I've been drafting personal statement after personal statement (not always to completion) over the past month or so, and once my LSAT take next Saturday is over I am 100% in "admissions mode," but I still haven't found a PS topic that feels convincing. I have quite a few good anecdotes, and those read well, but when it comes to drawing connections to law, and almost giving it that "juice" that many of the examples I read have, I find my attempts lacking. Does anyone have any advice or resources they've used thad has helped them with this sort of issue? I want to have all my applications in by November (hoping that is early enough) so need to make a bit of a breakthrough soon so I can start working on Perspective and optional essays.
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I enjoyed reading other successful essays from students in prior years to brainstorm a winning format. They typically open with a hook, pov story that seems unrelated or unique and interesting compared to other applicants. Then it would go into your real life experience with law and finally connect to why you’re pursuing law right now based on that story.
I watched some videos on YouTube about what the actual outline should be. I got advice from a 7Sage writing tutor that your essay should be “why you can’t NOT go to law school”. It should seem like the obvious next step to admissions because you cannot achieve what you want to in a career without it. (bleh, I know.)
He also recommended to skip the “when I was a child” and “it’s always been my dream” or “sob story of trauma” tropes. He said the admissions counselors want to know that as an informed adult you still believe you want to be a lawyer 😅 and that you have proven evidence of being dedicated enough to finish.
When I was super lost, I went through my best writing from high school and tried to get a sense of my voice from when I wrote more. Especially when you had to do creative writing or write your personal essay for college admissions.
You could also ask friends or family because they know your story and may remember cool parts about your life that you forgot. Or go through your own resume and think about a story from each time in your life that you find compelling and applicable to why law and pick the strongest one. Ultimately the best one is the one you can write a dynamic and memorable story about.
Two bits of advice just from being adjacent to this process over the years!
1) Don't read examples online. While schools (and companies!) post those with the hope of providing guidance, they're often interpreted as goals. Just write your own statement and don't worry about any comparison.
2) When you're outlining, start with the end goal. As an admissions officer, I want to understand why you want to go to law school and be a lawyer. That's it! So make sure that that point is completely clear by the end of the statement. But now work backwards in your outline to build the narrative that leads logically up to that Why Law conclusion.
Good luck!
I am also interested in this - thus far I have used the 7sage personal statement modules under the lessons library and it makes for a good foundation but I want to develop it well.