60% of PA applicants have a Bachelor’s degree, and most are around 27 years old. Any deviation from this makes you suspect, yet being within range makes it difficult to stand out. The answer to the conundrum is a great personal statement. A personal statement allows you to stand out from the crowd and give a reason why you’re here and what your path was like. You need it to stand out and be distinctive.

Steps for the Perfect Personal Statement

These four steps will get you on your way to a great personal statement format in no time.

  • Make notes and brainstorm: Take the time to think about what you want to write and jot down a few basic notes about your desired structure.
  • Write an outline: Take your notes and form them into an outline with a defined structure.
  • Fill it in: Once you’ve got your outline, it’ll be much easier to fill in your statement! Make sure you’re writing like yourself.
  • Proofread: Get someone to look over your statement for you, and proofread it yourself as well.

Tips for Personal Statement Writing

To get the personal statement you deserve, here’s some dos and don’ts.

  • Do include your story: Discuss what makes you you! This is your opportunity to show you’re unique.
  • Don’t rely on jokes: Humor is all right, but overuse can be the death knell for your application.
  • Do use keywords: What words are important in your field? Work them in naturally.
  • Don’t fall back on clichés: Don’t say you’re “passionate”, for heaven’s sake.
  • Do discuss relevant experience: If you can relate it to your goals, bring it in!
  • Don’t bring in irrelevant stuff: Hobbies are only important if they’re part of your PA program readiness.

Personal Statement Keywords and Trends

The most important trends you need to know about personal statements are these two: relevance and action. You want to demonstrate you’re qualified with a great statement that talks about your experiences, but you want to make sure that your experiences directly relate to your program. Transferable skills are fine, but should, again, remain relevant.

The second, action, leads us into the suggested buzzwords. The best words you can use are action words like created, innovated, lead, analyzed, and deconstructed. These are words that say something about what you did and how you did it: they show you do, instead of just thinking.

Personal Statement for PA School Examples

Here’s a sample outline to get you started on your PA school work.

  • Paragraph one: Discuss how you became interested in medicine and why you want to work as a PA.
  • Paragraph two: Examine experiences you’ve had and discuss why they make you qualified for this program.
  • Paragraph three: Talk about your plans for the future. What are you going to do once you get into and finish your PA program?
  • Paragraph four: Finish strong: sum up your basic points in a nonrepetitive way, and then end with a catchy last sentence that shows you have an understanding of rhetorical devices.

Best Ways to Write Personal Statement

Writing personal statements is a highly individual process. It’s difficult for you to do it by yourself, however. We hope that with these tips and our other samples like UC application personal statement examples, we’ve been able to craft some advice that will make you less stressed about your personal statement. Good luck!

With our helpful PA personal statement examples, you can easily succeed today!

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