Personal Statement - I haven't done anything special?

[RRani]

I am trying to begin working on my personal statement. It seems every “sample” I view consists of so many qualifications I simply don’t have. I graduated Magna Cum Laude with a 3.8 GPA from an average school and hold steady employment that's all. Nothing fancy, where I pursued an employer for a job, or even served on a college committee. Currently, I work as a Legal Assistant in my district’s U.S. Attorney’s Office (I graduated college in 2014). Because I had a baby right after college graduation, I unfortunately was not able to find any time to dedicate to volunteer work or things that would stand out.

I viewed many tips on ideas for personal statements and narrowed them down to:

1. I love writing in my free time. I thought of using “power of expression” as a theme, to describe how my passion for writing fictional novels in my free time has allowed me to the understand the importance of the power of voice, which I want to use in law school. However this is all I have—personal, unpublished writing. Would law schools even care about it if my resume doesn’t reflect anything related to it?

2. The maturity and realization that my newborn brought to me, that I wanted to work harder than ever to become a lawyer and provide him a wonderful life. However, I can’t put myself in any “struggling” position because I had a college degree and a job in the same field already. I had to take a break when he was born due to health reasons, and feared law school debts and timing with a child, but I don’t think a motherly sob-story will suffice…

3. There was a recent rape tragedy of a minor that happened in my home country. It shook me to my core, and because I work with the Cyber unit in my job that also fights child pornography in the U.S., I more actively want to pursue a career where I can fight the injustice that happens, and prosecute those that hurt others. However, I wonder if using a case that inspired me will be helpful, if I haven’t been volunteering and advocating for it (which sadly, again, due to being a full-time employee and a mother, isn’t an option for me).

Any ideas how I can boost a personal statement if my resume is mostly just professional work, with no extracurricular? Thanks in advance!

[Adam Tyson]

Let's get one thing out of the way right away, RRani - you are the mother of a three-year-old who is working full time and pursuing higher education. That IS special! You are a hero and an inspiration to others, and don't you forget it for a second.

On to business. I empathize with you, because I was in a similar position when I applied to law school. I didn't have the kind of amazing life story that it seemed so many other applicants had, just a steady work history, decent grades at an average school, and a child who was almost 3 who was the center of my world. Who had time to volunteer for anything, other than the occasional blood donation? My spare time as an undergrad was spent delivering pizza and pouring drinks at a dive bar!

In my personal statement I focused on what inspired me to consider law school, and my story centered around my experience with a lawyer who was an old family friend who helped me to prepare a simple estate plan, with the primary focus being naming guardians for my son should anything happen to his mother and me. The experience was profound, really, and the lawyer was a source of wisdom and guidance in ways I had not expected. I decided that I wanted to do for others what he had done for me.

You don't have to be a super-mom who cures diseases and fights crime all while changing diapers with your free hand! Focus on what inspires you. You can certainly weave in your experience as a writer and your understanding of story and voice and how those will translate to helping your clients tell their stories and find their voices in a legal system that is filled with noise that might otherwise drown them out.

I'm no expert on personal statements, RRani, but at PowerScore we have other folks who are. If you are interested in getting more advanced help than what we can provide in this limited forum, check out our offerings under the Admissions Consulting page at our website: https://www.powerscore.com/lsat/law-school-admissions/ Just be sure to be real and to tell your story, which is special and unique and amazing in its own way. You know that you can make a difference and contribute to a law school and to the legal profession, and when you tell your story the admissions folks will find that out too.

Good luck! You can do it!