Let’s talk about personal statement formulas and formulaic personal statements.
Let’s talk about clichés.
But first, let’s talk about me.
(Some would say that’s the same thing.)
When I was an undergraduate, during my “I’m going to be the next Steven Spielberg” phase, I briefly flirted with a major in Film. Then, as now, the Film program at my university was a closed major, meaning you had to apply to get in. One afternoon I trekked over to the Theater and Media Arts Department to inquire about the process.
“Why do you want to study Film?” the guy in charge of applications wanted to know.
“Well, I love movies,” I said. “I’ve always loved movies. And I love making movies. I’ve been making movies with my friends on our family’s video camera since I was a little kid. I think it’s something I would really love to do for a living.”
I don’t know what exactly I was expecting in his response, but it certainly wasn’t rage.
“I suggest that you go,” he said, like it was everything he could do not to shout the words at me, “and you think, really think, about why you would want to study Film, and you don’t come back until you’ve got a better answer. And if that’s the best answer you can come up with, then don’t even bother applying to the Film program.”
It was deflating, to say the least. To have given the total wrong answer when all I was doing was being honest was bad enough, but I absolutely did not know what to do with the level of negative energy he had for my answer. It was like he had somehow taken it personally.
Well, come to find out, I had wandered right into a cliché. I was a cliché, in fact, and didn’t even know it. Here’s what I would learn as I began to navigate the application process: that guy spent all day, every day, fielding application questions from starry-eyed “next Spielberg” undergraduates, walking through his office door and telling him about the movies they’d been making with their friends on their parents’ camcorders since they were wee children. Everyone in the department was so tired of hearing that particular answer, it was literally printed on the essay portion of the application form: “Do not tell us that you have loved movies since you were a child and used to make them on your parents’ video camera.” True story.
So why do I tell you that story? Is the purpose of this article to expose the dream-smashing, soul-crushing, works-in-a-film-department-even-though-he-apparently-hates-people-who-want-to-make-films, ivory tower snothead manning the application desk in the Film Department of my alma mater?
Yes. Yes it is. Screw that guy.
But now that we’ve taken care of that, let’s talk about law school personal statements.
It’s easy to wander into a cliché. Here you are, just trying to answer the committee’s question, and you inadvertently say exactly the thing they’re sick of hearing. How is that fair? How were you supposed to know that your most honest answer was something they’d already heard twenty-seven times that morning? Wouldn’t it have been nice if someone had warned you?
Well, that’s what this article is all about. We’re going to show you the cliches, the predictable formulas that most law school applicants fall into. So…now you’ve been warned.
But in another sense, the committee’s response is absolutely fair. (And yes, I admit, this was true of my Film Department story, too.) The reason admissions committees are sick of hearing these answers isn’t just that they’re familiar; it’s that they betray a certain superficiality or laziness in your thinking. They want to know that you are a serious person with well-formed ideas about who you are, what you care about, and how law school fits into that picture. In that sense, we aren’t just here today to warn you about these clichés; we’re here to warn you about the kind of thinking that causes them.
So without further ado (and that was a lot of ado), let’s jump into our list of the top ten cliché approaches to the law school personal statement—the formulas, if you will, sure to produce formulaic, generic essays. Take almost any law school personal statement (including many of the sample essays from the “Get Help!” websites) and hold it up against the following list, and you’ll be amazed how easily it matches one or more of these basic formulas. And if, like most law school applicants, you find yourself reading this list and thinking, “Oh crap! That’s the one I was going to write,” don’t despair. At the end of the article we’ll discuss how to avoid these clichés and turn your personal statement into something effective, memorable, and unique.
1) The Resumessay
The undisputed, all-time heavy-weight champion of essay formulas, accounting for at least half of all statements. As its name implies, it’s the resume, rehashed in narrative form. “Now that you’ve read my resume, let me tell you about my resume!”
The basic theme of the resumessay is always some variation of “My experiences have taught me ______.” For example, you might say that your experiences have taught you to ask good questions, and then you go through your resume and talk about the things you learned about inquiry at each stop. But the underlying intent of the resumessay is always the same: to try to highlight the candidate’s most “impressive” accomplishments. Again.
What a waste! Before they make a decision that will affect the rest of your life, the committee has agreed to read two pages of whatever you want to tell them. Why would you squander it by repeating what they already know?
2) The Death Essay
The second most common essay, a bit facetiously named, is what we call the “Death Essay.” It isn’t always about death, but it’s always about overcoming some kind of tragedy or hardship. For some reason many candidates, when they have to write a law school personal statement, immediately gravitate to the worst thing that ever happened to them. What that has to do with the relevant questions (who they are and why they want to go to law school) is generally treated as an afterthought.
3) The “Truth, Justice, and the American Way” Essay
This essay is an attempt to convince the committee of the depth of the candidate’s knowledge or sensitivity in relation to some grand topic like Justice or the Law. Putting aside for the moment the arrogance inherent in trying to teach a law school committee about the law, these essays are, frankly, dull. Regardless of their topics, they all blend together into a sort of forgettable gush of what-it-means-to-truly-see-that-law-truth-justice-are-the-very-scaffolding-nay-the-very-fabric-underpinning-our-neighborhoods-our-cities-our-world-because-aren’t-we-all-just-passengers-on-this-spaceship-called-earth…
You get the idea.
4) The Pro Bono Essay
Look. Let’s just say it. Attorneys have the potential to make pretty good money. This is not a secret. Nor is it a secret that many people who want a decent paycheck see law school as a path to that goal. This fact gives rise to the Pro Bono essay which seeks to assure the committee that for this candidate, it’s not about the money. This candidate’s motivations are entirely philanthropic, and the essay tries ad nauseum to establish that point.
Of course, there are undoubtedly some applicants who truly are driven by a desire to serve the world. Pity for them this type of essay has already been ruined by the thousands of others who have already written it.
5) The “Ever Since I Was a Small Child” Essay
That’s right! It’s not just for Film majors, ladies and gentlemen! This one almost always contains one of two paragraphs: the one about debate club or the one about how people used to tell you what a great attorney you would make because of how much you like to argue. Often it contains both.
Side note: The fact that people have always pointed out how much you like to argue really is a lousy reason to go to law school. First of all, arguing is a very small part of what attorneys do. And second, haven’t you figured out yet that those people were just finding a polite way to say you were being a jerk?
6) The Thesaurus Essay
This formula tries to wow us with vocabulary. Reading it, you can almost feel the strain to maintain the grandiloquence, the orotund verbosity, the bombastic prolixity. Pretention piled upon pleonasm.
At its worst, the thesaurus essay comes across as the most pathetic of the formulas. It makes the reader squirm, like a first date who is trying desperately to impress you. You find yourself wondering how long this can go on.
7) The Creative Writing Essay
Some clever applicants figure out that everyone else is writing formulas, so they try to do something “different.” They write about the day they went skydiving or spent a night in jail. They might use heavy foreshadowing or attempt humor. They throw in literary references or write the essay in rhyming couplets—anything to stand out. While we have to compliment these authors’ ingenuity and willingness to take a risk, we should point out that they too are falling into one of the formulas. Their creativity serves no purpose other than to catch attention. It’s more of a performance than a conversation. While their essays tend to be a bit more interesting than others, they are no closer to a genuine personal statement.
8) The Name Drop Essay
Maybe you know a school administrator. Maybe you worked for a senator. Maybe you once ate dinner at the same restaurant as a movie star. The whole point in this type of essay is to drop the name, to cash in on your association with a particular person. The essay itself, and the actual candidate writing it, take a back seat.
9) The Forced Analogy
This type of essay results from the writer choosing a catchy topic to write about and then, near the end, realizing that the statement should relate to law school, so they tack on a final paragraph that forces the story, somehow, to be about law school. “And much like the Egyptian tombs I visited in my youth, law school will….” See our article about How to Ruin Your Essay for more on this unfortunate impulse.
10) Why ____ is the School for Me
Pretty straightforward: these candidates do some research into a particular school and then try to make it sound like they’ve always known it, always dreamed of going there, were foreordained to attend, etc. Please, don’t patronize the committee. If you genuinely have unique interest in that school, okay, but stick it in an addendum.
There you have it, the ten formulas that almost every law school applicant uses, whether they mean to or not.
Think of those poor admissions committees who have to read thousands of essays, all variations on the same ten themes, over and over, year after year. No wonder they get jaded. And no wonder they respond so enthusiastically when they see something different!
But let’s clarify something. None of these topics are necessarily bad. (Well, the Thesaurus Essay is pretty much always a bad idea.) Just about any of these topics could potentially lead to a great essay. The problem is not the topic; the problem is the treatment. Look at this list closely and you’ll see what they all have in common; they’re all an attempt to impress the committee in some way. Whether it’s my internship with UNICEF or my deep understanding of Justice or my magnanimity, these formulas all betray a desperate need to be impressive.
What they are not is a sincere attempt to write an authentic law school personal statement.
As you read this list, you probably recognized some of the formulas. Perhaps your mind was already leaning in those directions. If so, we have some good news for you. You don’t need to fall into any of these formulas. Your essay can be different—an actual, original, memorable, honest-to-goodness personal statement. That’s what will make you stand out. That’s what will help you get into law school.
To find out how we can help you make your statement as unique as you are, learn more about our services or contact Admission Statements directly to set up a consultation.