College Essay Vs Personal Statement

[Maria Pittman]

Usually colleges have their own guidelines when it comes to college essay for admission or personal statements. It depends on what the actual college requires. You should consider that the colleges look at more than just college essays for admission statements; they look at your grades, GPA, class standing, extracurricular activities, and school service before they admit you. I would find out what the actual requirements are and base your statement on that.

I've heard more than one admissions representative stress, "the personal statement is NOT an essay," but every time it seems like they're just trying to keep you from stressing out about it.

That said, practically by definition, the personal statement is basically just another college application essay anyway.

Think of it this way. The common college essay writing is basically a personal statement, apart from they give you 5 prompts to choose from incase you're drawing a blank and don't want to make one up yourself. On the common college admission essay, if you choose one of the prompts, you have to respond to the prompt. If you make up your own prompt, it's basically a personal statement.

Most colleges don't have you write both. I don't think any of the colleges on my list that use the common college application essays ask for a personal statement.

This response was kind of unclear because there's no genuine and clear difference. On the personal statement, they're asking you to give an angle of yourself that the college admission essays don't provide. You should do the exact same thing on the common app essay.

If you have to write both (College entrance essay and personal statement) for the same college, try writing your common app essay on part of your life, and write your personal statement about you personally.

Again, there's no clear difference. You should provide an interesting take on your life in both.

Any comments on that will be highly appreciated…