When it comes to writing personal statements, the advice and support students receive from teachers is particularly important since this piece of writing has the potential to change the course of their lives. A great statement could get them into their preferred university and help launch them into a successful career, whereas a personal statement that reads badly and doesn’t showcase a student’s true potential could lead to disappointment. This is why a report which claims that there is a wide gulf between what teachers believe is a good personal statement, and what admissions tutors believe is a good statement, is so important.
The findings, published by the Sutton Trust – a think-tank which aims to combat educational inequality – suggests that “students are losing out as teachers’ and university tutors’ ideas about what makes a good personal statement are a ‘world apart’”.
Chairman of the Sutton Trust and Education Endowment Foundation, Sir Peter Lampl, said, “Today’s research shows how important it is that students get good advice about their personal statements, which are a key part of the application process to universities. The views of teachers and admissions tutors can be a world apart, so it is vital we ensure teachers, students and parents are well informed about what universities want in the statements.”
The writer of the report, Dr Steven Jones from the University of Manchester, has previously suggested that the educational gap (“where applicants from state schools with the same grades as their privately-educated peers are a third less likely to gain an offer from a leading university”) should be attributed to a difference in the quality of personal statements. He found that differences in statements were due to “inferior support” rather than academic ability, or lack thereof.
When admissions tutors and teachers were given the same statements to analyse as part of Jones’ experiment, 34 of the 44 statements were graded differently. In order to change this, the Sutton Trust stated that “schools and colleges need to improve the quality of staff training to ensure that key messages – such as the need to emphasize academic suitability – are consistent and based on up to date guidelines” and that “universities and UCAS should consider whether the current free form personal statement format could be improved to ensure it is a useful and fair indicator of an applicant’s potential.”
In the meantime, students are finding more resourceful ways to improve their chances of being admitted into university. Many are making use of personal statement writing services, and others have parents who write the entire statement on their behalf. Those students who go it alone with a DIY statement are at a potential disadvantage, at the same time it is worth noting that some parents’ perceptions about personal statements are also widely out of sync with university admissions and course leader expectations.
