Personal Statement

ANChan59

My son has diverse interest in university programs, he loves both Finance and Medical streams. In JUPAS may not an issue, but in non-JUPAS, he needs to submit a Personal Statement(s) to address his preference. Although still have 10 months for application, we would like to draft those statements around summer break and reduce the side-track in term time.

I have the following questions to seek for advice from experienced parents and or academics with admission experience.

1. What's the admission officer's view of applicants have diverse interests if they are equal capable in both streams?

2. Can he put both streams in a single statement? Like HKU - MBBS + BBA, or CUHK - Medicine + QFin....... It's a logical or risky attempt from an admission officer or professor's view?

3. His two streams option also reflect his safety-net mindset, say MBBS needs PG 40+ for interview, QFin 36+. Any comment or suggestion on this?

4. If its too risky, he should focus on one stream per university, what's your suggestion based on our current info?

English (A, L&LS) HL
Chinese (A, L&LS) SL
Maths HL
Economics HL
Chemistry HL
Physics SL

He takes 4 HL right now, will downgrade one to SL after July to maximise the PG and maintain the flexibility in program selection.

Thanks in advance.

ANChan59

Not necessary non-JUPAS, UCAS and other systems also welcome. I just want to know the mindset of the person who sit at the other side of the table.

ANChan59

Friends, any inputs?

slamai

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Assuming both HKU and CUHK have the same thresholds for MBBS and QFIN of 40 and 36 respectively, I have worked out an exaggerated and over-simplified hypothetical case of a candidate scoring between 39 and 41 in his IB exam below as an illustration:

IB	CUHK		HKU	CUHK
	MBBS	QFIN	MBBS	QFIN
41	OK	-	OK	OK
40	?	OK	OK	OK
39	X	OK	?	OK

? means a marginal case while a candidate adopting a ‘combined’ statement is assumed to fail in competing with another one submitting a ‘single-stream’ statement when other things are equal between them. Nevertheless, each candidate has his/her own preference of university choices and programme choices such that there are no hard and fast rules in formulating a unified strategy in university applications.

I also supplements some comments in the original post below:

ANChan59 發表於 12-2-25 11:36

My son has diverse interest in university programs, he loves both Finance and Medical streams. In JUPAS may not an issue, but in non-JUPAS, he needs to submit a Personal Statement(s) to address his preference. Although still have 10 months for application, we would like to draft those statements around summer break and reduce the side-track in term time.

I have the following questions to seek for advice from experienced parents and or academics with admission experience.

1. What's the admission officer's view of applicants have diverse interests if they are equal capable in both streams?
The admission officer of a particular programme/faculty will put more weight on a ‘single-stream’ statement targeting his programme/faculty rather than a ‘combined’ statement with diverse interests in other programmes/faculties.

2. Can he put both streams in a single statement? Like HKU - MBBS + BBA, or CUHK - Medicine + QFin....... It's a logical or risky attempt from an admission officer or professor's view?
The admission officer will look at the statement when there are cases of tie scores …

3. His two streams option also reflect his safety-net mindset, say MBBS needs PG 40+ for interview, QFin 36+. Any comment or suggestion on this?
While the safety-net consideration is well-understood, you may like to clarify with your son on his first choice based on his own interests.

4. If its too risky, he should focus on one stream per university, what's your suggestion based on our current info?

English (A, L&LS) HL
Chinese (A, L&LS) SL
Maths HL
Economics HL
Chemistry HL
Physics SL

He takes 4 HL right now, will downgrade one to SL after July to maximise the PG and maintain the flexibility in program selection.
Taking English A HL is very challenging for a local Chinese student not studying in an international school unless English/Law will be among his programme choices. Moreover, if the bilingual diploma is not important, downgrading one language to B may be considered with a view of maximizing the IB score.

Thanks in advance.

slamai

It seems to be the norm to apply one programme but multiple U's in UCAS as you can only submit one personal statement.

ANChan59 發表於 12-2-25 12:21
Not necessary non-JUPAS, UCAS and other systems also welcome. I just want to know the mindset of the ...

ANChan59

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Thanks so much for your replies. My initial thoughts:
1. He will fine tune his electives and levels to maximise the PG and AG respectively;
2. He may opt for MBBS - HKU, QFin - CUHK, BBA - HKUST.......

BTW, how useful is the personal statement? Refer to your reply, will be useful when tie scores only or more than that.

ANChan59

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So single stream mindset is the norm, not the best interest to students.

He focuses on Economics and or Political Science in UCAS. Should be OK.

slamai

My last post only reflected part of the whole picture as normally a non-JUPAS candidate will receive conditional offer before getting his/her actual IB score. Probably it applies more to this year's NSS candidates instead. The importance of personal statement varies between universities/ faculties/programmes.

ANChan59 發表於 12-2-28 14:06
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Thanks so much for your replies. My initial thoughts:

ANChan59

My son consulted his University Counselor last week and confirmed he can submit different personal statement version to different faculty. His senior got both conditional offers from MBBS and BBA-Law (HKU).
(After further clarification, both MBBS & BBA-Law must be as first choice in HKU, so eventually the senior accept the conditional offers of Medicine from CUHK, BBA-Law from HKU.)

ch1970

1. Personal statements are PERSONAL. If they want the grades/activity record of the candidates, they can simply look for an excel file to check. Don't simply think mentioning the various achievements made could impress the viewers - who themselves are high-achievers in many aspects. Say more personal experience - not just listing them out but illustrate how the experience changes u, and wt u've learnt.


2. Following/Before personal statements is interview. For this reason it should attract viewers to let u come to the interview/remember yr interview. Make them wonder how yr past experience made u feel the programme suits u. And wt u think the programme could benefit u - in terms of  the field of knowledge, interests, dream, and career.

3. Do some research on the University first - find out wt they're proud of - regardless of the PR rhetorics and pretentious press release - just think of them as if they're real. For example, is it a comprehensive research-based university? Are u really interested in research? how do u know? or u simply look for a tech-based vocational training institute? Don't just think of gaining from the U but how u're going to benefit the field of academics.

4. Don't paraphrase. Normally the personal statement is one in the many. Clumsy rephrasing wastes their time. IN OTHER WORDS, "in other words" means sth repeating/meaningless would follow. No single sentence should be the same -- don't write like wt I'm now doing. Be effective. Make a topic sentence and concluding sentence for each paragraph. Ask for chances for exploring more about the programme, rather than simply doing a "skippable" ending paragraph begging that "It would be most grateful if an interview is granted". Limit the statement in one A4 page (or online form in 500 words), unless otherwise stated.

5. Don't show your foolishness by telling wt/how much yr know in the field. They are experts more than u are. Just tell them how yr experience (ECA/action-learning/volunteering work) affect yr life, aspirations and achievements. DON'T JUST TELL THEM "I PARTICIPATE IN THIS RACE AND I ACHIEVE THAT PRIZE." Do some reflections. Be humble, not hollow.

6. Be specific. Why Oxford but not Warwick? Just because it's more famous huh? Why CU not HKU? No 2 programmes are identical.

7. Proofread 100 times. No grammatical errors. No wrong format (block style is fine). No flowery difficult complicated weird rare sentence structure and words. No "I" starting in every sentences.

These're just wt I told some others who applied for oxbridge warwick PPE/IPE/PE/E, HKU Science & CU Science and they all succeeded. I don't know much about the business programme but I guess their mindset would be roughly similar esp for the Business experts.

94BABY

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Hi, ch1970,

Thank you. It's a very good sharing, especially for those who have no experience.

My kid applied UK universities through UCAS last October and it was really a difficult task for him to draft the personal statement. The only guidance at the beginning were just from the websites of different universities (LSE, Durham...).

Fortunately, he got 2 interviews (one from oxbridge) and the warm up questions were related to the personal statement.

But for local universities (JUPAS), it seems that the personal statement weight much less, they consider academic results mainly.

ANChan59

Congratulation

slamai

Different universities in Hong Kong don't share the same system (for non-JUPAS) and my original comment on a single personal statement came from the answer of CU's Admission Officer at last year's information day admission talk in response to one of the questions raised.

ANChan59 發表於 12-3-13 20:36
My son consulted his University Counselor last week and confirmed he can submit different personal s ...

ANChan59

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Thanks for your reminder, I will tell my son to look into detail of CUHK.....

94BABY

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After the interviews, still have to get good public exam results to meet the conditional offers. Until then, ...

ANChan59

94BABY 發表於 12-3-20 20:40
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After the interviews, still have to get good public exam results to meet the c ...

Correct, that's why I said 16 months. He has aggressive and realistic plans, should be ok.  He has realistic expectation for different actual grades.

ch1970

早姆 日讀過有關今年牛津收人的報道, 當中說學生對學術研究/知識缺乏興趣是死因之一, 足證當日我們的建議真的有點道理...

ANChan59

ch1970 發表於 12-6-21 19:02
早姆 日讀過有關今年牛津收人的報道, 當中說學生對學術研究/知識缺乏興趣是死因之一, 足證當日我們的建議真 ...

Pls share the link with us. I would like to know more....

Shootastar

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Your son's senior could not obtain conditional offer from MBBS and BBA+Law because both programme specify that they would not consider your consideration unless you put your choice as 1st choice.

My D applied for MBBS (HKU) as her first choice and Biomedical Science (HKU) as her second choice. Her second choice was rejected soon after her submission of the application because both programme require the applicant to put the choice as the first choice.

ANChan59

Shootastar 發表於 12-6-21 21:23
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Your son's senior could not obtain conditional offer from MBBS and BBA+Law bec ...

Do you know LLB (HKU) will consider 2nd choice or 3rd chocie in non-JUPAs?