You’ve probably heard both of these sentiments:
1) “The personal statement can make a huge difference in your law school application.”
2) “The personal statement rarely, if ever, makes a significant difference. It really just comes down to your LSAT and GPA.”
Well, which is it?
The answer is, both!
If that sounds confusing, consider the stories of two of our past clients:
Applicant 1 was a young man with nearly-perfect scores. He had a 4.0 GPA, and his LSAT was in the high 170s. His resume was solid, and he had glowing letters of recommendation. Except for his personal statement, he looked like a terrific candidate, yet before he came to us, he’d been rejected at every law school where he’d applied, for two years in a row!
Applicant 2 was a middle-age woman had been out of school for twenty years raising a family. When her kids were grown, she decided to apply to law school, but her undergraduate grades had been mediocre (mostly Bs and Cs) and she had no law-related experience at all. After we helped her put together a powerful personal statement, she showed to the dean of her top-choice school. He read it and immediately gave her an offer: “If you can earn a 140 or better on the LSAT, we have a spot for you in our next class.” (A 140 was 23 points below their average that year!)
So…one applicant with stellar scores gets turned down everywhere he applies, while another only has to score a 140 to get into the school of her dreams! Do those results make any sense?
Actually, yes, they do, but only if you understand what law schools are really looking for, and what they’re looking out for.
Want to know why Applicant 1—a guy with great scores—got rejected everywhere he applied? The answer is simple. He made the same mistake most law school applicants make: he used his personal statement to try to impress the committee. In fact, he tried so hard to knock their socks off that he came across as egotistical, arrogant, unteachable, and insufferable. A fundamental misunderstanding about the purpose of the personal statement led him to mishandle his essay so badly that it essentially torpedoed his entire application. Fortunately, he came to us and we were able to help him change his approach. He wrote an authentic personal statement, and the next year when he reapplied, the very same schools that had rejected him (twice!) sent him acceptance offers, most of which included scholarships.
So how much difference can your personal statement really make? That depends entirely on what you do with it.
The problem is, most applicants make the same mistakes Applicant 1 did. In an attempt to impress the committee, they use their statement to try to sound like someone they’re not. Sharp readers can easily tell when they’re being “sold” something that’s not the genuine article, and believe us, law professors tend to be very sharp readers. As soon as they sense that an applicant is being inauthentic and playing games to try to look impressive, the committee’s natural skepticism kicks in. The opportunity to have a candid conversation is lost, and the essay quickly fades into the blur of generic essays and is forgotten.
Whose fault is that? Yours!
Admissions committees really do try to read every statement with open minds, hoping to find useful, reliable information about the candidate. If they find it, it can significantly affect the way they see that application. Sadly, most of the essays they receive are the same kind of generic, vapid, useless tripe that thousands of applicants send in every year. Can you really blame the committee if, after reading hundreds of versions of “Why my internship will make me a terrific lawyer,” their eyes glaze over and they start to skim?
If you let your statement be forgettable, if you follow the same formulas and tired themes as ten thousand other applicants, how much difference can you expect your essay to make?
Don’t put the committee in that position. Don’t force them to fall back on your GPA and LSAT scores just because you failed to give them anything more personal to go on. You have an opportunity to let the committee hear your unique story told in your authentic voice. Use it!
Take the time to learn what an effective law school statement looks like and how to write one. Your statement can set you apart from the mass of applicants with scores like yours. It can make a tremendous difference for you, but only if you make it.
