I heard one of the bar staff whisper to our guide 'don't take them down there...'. There was a uni wide sports event on the day we visited so not sure if perhaps it was rowdy or something, but he kind of about turned and whisked us off elsewhere.

He visited Lancaster with his Dad so I'm not sure of the exact details of their offer holder day. But iirc he said he enjoyed the mini lectures they did, and just liked the atmosphere of the place and could see himself there (which was imaginative if nothing else as it was pouring down all day!).

We really liked Hull. He was initially interested in their BPLS (has your DD looked into that- looks AMAZING with a year in Westminster), but after long discussions with current students decided he wanted to look at broader themes rather than the intricacies of legislation. However we got such a good vibe from the place. As I said he had a super detailed chat with a few lecturers and two students who were all genuinely lovely and interested and interesting. I know a few people who have had relatives that have been there or friends of friends and everyone has said lovely things about it.

He is at Lancaster now and happy. In terms of his course he LOVES IR, quite likes politics but they also have to take a minor. He took a philosophy one as thought there would be some crossover with politics and he's finding it quite tough I think (They drop the minor after the first year). Overall he is happy with his choice (although they only started 2/10 so it's still early days).

That's good to know. Lancaster is her second favourite and their standard offer is AAB I think so she's well over with her predicted grades

Teacher here.
Is school not helping with ucas? They usually have a ucas link teacher who helps with all this.

Lancaster was one of the few in clearing this year for history too.

@CocoonofDavid Thank you so much for your reply, very interesting to read how your DS went on to make his choice. BPLS at Hull does look very interesting and this is one we wouldn't have been aware of, so thank you for mentioning it. Politics is becoming quite a popular subject, isn't it? Let's hope our DCs will make a better job of it than the current crop of politicos 🙄
All the best to your DS in his studies - and student life 🤗

Realistically, there are three main cases where the PS will make or break an application:

• Courses that are over-subscribed and decisions must be made between applicants with otherwise very similar academic profiles. Here the PS is used to determine who is most suited to the course in terms of their interest, approach / readiness and ability.
• Cases where the applicant is for some other reason on the accept / reject borderline. They may not have high enough predicted grades, they may not have taken the right subjects, they may have some other inconsistency in their application. Again, the PS is used to determine their interest, approach / readiness and ability.
• Courses that are looking for particular experiences, attributes or certain types of ability beyond the simply academic due to the specific nature of the course.

Universities are very, very unlikely to have a blanket policy of not reading personal statements. It may appear that they don't ever seem to read them simply because they have very few applicants who fall into any of the groups above but it is not the case that they can't or won't.

As PP have said, the PS should not be about your DD, it should be about why she wants to study history. It should demonstrate her interest in the subject, her readiness for HE-level study and her ability to think, engage, analyse and write at a suitable level. These are all skills that will be necessary for her to succeed at university, and she should practice them in writing her personal statement.

PS are read more in detail for humanities and essay based subjects than Stem based subjects (though the top unis will read them for all) and is used frequently as a starting point for interviews or if they are torn between 2 candidates. Warwick definitely reads it. Maybe an idea if she's really stuck is to watch some you tube videos or visit a teacher at school to help her start it. I'm sure she'll be able to find her Rhythm and she'll find it easier as she'll read used to writing essays for history / English. Good luck.

Of her list, Bristol, Lancaster, York and Exeter unlikely to read it in any detail. Cursory scan only. She can relax a bit, although it's still a worthwhile exercise and is inportant for Warwick.

They do read them - but for most applicants and most courses, they won't be scoured forensically (exceptions do apply). Along with all the above, give time and a second pair of eyes to punctuation, spelling, etc, and don't use language that you would not use in a good A-level essay.

Perhaps have an awareness of certain career paths that could be opened by the elements of the degree (so if there is a specialist in a certain area teaching in the department, consider that as something to develop, rather than something with no relevance, for example).

PS are read more in detail for humanities and essay based subjects than Stem based subjects

Depends on the course. Upthread someone mentioned Southampton apparently not reading PSs for humanities; DDs for elec eng there definitely had been read. But all 5 of her choices interviewed, so probably a bit unusual in that regard. The Southampton chap had noticed her brief mention of watersports so mentioned it as a selling point.

It’s worth bearing in mind that even universities which don’t pay very much attention to the PS in the first instance might we’ll look at it more closely if she misses her grades next summer. She needs to take it seriously, and school should be helping. Get her to talk to her History teacher. She needs to include loads of evidence of reading etc beyond the syllabus. Good luck to her.

I think she absolutely needs to see this as part of what she’d be expected to do as a history degree. She needs to be able to take initiative and work it hard so every word counts

start by writing down 5-10 bullet points in just shorthand text .she needs to explain why she is so interest3d in history, what sparked it, what makes her tick etc…forget all the crap about “I spent 6 weeks volunteering with orphans” or “I climbed Everest” shit. Just try to get something across about her personality and why she wants to do haitory..what sparked her…it doesn’t matter if it seems a silly reason (like a childhood memory) , it will be persnal

once she has got down 5-10 points in bullet form..work at then putting them into English and then onto expanding them more etc.

it takes time to get something good

she can perhaps also start by thinking of an “elevator pitch”, if she met a fellow student in lift going up to 20th Floor and they asked why history and why here , what would she say? Short, sweet…then expand on that

She’s a great writer. She’s eloquent and has great use of vocabulary. She’s worried about not having lots of things to draw on since her extra curricular stuff isn’t related to history at all so she will only make passing reference to it. She’s just getting herself into a tizzy unnecessarily.

History remains a popular subject and most departments do read the PS . The 'no one reads them' trope actually isn't a uni by uni rule. It varies by subject.

BTW, my DS just swapped uni courses and in order to decide if they'd accept him they looked out his application again and read his PS. Apparently it was a deciding factor. He swapped to history.

Has she read books which are relevant? Fictional or non fiction. That's good for a PS.

'She’s a great writer. She’s eloquent and has great use of vocabulary.'

That's good, and bodes well, but the readers will be seeing plenty of statements where those skills are not at all amazing so it does count and it stands out. I've read quite a lot of Masters dissertations where more than just a computer spell-check would have made a huge difference. Don't underestimate the power of someone else's read through if you and she have been zoning in so you can no longer see the wood for the trees, especially if she's worked up about it. She wants a subject with a high volume of essay writing.

Read a few examples online. Hopefully you will find some that are subjectively less good, with a few interesting points that may not have been thought of, but things she will notice as not intended, like repetition, cheesy expression, too much drama, and so on.

Bristol don’t read the PS apart from for courses in vocational subjects like healthcare. None of them care about extracurriculars for History. Predicted grades are the main thing they will use to decide whether to give offers or not

She doesn't need to mention extra curricular at all. Just talk about history! Ideally refer to something outside to the A level syllabus.

Some courses are blatantly honest that they don't have time to read personal statements. Eg medicine at Keele. I think most of us in university know these statements are either written very badly or parents have written them. Have you checked the admission page of each university? It may well tell you.

Since she is obviously very capable, one possible approach to starting her PS would be to treat it as a piece of research. She could look at some of the modules in her top 3 choices and put down some points about why she would find certain topics particularly interesting to study. She likely will be able to draw on something she has already learnt or read. If not she could look up a bit more background.

It’s difficult to know but I think Birmingham read DSs last year. He got an offer but a few weeks later than the others and got a holding letter saying admissions were reviewing it. (His predicted grades matched the entry requirements so it’s possible it was just that).

At the open day Lancaster said that they rarely look and tend to offer based on predicted grades (not including those they interview for). They will look if over-subscribed or borderline grades.

They also said that they offer within 15 days but DS is on day 19 now and still waiting!

Manchester offered very quickly so suspect his PS wasn’t looked at.

Is that history? Lancaster definitely look at PSs in some subjects.

That was at the Lancaster admissions talk by the senior admissions tutor. They interview for medicine, dentistry, architecture and I think one other, so those will definitely be looked at. But for the others it was pretty much - if you meet the grades we’ll make an offer - with a couple of caveats. She did say that all universities are different in their approach. The Head of Sixth form wasn’t all that pleased when DS told her.