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July 27, 2022

5 Tips on Writing About the Immigrant Experience for Law School

Many applicants are recent immigrants or have parents who are immigrants and plan to write about this aspect of their life in a personal statement or diversity statement . Certainly, having this life experience makes you distinctive and can add to your appeal at any school . But, often these essays fall flat. 

First, you must decide if you are going to write your immigrant narrative in the personal statement or diversity statement or both. How do you decide? The personal statement is the opportunity to answer the questions, why law school and why now. If your immigrant story is part of the answer, then introduce the narrative here. If you hope to become a tax attorney, your immigrant story may be best told in your diversity statement. Each statement should stand alone. They should complement each other and not duplicate each other. For those applicants using both opportunities to tell aspects of your family history, don’t repeat. Tell unique stories and provide unique insight in each essay.

Here are 5 tips to help you improve:

• Show. Don’t Tell . Just telling the reader that you and/or your family assimilated or learned English isn’t always enough. You need to show the admissions committee – paint a scene . Give a specific example. You need an arresting image to get their attention. Did you learn English watching cartoons? Immersed in an elementary school classroom? Are you still maintaining cultural aspects of your country of origin, and if so what are they and why? How do they impact your law school decisions or how will they impact the law school community?
• Show grit. In your essays, focus on how you solved the problem rather than the problem itself. For example, if you moved to the U.S. and didn’t speak any English, what did you do? How did you learn the language? How did you make friends, form a new community? Are you still observing certain holidays or traditions from your native country? If so, what are they and why? How do they influence you today?
• Avoid clich é s . “Fish out of water.” “Cultural differences.” “Breaking down barriers.” “Pulled up by their bootstraps.” These are phrases that are repeated often. That repetition has made them, well, cliched. You are trying to set yourself apart from the applicant pool; don’t employ overused phrases that cause you to blend in. You are better off explaining your situation with specificity than turning to hackneyed, overused, boring clichés.
• Don’t make Mom the focus. Often, applicants write about people they admire – usually a parent or grandparent. It’s great to love your family, but don’t make them the focus of your essay. You need to show the admissions committee that you are a good fit , not your father, mother, or other relative. Set a scene, but make yourself the lead character.
• Make a point. Going through an experience – good or bad – means nothing if you haven’t gained insight into yourself. Law schools want people who can think critically and examine the world around them. Your essay needs to show what you learned and how you can apply that skill to your studies and work. How have you grown from this experience? How does your experience help other people?

Remember that most basic failures of imagination in essay writing occur because applicants don’t want to spend time brainstorming, thinking, and writing . All that preparation is an important part of the process that will produce a quality finished product worthy of pride.

Work one-on-one with an Accepted advisor to devise an admissions strategy that will help you present a compelling story and produce an application that will stand out and get you accepted. Check out our  Law School Admissions Consulting Services  for more information. 

Related Resources:

• 5 Summer Experiences That Could Enhance Your Law School Profile
• The Paul & Daisy Soros Fellowships for New Americans Application Essay Tips
• 7 Simple Steps to Writing an Excellent Diversity Essay

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Applying To Law School As An Immigrant Or As The Child Of Immigrant Parents

In the last five years, nearly 70 percent of my law school admission consulting clients have had one of the following stories to tell in their personal statements and/or diversity statements for law school application..

• I am the child of immigrants.
• I am an immigrant.
• I am from a foreign country, either educated in the U.S. or abroad.

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Allow me to do something uncharacteristic and share a statistic:

“In 2013, 17.4 million children under age 18 lived at home with at least one immigrant parent. They accounted for 25 percent of the 69.9 million children under age 18 in the United States.” (from http://www.migrationpolicy.org/article/frequently-requested-statistics-immigrants-and-immigration-united-states )

If this is your story, you probably can incorporate at least some of these experiences into your law school application:

• Ability to speak a foreign language;
• Ability to relate to potential clients who come from a similar cultural background;
• A history of overcoming language barriers, cultural barriers, and prejudice;
• Experiencing financial struggles;
• Additional difficulties in school because of the inability of parents to assist you;
• Struggles in college due to insufficient preparation by your public high school;
• Significant time spent in another country, giving you an understanding of the world; and/or
• Appreciation of educational and professional opportunities.

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What are some ways to incorporate these aspects of your background into your law school applications? Let’s approach this with three case studies:

Ana, age 25, from Brazil: Ana studied law for three years in Brazil then came to the U.S. to finish her degree. She speaks Portuguese and Italian. She has not faced any significant financial difficulties and did not need to work during college, but also does not have work experience in the U.S. because she does not have a Green Card as an international student. What are some themes she can emphasize in different aspects of her application?

• Drive to study law and understanding the differences between studying law in Brazil and in the U.S.;
• Work experience at companies/organizations outside of the U.S. and the ability to work successfully in a multi-cultural environment;
• Showing she has been able to succeed academically, far from home and from her support network, in English, and that she has been able to learn from and contribute to the environment at her university in the U.S.

Anuja, age 22, was born in India but came to the U.S. with her parents when she was 7 years old. She was raised in the suburbs of D.C. Her parents were professionals in India, but in the U.S. they have worked in retail sales and now own their own web-based business. She worked part time through college helping with the family business, and attended college near home in order to help with her grandparents, who have lived with them for the past 10 years. What are some aspects of her background to emphasize in her application?

• An understanding of what it means to be a responsible member of a family, to have a purpose and focus beyond yourself;
• The experience in business, what it takes to succeed, and serving clients successfully;
• Language and cultural skills that have benefited other members of her community who come from similar backgrounds, and an empathy with the struggles of immigrants.

Brian, age 27, from South Korea. Brian came to the U.S. for boarding school at age 15, and obtained a degree in business from a prestigious U.S. university. After graduating, he returned home to serve in the military. He is applying to law school with hopes of working in BigLaw in Asia or in the U.S. His LSAT is very high, and his grades are also impressive, but he is worried that he will appear quite privileged and that his story is very common. He feels that he must attend a top 5 law school.  What can he emphasize in his application?

• Military experience, particularly working closely with U.S. counterparts;
• Undergraduate and professional experiences that led him to law (so he does not look like he should really be applying to MBA programs).

How can these ideas be incorporated into the law school application?

Ana’s personal statement can be about why she came to the U.S. to study law, and what she has learned about herself and society by studying the differences in law. It would help if she could emphasize what she plans to do with a J.D., and how her background (understanding two legal systems) will assist her in the practice of law. She could draft a diversity statement about why she took the leap to leave home, overcoming culture shock, what it was like to be in a participatory classroom environment operating in her third language, and how she delved into the university community to take advantage of her experiences in the U.S.

Anuja could use her resume to describe the family business and the number of hours worked per week. She could use her personal statement to talk about being a part of a family and the responsibility she feels, and how her capabilities in business and her drive to serve others are the result of her background. Her diversity statement could focus on her family’s story and the time she spends taking care of her grandparents, or – if she is trying to explain a lower GPA or a particularly poor semester at school – she could include this in an addendum to explain her grades.

Brian might use his diversity statement to describe family dynamics and pressures, and how he paved his own way by insisting on coming to the U.S. at a young age instead of waiting until it was time for college. He might also talk about how his fellow soldiers regarded him based on this choice, and/or how he reached out to the Korean community near his college and began tutoring kids at the local Korean church. In his personal statement, he should emphasize professional and academic experiences that led him to law.

For all of these applicants, language abilities should be described on the resume, and time spent living outside of the U.S. can be listed there in a “travel,” “personal” or “cultural skills” section, especially where a diversity statement is not invited by a school. You could incorporate a line that says, “Came to the U.S. at age 7 and graduated from ESL program in fourth grade.”

Because of the growing number of immigrants in the U.S., and because immigrant populations tend to gravitate together, there is a great need for lawyers who can serve these populations. It also shows a diverse perspective that you can offer to classroom discussions. Therefore, rather than worrying about your story being a dime a dozen, concentrate on emphasizing your story and what you bring to the table as a result.

In appreciation for the stories of so many of the applicants I am privileged to assist, I created a scholarship program for entering law students. This month, two 1Ls became the first recipients. One is the child of immigrants who experienced great hardship during college – she is attending UCLA Law. Another is an immigrant herself – one whose parents came to this country illegally. She is attending the University of Illinois. Each received a $5,000 scholarship to help them defray the cost of their first year of tuition.

Ann K. Levine is a law school admission consultant and owner of LawSchoolExpert.com . She is the author of The Law School Admission Game: Play Like an Expert  and The Law School Decision Game: A Playbook for Prospective Lawyers .

Career Files , Immigrants , Law School , Law School Applications , Pre Law

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The Law School Personal Statement: Tips and Templates

Photo by Alejandro Escamilla on Unsplash

Published February 28, 2024

Editor's Note: This post was originally published in July 2019 and has been updated for accuracy and comprehensiveness.

The stress of cramming for the LSAT (or GRE) is behind you, and you survived the intolerably long wait for your score. You have researched schools, requested transcripts, secured recommendation letters, and updated your resume. Now only the dreadful personal statement is preventing you from hitting the submit button.

So, you might ask:  Does anyone even read the personal statement?  Yes .  Could it be a make or break deciding factor?   Definitely . 

While your standardized test score(s) and GPA are good law school success predictors, non-numerical factors such as your resume, recommendation letters and the personal statement give the Admissions Committee an idea of your individuality and how you might uniquely contribute to the law school. Most importantly, your personal statement is a sample of your writing, and strong writing skills are critically important to success throughout law school and in legal practice. 

If the thought of writing about yourself makes you cringe, adhere to these 5 tips to avoid disaster. 

BONUS :  Scroll down to review 5 law school personal statement samples. 

1. Make it personal

The Admissions Committee will have access to your transcripts and recommendation letters, and your resume will provide insight into your outside-the-classroom experiences, past and current job responsibilities, and other various accomplishments. So, the personal statement is your best opportunity to share something personal they don’t already know. Be sure to provide insight into who you are, your background and how it’s shaped the person you are today, and finally, who you hope to be in the future.

2. Be genuine

If you haven’t faced adversity or overcome major life obstacles, it’s okay. Write honestly about your experiences and interests. And whatever you do, don’t fabricate, or exaggerate—the reader can often see through this. Find your unique angle and remember that a truthful and authentic essay is always your best approach.

Tip: Don’t use big words you don’t understand. This will certainly do more harm than good.

3. Tackle the “Why?”

Get creative but remember to home in on the why . Unless the personal statement prompt has specific requirements, it is recommended you include what influenced you to pursue a legal education. Consider including what impact you hope to make in the world post-graduation.

4. Keep it interesting & professional

The last thing you want to do is bore the reader, so keep it interesting, personable, and engaging. A touch of humor is okay, but keep in mind that wit and sarcasm can be easily misinterpreted. Demonstrate maturity, good judgment and tact and you won’t end up offending the reader.

5. Edit & proofread

The importance of enrolling and graduating strong writers cannot be stressed enough, so don’t forget the basics! Include an introduction, supporting paragraphs and a closing. Write clearly, concisely, and persuasively. Take time to edit, proofread--walk away from it--then edit and proofread again before submitting. 

Tip :   Consider consulting a Pre-Law Advisor or mentor to help you proofread and edit. Sound easy enough? It is if you take it seriously. Don’t think you have to craft the “best” or most competitive personal statement, just the most “genuine” personal statement. Remember, there is nobody with your exact set of life experiences, background, or point of view. Just do you.

Guest blogger  Lindsay Gladney  is the Vice Dean for Admissions at UB School of Law. 

Office of Admissions University at Buffalo School of Law 408 O'Brian Hall, Buffalo, NY 14260 716-645-2907 [email protected]

Learn more about the law school admissions process and School of Law community through an individual meeting with one of our staff members.

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Submit this form to receive an application fee waiver.

Additional Resources:   

• Law School Application Checklist: Everything You Need To Know
• Law School Application Advice to Ignore
• When Should I Submit My Law School Application: Timeline & Tips
• 5 Benefits of Attending a State Law School

Bonus: 5 Law School Personal Statement Samples

1. this applicant writes about their experience hiking a mountain peak, what it taught them, and how it reaffirmed their affinity for the natural environment..

As I trudged my way up the path, only about a mile from the peak, I could not escape the creeping sense of self-doubt entering my mind. That day I had willingly accompanied my best friend on a hike up a “fourteener” (a mountain peak in Colorado with at least 14,000 feet of elevation). With a false sense of bravado, I jumped at the idea because I considered myself to be an avid hiker and in decent physical condition despite my inexperience at that altitude. Nearingthe top, with my head pounding and my knees weakening, my confidence had been shaken by the altitude sickness that started to take hold of me. I began asking myself questions like, “Will I finish?”, “Why did I even agree to this?”, and “Is this even worth it?”. However, as I took a sip of my water to rest and collect myself, it registered that the opportunity to encounter such natural wonder might not strike again. I knew that if I turned back, I would regret it and possibly never have the chance again. Accordingly, I decided to do my best to finish the trek.

Even though I was still in considerable discomfort, that sensation seemed to fade away when I finally reached the peak. I became enamored with the magnificence of the surrounding mountain range and the epic view it had to offer. The peaks extended out forever, some stretching high enough to look as though one could reach up and touch the clouds themselves. Crisp green alpine forests totally engulfed the surrounding valleys and eventually led down into the crystal blue water of the lakes and rivers below. Cliché though it may be words truly cannot do justice to such a surreal experience.

As I reflect on the experience, I am proud to have accomplished such a physically challenging adventure, but perhaps more grateful for what the hike taught me about myself. First, I gained a sense of confidence in my ability to persevere despite difficult circumstances and especially when faced with self-doubt. Indeed, I have drawn from the experience on numerous occasions to remind myself that I am capable of enduring whatever challenges life may throw at me. Secondly, I believe this hike to have been a defining moment that reaffirmed and strengthened my affinity for the natural environment. I developed this fondness from an early age where much of my childhood was spent outdoors, whether it was fishing and camping with my father or hiking and playing sports with my friends. However, the wonder I felt on that peak in the Rockies was something I seldom experienced growing up in Buffalo, New York. It is a feeling that I hope all can feel at some point in their lives and partly why I believe it to be so important that we do all we can to protect and preserve the environment. The importance of conservation is greater now than ever amid the challenges posed by issues such as pollution and global climate change.

During my undergraduate coursework, I was able to take a class in Environmental Law, where I learned about state and federal statutes that regulate water, soil, air pollution, resource conservation and recovery, and actions of the Environmental Protection Agency. For example, we studied the Clean Air Act and how it is applied during legal disputes to enforce national air quality standards. Participating in this course showed me that there is an opportunity to apply my enthusiasm for the environment into the legal profession as it is my eventual goal to represent those damaged by pollution. I believe studying at the University of Buffalo School of Law will allow me to pursue my goals and make a positive contribution towards environmental problems by serving those who have been affected in the local and global community. Although the experience will be challenging, I am excited for the opportunity, motivated by a passion for the environment and knowing that I possess the ability to persevere in the face of doubt.

2. How one applicant’s experience interviewing incarcerated individuals shaped their understanding of our justice system and influenced them to pursue policy work.

Above me, in a giant watchtower, stood a large man holding a semi-automatic rifle while staring down at me. I heard the echoing clink of a prison lock, allowing me to pass through a massive barbed-wire fence. Although I begged and pleaded for the opportunity to interview an inmate at a maximum-security prison, I have never felt more intimidated than I did in this moment. I was only seventeen years old, sitting in a visitation room filled with orange-suited men. An overwhelming sense of fear crowded my thoughts. In fact, I was nearly paralyzed by the environment I had found myself in. I could hardly conduct an interview, but thankfully, my interviewee, Mr. Thomas Gant, had about twenty years of stories to tell. He ambitiously shared

first-hand accounts of prison fights, housing raids, gang activity, and injustices that he has endured during his sentence of twenty-five years to life. His stories were captivating and filled with raw emotion. It was evident that he too, felt a similar sense of fear each and every day.

Fast forward to my last semester of undergrad, where I spent four months at the Ingham County Jail working with incarcerated men and women to prepare them to transition into our communities. I interviewed dozens of orange-suited men each week and loved every second of it.

I was eager to contribute to a program that helped break the vicious cycle of incarceration and confront the plethora of barriers to reentry. I often think about Mr. Gant and how his stories ignited a passion within me that still drives my ambition to this day. If I had the chance, I would thank him for inspiring me to pursue every opportunity to help incarcerated men and women, such as those at the Ingham County Jail. I would share with him the knowledge from my academic and professional experiences, in hopes of keeping his life on track upon release, and most of all, in hopes of protecting him from the fear we shared on the day I met him.

My variety of field experiences and my success with academic rigor has surely prepared me for law school. I have completed several other justice-related internships which have provided me with a comprehensive understanding of how our justice system operates in practice, which often deviates from how our justice system operates in textbooks. These field experiences led me to pursue a bachelor’s degree in criminal justice, where my classes focused on the history of corrections and how other countries are utilizing confinement to successfully rehabilitate offenders. Academia quickly taught me that the majority of people simply accept our prison system for what it is, and very few question its punitive and unjust nature. Fortunately, my bachelor’s degree in social relations and policy allowed me to challenge conventional wisdom and confront policy issues as they relate to factors of class, race, ethnicity, gender, and religion – all of which exist in our prison system. My professors constantly pushed me to find ways that the American corrections system could change the course of its future. I spent countless hours researching the topic of injustice behind bars, writing numerous analytical essays and policy proposals, and presenting interdisciplinary conclusions to rooms filled with aspiring politicians. I look forward to perfecting these skills, sharing my experiences to enhance classroom discussions, and engaging in additional field experiences and clinics while in law school.

Ultimately, I am confident that my career fulfilment will lie in policy making and advocacy for those who have faced injustice within our prison system and in the free world. My interest in studying law and my decision to apply to University at Buffalo School of Law are a result of my longstanding enthusiasm to advocate for and to improve the lives of people impacted by incarceration. The University at Buffalo will provide me with both the necessary education as well as the hands-on experience to ensure that I will confidently enter the legal world prepared to contest the many issues of justice reform.  

3. How one applicant found their voice, and why a stale piece of toast is displayed alongside their college diploma.

Growing up, I was nonplussed by the idea of awards. While other friends entered cut-throat competitions over grades and the attention of our coaches, I cared more about preserving my friendships with people than beating them on any field or test. Whenever I found myself winning, I tended to remain quiet about my victories. Most of the time.

In the waning weeks of my junior year of high school, my tireless U.S. History teacher – Mr. Welgoss– kept us showing up to class each day by breaking us into debate teams and having individuals from each side square off against each other around designated topics. The winner would take away a most delicious reward: A single slice of white bread toast. Pun intended. This was when I learned that I was to define the best Supreme Court Cases in U.S. History and then defend my stance in front of the entire class. Alone. I was completely terrified.

This is the perfect place to share just a bit about high school me. You likely knew me well. I was that kid curled into a corner at the back of the classroom in an effort to make myself smaller. During the first week of each school year, I sized up my teachers, figured out which of them was into cold calling on students, and positioned myself within the room accordingly. While I was a dedicated student and history geek who loved to read, I was not a particularly extroverted one. There was no part of this assignment that I was excited about.

To make matters worse, I was assigned Marbury v. Madison, perhaps one of the most boring cases in the eyes of a bunch of fresh faced politically active 16-year-olds who had just spent an entire year learning about the societal gravity of cases like Brown v. Board of Education and Roe v. Wade. Still, I did careful research. I composed a meticulous claim. I didn’t want to embarrass myself, so I did the work that I needed to.

Along the way, I fell in love with the assignment. This was the first time I experienced that rare moment as a researcher when everything seems to click. I’d never had that moment as a research and argument writer before, and I have been chasing that feeling since. I love leaning into knotty problems, following research, and learning processes that help me untie them, and then, showing others how to unscramble crossed lines themselves, when they need to.

So, you likely know how this story ends. I won the debate. That piece of toast, miraculously mold free after six years, sits on my bookshelf alongside my college diploma, reminding me of the moment I not only found my passion, but my voice.

Since the moment I won that single slice of super processed food that still looks as fresh as the day I brought it home, there have been other moments that solidified my decision to study law. As a freshman at Nazareth University, my newfound interest in the law inspired my decision-making as I chose my major and began coursework that I inevitably fell in love with. When I started my internship at a local non-profit during undergraduate, I saw how my research and application of the law could help me to advocate for marginalized communities. My desire to

practice law was again upheld when I began paralegal work for Berardi Immigration Law the day after I earned my degree. My dedication to this work has taught me that there are often a variety of solutions for complicated problems. Many assume that creativity is something you’re born with. Experience has taught me it's not quite this simple, though. Constraint often inspires creativity, and to me, this is what makes the law the most wonderful muse.

I’m the daughter of a writer and the sister of a designer. My great grandfather owned a hobby shop. I never enjoyed most of these things, and try as I might, any attempt to practice arts and crafts always ended badly and left me feeling like the least creative bird on my family tree. Imagine my surprise then, as the last few years of learning, work, and a piece of toast began revealing the creative nature of the law to me. Imagine my delight when I realized that I have certain strengths here, too.   

4. This applicant writes about their never-ending pursuit of knowledge and how pursuing law provides a practical outlet for their curiosity.

There are very few things in life that are more important to me than learning. I have been driven by curiosity, and the never-ending pursuit of knowledge has always been a great source of joy for me, both inside and outside of the classroom. I finished my undergraduate studies in December of 2019, with plans to work in France as a teacher that coming fall. I was beyond excited that I had been afforded an opportunity to pursue such a dear intellectual passion. The intervening pandemic meant that I had to make difficult decisions about the direction my future would take, and ultimately this meant setting aside some of my own ambitions in order to take care of my loved ones.

While my immediate post-graduation plans did not work out, I have never set aside my curiosity. If anything, the challenges of post-collegiate life have reaffirmed to me the vital importance of learning as a constant and on-going part of living. As a student of history and languages, many of my college peers nurtured plans of attending law school, and the idea of studying law has long interested me.

In June of 2022 I began working as a legal assistant at a small law firm in Queens. I hoped that job would give me a chance to learn about the legal field, while pushing me to grow as a professional. Being confronted with the vast complexity of the law has been a humbling experience, but also an endlessly intriguing one. At work, I relish any opportunity to learn more about the law, and I have found that the field is perfectly suited to the academic skills that I have spent my entire life building.

What is perhaps most exciting to me about the prospect of studying law is the idea of having a practical, real-world outlet for all the curiosity and scholarly instincts that I have nurtured throughout my life. Studying case law, building arguments based on evidence and legal research, using language itself as a tool; all these skills that I have seen to be so vital to the successful practice of law feel like natural extensions of the skills that I’ve developed across my life. Performing research was of course integral to my studying history, and combing through Westlaw as a legal assistant has often reminded me of the time I would spend searching through university archives as a student, looking for information to help me build my arguments. Having studied both History and French, I am very comfortable with interpreting language that feels unfamiliar or archaic, which is certainly a necessary skill to have when studying and practicing law.

The challenges of post-graduation life have led me to do a great deal of reflecting. I’ve been forced to ask myself what makes me feel fulfilled, and at the same time have had to evaluate my own strengths and weaknesses. I’ve found that there are no simple answers, but I can affirmatively say that I have the self-confidence, motivation, and ability to be an excellent law student.

5. How a Unified Basketball program inspired this applicant to pursue education law.

I never realized how great of an impact one policy could have on so many people until I was in high school. I knew how far-reaching the law was, but it became so much more apparent and personal when it began to impact the lives of my friends and classmates in the Unified program.

When I began high school, I was still a little shy, but I was sure that I wanted to get involved in things that made a difference in other people’s lives. It was through my involvement in Student Council that I was asked by the athletic director to help start up a program called Unified Basketball. I remember being called down to the Athletic Office one day out of the blue. I felt extremely confused. I had not previously played any school sports and I never would have expected to be asked to speak with the athletic director. I also wouldn’t have expected a meeting that lasted maybe fifteen minutes to serve as a great turning point in my life.

The Unified Basketball program is a cooperative team combining students with and without intellectual disabilities, run by the Special Olympics and New York state high school sports. From that first season, the Unified program quickly grew to become one of the best experiences of my life and it continues to shape me every day. In the second year of the program, we added a Unified Bowling team, and I helped create a Unified Club so that those who might also have physical limitations that would keep them from playing sports, could still benefit from the family created in the program.

Through this program I created connections with the members of the team and our coaches, and we effectively created a family and a community greater than ourselves. Because of these friendships which I had grown to value so much, it only hurt that much more when I learned from my coach that New York’s eligibility rules for high school sports would cause some of my teammates to be ineligible to play. Although they could remain in school until the age of twenty-one, they would not be able to play after they reached a certain age or had played for a certain amount of time. One of my friends was the first on our team to age out due to these guidelines and as a team we were devastated. These policies did not line up and although the original guidelines were intended to prevent unfair advantages in competition, this really wasn’t an issue with the Unified program. Thankfully, this policy was eventually changed by the state Board of Regents to allow my teammates to play once again.

There have been two indelible legacies created through the Unified program. First, I have been able to see the impact that the program has had on students in our district’s special education program. I saw this happen for one of my teammates, who was first introduced to me by his aide as being nonverbal. He was initially very shy but as he grew more comfortable with the game and his teammates, he came out of his shell. From that first season on his confidence grew and even when I see him now, over five years later, he will rush over to give me a high-five or a fist-bump and say “Hi!” Second, is the impact the program has on my district and the community at large. During my junior year of high school, our team performed the dance “The Wobble” at our pep rally, marking the first time that our special education students were included in the homecoming event. Even years later, this tradition has continued and the response from the school and community has been extraordinary.  

This experience shaped me as a person and shifted my interests in terms of career goals. I have had an interest in education and the social sciences since I was little, but being involved in the Unified program allowed me to better understand how these interests could connect and how I can make an impact. I want to pursue a law school education and become an attorney so that I can practice education law. I want to support students, faculty, and staff to create the best possible educational environments for our future generations.

Podcast: Experience/Perspective Essay (Diversity Statement) Deep Dive with Former Law School Admissions Officers

In this episode of Status Check with Spivey , Anna Hicks-Jaco speaks with three Spivey consultants—Tom Robinson, former Harvard Law Director of Admissions; Sir Williams, former Wisconsin Law Director of Admissions; and Anne Dutia, former Michigan Law Assistant Director of Admissions—about the relatively new category of law school admissions essays that we're calling " experience/perspective essays " or "E/P essays," many of which are variations on the essays previously known as "diversity statements." They walk through the specifics of what these essays can look like (going through several example prompts), how to approach those different prompts, common mistakes applicants make with these statements, traits of outstanding E/P essays, and more.

This episode is part of an ongoing deep dive series on the main components of the law school application. You can listen to our episode on personal statements   here and our episode on resumes here .

You can listen and subscribe to  Status Check with Spivey  on  ⁠⁠Apple Podcasts⁠⁠ ,  ⁠⁠Spotify⁠⁠ , and  ⁠⁠YouTube⁠⁠ .

Full Transcript:

Anna: Hello and welcome to Status Check with Spivey , where we talk about life, law school, law school admissions, a little bit of everything. I'm Anna Hicks-Jaco, Spivey Consulting's President, and today we'll be doing a deep dive into the essays that were once pretty universally categorized as "diversity statements," but which have now broadened into a wider range of essay prompts and topics—and we'll talk about the reasons for that in the episode—but we're calling that new category of essay "experience/perspective essays," or "E/P essays."

This is a continuation of a series that we're doing where we really delve into the specifics, advice, strategies related to each of the main law school application components. We did an episode on personal statements, we did an episode on resumes, you can find links to both of those in the description—and now we'll be taking a close look at these E/P essays. We'll talk through the various different types and categories that these essays can fall into, common mistakes, traits of really stand-out excellent E/P essays, and more.

I am fortunate to be joined today by three of our fantastic Spivey consultants: Tom Robinson, former Harvard Law Director of Admissions; Sir Williams, former Director of Admissions at the University of Wisconsin Law School; and Anne Dutia, former assistant director of admissions at the University of Michigan Law School. Between the three of them, we have well over 50 years of law school admissions experience on this podcast episode. They have so much great advice and so many insights to share. So without any additional delay, I'll go ahead and let them introduce themselves further.

Anne: Hello, everybody. My name is Anne Dutia, and I have been with Spivey Consulting for about seven years. I practiced law for a few years, and then I worked in admissions at the University of Michigan Law School under the wonderful Sarah Zearfoss. I served as a pre-law advisor and an undergraduate moot court coach. I'm still on the board for the American Moot Court Association as I so strongly believe in the mission and benefit of the activity for pre-law students. I'm a first-gen American and a first-gen law student. And one thing that is probably not immediately evident or even clear to folks who have known me for a long time is that I'm from and still consider Alabama my home. My family lives there, and it's where I did most of my growing up and where I went to college and law school.

Sir: Hello, everybody, I'm Sir Williams. Sir is my given first name. I did not pick it, but if you like it, let me know. I'll pass your compliments along to the chef. I am originally from Chicago, Illinois, born and raised. I went to law school at University of Wisconsin, so I graduated in 2011, practiced for a little bit, and then became Director of Admissions there from 2012 until 2019. And then I've been consulting with the firm; this will be my fifth cycle.

I'm really passionate about good storytelling in the admissions process. These types of special essays, it's one of the favorite parts of my work of helping people apply successfully, because everyone has a story, and everyone's story is interesting if you ask the right questions and if you help them craft good answers to the right questions.

Tom: Hi, everyone. My name is Tom Robinson. I've worked in higher education for about 30 years, and the last seven years have been with Spivey. I spent a few years working in financial aid, undergraduate admissions, international admissions, and about four of my seven years at Harvard working and managing the admissions office in the law school.

Over the years, I've met a lot of international students, and I really enjoy working with them through the law application process. But as a first-generation college student, I think the best thing for me about this job is that I get to sort of reveal the entire process as much as I can and help people navigate it and feel confident about the process as they move forward. So I'm looking forward to talking with you today about the experience and perspective essays.

Anna: Wonderful. Thank you all for being here. I am so lucky to have all of your perspectives on this topic. Let's go ahead and jump right in, because this is a big topic. The first thing that I was hoping to talk about was, baseline level, we are talking about this as "experience perspective essays" or "E/P essays," whereas if we had recorded this same or a similar type of podcast two years ago, we would have been talking about "diversity statements." So I'd like to talk a little bit about how and why diversity statements developed into what we're now calling these E/P essays. Does someone want to give sort of an overview for anyone who might not be familiar with the trajectory of how things have gotten to where they are now?

Anne: I am a moot court nerd, so I will give a little bit of the constitutional history. In 2023, the Supreme Court decided in Students for Fair Admissions v. Harvard that race could not be considered in higher ed admission, except for the military academies. Former lawyer, so I feel like I always have to add in all of those technicalities.

Anna: You never hear anybody bringing that up! Look at you, so nuanced.

Anne: But there was a piece of dicta, and it said that students or applicants can still mention those as long as they talk about the experiences and perspectives that were shaped by their race, and so the experience and perspective essay is a way for students to talk about the things that they would have talked about in diversity essays and are important to them, or informed their experiences, informed their motivations, and may have shaped who they are.

Sir: I was going to say, yeah, I appreciate that background and agree with how Anne described it. So for me, I don't really think that the thrust of what schools are looking for has really changed dramatically. The entire point of the application is to help them get to know you.

And so in the past, they had these prompts that were designed to give folks who've had unique, defining experiences, particularly experiences that may have come about as a function of someone's race or class or gender or some other marginalized and/or protected group, and now I think questions have evolved, because of the Supreme Court case, to be more broad, so that people who don't necessarily have defining experiences in that tight little box because you're part of some underrepresented or otherwise marginalized group, but they just want to know, hey, what have been your experiences? Everybody. What are your experiences? What's your perspective? What's informed it? Ultimately, I think the goal is, to use an analogy, to get more of a multidimensional picture of a person, as opposed to just a straight—maybe a 2D version that could be just your numbers. And maybe your personal statement, again, adds a little depth, but these experience/perspective essays or the diversity statements—those are all designed just to give a different angle, a different perspective on still you. So the goal of getting to know you: unchanged. Just how they frame the question: updated for contemporary times.

Tom: I feel like some of my clients, when I talk to them, are more interested in writing these types of essays than they were when they had the traditional diversity statement title. Because it does feel like, while the schools may still be looking for similar things, students, applicants feel a little bit more licensed to talk about things that aren't related to protected categories or ability or religion or sort of immigration status. And so now they are able to talk about things that are a little bit broader, and they feel like they might have the license to do that.

Anna: Let's get specific here. Diversity statement prompts, I think, certainly had differences between various schools' prompts, but I think by and large they were pretty similar. Now, the range of prompts that law schools are giving applicants under this umbrella term that we are using, "experience/perspective essays," "E/P essays," there are so many different options, and they take many different forms. Some of them are optional; some of them are required; some of them have seven different options for you to choose from; some are just one general, broad prompt.

Let's get into some specifics. Let's talk about what these prompts actually look like. I’m not going to get into specific schools, especially because we're looking at last year's prompts—it's August 7th; most law schools have not released their new applications yet, but we can look at last year's prompts as sort of a general idea of the various categories that these types of prompts can fall into. I think the first and probably the most common—you guys tell me if you disagree—is probably pretty simple and pretty broad.

So, I'm going to read one law school's prompt here. "X Law School is committed to achieving an expansive and inclusive law school community that brings a diverse range of ideas, experiences, and perspectives to our classroom. Tell us how your lived experience informs who you are today." And then plenty of other schools include some examples—whereas in the past, applicants might have limited themselves to certain categories here, law schools are now giving examples that make it clear that this is broader. Some of the examples that other schools have given include financial hardship, educational adversity, special talents, work or community service experience, first generation or immigrant experience, an unusual rural or urban upbringing, foreign residence, military background, unique family and/or personal circumstances, health issues, disability, surviving abuse or complex family circumstances like an incarcerated parent, homelessness, living in foster care, neurodivergence, linguistic barriers, skills built and/or lessons learned. That is a huge range of things that you can talk about when you are answering this type of prompt, and it is broader than it once was.

That's one category. Do you think this is the most common type that most law schools are falling into now? What are your thoughts on this?

Tom: I think that is pretty common, and it does seem a lot broader. I think when an applicant might be applying to 10 or 15 schools, they could get overwhelmed with trying to categorize the different ways that the schools talk about this type of essay, but what I usually encourage them to do is to just think about, these essays, broadly speaking, are talking about how your experiences sort of shape your perspectives, how your perspective might be shaped by your history, all of the experiences that you've had and how that might be something that you utilize either uniquely or not uniquely in the law school environment as a peer, as an attorney, as a student working in a clinic. So how do those experiences shape your perspectives on working with others? Generally speaking, I think if you think about it on that level, students can really come up with some really creative ideas and some strong essays.

Sir: I think it's helpful to remember that there are no right or wrong answers to these questions. Again, they're just designed to prompt you to talk about interesting things that you think the school would want to know. Again, because the school doesn't know who you are outside of the application, they can't narrowly craft their questions to get at your specific experiences. So I think what many schools are trying to do is, again, make it broad enough so that you know that your experiences, your story is welcome. There is a place for it. They want you to talk about it. They're trying to help you help them get to know you better. I'm probably going to keep coming back to that during this conversation, but this is all a big old icebreaker. Getting to know you—okay, I'm not going to sing this time; I promised myself I wouldn't, so.

Anne: But I also think that ultimately it's what we were encouraging our applicants to do with the diversity essays anyway, right? We're not approaching these too differently. I think it just, like Tom said, helps students feel a little bit more comfortable digging into their own experiences and thinking about things they believed the schools traditionally wanted, when, in fact, the schools wanted to hear about all of these things all along.

Anna: Some law schools do require this type of essay, and we'll get into that soon, but these ones that we've just looked at are optional. So, what are your all thoughts? Should everybody write these? Should only certain types of applicants write these? How should listeners determine whether they should write this essay or not?

Anne: One of our very wise colleagues talks about it this way, and I go back to it over and over in that, do you have a viewpoint or insight informed by your experiences or perspective that is less common in the law school classroom or in the legal profession, and would it be valuable, for example, in terms of the questions that you ask, or causes that you pursue? I encourage applicants to really dig into, what are those perspectives and experiences are that are differentiating, and also, how do they help you engage with the law maybe differently than the majority of the folks in law school would?

Tom: Yeah, I think that's a great way to describe it, Anne. And I think some students feel like if they don't have a story about grit and distance traveled, maybe they shouldn't write about it, but I think it's really good to pause and brainstorm. If someone was a caregiver, or if someone had some sort of client relationship that wasn't even related to the law. I read a beautiful essay today about someone who worked in a grocery store. So, you know, ideas about how they connect with others and how they build rapport with people, I think those kinds of topics can be really wonderful for this type of essay. If it's not required by a school, I think maybe you should still consider and really spend some time trying to brainstorm what you might bring to a client relationship, to working with peers, or to helping people tell their stories, or to empowering peers, what kind of role you play in teams—think about that perspective and how that might help an admissions officer get in your corner as they're reading your application.

Anne: Tom, that brings to mind my own personal statement from, let's just say, more than a quarter century ago.

Tom: My statement was handwritten, so it was so long ago.

Anne: But it was what I learned about people and myself from waiting tables, and just how working in the service industry really helped me interact with a wide variety of people and understanding kind of the commonalities, but then also meeting people where they were, and I love how you brought that in with the caregiver. Maybe my essay is not as cringy as I'm remembering it, because I'm sure that I wasn't as good a writer, and I'm sure that I wasn't incorporating all of this great advice, but I am hoping that maybe one day I can find it and polish it up to make it look as good as our clients' might.

Sir: I think there is a very common misconception that, in order to speak to these types of prompts, it has to be coming from a place of, "I've overcome this obstacle," or "There was some sort of drama involved in my process to get to here." I worked with someone who is at a top three school now whose statement really focused on the fact that they grew up in an ethnic enclave in Miami, and being around people that looked like them and had the same faith as them who were like, really successful, just motivated them and said, I don't have any excuse for not being able to achieve anything I want, because there are doctors and there are lawyers and there are all these things that people can do, people who look like me ,who came from where I came from, whose parents came from where my parents came from, they're all doing it. So their way of processing that was "I don't have any excuses," and they pushed themselves to sort of do their very best all the time, and it worked out for them. Now, that doesn't take anything away from anybody who had to overcome major obstacles. But at the same time, for me, it illustrated that this doesn't have to be a sad story. You don't have to manufacture drama. Your law school application is not Shondaland. I love Grey's Anatomy, but I'm there for the drama. They're not coming to your application for the drama, necessarily.

Anne: Insights can be derived from success as well. That's what the schools are interested in; they're interested in the insights you've derived from your experiences.

Tom: Yeah, and I think on the other side of that, Sir, is when someone has a real story of perseverance or they have what a lot of admissions people call "distance traveled"—distance traveled is the concept that you may be entering law school just like hundreds of other people at your school, but maybe you had to cross a lot more distance, a lot more barriers, a lot more challenges you had to encounter to get there. And so, some people who do have grit or perseverance that they could talk about in their essay worry about trying to capitalize on that or be perceived as trying to have some sort of admission advantage because of that. That's something to definitely process with people who are mentors and things like that as you write essays, but it is something that I think is really important to share with admissions committees and talk about that distance traveled and grit and perseverance if that's something that really belongs in the essay. Then certainly I think you should feel comfortable sharing it, because admissions officers also want to know that. So it doesn't have to be there. If it's part of your experience, then definitely share it. That can be really helpful.

Anna: We've been doing this as a series where we're doing a deep dive into the various different application components. We did one on personal statements. We did one on resumes. And I think a big theme throughout both of those episodes has been authenticity. And it's such a big theme in all of the content that we put out, honestly. And I think that's important to remember here. If it is your authentic experience and what your life experiences have led you to this point and who you are today, and those experiences have been difficult and hard to get through, you've encountered adversities that most other people have not—if that's an authentic part of who you are, then you should write about it. If it's not, then don't fabricate it. Don't make it up. You don't have to.

So we've been talking about these optional E/P essays. Let's look at a required essay prompt. Most schools do not, but some schools are requiring this general type of essay, and I think that is a different category that people have to think about, especially if they ultimately determine, "I don't think I'm going to write these optional ones."

I'm going to read out one law school's required experience or perspective essay prompt. It reads, "The admissions committee makes every effort to understand who you are as an individual and potential X Law School student and graduate. Please share how your experiences, background, and/or interests have shaped you and will shape your engagement in the X Law School community and the legal profession."

Let's talk about that a little bit. This essay is required. How do you all advise applicants to start brainstorming how they want to answer this question? Especially if they maybe took a look at those optional prompts and decided, I don't think it makes sense for me to submit this. But for schools that require it, now they have to choose a topic. They have to figure out what to write about. How do we brainstorm?

Sir: I take a very linear, logical, and maybe boring approach to this. I say, "What is it that I want people to remember about me when they put this thing down?" Whenever I start writing something in the context of a law school application or an application generally. So if I'm making a statement, I have to be really clear on what I'm trying to communicate; everything else will flow from that. If you're not really clear why you're telling a story, you will very easily—and I know this from personal experience as a rambler—you will get lost in that story, and you won't remember why you started. No one else is going to remember why you started or where you were going, and it's messy. It doesn't have to be that way. So the easiest thing—I'm not saying it's easy to execute, but maybe a simple way to start—is to figure out, okay, so they're asking me to talk about my experiences or background and things that have shaped me. Okay, well, what do I want to say? What has shaped me, and what was the impact? What did it actually do? So what was the event, person, or thing, and what was the outcome? How did it change me? And then the next part could be, okay, and then why is that relevant to this law school experience?

Because if you approach it from that frame, you can take almost any experience, I think, and make it relevant. If you're thoughtful, then you'll be able to not just pick any experience but your best experience. I'll give you a super quick example. I sold women's shoes at Nordstrom all five years of college. Knowing what I know now, I feel like I could crush one of these statements just talk about selling women's shoes, and people would say, "Well, what does selling women's shoes have to do with the law?"

Anne: Like waiting tables?

Sir: Right, waiting tables, watching paint dry, requires a lot of attention to detail and a lot of focus and commitment. I know it sounds marketing-y and spin-y. And I'm not saying you have to be that dramatic, but again, there really are really cool, interesting stories about things that you might feel are just very mundane and normal. "Yeah, I commuted an hour and a half to school every day each way. It's not a big deal. It's just what I had to do." Wait a minute, what? Stop! Let's talk about that. That's different.

Anne: I think people have a lot of trouble seeing themselves as other people see them and what might be interesting or extraordinary about them. Like, commuting an hour and a half to school every day, or even both ways—that's a lot. And also, thinking about what that person did during that time or what they did when traffic held them up, I think those kinds of things are interesting. If we're going to go back to an analogy, that "distance traveled" is harder than, you know, somebody who lived on campus, and they didn't have that time to study or to go visit with professors in office hours. They were missing out on that time because they had to invest that time traveling.

Tom: Yeah, I think that's very true. And changing gears a little bit, I think sometimes it's, if you are looking at your overall school list and there are a couple of schools on there that require a life experience or perspective essay, then maybe start there. A lot of people might write their personal statement or statement of purpose first. Think about the life experiences essay and really put some time into it, because you might find something, just as Sir and Anne have been describing, that is really compelling from a very simple job or responsibility that you had, and that thing might then come out and be a great essay, and if it is, you can use that for multiple schools, even the ones where these essays are optional. That can also obviously save you time. Columbia last year added an optional perspective/life experience essay, but they also had other essays, so you might be able to use the essay more broadly for lots of different schools.

And, sometimes, it is a process, so you'll find a brainstorming partner and try to think through what the topics could be. I had a client who was really struggling to find a topic, and he settled on something related to intuition, like interpersonal intuition was his topic—I don't want to, you know, obviously get too into that, but it ended up being a wonderful essay, and I think it was something fresh and authentic.

And I guess another piece of advice with this, and this kind of goes with what Sir and Anne have been saying too, is that it's good to understand what a school wants out of this prompt, but don't try to write what you think they want to hear. And I think those are different things. So, what they want is to build a class that's full of people who can bring different attributes, and those attributes in these essays can be really broad, as we've talked about. But at the same time, don't try to tell them what you think they want to hear. Try to look within yourself and come up with a topic from there. That's when things like caregiving or intuition or common moments in your life or something you do naturally could be really relevant to how you might work with clients in the future. Those types of things can, I think, add a more personal, more emotional touch to your application. So, you know, this essay can really be an advantage for folks.

Anne: One thing that we talked about in the personal statement deep dive was self-awareness. And I think that's also really important for this essay. Having some self-awareness or spending some time with self-examination and thinking about where you've come from, the trajectory that you're on, and the insights that are derived from those. I think that the best essays, in general, whether they're personal statements or experience essays, are those that demonstrate that self-awareness and how you're situated in the world and what that means for you. Honestly, that's really hard when you've only been alive 20 years, right? With homework and tests and the rest of your life, people don't have a whole lot of time to sit there and gaze at their navel and think about their lives. I recommend engaging in at least a little bit of that to think about what kind of insights you can offer and then maybe work backwards as to the experiences and perspectives that developed those insights.

Anna: All excellent advice. I think it's all contributing to that multidimensional picture, as Sir was saying, of who you are and what you're bringing to a law school.

So, another way that law schools incorporate asking about your experience or your perspective is by actually incorporating it into the personal statement prompt. This is more uncommon, I think. Last year, there was at least one law school that did it this way, where instead of having separate essays for "here's your personal statement" and "here's where we're asking about your experience or perspective," they basically combined it and said, "Here's your personal statement; it can be up to five pages"—and I'm guessing none of you would encourage people to write that full five pages, but I won't put words in your mouth—and basically said, okay, talk about your interests and motivations for law school, your typical personal statement type prompt, but then also folded in elements of asking about your experience or your perspective.

So, what is your advice for applicants who, maybe they've written a personal statement; maybe they've even written one or a few versions of an experience or perspective essay. They have these two separate narratives. What advice do you have for combining those into one sort of cohesive essay? Or do they even need to combine it into a cohesive essay? Could it maybe just be, "and here's this other topic that I want to talk about," without really combining them?

Sir: I think that both are possible. Obviously, you have to pay attention to the instructions that the schools provided, but oftentimes, your stories and experiences tie into these big universal things. And so combining two things that don't seem like they're connected is really just an exercise in thinking about, okay, what is the common denominator? And I'm not going to go long with this math analogy because I suck at it and I hate it, but that's really kind of what it comes down to.

And so I love that we're having this whole conversation and we've talked about three or four different types of prompts so far, because for me, again, at the end, they're all getting toward a similar thing. And so, if you've ever seen a really good politician, they'll agree to go on anyone's show. The questions that they're going to be asked are almost an afterthought to the talking points they have in their head when they go into it. So no matter what questions you ask me, I'm going to make sure that you know that I love puppies and that if I get elected there's going to be Kool-Aid coming out of the water fountain. It doesn't matter what question you ask me. I'm going to make sure I say those things. That's how my team has prepared me. And so similarly, I think coming into an application, it's really helpful if you're thinking about, no matter what question I encounter, I'm going to share this thing about me. I look at these different prompts as different vehicles I have to choose from. Am I going to be driving a Ford today or a Toyota? It doesn't matter. They have four doors or two doors and wheels, and they're going to get you where you need to go. It takes a lot of that sort of, I think, anxiety out of it, about "Oh, I don't know what they're going to ask. They could ask me 20 different things." I have to be very careful, because I want to say that it doesn't matter what they ask you—no, it does. You have to follow directions. But thinking a little bit deeper beyond the surface level of what the question is, and thinking about why they're asking the question, can sometimes help with that brainstorming. "What would they possibly get about me from my answer to this question?" And that can help you get really warm or hot about where you should focus your attention and storytelling effort.

Anne: And Sir, I think that's great advice for interviews as well.

Tom: That's true.

Anna: So I'd like to talk about a couple more categories of prompts that applicants might encounter when they are searching, "Okay, where is the place that I can put my experience perspective type of essay?" One of those types is pretty similar to the first category that we talked about, where it's just giving you the optional opportunity to talk about your experience or perspective, and that is law schools that give a broadly-defined addendum prompt that may be used for an experience or perspective essay.

So traditionally, law school addenda have been pretty limited in the subject matter that law schools are looking for: explaining your LSAT score if you think they need additional context on that, explaining your undergraduate GPA if they need additional context on that, explaining any character and fitness issues. Those were sort of the three main categories of addenda, with, of course, tons of little one-off situations where, you know, this one individual has to include this information, so they include an addendum. But a few schools have broadened their addendum prompt to specifically ask for this experience and perspective type of information from applicants.

So that's just something that I think applicants should look out for if they are going to an application and wondering where to put this essay, is that, it might be under the addendum, even if that's not what an addendum typically in the past would have included. So just be aware of that. And that, I think the considerations are very similar for the first category that we talked about, where it's just an optional, typical type of experience/perspective essay.

Another type of situation that I would like to flag is that—most schools did not do this, but at least a couple of schools did not include any essay or prompt that specifically got at or used any type of language to indicate experience, perspective, this type of essay that previously might have been a diversity statement and now is broader. For at least one of those schools, we talked to their dean of admissions, and they specifically told us, the addendum slot is where you would put that essay, even though they don't specifically let you know. So that's another thing that I want to flag for applicants to be aware of, is that even if you don't see a specific prompt for it, it could make sense in the addendum spot. Now, certainly read over the instructions carefully. If they specify, "these are the only things we want to see in an addendum," don't do it that way. But if a law school leaves it open-ended, which I think some law schools did so very intentionally, of saying "this can be used to address any of the many topics you may wish to include," that might be an appropriate place for your experience or perspective essay.

Tom: I totally agree, and I think in the past, I would always advise folks to be very careful, be very brief with addenda. Now, with this sort of inclusion of a broader addendum, even, you know, that could fit the life experience essay, I think that makes sense. And if you already have a strong essay that you've written for one of the other schools because it was required or because you wanted to, yeah, definitely consider doing that. And the school might wonder why you didn't.

Sir: I think the flipside of the coin is that some of these prompts actually say, "Use your best judgment," which is code for, "We're judging you based off of the decisions you're making"—

Sir: —which is code for, don't include your thesis. I know you think it's interesting, but the application is already like 30 pages long. When you think of all of the essays and resumes and transcripts and letters of recommendation, it's not good judgment to drop your master's thesis in there, or that 32-page, single-spaced response that you wrote because you felt like it was brilliant. That's where, again, talking to people that like, know and love you but who will also be honest with you, can be a good thing. Like Tom was saying, you have to fight this urge, maybe, not to talk about things that you should, because maybe you don't think they're that interesting, but then you have to also be aware of the other side of the coin. I won't name that side of the coin, but there is a name for it. And the application process—it's all about you, in doses. Brevity is a virtue when it comes to applications, I often think, again as long as you're including everything that should be there.

Anne: We used to talk about application files that landed with a "thud" back when we were reading paper applications.

Tom: Right.

Anna: And that is not a positive thing.

Anna: So, let's talk about another type of prompt, and honestly, at this point, it starts to get really divergent. There are lots of different types of ways that law schools can ask this question, that law schools did ask this question last cycle; there might be ways that they're going to ask it this upcoming cycle that we aren't even anticipating. But I'd like to look at one school's prompt that did it in a way that is slightly different from the way that a lot of other schools did it, which is that they gave a bunch of different options for things to talk about, some of which are pretty squarely within the experience/perspective type of essay, and some of which are different, and some of which offer opportunities to talk about totally separate things. And they give a pretty short word limit, 250 to 500 words per prompt, for these optionals.

So I'm just going to read this out. "Our admissions process is guided by the view that a law school class that includes actively engaged students who possess a variety of skills, personal qualities, and life experiences helps to advance the law school's mission, improves the learning process, and enriches the educational experience for all. Please write one or two short essays from the list below."

The options that they give include, "What does the rule of law mean to you, and what special background or experience do you have that may help you contribute to its advancement or that underscores its importance to you personally?" Second one they have is, "The promise of equal justice is fundamental to our legal system. Why is equal justice important to you personally, and what personal experiences or knowledge do you have that may help you to become an effective advocate for equal justice under law?" Their third prompt is, "Exposure to a diversity of perspectives and experiences can enhance one's ability to deliver effective professional services. Please describe any opportunities you have had to serve clients or your community, either through work or on a volunteer basis, and how your own exposure to different perspectives and experiences helped you." Their fourth option is, "Lawyers are members of a learned profession and are often called to serve the public in a variety of ways. Please describe your interest in public service and any experience that you have had to prepare you for a life of service in the public interest." Fifth one they give you: "Please describe your interest in learning the law in an open, rigorous, and collaborative environment. Why is a commitment to the free expression of ideas so important in the learning process?" And their last option is, "What does ethical leadership mean to you? Please provide examples of how you have prepared yourself to become an ethical leader."

Okay, so let's say an applicant comes to any of the three of you and says, "Hey, we've written these experience/perspective essays; I've adapted it for different schools; we've written this personal statement. Now I've come across this huge thing. What advice do you have?" I know to some extent it's going to depend on the individual, but what advice generally do you have for approaching this type of very broad essay prompt that really gives you a variety of different options for how you want to talk about various topics that might be relevant to you?

Anne: I like that they are fairly narrowly tailored questions, so even if you had to write a new essay, I think that, for people who enjoy writing, this could be an interesting exercise. For people who want to, I think, use essays that they've already written, number three or number five tend to be ones that they could adapt what they've already written. I actually like this prompt, because I think that it allows students to explore or share facets of their experience that they maybe wouldn't have considered otherwise.

Tom: One pitfall that could happen with this particular school is, if you have a perspective or life experience essay that you already like, then you might be tempted to submit it as part of your "different perspectives" prompt the school offers. But I think it's really important to, what all of us have been talking about, which is "read the instructions." Because a lot of life experience/perspective essays don't exactly answer this particular prompt, because it says, please describe any opportunities you've had to serve clients in your community on a volunteer basis, so they're kind of looking for a particular population that you've been serving with that perspective. It's not just sort of a copy-and-paste and bring in a general perspective essay and put it here. So it's really important to pay attention to that prompt. It is an opportunity to maybe reuse that essay in a practical way, but then also look at the other essays and think about maybe there's something else—a shorter 250 words, for example—that you might want to include as well.

Anna: Great advice from both of you. I'd like to look at a couple more prompts. Believe it or not, there are more types still yet to come.

We've talked a lot about prompts that have broadened the scope of what they are looking for from what previously would have been a diversity statement. There are some schools that narrowed what they're looking for and get very specific as far as the type of essay that they're looking for. One of these types of essays is really focused on adversity. So we've talked a lot about the variety of different ways that your identity, your perspective, your experiences have informed who you are and how you can talk about those, and they don't have to be about adversity, they don't have to be about hurdles that you had to cross—but some schools do get very specific and ask for that.

I'm going to read one law school's prompt that sort of falls within this category. They say, "We recognize that some applicants have faced and overcome particular challenges in life thus far. In this optional section, we invite you to share any information about adversity or challenges that you would like us to consider about your personal life experiences. This may include socioeconomic challenges, educational challenges, health issues, disability, immigration status, surviving abuse, or complex family circumstances like an incarcerated parent, homelessness, living in foster care, or others. This is not an inclusive list, but simply an opportunity, if you wish, to share any additional aspects of your background that may give us a deeper understanding of your strengths and who you are."

Thoughts/advice on this type of prompt? Because it is narrower than those that we've been talking about.

Sir: Even with this one, they're sort of narrow up front and signaling "these are the types of things we had in mind," then even they at the end put this catch-all, "this is not an inclusive list. You can go off the rails here if you want. But be careful; we are judging you." Any additional aspects of your background that may give us a deeper understanding of your strengths and who you are—at the end of the day, they want to know about these things, not just because you can check a box, not just because you can claim membership in a group, but they're curious about how these parts of your background—and in this case, primarily adversities—how they've strengthened you and made you who you are. So why are you so passionate about this justice issue? It's an opportunity to help make sense of all of the other information you've provided about yourself in the application process. It provides context for why, during college, maybe you weren't as focused on your grades as you could have been, because there was other more important stuff going on, like college was a means to an end: get the degree so I can support my family. "C's get degrees"—that's not exactly the mantra you want to march into your law school applications with, but at the same time, though, I advise people when I'm talking with them, I always say, look, it's about making your application make sense. It's not that people have to agree with your decisions, but they do want them to make sense. They want them to resolve in the way that musical chords do. When you put certain notes together, it just sounds right, and if you put stuff not together, you don't have to know anything about music to say, "that just sounds weird." It's unsatisfying. I often tell people, when you're faced with an optional prompt, really be thinking about, is this sort of adding to the harmony? Is this sort of completing something that was maybe left unresolved, a question that came up, or is this just you wanting to talk more? Because if you want to talk more, talk to me, but leave it out of the application.

Anna: If you were talking to an applicant, they came to you and they had written their experience or perspective essay for other schools, and it was of the nature of the sort of one that you were talking about earlier with the applicant who lived in Miami and had this joyful experience of his culture and his identity. In this hypothetical, the essay is all that tone; it's about the positive aspects and doesn't really touch on adversity at all. In this type of situation, would you advise that applicant to submit it anyway, given that they do have that sort of catch-all at the end? Would you advise them to try to adapt it or write something completely different? I think this is a situation that some applicants are probably going to come across.

Sir: It would be case-by-case. My default would probably be, if you don't really have any adversity to talk about, let's not. But let's not end the conversation there; let's talk a little bit more. Because some people might view exactly those things you described—growing up in an enclave with a bunch of people that looked like you and feeling sheltered—they might describe those as negatives, as adversity. Think of the immigrant kid whose parents are just so focused on success in America, "You're going to be a STEM major. That's all you can do. Are you going to be a doctor or an engineer? Which one? Because all this other stuff, I haven't heard of that, and that doesn't count. I don't care about what you want to do personally." You could have been a straight-A engineering student, but you could just be very unfulfilled. And so even though it was a sort of boon, it was an adversity and a thing that you had to overcome, too, the ability to speak truth to power and tell the person that's maybe funding the degree that you don't want that. I would get really specific into that person's circumstances. I would feel comfortable assessing and giving them advice on, like, maybe what I would do if I were in their shoes. But I would also be careful not to supplant my judgment for theirs. If they feel strongly about it, then let's figure out a way to make it work. If they feel strongly about not wanting to do it, I'm absolutely not going to force it, because then I think that forcing them to do it, it'll come through.

Anne: I think that's wonderful, Sir, because it's the digging into the way that somebody told the story originally and requiring them to see it maybe from a slightly different angle, or even appreciate their lived experience in a way that's a little bit different from how they had originally thought about it, because our story and what we go through, I think, changes with the more life that we live and how we think about what we've been through, and something that we thought was wonderful at one point or awful at one point, we may re-evaluate with kind of greater life experience.

Tom: I agree with what you both said. And applicants probably put a higher bar for grit and perseverance, like what qualifies as something that I should write about. Sir, I think your example of someone feeling intense family pressure to do one thing or another, from a cultural perspective or from a personal family perspective, that can be really intense. I've definitely had international clients, particularly women from East Asia, write about social pressures and expectations. "You have to be married before you're 30." These are things that are really intense for some applicants. "A professional role is not really what this is meant for, and even investment in a legal education is wasteful." I'm not trying to say parents are awful, but there are some pressures that are really there about having children and raising a family, and how does law school fit into that? So people can write about these things after they reflect on them, as you were saying, Anne.

Anne: Tom, one of my favorite diversity statements—that was the type of essay when we wrote it—was a young woman who reflected on having wonderful, supportive, loving family and lots of extended family all around, and their greatest ambition for her was that she could make a perfectly round tortilla, because that meant that she would be a good manager of her home, or she would be able to be a good housewife. And one of the harder things she had to do was break away from that and show that she could still do this but also have the career that she wanted. So I love that you showed how even loving, supportive, kind of Pollyanna-like life experiences can have expectations that people have to work against.

Anna: The only thing I would add there is that writing about your family, or writing about experiences that you've had in the framework of challenges or adversities, does not take away from the positive and wonderful things about your family. I think a lot of applicants can sometimes feel guilty or bad about writing about things under that framework of adversities and challenges, because they're thinking to themselves, you know, "no, my family loves me; they've done all these wonderful things for me; I shouldn't be talking about the difficulties that I've experienced in that context, because they've been so great," and feeling like it is a slight against them or takes away from any of the positive things that they have gotten from their family, from their parents. So I just wanted to flag that you should not feel that guilt, and that talking about things from a multitude of different perspectives, just because you have this one side doesn't take away from the other side, doesn't take away from all of the positives. So do look at it in a nuanced way and think about things in ways that you might not have in the past, but recognize that that doesn't invalidate anything else about your identity, or your family, or your culture.

Sir: Quickly, one of our colleagues, Jordana, I think she writes a blog; she definitely writes LinkedIn posts about basically being, like, a recovering perfectionist. And it's so fascinating because, on the outside, these really high-performing people that seem to get all the things, it'd be really easy to assume that they get all the things and that life is great because of it. But the other side of that coin is really intense, very high expectations, sometimes unrealistic, and that in and of itself can be a real barrier. Right now we're in the midst of the Olympics; there are so many stories of that there. You look at Simone Biles pulling out of the Olympics, and everybody's like, "Oh, my God, what are we going to do? I can't believe," but it's like, wait a minute. Or 100 meters, the marquee track and field event, and there's so much pressure on the U.S. favorite to win the whole thing, and when they don't, they're not even talking about the person who won. It's "this person lost"—that's got to be terrible. Your reward for being consistently good is that people are always asking you what's next. It's like, "Oh my god, you graduated from college; that's so wonderful, so when are you getting married?" "Oh, you're married, that's great, so when are you having kids?" "Oh, you've got kids, so when are you having another one?" Wait! What? What's happening here?

Tom: You're stressing me out!

Sir: Like, wow.

Anne: You're making me reevaluate some of my life story!

Sir: Like Anne was saying, sometimes it takes a little bit of sitting and stewing and maybe talking to people that you trust who know you well. But there often, almost always is a story in there somewhere. It's just about being in the space to sort of realize it and maybe shift your thinking a little bit so that you can see it. And if you can't do that for yourself, which most people can't, find a partner who can help you do that.

Anna: Great advice.

So there is one last category of prompt that I would like to talk about—and this one is pretty different from most of the other prompts that we've been talking about—and this is the prompt that specifically gets at "communicating across differences" or working with people who have different perspectives from you or who you disagree with.

So I'll read one school's prompt that, this was their only prompt of this nature; they did not have another sort of experience/perspective essay type option. And this school said: "At X Law School, we value the ability to communicate constructively across differences, even when the stakes are high or the differences significant. Please discuss a time when you encountered a viewpoint that contrasted with your own and explain how you responded. Would you do anything different if the same thing happened today?"

That's one very specific way of framing it. I think some other schools have either one option, or this is their main option, where it's similar, not necessarily the exact same framing. So, as with all of these, read every school's instructions carefully and be sure you are answering the question that they ask. But for this type of prompt generally, about communicating across differences and having these ideological differences with your peers or with people with who you're working with, what advice do you give applicants for this one? Because it is so different.

Tom: I think law schools, like many other places, many other schools and universities across the country, are trying to figure out how to encourage communication and how to help people understand what it means to disagree and disagree well.

Law schools train people to disagree, advance the best arguments, and to problem-solve and use strategy. But at the same time, it seems like, in some cases, people are talking past each other; people are not communicating. So they want to really emphasize right from the very beginning that these are priorities for them. They want people to disagree, but they want them to do it well.

When I was at HLS, and I don't know if they are still using this quote, but Dean Manning used to say, "Listen generously and disagree strenuously"—he would say that at orientation, he would say that in writing, and I think it might have been partially from RBG, a Ruth Bader Ginsburg quote as well. But the idea is, what they really want to emphasize and see among their students is the ability to disagree well, to not burn a bridge in order to win an argument or to score a point even if no one's listening. I think these essays, if you're keeping that in mind, this can be a real opportunity to show them that you can do that. It doesn't have to be a major disagreement, but it could be, and it's all about how you disagree and how you try to listen and what you can illustrate around those points through these essays.

You know, I think there might be more of this type of thing from schools, either during interview questions—because also this year I've noticed it in interview questions, not just in writing for a couple of schools—so I think it's something that schools are really interested in, and they want to hear applicants talk about real-life situations where they've disagreed. Maybe they didn't change anyone's mind. Maybe they changed their own mind, which is always, I think, a gift when someone can educate you. All those themes can come through in these essays if you think of the right examples and do them well.

Anne: Law school discussions can get heated, especially when you're talking about hot button issues. I think law schools are really interested, can you disagree with someone without being disagreeable? And can you try to get to a common understanding, or are you someone who digs in and isn't willing to listen to others? To be clear, you do not want to communicate that if you are. But I think what they're looking for are people who can really listen to others, as well as staying grounded in their own beliefs and communicating those, and seeing if there's any way forward with arriving at a common understanding. And I think that's what these types of questions are designed to uncover.

Sir: I look at this type of question, and I go back to, why they would possibly be asking me this question? What positive things about me could they glean from my answer to this question if I do it right? And maybe it's an opportunity to signal that I'm mature and self-aware, that I understand people and I have some empathy and I can play well with others. In this world, particularly in this country where our last few elections have been pretty close, it's not hard to imagine a scenario when you're going to have people that strongly disagree with you on really significant things. To Anne's point, what you can't do is signal your worst impulses. "Oh, I sat there and cried like a baby, and then I punched that guy out." That's not going to get you admitted. It might get you committed, but not admitted. So I think it's about figuring out, like, all right, this question is an opportunity again for me to say one more thing, for me to give them a little more information about who I am. What are those best qualities and virtues that I want to put forward? Now that I've got those locked in, what's the best story I can tell, the best example I can give within these limited parameters, one to two pages? What can I talk about that's really going to bring people to this conclusion without me even having to explicitly say it? "I'm really smart and mature and well-adjusted and I can play well with others." You can't say those things, because no one's going to believe you, but if you tell the right story, they'll come to the conclusion on their own. And then it feels like their idea. And now you've got somebody rooting for you in the process.

Anna: All great advice. Let me throw out another hypothetical. Let's say an applicant comes to you all, and they have a specific element of their identity, you know, maybe it's their race or ethnicity, maybe it's that they were an immigrant, maybe it's their gender identity or their sexuality, they have some element of themselves that is really important to who they are, and that they want to communicate that to law schools because it is really important to who they are. Do you recommend, in a situation where this kind of seems to be the only prompt that is vaguely in the realm of experience/perspective, do you recommend that they find a way to incorporate that information into this essay, that they find a way to incorporate it into some other essay, or somewhere else in the application? What's your advice for someone coming across this difficult question?

Tom: Personally, I think it gets back to authenticity. I did have a client, she was on a trip with someone, and they were walking from one place to another, and they were from very different backgrounds, and they had very different beliefs. So it was in the context of their own sort of identities, and there was a dialogue—maybe it was a disagreement—and that was a place where it sort of naturally fit that she could share some of her own identities, so I think that would feel authentic. If it feels artificial at all... I was probably one of the more generous readers of essays when I was working directly in admissions. You know, I would read an essay and think, "Oh, that was beautiful," and someone else could read it and say, "Well, that seems a little contrived." People have different responses, and I do feel like admissions people have read thousands of essays, and they will see something that isn't authentic. So you have to be careful if you're trying to get that sort of life experience content into an essay like this.

Anna: Great advice, Tom, for this type of situation. As with all of this, it's so nuanced, it's so individual.

Our team looks extremely closely at law schools' applications and what they're specifically asking for and the options that they give applicants. Those are sort of the main categories that we identified this past cycle. Now, will there be new categories this upcoming 2024–2025 cycle? Maybe. But I think we covered the bases of what most schools are going to be asking.

I'd like to talk a little bit more broadly, now that we've gone through those specific types of prompts. What are some common mistakes or pitfalls that applicants fall into when they are going to write this type of essay?

Sir: I'll quickly jump in. I think I said it before, but sometimes people feel that it needs to be sad or bad or high drama, and so again that forces them to either make something up entirely or embellish a normal situation. And I think it's a mistake, but it's also a missed opportunity. I think Tom has said a few times "authenticity," and that really is it. They want to get to know the real you. And again, that doesn't mean oversharing, so, which kind of ties into another mistake for people where it is true, and life really has been that dramatic. This essay, in specific, it shouldn't be like a therapy session. You really have to be cognizant of why you're telling the story, because if you're telling it to generate pity and make people sad, you're going to tell it a specific way. But if you're just telling it to give context for you being great and fine where you are, if you're telling it for the purpose of "distance traveled," that story looks different, even though it's the same base story.

Anne: I think, just to build on that, don't assume that the conclusion is a given. Help the reader understand what you want the takeaway to be. That doesn't mean that you have to hit them over the head with a hammer, but guide them to what you want that conclusion to be. Do your experiences make you particularly compassionate, overall, or with a certain population of people? Or could it make you a champion for this particular group? Could it make you a source of support for others similarly situated, either in law school or the legal community or the broader community? Are you going to be a thought leader, right? Are you going to be out there asking questions that other people don't think to ask? Leave the reader with some sense of how this experience has primed you to engage with the law and to use the law to make the changes you want to see in the world.

Tom: I really like what you both said there. And one of the things that I've seen—I was reading maybe 15 or 20 perspective essays for a different sort of project I'm working on, and one of the things I noticed is that, in some essays, even really good ones, there's a significant amount of the territory of the essays on other people, and I think some essays can be about others. That could be for a couple of reasons. Maybe the applicant is just nervous to talk about themselves really in a personal way. Maybe they've been trained to speak in the third person, and only talk in data and research, and suddenly this sort of self-revelatory essay, whether it's about something as simple as empathy or something really important to them in a more dramatic way, it's really important for the essay to be about the applicant, and that sounds silly to say, but often, someone's experience can be really shaped by a parent or a grandparent or an important person in their lives, and it's important to share that person's background, but it's also critical to get right into why that changed you, how that changed you, what it meant to you, how you interpreted what happened. It's okay if the first draft is a whole page about another person, but the last draft shouldn't be. As you get into it, really draw those lines from what you learned from that person or what you learned from that situation, and also connect them to how that shapes your contributions in law school. A lot of people think, "I heard that I shouldn't talk about other people, so I'm not going to do it at all." That's maybe an overreaction. I hear that a lot; there are some podcasts out there, "Don't talk about other people in your essays." I don't think that's a problem at all, unless you're doing it too much. And there's not a lot of territory, so you can't do very much, but it's not necessarily, in my opinion, a negative thing to talk about someone who's been a mentor or inspired you.

Anna: Another common mistake that I would add with these essays is that, because they are so different from one another now, because there's such a wide variety of these types of prompts, I think one mistake that applicants can make is just submitting the same type of essay without looking over those different prompts, without addressing the specific questions that are being asked. Many of these have very different length requirements. Some will allow you up to two pages. We talked about the personal statement that was allowed up to five pages. Some of them are 300 words. So there's a huge variety of what law schools are asking for with this sort of umbrella of "E/P essays." That's one common mistake is not to pay attention to those differences and make sure that you are following the instructions and answering the questions asked. Any other mistakes?

Sir: I just want to underline yours, I think it was a really good one, Anna, that people underestimate the importance of following instructions. That's a big folly. I mean, law is all about instructions. Whole documents and lives can turn on a word, an "if," or a "but," and so the people reviewing your application, if they weren't intimately involved with creating the application form, they've certainly read that application form several hundred times. So without even trying, they're very sensitive to exactly what their application is asking. And so, to the extent that you turn in something that doesn't fit, or if you decide to be cute and make your margins eight tenths of an inch instead of an inch, like, they're going to instantly know it, just because they've been exposed so much. Following instructions to me is critically important, because you never know if you're just going to meet that weirdo in the process who's just going to be like, "Oh, trash, because your margins were too big." That's not fair, and it's not normal, but you don't know. So don't play that game.

Anne: What I always say is, you want them predisposed to liking you, so you don't want to either overstay your welcome by writing too much or trying to stretch what they've asked for.

Tom: Picking up what Sir said, too, is the header—because the essay prompts, either a number or the title of it could be different from school to school, it could be just "Addendum 2" or whatever—so that should change. You might be tempted to have a PDF that's just your perspective essay. Just make sure the header is really specific to the school's instructions. Some schools have really specific instructions, some schools have none, but just tailor it to each school's general prompt.

Anna: Great advice, and one of those little things that people don't necessarily have on their radar but that they should.

I'd like to end on discussing some of the traits of really excellent, standout, A+ experience or perspective essays. You all have one admissions cycle of experience reading these types of essays, and then many more cycles of admissions experience reading diversity statements. So based on all of that experience reading thousands of essays that are either within this category or could fall within this category, what are the common attributes among the ones that are just really stand-out excellent?

Sir: They tend to be really thoughtful and intentional. It just feels just right. It's weird, but it's satisfying in a way. It's like Anne was saying, you didn't stay too long, you didn't give me too much detail, you weren't glib. It's just balanced, I guess, is the one-word response to it. That it's just well thought out and balanced. And I think that's possible for everybody, because no one is forcing you—in theory—no one's forcing you to turn your applications in on a specific day. There was a time constraint in terms of how much time you had to study for the LSAT, but this, with these essays, in theory you have unlimited time, or at least more, and so I think that the expectations are higher than they would be for your LSAC writing sample, for example, because again, that was contemporaneous and it was timed, and they sprung that on you. No one sprung these prompts on you. I think people have a right to be persnickety about you following instructions and making sure that it's just the best work that you can muster.

Tom: I guess my response to that question blends the last topic we were on, which is problems that you can encounter writing these essays. Sometimes an applicant might have 2 or 3 parts of themselves they want to talk about in an essay, and they might present it sort of as part 1, part 2, part 3. Whenever I see that in an essay, I always want to think about, what's the through-line? What's the synthesis? What have you learned from it? What can you teach—you've had these experiences, whether it was working in a restaurant, or being a caregiver, or being the target of discrimination, what's the thing that ties it together for you—something that you can teach the reader? As an admissions officer, when I read an essay and I learn something, I'm talking about it at dinner the next night. And those are the essays that, for me, stand out, and they often have a through-line that someone has taken time to think about, "Oh, these concepts sort of connect for me." I think that can just be really powerful. So I always love it when I learn something from an essay, especially from a diversity or life experience essay. And I think, as all three of us have said, don't underestimate yourself. Look inside, and tell the story that you have inside, not necessarily what you think admissions officers want to hear.

Anne: So, I can't build on what my colleagues already said so well, so I'm going to go in a slightly different direction and say that, make sure that this essay complements what you're saying in your personal statement. It can't be a complete departure. The readers are reading all of your documents at the same time. Make sure that it all fits together. If you're covering something even briefly that you covered in your personal statement, you don't have to give as much time or add as much detail. You can refer to it and move on. With the best E/P essays, they're ones that are authentic and personal, but they also fit in with the rest of the application and help the reader understand who you are on a deeper level.

Anna: Great advice. I think that's a wonderful place for us to end as well. Thank you all again for your time. This has been a long one, but I think we got into so many different nuanced situations and advice and looking at these different prompts. I hope that it's valuable for any applicants who are approaching these different types of essays. Thanks everyone, and thank you to our listeners. If you found this helpful, please like, subscribe, and we'll hope to see you next time. Bye, everybody!

Tom: Bye, everybody.

Sir: Bye, everybody.

Anne: Bye, everyone. Thanks!

Tips For Law School Personal Statements: Examples, Resources And More

Expert Reviewed

Updated: Mar 22, 2024, 4:48pm

Tens of thousands of undergraduates pursue law school every year, and the competition for admission is fierce.

When it comes to admissions, your law school personal statement is not as impactful as your LSAT scores or undergraduate GPA. Still, a personal statement can be the deciding factor when competing with other applicants.

In this article, we discuss how to write a law school personal statement that demonstrates why you belong in a Juris Doctor (J.D.) program.

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What Is a Law School Personal Statement?

A law school personal statement is a multi-paragraph essay or narrative highlighting the reason you are pursuing a J.D. degree . This essay is an opportunity to share your identity with an admissions committee—beyond just transcripts and test scores.

Personal statements are typically two to four pages long. Most law schools do not provide specific prompts for applicants’ statements, but some do. Either way, the content of your statement should leave a strong impression.

Why Do Law Schools Ask for Personal Statements?

Law schools receive a high volume of applications and typically do not contact applicants for interviews until after reviewing their applications. As a result, personal statements largely act as a substitute for the applicant interview process.

Your personal statement serves as a writing sample that shows your ability to communicate ideas effectively. In addition to demonstrating your ability to write well, a personal statement can give an admissions committee a clear picture of your motivations for attending law school and indicate how well you might fit into their program.

If you’re wondering how to become a lawyer , law school is the first step—and your personal statement is important to the law school application process.

How To Write a Law School Personal Statement

Writing a law school personal statement can be a challenging part of the application process, involving hours of planning and drafting. However, with solid brainstorming and prewriting strategies, you can craft an effective personal statement that illustrates how you are a strong candidate for law school.

Picking What to Write About

If your prospective school does not provide a prompt, choosing what to write about can be frustrating and time-consuming.

Start with a serious brainstorming session to get your ideas on paper. Give yourself the license to explore every experience or idea before deciding on your final topic.

Consider spending time jotting down every idea that falls into the following categories:

• Life events or experiences that motivated you or changed your perspective
• A meaningful personal achievement and what you learned from it
• How you became interested in the law
• Your passions and how they contributed to your individual goals

Structuring Your Law School Personal Statement

The structure and method you use to craft your statement is important. It might be tempting to follow a rigid formula and write a personal statement that methodically unpacks your reason for attending law school, your qualifications and the relevance of your extracurricular engagements. However, some of the most effective personal statements are crafted through a narrative approach.

Well-written narratives are engaging and illustrate why law school would benefit your career path. Your essay should exhibit your dedication and passion for the law and highlight the relationship between your values and your target law school. By creating a narrative with a common theme woven throughout, you can captivate your reader while informing them of your qualifications and goals.

Rather than overtly telling the reader why you should be accepted into law school, a narrative allows its audience to make connections and engage at a personal level. Your anecdotes and specific examples should reveal the traits you want the admissions committee to see and appreciate.

What Makes a ‘Good’ Law School Personal Statement?

Law school admissions teams read hundreds, even thousands of personal statements, so it’s important to write one that stands out. Ultimately, a good law school personal statement engages the reader, provides a unique perspective and demonstrates why you would make a good candidate for law school.

Choose a Unique Topic

A personal statement is exactly that: personal. Crafting a memorable narrative is paramount and dependent on your story and unique life experiences, especially since reviewers read so many personal statements with similar stories and themes.

Unfortunately, certain topics can come across as cliche. This is not to say that your lived experience of overcoming adversity or your time spent volunteering to help those in need is undervalued. However, those narratives have motivated thousands of aspiring attorneys to pursue law—meaning they have appeared in thousands of law school personal statements.

Give Specific Examples

Once you’ve selected a topic, take time to unpack the examples you plan to share and how they tie into the “why” behind your pursuit of law school. General statements are not only boring to read but lack the depth of meaning required to make an impact. Specific examples are critical to creating interest and highlighting the uniqueness of your personal experience.

According to law school admissions consultant and founder of PreLawPro, Ben Cooper, “It is always great to have a story that speaks for you. A story that demonstrates certain qualities or a key lesson learned is always more compelling than simply saying, ‘I am dedicated, responsible etc.’ ”

Be Personal and Reflective

Law schools want to see critical thinking skills and deep reflection in applicants’ personal essays. Before you write, consider a few questions. Is your story unique to you? What was the primary conflict in your story? How did you develop over time? How does this story reflect who you are now and how law school suits you? Take time to ponder what challenges you’ve overcome and what events and experiences have shaped your worldview.

Common Pitfalls for a Law School Personal Statement

Before you invest hours writing an essay just for it to fall flat, make sure you’re aware of the most common pitfalls for law school personal statements.

Failing To Follow Instructions

Law schools set specific formatting and length guidelines. Reading comprehension and attention to detail are key skills for law school success, so failing to meet these expectations could count against your application or even result in an automatic rejection.

Length and formatting requirements vary among law schools. For example, if a school expects no more than two pages, 11-point font, 1-inch margins and double spacing, make sure to format your personal statement precisely according to those specifications. We advise tailoring your personal statement to each individual school to avoid violating any formatting requirements.

If a law school asks you to answer a specific prompt or write multiple essays, make sure to follow those instructions as well.

Not Revising And Proofreading

Nothing screams a lack of effort, interest and commitment like an unpolished personal statement. Admissions teams will quickly notice if you skip proofreads and revisions, even if the content of your essay is exceptional.

This step entails much more than running a spelling and grammar check. You must ensure that the order of information is purposeful and logical. Each word you use should be intentional and add value to the story you are trying to tell.

Revising an essay is not a one-person job. Have others provide feedback, too. Your peers and mentors are a great place to start, as long as they give objective feedback.

Also ask people you do not know to provide feedback. You might start with your university’s writing center . Writing centers employ trained writing tutors who are skilled in providing feedback across disciplines. A writing center tutor will not proofread your essay, but they assist in making it reach its full potential.

Using Flowery Or Overly Academic Language

The voice and tone of your personal statement should flow naturally and reflect who you are. This doesn’t require flowery or overly academic language, which can make your essay sound more obtuse and less personal.

As we stated earlier, your personal statement should use specific examples and stories to generate interest and reveal why you want to attend law school and become a lawyer.

Likewise, you should avoid using excessive legal language or famous quotes in your statement. Admissions reviewers are academics, so if you use a term improperly, they will catch it. Use language that you feel comfortable with, without being too informal, and allow your narrative to convey your intended themes and ideas.

Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs) About Law School Personal Statements

What is a good personal statement for law school.

A good personal statement for law school is original, engaging, truthful and well-structured. When composing your personal statement, take time to reflect on your life experiences and how they led you to pursue a legal career. Follow each school’s required format, make sure to proofread carefully and use natural-sounding language.

How much does a law school personal statement matter?

Law school admissions committees typically place more emphasis on your LSAT performance and undergraduate academic record—including your GPA and the rigor of your course of study—but a personal statement can still have a powerful impact on the success of your application. A strong essay can help you stand out from the crowd, and conversely, a clichéd, poorly written or incorrectly formatted essay can hurt your chances.

Do law schools fact-check personal statements?

Assume that law school admissions officers may fact-check any verifiable information in your personal statement. They may not know if you are presenting your motivations for applying or your career plans honestly, but they can—and will—check whether, for example, you participated in a particular student organization or attended a specific conference.

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Brandon Galarita is a freelance writer and K-12 educator in Honolulu, Hawaii. He is passionate about technology in education, college and career readiness and school improvement through data-driven practices.

Brenna Swanston is an education-focused editor and writer with a particular interest in education equity and alternative educational paths. As a newswriter in her early career, Brenna's education reporting earned national awards and state-level accolades in California and North Carolina. Since 2018, she has worked in the higher-education web content space, where she aims to help current and prospective students of all backgrounds find effective, accessible pathways to rewarding careers.

Ben Cooper the founder and CEO of PreLawPro, a law school admissions and career consulting firm. He is a former international lawyer who spent much of his legal career as a litigator in London’ financial district. After leaving private practice he oversaw the Pre-Law program at Baylor University, where he taught college classes on the legal profession, law school admissions, careers, and academic success. He has also helped students explore careers in diplomacy, intelligence and national security. After almost a decade of working with college students and young professionals, Ben has helped hundreds of law school applicants gain admission to law schools all over the country. Ben also coaches and mentors college students and young professionals (across a broad range of industries) as they navigate their education and careers.

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Excellent Law School Personal Statement Examples By David Busis Published May 5, 2019 Updated Feb 10, 2021

We’ve rounded up five spectacular personal statements that helped students with borderline numbers get into T-14 schools. You’ll find these examples to be as various as a typical JD class. Some essays are about a challenge, some about the evolution of the author’s intellectual or professional journey, and some about the author’s identity. The only common thread is sincerity. The authors did not write toward an imagined idea of what an admissions officer might be looking for: they reckoned honestly with formative experiences.

Personal Statement about a Career Journey

The writer of this personal statement matriculated at Georgetown. Her GPA was below the school’s 25th percentile and her LSAT score was above the 75th percentile. She was not a URM.

* Note that we’ve used female pronouns throughout, though some of the authors are male.

I don’t remember anything being out of the ordinary before I fainted—just the familiar, heady feeling and then nothing. When I came to, they were wheeling me away to the ER. That was the last time I went to the hospital for my neurology observership. Not long after, I crossed “doctor” off my list of post-graduate career options. It would be best, I figured, if I did something for which the day-to-day responsibilities didn’t make me pass out.

Back at the drawing board, I reflected on my choices. The first time around, my primary concern was how I could stay in school for the longest amount of time possible. Key factors were left out of my decision: I had no interest in medicine, no aptitude for the natural sciences, and, as it quickly became apparent, no stomach for sick patients. The second time around, I was honest with myself: I had no idea what I wanted to do.

My college graduation speaker told us that the word “job” comes from the French word “gober,” meaning “to devour.” When I fell into digital advertising, I was expecting a slow and toothless nibbling, a consumption whose impact I could ignore while I figured out what I actually wanted to do. I’d barely started before I realized that my interviewers had been serious when they told me the position was sink or swim. At six months, I was one toothbrush short of living at our office. It was an unapologetic aquatic boot camp—and I liked it. I wanted to swim. The job was bringing out the best in me and pushing me to do things I didn’t think I could do.

I remember my first client emergency. I had a day to re-do a presentation that I’d been researching and putting together for weeks. I was panicked and sure that I’d be next on the chopping block. My only cogent thought was, “Oh my god. What am I going to do?” The answer was a three-part solution I know well now: a long night, lots of coffee, and laser-like focus on exactly and only what was needed.

Five years and numerous emergencies later, I’ve learned how to work: work under pressure, work when I’m tired, and work when I no longer want to. I have enough confidence to set my aims high and know I can execute on them. I’ve learned something about myself that I didn’t know when I graduated: I am capable.

The word “career” comes from the French word “carrière,” denoting a circular racecourse. Perhaps it shouldn’t surprise me then, that I’ve come full circle with regards to law school. For two college summers, I interned as a legal associate and wondered, “Is this for me?” I didn’t know if I was truly interested, and I was worried that even if I was, I wouldn’t be able to see it through. Today, I don’t have those fears.

In the course of my advertising career, I have worked with many lawyers to navigate the murky waters of digital media and user privacy. Whereas most of my co-workers went to great lengths to avoid our legal team, I sought them out. The legal conversations about our daily work intrigued me. How far could we go in negotiating our contracts to reflect changing definitions of an impression? What would happen if the US followed the EU and implemented wide-reaching data-protection laws?

Working on the ad tech side of the industry, I had the data to target even the most niche audiences: politically-active Mormon Democrats for a political client; young, low-income pregnant women for a state government; millennials with mental health concerns in a campaign for suicide prevention. The extent to which digital technology has evolved is astonishing. So is the fact that it has gone largely unregulated. That’s finally changing, and I believe the shift is going to open up a more prominent role for those who understand both digital technology and its laws. I hope to begin my next career at the intersection of those two worlds.

Personal Statement about Legal Internships

The writer of this essay was admitted to every T14 law school from Columbia on down and matriculated at a top JD program with a large merit scholarship. Her LSAT score was below the median and her GPA was above the median of each school that accepted her. She was not a URM.

About six weeks into my first legal internship, my office-mate gestured at the window—we were seventy stories high in the Chrysler Building—and said, with a sad smile, doesn’t this office just make you want to jump? The firm appeared to be falling apart. The managing partners were suing each other, morale was low, and my boss, in an effort to maintain his client base, had instructed me neither to give any information to nor take any orders from other attorneys. On my first day of work, coworkers warned me that the firm could be “competitive,” which seemed to me like a good thing. I considered myself a competitive person and enjoyed the feeling of victory. This, though, was the kind of competition in which everyone lost.

Although I felt discouraged about the legal field after this experience, I chose not to give up on the profession, and after reading a book that featured the U.S. attorney’s office for the Southern District of New York, I sent in an internship application. Shortly after, I received an offer to work at the office. For my first assignment, I attended a hearing in the federal courthouse. As I entered the magnificent twenty-third-floor courtroom, I felt the gravitas of the issue at hand: the sentencing of a terrorist.

That sense of gravitas never left me, and visiting the courtroom became my favorite part of the job. Sitting in hearings amidst the polished brass fixtures and mahogany walls, watching attorneys in refined suits prosecute terror, cybercrime, and corruption, I felt part of a grand endeavor. The spectacle enthralled me: a trial was like a combination of a theatrical performance and an athletic event. If I’d seen the dark side of competition at my first job, now I was seeing the bright side. I sat on the edge of my seat and watched to see if good—my side—triumphed over evil—the defense. Every conviction seemed like an unambiguous achievement. I told my friends that one day I wanted to help “lock up the bad guys.”

It wasn’t until I interned at the public defender’s office that I realized how much I’d oversimplified the world. In my very first week, I took the statement of a former high school classmate who had been charged with heroin possession. I did not know him well in high school, but we both recognized one another and made small talk before starting the formal interview. He had fallen into drug abuse and had been convicted of petty theft several months earlier. After finishing the interview, I wished him well.

The following week, in a courtroom that felt more like a macabre DMV than the hallowed halls I’d seen with the USAO, I watched my classmate submit his guilty plea, which would allow him to do community service in lieu of jail time. The judge accepted his plea and my classmate mumbled a quiet “thank you.” I felt none of the achievement I’d come to associate with guilty pleas. In that court, where hundreds of people trudged through endless paperwork and long lines before they could even see a judge, there were no good guys and bad guys—just people trying to put their lives back together.

A year after my internship at the public defender’s office, I read a profile of Preet Bharara, the U.S. attorney for the Southern District of New York, and my former boss. In the profile, he says, “You don’t want a justice system in which prosecutors are cowboys.” The more I saw at the public defender’s office, the more I rethought my experience at the USAO. When I had excitedly called my parents after an insider trading conviction, I had not thought of the defendant’s family. When I had cheered the conviction of a terrorist, I hadn’t thought about the fact that a conviction could not undo his actions. As I now plan on entering the legal profession—either as a prosecutor or public defender—I realize that my enthusiasm momentarily overwrote my empathy. I’d been playing cowboy. A lawyer’s job isn’t to lock up bad guys or help good guys in order to quench a competitive thirst—it’s to subsume his or her ego in the work and, by presenting one side of a case, create a necessary condition for justice.

Personal Statement about Cultural Identity

The writer of this essay was offered significant merit aid packages from Cornell, Michigan, and Northwestern, and matriculated at NYU Law. Her LSAT score was below the 25th percentile LSAT score and her GPA matched the median GPA of NYU.

By the age of five, I’d attended seven kindergartens and collected more frequent flier miles than most adults. I resided in two worlds – one with fast motorcycles, heavy pollution, and the smell of street food lingering in the air; the other with trimmed grass, faint traces of perfume mingling with coffee in the mall, and my mom pressing her hand against my window as she left for work. She was the only constant between these two worlds – flying me between Taiwan and America as she struggled to obtain a U.S. citizenship.

My family reunited for good around my sixth birthday, when we flew back to Taiwan to join my dad. I forgot about the West, acquired a taste for Tangyuan, and became fast friends with the kids in my neighborhood. In the evenings, I’d sit with my grandmother as she watched soap operas in Taiwanese, the dialect of the older generation, which I picked up in unharmonious bits and pieces. Other nights, she would turn off the TV, and speak to me about tradition and history – recounting my ancestors, life during the Japanese regime, raising my dad under martial law. “You are the last of the Li’s,” she would say, patting my back, and I’d feel a quick rush of pride, as though a lineage as deep as that of the English monarchy rested on my shoulders.

When I turned seven, my parents enrolled me in an American school, explaining that it was time for me, a Tai Wan Ren (Taiwanese), to learn English – “a language that could open doors to better opportunities.” Although I learned slowly, with a handful of the most remedial in ESL (English as a Second Language), books like The Secret Garden and The Wind in the Willows opened up new worlds of captivating images and beautiful stories that I longed to take part in.

Along with the new language, I adopted a different way to dress, new mannerisms, and new tastes, including American pop culture. I stopped seeing the neighborhood kids, and sought a set of friends who shared my affinity for HBO movies and  Claire’s Jewelry . Whenever taxi drivers or waitresses asked where I was from, noting that I spoke Chinese with too much of an accent to be native, I told them I was American.

At home, I asked my mom to stop packing Taiwanese food for my lunch. The cheap food stalls I once enjoyed now embarrassed me. Instead, I wanted instant mashed potatoes and Kraft mac and cheese.

When it came time for college, I enrolled in a liberal arts school on the East Coast to pursue my love of literature, and was surprised to find that my return to America did not feel like the full homecoming I’d expected. America was as familiar as it was foreign, and while I had mastered being “American” in Taiwan, being an American in America baffled me. The open atmosphere of my university, where ideas and feelings were exchanged freely, felt familiar and welcoming, but cultural references often escaped me. Unlike my friends who’d grown up in the States, I had never heard of Wonder Bread, or experienced the joy of Chipotle’s burrito bowls. Unlike them, I missed the sound of motorcycles whizzing by my window on quiet nights.

It was during this time of uncertainty that I found my place through literature, discovering Taiye Selasi, Edward Said, and Primo Levi, whose works about origin and personhood reshaped my conception of my own identity. Their usage of the language of otherness provided me with the vocabulary I had long sought, and revealed that I had too simplistic an understanding of who I was. In trying to discover my role in each cultural context, I’d confined myself within an easy dichotomy, where the East represented exotic foods and experiences, and the West, development and consumerism. By idealizing the latter and rejecting the former, I had reduced the richness of my worlds to caricatures. Where I am from, and who I am, is an amalgamation of my experiences and heritage: I am simultaneously a Mei Guo Ren and Taiwanese.

Just as I once reconciled my Eastern and Western identities, I now seek to reconcile my love of literature with my desire to effect tangible change. I first became interested in law on my study abroad program, when I visited the English courts as a tourist. As I watched the barristers deliver their statements, it occurred to me that law and literature have some similarities: both are a form of criticism that depends on close reading, the synthesis of disparate intellectual frameworks, and careful argumentation. Through my subsequent internships and my current job, I discovered that legal work possessed a tangibility I found lacking in literature. The lawyers I collaborate with work tirelessly to address the same problems and ideas I’ve explored only theoretically in my classes – those related to human rights, social contracts, and moral order. Though I understand that lawyers often work long hours, and that the work can be, at times, tedious, I’m drawn to the kind of research, analysis, and careful reading that the profession requires. I hope to harness my critical abilities to reach beyond the pages of the books I love and make meaningful change in the real world.

Personal Statement about Weightlifting

The writer of this essay was admitted to her top choice—a T14 school—with a handwritten note from the dean that praised her personal statement. Her LSAT score was below the school’s median and her GPA was above the school’s median.

As I knelt to tie balloons around the base of the white, wooden cross, I thought about the morning of my best friend’s accident: the initial numbness that overwhelmed my entire body; the hideous sound of my own small laugh when I called the other member of our trio and repeated the words “Mark died”; the panic attack I’d had driving home, resulting in enough tears that I had to pull off to the side of the road. Above all, I remembered the feeling of reality crashing into my previously sheltered life, the feeling that nothing was as safe or certain as I’d believed.

I had been with Mark the day before he passed, exactly one week before we were both set to move down to Tennessee to start our freshman year of college. It would have been difficult to feel so alone with my grief in any circumstance, but Mark’s crash seemed to ignite a chain reaction of loss. I had to leave Nashville abruptly in order to attend the funeral of my grandmother, who helped raise me, and at the end of the school year, a close friend who had helped me adjust to college was killed by an oncoming car on the day that he’d graduated. Just weeks before visiting Mark’s grave on his birthday, a childhood friend shot and killed himself in an abandoned parking lot on Christmas Eve. I spent Christmas Day trying to act as normally as possible, hiding the news in order not to ruin the holiday for the rest of my family.

This pattern of loss compounding loss affected me more than I ever thought it would. First, I just avoided social media out of fear that I’d see condolences for yet another friend who had passed too early. Eventually, I shut down emotionally and lost interest in the world—stopped attending social gatherings, stopped talking to anyone, and stopped going to many of my classes, as every day was a struggle to get out of bed. I hated the act that I had to put on in public, where I was always getting asked the same question —“I haven’t seen you in forever, where have you been?”—and always responding with the same lie: “I’ve just been really busy.”

I had been interested in bodybuilding since high school, but during this time, the lowest period of my life, it changed from a simple hobby to a necessity and, quite possibly, a lifesaver. The gym was the one place I could escape my own mind, where I could replace feelings of emptiness with the feeling of my heart pounding, lungs exploding, and blood flooding my muscles, where—with sweat pouring off my forehead and calloused palms clenched around cold steel—I could see clearly again.

Not only did my workouts provide me with an outlet for all of my suppressed emotion, but they also became the one aspect of my life where I felt I was still in control. I knew that if it was Monday, no matter what else was going on, I was going to be working out my legs, and I knew exactly what exercises I was going to do, and how many repetitions I was going to perform, and how much weight I was going to use for each repetition. I knew exactly when I would be eating and exactly how many grams of each food source I would ingest. I knew how many calories I would get from each of proteins, carbohydrates, and fats. My routine was one thing I could count on.

As I loaded more plates onto the barbell, I grew stronger mentally as well. The gym became a place, paradoxically, of both exertion and tranquility, a sanctuary where I felt capable of thinking about the people I’d lost. It was the healing I did there that let me tie the balloons to the cross on Mark’s third birthday after the crash, and that let me spend the rest of the afternoon sharing stories about Mark with friends on the side of the rural road. It was the healing I did there that left me ready to move on.

One of the fundamental principles of weightlifting involves progressively overloading the muscles by taking them to complete failure, coming back, and performing past the point where you last failed, consistently making small increases over time. The same principle helped me overcome my grief, and in the past few years, I’ve applied it to everything from learning Spanish to studying for the LSAT. As I prepare for the next stage of my life, I know I’ll encounter more challenges for which I’m unprepared, but I feel strong enough now to acknowledge my weaknesses, and—by making incremental gains—to overcome them.

Personal Statement about Sexual Assault

The writer of this essay was accepted to many top law schools and matriculated at Columbia. Her LSAT score matched Columbia’s median while her GPA was below Columbia’s 25th percentile.

My rapist didn’t hold a knife to my throat. My rapist didn’t jump out of a dark alleyway. My rapist didn’t slip me a roofie. My rapist was my eighth-grade boyfriend, who was already practicing with the high school football team. He assaulted me in his suburban house in New Jersey, while his mom cooked us dinner in the next room, in the back of an empty movie theatre, on the couch in my basement.

It started when I was thirteen and so excited to have my first real boyfriend. He was a football player from a different school who had a pierced ear and played the guitar. I, a shy, slightly chubby girl with a bad haircut and very few friends, felt wanted, needed, and possibly loved. The abuse—the verbal and physical harassment that eventually turned sexual—was just something that happened in grown-up relationships. This is what good girlfriends do, I thought. They say yes.

Never having had a sex-ed class in my life, it took me several months after my eighth-grade graduation and my entry into high school to realize the full extent of what he did to me. My overall experience of first “love” seemed surreal. This was something that happened in a Lifetime movie, not in a small town in New Jersey in his childhood twin bed. I didn’t tell anyone about what happened. I had a different life in a different school by then, and I wasn’t going to let my trauma define my existence.

As I grew older, I was confronted by the fact that rape is not a surreal misfortune or a Lifetime movie. It’s something that too many of my close friends have experienced. It’s when my sorority sister tells me about the upstairs of a frat house when she’s too drunk to say no. It’s when the boy in the room next door tells me about his uncle during freshman orientation. It’s a high school peer whose summer internship boss became too handsy. Rape is real. It’s happening every day, to mothers, brothers, sisters, and fathers—a silent majority that want to manage the burden on their own, afraid of judgement, afraid of repercussions, afraid of a he-said she-said court battle.

I am beyond tired of the silence. It took me three years to talk about what happened to me, to come clean to my peers and become a model of what it means to speak about something that society tells you not to speak about. Motivated by my own experience and my friends’ stories, I joined three groups that help educate my college community about sexual health and assault: New Feminists, Speak for Change, and Sexual Assault Responders. I trained to staff a peer-to-peer emergency hotline for survivors of sexual assault. I protested the university’s cover-up of a gang-rape in the basement of a fraternity house two doors from where I live now. As a member of my sorority’s executive board, I have talked extensively about safety and sexual assault, and have orchestrated a speaker on the subject to come to campus and talk to the exceptional young women I consider family. I’ve proposed a DOE policy change to make sexual violence education mandatory to my city councilman. This past summer, I traveled to a country notorious for sexual violence and helped lay the groundwork for a health center that will allow women to receive maternal care, mental health counseling, and career counseling.

Law school is going to help me take my advocacy to the next level. Survivors of sexual assault, especially young survivors, often don’t know where to turn. They don’t know their Title IX rights, they don’t know about the Clery Act, and they don’t know how to demand help when every other part of the system is shouting at them to be quiet and give up. Being a lawyer, first and foremost, is being an advocate. With a JD, I can work with groups like SurvJustice and the Rape Survivors Law Project to change the lives of people who were silenced for too long.

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The Ultimate Guide to Writing an Outstanding Law School Personal Statement

Dazzle admissions with your legally awesome personal story, introduction.

Let's face it: you've spent countless hours studying and acing the LSAT, and now it's time for the pièce de résistance – the law school personal statement. This is your golden opportunity to showcase your personality, and put your best legal foot forward. But don't worry, this guide has got you covered. In no time, you'll be writing a personal statement that could put John Grisham's early drafts to shame.

If you're ready to convince law school admissions committees that you're the next Ruth Bader Ginsburg or Thurgood Marshall, then buckle up and get ready for a wild ride through the world of crafting the ultimate law school personal statement.

1. Know Your Audience: The Admissions Committee

First and foremost, remember that you're writing for the admissions committee. These are the gatekeepers of your future legal career, and they've read more personal statements than there are citations in a Supreme Court decision. To avoid becoming a legal footnote in their memory, keep the following in mind:

• Be professional, but also relatable. You don't want to sound like a robot that's been programmed to spout legalese.
• Avoid clichés like "I want to make a difference" or "I've always wanted to be a lawyer." Unless, of course, you've been dreaming of billable hours since you were in diapers.
• Consider what makes you unique. Remember, this is your chance to stand out among a sea of applicants with equally impressive academic records and LSAT scores.

2. Choosing Your Topic: Make It Personal and Memorable

When it comes to choosing a topic for your personal statement, think of it as an episode of Law & Order: Your Life Edition. It's your moment to shine, so pick a story that showcases your passion, resilience, or commitment to justice. Consider these tips:

• Use an anecdote. Admissions committees love a good story, especially one that shows your problem-solving skills or ability to navigate tricky situations. Just be sure not to end up on the wrong side of the law!
• Reflect on a transformative experience. If you've had a life-changing event that led you to pursue law, share it! Just remember to keep it PG-rated.
• Discuss a personal challenge you've overcome. Nothing says "I'm ready for law school" like demonstrating your resilience in the face of adversity.

3. Structure and Organization: Your Legal Blueprint

Now that you've chosen your topic, it's time to draft your personal statement. Like a well-organized legal brief, your statement should have a clear beginning, middle, and end. Consider the following tips for structuring your masterpiece:

• Begin with a strong opening. Start with a hook that will capture the reader's attention and make them want to keep reading. Think of it as your own personal Miranda warning: "You have the right to remain captivated."
• Develop your story in the body. This is where you'll expand on your anecdote or experience, and explain how it has shaped your desire to pursue a legal career. Remember to be concise and avoid meandering – this isn't a filibuster.
• End with a powerful conclusion. Tie everything together and reiterate why you're the ideal candidate for law school. Just like a closing argument, leave the admissions committee convinced that you're the right choice.

4. Style and Tone: Finding Your Inner Legal Wordsmith

When it comes to your personal statement, you want to strike the perfect balance between professional and engaging. After all, no one wants to read a 500-word legal treatise on why you should be admitted to law school. To achieve this delicate balance, follow these style and tone guidelines:

• Write in the first person. This is your personal statement, so own it! Using "I" allows you to convey your unique perspective and voice.
• Keep it conversational, yet polished. Write as if you were speaking to a respected mentor or professor. Avoid slang, but don't be afraid to inject a bit of your personality into your writing.
• Employ dry humor sparingly. A little wit can make your statement more enjoyable to read, but remember that humor is subjective. It's best to err on the side of caution, lest you inadvertently offend the admissions committee.
• Be precise and concise. Legal writing is known for its clarity and brevity, so practice these skills in your personal statement. Aim to keep it between 500 and 700 words, as brevity is the soul of wit (and law school applications).

5. Revision: The Art of Legal Editing

It's been said that writing is rewriting, and this is particularly true for your personal statement. Once you've drafted your masterpiece, it's time to don your editor's hat and polish it to perfection. Follow these tips for a meticulous revision:

• Take a break before revising. Give yourself some distance from your statement before diving into revisions. This will help you approach it with fresh eyes and a clear mind.
• Read your statement out loud. This technique can help you catch awkward phrasing, run-on sentences, and other errors that might not be apparent when reading silently.
• Seek feedback from others. Share your statement with trusted friends, family members, or mentors who can provide constructive criticism. Just remember, opinions are like law school casebooks – everyone's got one, but you don't have to take them all to heart.
• Edit ruthlessly. Don't be afraid to cut, rewrite, or reorganize your statement. Your goal is to make your writing as strong and effective as possible, even if it means sacrificing a clever turn of phrase or an endearing anecdote.

6. Proofread: The Final Verdict

Before submitting your personal statement, it's crucial to proofread it thoroughly. Even the most compelling story can be marred by typos, grammatical errors, or other mistakes. Follow these proofreading tips to ensure your statement is error-free:

• Use spell check, but don't rely on it entirely. Some errors, like homophones or subject-verb agreement issues, may slip past your computer's watchful eye.
• Print your statement and read it on paper. This can help you spot errors that you might have missed on-screen.
• Enlist a second pair of eyes. Sometimes, a fresh perspective can catch mistakes that you've become blind to after multiple revisions.

Crafting an outstanding law school personal statement may seem daunting, but with the right approach and a healthy dose of perseverance, you can create a compelling and memorable statement that will impress even the most discerning admissions committee. So go forth and conquer, future legal eagles! And remember, as you embark on your law school journey, may the precedent be ever in your favor.

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Columbia Law School Personal Statement Examples

Featured Expert: Phoebe Gilmore, JD

If you’re applying to Columbia Law School , you must first take a look at some Columbia Law School personal statement examples that can help you understand what you’re up against and what you will be expected to showcase in your own law school personal statement. Columbia is the home to one of the best law schools in the US and has a reputation for excellence and a rigorous admissions process. In this article, we will go over three Columbia Law School personal statement examples and provide you with tips that will help you write your own outstanding submission!

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Article Contents 10 min read

Columbia law school personal statement example #1.

English is not my first language, but I have always felt like I was born to speak it. While my high school classmates sighed with frustration every time we were asked to read Shakespeare or Chaucer, I looked forward to the challenge. It gave me great satisfaction to decipher the Bard’s winding phrases and encrypted aphorisms. I feel great joy in reading English writers in their original form, without resorting to reading them in my native tongue. While I love my first language, I am glad I can transition between my native language and English with ease. 

This did not go unnoticed by my professor, Dr. Linda Hamel, who taught me in a second-year course in Medieval literature. In addition to being an instructor at X University, Dr. Hamel also taught an ESL course at a local language center. We often spoke after class and seminars, and when she learned that I was an immigrant, she asked if I would be interested in helping her students practice their English after class.

I decided to pursue this opportunity because I remember how hard it was to talk with native-English speakers as a newcomer to the United States. I remembered the discomfort I felt due to my accent, the fear of mispronouncing words, the unease at the thought my interlocutor would not understand me. It was always much easier to speak with another immigrant, even if they were not from the same background as me! Dr. Hamel also noticed that her students did not feel too comfortable chatting with her after class about their day-to-day lives, hobbies, and interests. They were afraid of making mistakes and making a bad impression on their teacher.

I started coming to visit her classes every Thursday night. Dr. Hamel allowed me to take the last 30 minutes of her classroom time to set up practice opportunities with her students. I restructured the practice time to allow everyone to have the opportunity to use what they learned in the latest class and previous weeks. I also invited my brother and sister to visit from time to time to help with the students’ practice. Dr. Hamel noted that within a few weeks her students showed improvement in using newly learned words and phrases and showed more initiative in speaking with her after class.

This experience also opened up another interest that led me to apply to law school: many of my new acquaintances in the ESL class were unfamiliar with the local legal culture and found it difficult to navigate the challenging landscape of immigration law. This discovery led me to join the Immigration Law Society at my college in my third year of undergrad. Not only was I able to learn more about US immigration policies, but I was also exposed to working in the legal field with immigration agencies, non-profits, and government institutions. We disseminated legal information in immigrant communities by sharing fliers, organizing free workshops, and helping local law firms with pro-bono work in these communities.

During this time, I met another mentor, Mr. Jack Turner, a local immigration lawyer, who invited me to work in his law firm to help with paperwork. As an Immigration Law Clerk, I helped prepare and file LMIA-based work permit applications and a wide range of LMIA-exempt work permit applications. I also helped organize and file permanent residence matters, including Express Entry-based PR applications, PNP applications and Family Sponsorship applications. Not only was I able to gain firsthand experience with the paperwork, but I also got to learn how to work with immigrants and their families and provide them with knowledge on these matters so they could learn more about their immigration journey.

Immigration is a huge part of US history, but it is not always recognized as such. As a lawyer, my goal is to continue working in immigration law and help people from all over the world find home here, in America, and I cannot think of anywhere better to pursue this goal than Columbia Law School. One of my goals as a Columbia law student is to join the Immigrants’ Right Clinic – this experiential and inspirational learning opportunity is one of the biggest draws for me. In most recent history, immigration has become the ground for some of the most prominent political and human rights issues in our history and I will be proud to contribute to the legal discourse on immigration law as a Columbia Law student and alumnus.

From the moment I stepped into my high school's mock trial team meeting, I felt an undeniable surge of excitement. I am what some would call a typical “prelaw” student. As a teenager fascinated by courtroom dramas and legal intricacies, I knew that law was more than just a passing interest for me. The dynamic exchange of ideas, the art of persuasive argumentation, and the pursuit of justice ignited a fire within me that has burned brightly ever since. I knew, going into my undergrad, that I would major in political science and law courses because I realized at an early age that it was not merely a profession but a means to effect profound societal change. 

I continued to nurture my passion during my college years, as I sought opportunities to immerse myself in the field and gain practical experience. During my sophomore year of college, I joined the International Law Society, a decision that would profoundly shape my understanding of the legal world. As a member of this society, I was exposed to a diverse range of legal issues transcending national boundaries. Through panel discussions, guest lectures, and case studies, I explored the complexities of international law, witnessing firsthand how legal principles could foster cooperation, resolve conflicts, and promote justice on a global scale. This exposure solidified my belief that law was a powerful instrument for change and propelled me to take a more active role in the society. By my fourth year, I became the Vice President of the society and continue with this role today.

Inspired by my involvement in the international law society, I sought opportunities to contribute my time and skills in a meaningful way. I eagerly volunteered to organize an international law conference hosted by our society. Coordinating with renowned legal scholars, practitioners, and students from around the world, I assumed responsibility for logistical arrangements, speaker coordination, and publicity efforts. This experience allowed me to witness the immense power of collaboration and the profound impact of legal dialogue. As I observed legal professionals engaging in thought-provoking discussions and striving for innovative solutions to complex global challenges, I realized the transformative potential of international law.

Driven by the impactful experiences I had in organizing the conference, I sought to expand my legal knowledge and practical skills further. Seeking to enhance my understanding of legal systems and their impact on society, I pursued an internship at ABC law firm. This experience provided me with invaluable insights into the practical aspects of law, offering glimpses into the real-world implications of legal decisions and the intricate workings of the justice system. Whether drafting legal briefs, conducting legal research, or advocating for marginalized individuals, each encounter reinforced my commitment to pursuing a legal career focused on promoting justice and advocating for those who lack a voice.

Building on my experiences, I am now ready to embark on the next phase of my journey as a law student at Columbia Law School. Moreover, I am excited about the opportunities for experiential learning, such as participating in moot court competitions and pro bono initiatives, for which Columbia Law School is famous. With my unwavering dedication, diverse experiences, and strong passion for justice, I am confident that I will thrive as a law student at Columbia and, in due course, as a legal professional committed to making a lasting impact on our world.

Becoming a paralegal was never my first career choice, but it became the most lifechanging experience for me. I got the position after completing my political science degree, unsure of what I want to do next. In the meantime, I wanted to work in a meaningful environment and contribute to my community by using my analytical and research skills. After completing my training as a paralegal, I joined a local firm that specialized in criminal law. Working as a paralegal after graduating college provided me with a profound glimpse into the world of law. A world I never really understood before I was plunged into this environment. This relatively accidental turn in my journey determined the course of my life and led to me writing this law school application. 

As I assisted criminal attorneys in conducting legal research, preparing briefs, and interacting with clients, I realized the immense power and responsibility entrusted to legal professionals. Witnessing the impact of their work firsthand, I became captivated by the intricacies of the legal system and its potential to effect meaningful change not only in a person’s life, but also in the legal system. My research has helped my superiors with dozens of cases, and they continued to delegate more tasks and responsibilities to me as I grew in my role. 

As I continued to thrive as a paralegal at the firm, I sought out opportunities to attend conferences, seminars, and lectures, where I could expand my understanding of legal theory and witness the dynamic nature of legal discourse. In June of 20XX, I attended the XYZ Law Conference in Los Angeles where I was able to participate in a panel on legal education among refugees. Through this experience, I recognized that attending law school would not only enhance my analytical and critical thinking abilities but also provide me with a platform to effect change on a broader scale. Encouraged by my growing fascination with the law, I decided to seek deeper understanding of the law among professionals around me.

I actively reached out to mentors at the law firm where I worked who generously shared their insights and guided me along my path. Mrs. Lauren Call, a senior partner at the firm, provided me with invaluable advice and inspired me with her dedication to justice and service. Her guidance deepened my appreciation for the multifaceted nature of the legal profession, and it became clear to me that attending law school was the logical next step in my journey. Armed with a newfound clarity of purpose, I eagerly embraced the challenge of applying to law schools.

Columbia Law School is famous for interdisciplinary studies, which aligns perfectly with my belief that the law must be contextualized within a broader societal framework. The opportunity to engage with accomplished scholars from various disciplines would provide me with a well-rounded legal education, equipping me with the skills necessary to tackle complex legal issues and effect meaningful change. My journey from working as a paralegal to the decision to attend Columbia Law School has been fueled by a deep desire to effect positive change within the legal system. I am eager to embark on this new chapter of my life and further cultivate my passion for justice, advocacy, and intellectual growth.

1. A story.

A law school personal statement is a story of your journey to applying to law school. Forget about statistics like your GPA or LSAT; forget about listing your accomplishments and experiences as you would in a law school resume . This is a narrative, and you must approach it as a writing assignment. Essentially, you are writing an essay to answer the question “ why do you want to study law ?”

It may sound simple, but it’s truly a great challenge to compose a narrative that tells the story of what prompted you to pursue law. Keep in mind that Columbia Law School asks for a statement that’s no more than 2 pages long, double spaced. This is not very much space at all, so you need to be mindful with what aspects of your story you tell and how you link them together into a captivating narrative.

It should be formatted as an academic essay, with introduction, body paragraphs and conclusion. But do keep in mind that it should be vibrant and engaging. Simple narration of facts and events will not do. You must have a captivating introduction, strong transitional sentences, and conclusion that tell us what you want to achieve as a law student or a lawyer, and what you look forward to as a legal professional. Be creative – this is the best place for creativity in your entire law school application. And frankly, this is where your creativity can really make you stand out. 

2. Examples.

The core of your story should be examples of events and experiences that led you to pursue law. It might be best to keep it to 1 or 2 experiences. As we already mentioned, you do not want to list too many events in the statement. Your story should revolve around 1 or 2 experiences that really motivated you to pursue law. They do not need to be law-related necessarily, but they should give us an idea that you understand the kind of career you are pursing and that you have a general knowledge of what a career in law entails. The story can cover your work experience, academic experiences, personal experiences, as well as law school extracurriculars you participated in.

Most importantly, your story needs to tell what kind of skills and lessons you learned that prepared you to become a law student. Do you possess curiosity, attention to detail, analytical and research skills, patience, intrinsic motivation, and so on? Give us examples of events and experiences in your life that showcase this!

Never underestimate the amount of time you will need to write your law school personal statement. Give yourself at least 8 weeks to write your submission. We cannot stress this enough. This is a challenging and time-consuming task.

Consider reaching out to a law school admissions consulting professional to get feedback. You do not want to leave your statement to chance. An outstanding law school personal statement can really mean the difference between a rejection and an interview invite.

It should be no longer than 2 pages, double spaced. However, keep in mind that a shorter essay can sometimes be a better choice. As long as it’s a strong essay and tells a captivating story of why you want to be a lawyer, your essay can be and should be shorter than 2 pages. Admissions committees review thousands of documents, so if you can showcase your strong communication skills in a shorter submission, do not hesitate.

Your personal statement should answer the question of why you want to become a lawyer. Choose 1 or 2 events that led you to apply to law school and create a captivating narrative.

No, there is no law school essay prompt . But your essay should answer the question of why you want to become a lawyer.

You can tailor your personal statement for different schools but try to not be too school specific in your personal statement if you plan on using it for different schools.

Columbia Law School is one of the most competitive law schools in the country. The law school acceptance rates for Columbia are around 11.8%.

Other law school requirements include your transcripts, GRE or LSAT scores, two law school letters of recommendation , a resume, a Dean’s appraisal, and a video statement.

You may be contacted for an in-person or a video interview. Start you prep early by going through common law school interview questions . 

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The University of Chicago The Law School

In their own words: admissions essays that worked.

Throughout this issue, countless examples show why we are so proud of the students at the law school. One might think that we get lucky that the students the admissions office chose for their academic accomplishments also turn out to be incredible members of our community, but it’s really all by design. Our students show us a great deal more in their applications than just academics—and we care about a lot more than their numbers. In these pages, meet five of our students in the way we first met them: through the personal statements they wrote for their law school applications. And through their photos, meet a sixth: Andreas Baum, ’12, the talented student photographer who took these pictures for us.

Tammy Wang, ’12

EDUCATION: Johns Hopkins University, BA in International Relations, concentration East Asian Studies, with honors (2007) WORK EXPERIENCE: AsianFanatics.net LAW SCHOOL ACTIVITIES: University of Chicago Law Review, Immigrant Child Advocacy Project Clinic, APALSA, Admissions Committee, Law School Film Festival I fell in love for the first time when I was four. That was the year my mother signed me up for piano lessons. I can still remember touching those bright, ivory keys with reverence, feeling happy and excited that soon I would be playing those tinkling, familiar melodies (which my mother played every day on our boombox) myself. To my rather naïve surprise, however, instead of setting the score for Für Elise on the piano stand before me, my piano teacher handed me a set of Beginner’s Books. I was to read through the Book of Theory, learn to read the basic notes of the treble and bass clefs, and practice, my palm arched as though an imaginary apple were cupped between my fingers, playing one note at a time. After I had mastered the note of “C,” she promised, I could move on to “D.” It took a few years of theory and repetition before I was presented with my very first full-length classical piece: a sonatina by Muzio Clementi. I practiced the new piece daily, diligently following the written directives of the composer. I hit each staccato note crisply and played each crescendo and every decrescendo dutifully. I performed the piece triumphantly for my teacher and lifted my hands with a flourish as I finished. Instead of clapping, however, my teacher gave me a serious look and took both my hands in hers. “Music,” she said sincerely, “is not just technique. It’s not just fingers or memorization. It comes from the heart.” That was how I discovered passion. Beethoven, Mozart, Mendelssohn: the arcs and passages of intricate notes are lines of genius printed on paper, but ultimately, it is the musician who coaxes them to life. They are open to artistic and emotional interpretation, and even eight simple bars can inspire well over a dozen different variations. I poured my happiness and my angst into the keys, loving every minute of it. I pictured things, events, and people (some real, some entirely imagined— but all intensely personal) in my mind as I played, and the feelings and melodies flowed easily: frustration into Beethoven’s Sonata Pathétique, wistfulness into Chopin’s nocturnes and waltzes, and sheer joy into Schubert. Practice was no longer a chore; it was a privilege and a delight. In high school, I began playing the piano for church services. The music director gave me a binder full of 1-2-3 sheet music, in which melodies are written as numbers instead of as notes on a music staff. To make things a bit more interesting for myself—and for the congregation—I took to experimenting, pairing the written melodies with chords and harmonies of my own creation. I rarely played a song the same way twice; the beauty of improvisation, of songwriting, is that it is as much “feeling” as it is logic and theory. Different occasions and different moods yielded different results: sometimes, “Listen Quietly” was clean and beautiful in its simplicity; other times, it became elaborate and nearly classical in its passages. The basic melody and musical key, however, remained the same, even as the embellishments changed. The foundation of good improvisation and songwriting is simple: understanding the musical key in which a song is played—knowing the scale, the chords, the harmonies, and how well (or unwell) they work together—is essential. Songs can be rewritten and reinterpreted as situation permits, but missteps are obvious because the fundamental laws of music and harmony do not change. Although my formal music education ended when I entered college, the lessons I have learned over the years have remained close and relevant to my life. I have acquired a lifestyle of discipline and internalized the drive for self-improvement. I have gained an appreciation for the complexities and the subtleties of interpretation. I understand the importance of having both a sound foundation and a dedication to constant study. I understand that to possess a passion and personal interest in something, to think for myself, is just as important.

Josh Mahoney, ’13

EDUCATION: University of Northern Iowa, BA in Economics and English, magna cum laude (2009) LAW SCHOOL ACTIVITIES: Student Admissions Committee, flag football, Tony Patiño Fellow The turning point of my college football career came early in my third year. At the end of the second practice of the season, in ninety-five-degree heat, our head coach decided to condition the entire team. Sharp, excruciating pain shot down my legs as he summoned us repeatedly to the line to run wind sprints. I collapsed as I turned the corner on the final sprint. Muscle spasms spread throughout my body, and I briefly passed out. Severely dehydrated, I was rushed to the hospital and quickly given more than three liters of fluids intravenously. As I rested in a hospital recovery room, I realized my collapse on the field symbolized broader frustrations I felt playing college football. I was mentally and physically defeated. In South Dakota I was a dominant football player in high school, but at the Division I level my talent was less conspicuous. In my first three years, I was convinced that obsessively training my body to run faster and be stronger would earn me a starting position. The conditioning drill that afternoon revealed the futility of my approach. I had thrust my energies into becoming a player I could never be. As a result, I lost confidence in my identity. I considered other aspects of my life where my intellect, work ethic, and determination had produced positive results. I chose to study economics and English because processing abstract concepts and ideas in diverse disciplines was intuitively rewarding. Despite the exhaustion of studying late into the night after grueling football practices, I developed an affinity for academia that culminated in two undergraduate research projects in economics. Gathering data, reviewing previous literature, and ultimately offering my own contribution to economic knowledge was exhilarating. Indeed, undergraduate research affirmed my desire to attend law school, where I could more thoroughly satisfy my intellectual curiosity. In English classes, I enjoyed writing critically about literary works while adding my own voice to academic discussions. My efforts generated high marks and praise from professors, but this success made my disappointment with football more pronounced. The challenge of collegiate athletics felt insurmountable. However, I reminded myself that at the Division I level I was able to compete with and against some of the best players in the country.While I might never start a game, the opportunity to discover and test my abilities had initially compelled me to choose a Division I football program. After the hospital visit, my football position coach—sensing my mounting frustrations—offered some advice. Instead of devoting my energies almost exclusively to physical preparation, he said, I should approach college football with the same mental focus I brought to my academic studies. I began to devour scouting reports and to analyze the complex reasoning behind defensive philosophies and schemes. I studied film and discovered ways to anticipate plays from the offense and become a more effective player. Armed with renewed confidence, I finally earned a starting position in the beginning of my fourth year. My team opened the season against Brigham Young University (BYU). I performed well despite the pressures of starting my first game in front of a hostile crowd of 65,000 people. The next day, my head coach announced the grade of every starting player’s efforts in the BYU game at a team meeting: “Mahoney—94 percent.” I had received the highest grade on the team. After three years of A’s in the classroom, I finally earned my first ‘A’ in football. I used mental preparation to maintain my competitive edge for the rest of the season. Through a combination of film study and will power, I led my team and conference in tackles. I became one of the best players in the conference and a leader on a team that reached the semi-finals of the Division I football playoffs. The most rewarding part of the season, though, was what I learned about myself in the process. When I finally stopped struggling to become the player I thought I needed to be, I developed self-awareness and confidence in the person I was. The image of me writhing in pain on the practice field sometimes slips back into my thoughts as I decide where to apply to law school. College football taught me to recognize my weaknesses and look for ways to overcome them. I will enter law school a much stronger person and student because of my experiences on the football field and in the classroom. My decision where to attend law school mirrors my decision where to play college football. I want to study law at the University of Chicago Law School because it provides the best combination of professors, students, and resources in the country. In Division I college football, I succeeded when I took advantage of my opportunities. I hope the University of Chicago will give me an opportunity to succeed again.

Osama Hamdy, '13

EDUCATION: University of California, Berkeley, BA in Legal Studies, AB in Media Studies (2010) LAW SCHOOL ACTIVITES: BLSA, Intramural Basketball I was a shy thirteen-year-old who had already lived in six locations and attended five schools. Having recently moved, I was relieved when I finally began to develop a new group of friends. However, the days following September 11, 2001, were marked with change. People began to stare at me. Many conversations came to a nervous stop when I walked by. However, it wasn’t until one of my peers asked if I was a terrorist that it really hit me. Osama, my name is Osama. I went from having a unique name that served as a conversation starter to having the same name as the most wanted man in America. The stares and the comments were just the beginning. Eventually I received a death threat at school. I remember crying alone in my room, afraid to tell my parents in fear that they might not let me go to school anymore. My experience opened my eyes up to racial and religious dynamics in the United States. I started to see how these dynamics drove people’s actions, even if some were not aware of the reasons. The more I looked at my surroundings with a critical eye, the more I realized that my classmates had not threatened me because of hate, but because of fear and ignorance. This realization was extremely empowering. I knew that mirroring their hostility would only reinforce the fear and prejudice they held. Instead, I reached out to my peers with an open mind and respect. My acceptance of others served as a powerful counter example to many negative stereotypes I had to face.With this approach, I was often able to transform fear into acceptance, and acceptance into appreciation. I chose not to hide my heritage or myself, despite the fear of judgment or violence. As a result, I developed a new sense of self-reliance and self-confidence. However, I wasn’t satisfied with the change that I had brought about in my own life. I wanted to empower others as well. My passion for equality and social justice grew because I was determined to use my skills and viewpoint to unite multiple marginalized communities and help foster understanding and appreciation for our differences and similarities alike. The years following September 11th were a true test of character for me. I learned how to feel comfortable in uncomfortable situations. This allowed me to become a dynamic and outgoing individual. This newfound confidence fueled a passion to become a leader and help uplift multiple minority communities. During the last two summers I made this passion a reality when I took the opportunity to work with underprivileged minority students. All of the students I worked with came from difficult backgrounds and many didn’t feel as though college was an option for them. I learned these students’ goals and aspirations, as well as their obstacles and hardships. I believed in them, and I constantly told them that they would make it. I worked relentlessly to make sure my actions matched my words of encouragement. I went well above the expectations of my job and took the initiative to plan several additional workshops on topics such as public speaking, time management, and confidence building. My extra efforts helped give these students the tools they needed to succeed. One hundred percent of the twenty-one high school juniors I worked with my first summer are now freshmen at four-year universities. I feel great pride in having helped these students achieve this important goal. I know that they will be able to use these tools to continue to succeed. Inspired by my summer experience, I jumped at the opportunity to take on the position of Diversity Outreach Ambassador for the San Francisco Bar Association Diversity Pipeline Program. In this position, I was responsible for helping organize a campus event that brought educational material and a panel of lawyers to UC Berkeley in order to empower and inform minority students about their opportunities in law school. In this position I was able to unite a diverse group of organizations, including the Black Pre-Law Association, the Latino Pre-Law Society, and the Haas Undergraduate Black Business Association. Working in this position was instrumental in solidifying my desire to attend law school. The lawyers who volunteered their time had a significant impact on me. I learned that they used their legal education to assist causes and organizations they felt passionate about. One of the lawyers told me that she volunteered her legal services to a Latino advocacy association. Another lawyer explained to me how he donated his legal expertise to advise minority youth on how to overcome legal difficulties. Collaborating with these lawyers gave me a better understanding of how my passion for law could interact with my interest in social justice issues. My experiences leading minority groups taught me that I need to stand out to lead others and myself to success. I need to be proud of my culture and myself. My experiences after September 11th have taught me to defeat the difficulties in life instead of allowing them to defeat me. Now, whether I am hit with a racial slur or I encounter any obstacles in life, I no longer retreat, but I confront it fearlessly and directly. I expect law school will help give me the tools to continue to unite and work with a diverse group of people. I hope to continue to empower and lead minority communities as we strive towards legal and social equality.

Eliza Riffe, '13

EDUCATION: University of Chicago, AB in Anthropology, with honors (2006) WORK EXPERIENCE: Sarbanes-Oxley coordinator and financial analyst, ABM Industries Harper Library, situated at the center of the main quadrangle at the University of Chicago, resembles a converted abbey, with its vaulted ceilings and arched windows. The library was completed in 1912, before Enrico Fermi built the world’s first nuclear reactor, before Milton Friedman devised the permanent income hypothesis, and well before Barack Obama taught Constitutional Law. Generations of scholars have pored over Adam Smith and Karl Marx in the main reading room, penned world-class treatises at the long wooden tables, and worn their coats indoors against the drafts in the spacious Gothic hall. Abiding over all of these scholars, and over me when I was among them, is an inscription under the library’s west window that has served as my guiding intellectual principle: “Read not to believe or contradict, but to weigh and consider.” Per this inscription, which is an abridgement of a passage by Sir Francis Bacon, we readers ought to approach knowledge as a means of enhancing our judgment and not as fodder for proclamations or discord. The generations of scholars poring over Marx, for example, should seek to observe his theories of economic determinism in the world, not immediately begin to foment a riot in the drafty reading room at Harper. The reader may contend, though, that too much weighing and considering could lead to inertia, or worse, to a total lack of conviction. The Harper inscription, however, does not tell its readers to believe in nothing, nor does it instruct them never to contradict a false claim. Instead it prescribes a way to read. The inscription warns us to use knowledge not as a rhetorical weapon, but as a tool for making balanced and informed decisions. On the cruelest days in February during my undergraduate years, when I asked myself why I had not chosen to pursue my studies someplace warmer, I would head to Harper, find a seat from which I would have a clear view of the inscription, and say to myself: “That is why.” On such a day in February, seated at a long Harper table with my coat still buttoned all the way up, I discovered how much I appreciated Carl Schmitt’s clarity and argumentation. I marveled at the way his Concept of the Political progressed incrementally, beginning at the most fundamental, linguistic level. As an anthropology student, I wrongfully assumed that, because Schmitt was often positioned in a neo-conservative tradition, I could not acknowledge him. That day in February, I took the Bacon inscription to heart, modeled its discipline, and was able to transcend that academic tribalism. I added the kernel of The Concept of the Political , Schmitt’s “friend-enemy” dichotomy, to an ever-growing array of images and ideas that I had accumulated, among them Marx’s alienation, C. S. Peirce’s indexicality, and Pierre Bourdieu’s graphical depiction of social space. This patchwork of theories and descriptive models, when weighed and considered, informs my understanding of new ideas I encounter. The academic dons who decided to place the Bacon quote under the western window intended that the idea would transcend the scholastic realm of its readers. Indeed, in my work as a financial analyst for a publicly traded company, it is often a professional touchstone. Though each day in the world of corporate finance is punctuated with deadlines and requests for instantaneous information, I am at my best as an analyst when I consider all of the data thoroughly and weigh the competing agendas. Like emulsified oil and vinegar that separate over time when left undisturbed, the right answer will emerge from among all of the wrong answers when I take the time to consider all of the possibilities. An extra hour spent analyzing an income statement can reveal even more trends than could a cursory glance. Moreover, the more I weigh and consider when I have the opportunity, the more I enhance the judgment I will need to make quick decisions and pronouncements when I do not have time.With inner vision sharpened by years of consideration, I am able to “see into the life of things,” as Wordsworth described in writing of “Tintern Abbey.” Wordsworth’s memory of the abbey provided him much-needed transcendence in moments of loneliness or boredom. The memory of the inscription under the west window at Harper—“Read not to believe or contradict, but to weigh and consider”—has a similar function. For Wordsworth, Tintern alleviated emotional anguish; for me, the Bacon inscription reaffirms a sense of intellectual purpose. The words under the window, their meaning, and the very curvature of the letters in the stone are fixed in my mind and will continue to be as I enter the life of the law. What intrigues me most about legal education is the opportunity to engage simultaneously in the two complementary processes the Harper inscription inspires in me—building a foundation of theories and descriptive models while enhancing my judgment with practice and patience.

Evan Rose, '13

EDUCATION: University of Otago (New Zealand), BA in Philosophy (1999) WORK EXPERIENCE: Ski and Snowboard Schools of Aspen/Snowmass, Eurospecs Limited (NZ) LAW SCHOOL ACTIVITIES: LSA 1L Representative, BLSA, Student Admissions Committee As I tumble through the air, time seems to slow. I have fallen hard many times before, but even before I hit the ground I can tell this fall is different. I complete one and a half back flips and slam shoulders-first into the slope. As I lie on the hill, the snow jammed into the hood of my jacket begins to melt, and icy water runs down my back. I do not yet know that the impact has broken my neck. I grew up only a short drive from some of New Zealand’s best ski resorts, but my family could never afford ski vacations. My first opportunity to try snowboarding came on a trip with my university flatmate.With expectations shaped purely by the media, I left for the trip assuming snowboarding was a sport for adrenaline junkies, troublemakers, and delinquents. Much to my surprise, I instead found that it provided me with a sense of peace that defied these preconceptions. Anxiety had been a constant companion throughout much of my childhood. I had not always been this way, but years of physical and psychological abuse at the hands of my stepfather had taken their toll. My once carefree demeanor had changed, leaving me fearful, panicky, and timid. On a snowboard these feelings faded into the background for the first time in years, and the difference was profound. I never truly realized the pain I had endured until riding gave me the opportunity to escape it. I sought out every possible opportunity to go riding, and through the sport I pushed the limits of both my physical and mental courage. Snowboarding became a vehicle for regaining the confidence and self-worth that had been taken from me through the injustice of abuse. Even as I began to ride competitively in boardercross racing and halfpipe, launching myself into the air over sixty-foot jumps, the sense of peace I gained during my first day on a snowboard stayed with me. It did, at least, until that April afternoon. As I lay in a hospital bed a few hours after my accident, an overwhelming sense of fear replaced any confidence that snowboarding had instilled in me. I faced the prospect of a lengthy and complicated surgery, with no certainty about the outcome. I knew my shattered vertebrae could easily leave me paralyzed. I was lucky to be alive, but any sense of luck eluded me as pain sent me in and out of consciousness. Two days later, surgeons worked for seven hours to rebuild my neck. I awoke to learn that I had escaped any serious nerve damage. However, I would need to be immobilized by a brace twenty-four hours a day, and for over three months, before I could even contemplate rehabilitation. Those months passed slowly. When I was finally able to start the process of rehabilitation, I made recovery my full-time job. I quickly learned that pain was to become the central reality of that year. The first day I could walk to my mailbox marked a significant achievement. Determined to return to full health, and even hoping to eventually return to riding, I gritted my teeth through the daily therapy sessions. At each subsequent visit, my doctor expressed his surprise at the progress of my recovery. Only twelve months after my injury, he cleared me to make a few careful runs on an easy, groomed slope. While I made it through those first few runs safely, they left me shaking with fear. Since then, I have again found joy in riding, but no amount of determination will allow me to ride the way I had before. I won’t be attempting double back flips again any time soon. Rather than focusing on my own riding, I now direct my energy into coaching. My experiences showed me the transformative power of courage and self-confidence, and taught me to build these qualities in others. At the Aspen Skiing Company, I develop and implement teaching curricula for more than two hundred snowboard instructors. My goal is for my fellow coaches to recognize that snowboarding can offer much more than just a diversion. It has the potential to have a profound and inspiring impact on their students’ lives. In the ample time my recovery allowed for reflection, I found solace in the fact that the abuse in my childhood fostered in me not bitterness, but an enduring dedication to fairness and justice. As a college student, this dedication led me to seek out classes in ethics and morality. As a manager and leader, I strive to display both courage and enduring fairness. My interest in the legal profession stems from my belief that laws represent the concrete expressions of justice and fairness in our society. After discovering the salvation it held for me, I believed that I was reliant on snowboarding. Yet, being forced to face the grueling process of rehabilitation without it allowed me to take the final step to recovery from the trauma of my childhood. I realized I am much stronger and more resilient than I had previously believed. I realized that courage is not something that snowboarding gave me but something that has always been within me. These realizations have prepared me to broaden the scope of my dedication to justice. Secure in the knowledge that the courage and determination I have shown will help shape my future success, I am now ready to take on this new challenge: the study and practice of law.  

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Sample law school personal statement essays, get accepted speak with an admissions expert today.

• Sample Essays

You are a thoughtful, intelligent, and unique individual. You already know that—now you just need to convince top law school adcoms that you're a cut above the rest. To do so you need to write a powerful personal statement for law school. Let's first discuss what that personal statement should be and then examine examples and what made them powerful.

A law school personal statement tells the part of your story that reveals your motivation for attending law school and the reasons you will make a great lawyer (or whatever career you want to pursue after law school). 

By reading the sample law school essays provided below, you should get a clear idea of how to translate your qualifications, passions, and individual experiences into words. You will see that the samples here employ a creative voice, use detailed examples, and draw the reader in with a clear writing style. Most importantly, these personal statements are compelling—each one does a fine job of convincing you that the author of the essay is a human being worth getting to know, or better yet, worth having in your next top law school class.

These sample law school personal statement essays are here to stimulate your writing juices, not to shut them down or persuade you to think that these essays represent templates that you must follow. The writers of these essays, who were all once law school applicants just like you, sat down, thought about their stories, and crafted these essays. However, their first step, significant self-reflection and thought, you can’t see. They didn’t use a template or try to shoehorn their story into someone else’s story. You shouldn’t either. But you should take the same first step that they took: Think about your life, the influences upon it, and why you want to obtain a legal education. 

Your story will be different from these author’s stories, but as you review all four of the sample essays you will see commonalities among them, which are highlighted below. You will also see that they are very different essays written by individuals reflecting their different life experiences and dreams. The authors of each of these essays were all accepted to law school, in some cases to elite U.S. law schools. 

Now let’s explore what you can learn from each of these outstanding sample law school essays.

Lessons from Law School Sample Essay #1: The Archaeologist Enthusiast  

• Attention-grabbing opening - The author of the essay immediately grabs the readers’ attention by placing them in the midst of the scene and vividly conveying what the author felt and saw as well as the excitement she felt. 
• Vivid, visual opening and consistent use of opening imagery - You can practically feel the dripping sweat and the heat at the opening of this essay because the applicant used vivid, sensory language that we can all relate to. She also quickly develops a metaphor comparing archaeological excavation with research in general and legal research specifically. She uses the imagery of archaeology (“finding the shard of glass,” “reconstructing the pot”) consistently throughout the personal statement to convey not only the unusual experiences she’s had in the past, but to show her love of research and analysis. 
• A clear theme that ties the essay together-  Her essay has a clear theme, which she states at the end of the first paragraph and in her conclusion. (You may not need to state it twice; that depends on your essay.) The applicant also relates every experience in the essay to her theme of research, analysis, and discovery. 
• Solid structure - Because her theme is so strong, the essay is easy to follow even though she has diverse experiences that aren’t obviously related to each other – archaeology in Spain, research on Colombian environmental policy, working for an online real estate company considering entry into the art market, and her travels.
• Good use of transitions - Transitions help your reader move from one topic to the next as you connect the topic in the preceding paragraph to the topic in the next. They can consist of a few words or a phrase or simply repetition of the topic by name as opposed to using a pronoun. The first paragraph in this sample essay ends with “research and analysis” and the next paragraph begins with “The challenge of researching and analyzing an unknown subject” as she turns from her introduction to her enjoyment of academic life and the research she had done in college. 

While one could argue that perhaps she has too many subtopics in this essay, because of the strong theme and excellent use of transitions, the essay holds together and highlights her diversity of experience, curiosity, and sense of adventure. 

Most importantly this law school personal statement earned its author a seat at an elite T10 law school.

Click here to read the essay >>  

Lessons from Law School Sample Essay #2: Returning to School 

This sample law school personal statement is about half the length of Essay 1 and concentrates on the author’s post-college work experience. In its brevity and focus it’s the mirror image of Law School Essay 1. The contrast between the two highlights the diversity that can work in law school essays.

This applicant writes about the impact of his work experience on his law school goals – with no discussion of extracurricular activities, hobbies, or travels. He had a tight word limit on his personal statement and simply had to be concise. Regardless of the narrower focus and shorter length, this essay also shares certain elements with Essay 1 and in both cases it leads to an engaging personal statement and acceptance. Let’s review them:

• Engaging, vivid opening that grabs attention - The applicant plops the reader right into his story and challenge: how to persuade the tired, grouchy doctors that the product he’s selling is better than the one they have been prescribing.
• A detailed story of his developing interest in law and relevant experience - Using just enough details, he tells his story starting with research that led to evidence-based persuasion. He also highlights his success, which led him to be named Rookie of the Year. He then goes on to explain that he now seeks new, more-lasting intellectual challenge than he currently has as a pharmaceutical sales rep because the industry, or at least his segment of it, changes slowly.
• Direction within law - Based on his background in science and his work in Big Pharma, he has direction in law. He clearly states that he wants to go into medical law. Given his background and work experience, that goal builds logically on his past, and is distinctive. 
• Ties the essay back to the opening - At the end of his essay, he references “his grumpy physicians” and “staring at his professor…” Sometimes applicants will start an essay with a catchy opening that grabs attention, but has little or nothing to do with the rest of the essay. When reading that kind of essay, the opening feels like a tease or a gimmick. In this essay, the applicant paints a picture of what he faces on a typical workday at the beginning, refers back to the opening scene in his conclusion, and contrasts that experience with what he hopes to face when in law school. It’s not a gimmick. It unifies the story.

This applicant was accepted at several T14 law schools.

Click here to read the essay >>

Law School Sample Essay #3: The Twilight Zone

There is a story behind this law school personal statement. This applicant, a very early Accepted client, during her first meeting said that she wanted to write about a trip to Country X. When asked about the trip, she said, “Oh, I’ve never been to Country X, but I know many people who have visited, and I haven’t done anything interesting.” 

Surprised at this unexpected approach, her consultant asked if she had any creative writing experience. The client said she didn’t. The consultant said that she too lacked creative writing experience and suggested they discuss what the client had done as opposed to what she hadn’t. This essay is the result of that (and other) conversations. It is an oldie but goodie.

Let’s take a look at the lessons in this sample law school essay:

• Don’t ever feel you don’t have a story to tell. Every single one of us has a story, and you don’t have to make one up or borrow someone else’s. Tell yours proudly and authentically.
• Launch with a vivid, engaging opening.  While her opening is a more frightening than the other openings, it definitely grips the reader’s attention and starts her story.
• Always have a clear theme.  Everything in this essay relates to the impact of the earthquake on her and specifically her decision to become a public interest lawyer. 
• Tell a story.  This personal statement tells the story of the earthquake’s impact on the applicant. In telling her story, she highlights her community service, her internship, and the evolution of her goals. 
• Use effective transitions.  As she moves from topic to topic, the author effectively carries the reader along. Look at the end of one paragraph and the beginning of the next one throughout the essay. You’ll see that in every case, there is either a word, phrase, or concept that ties one to the other. 
• Write a conclusion that really brings the essay to a close and contributes to the sense of unity while still looking forward. The applicant repeats her thesis that her career direction was shaped by the earthquake and its aftermath. She touches on key experiences (and achievements) that she wants the reader to remember, looks briefly forward, and ties back to the Twilight Zone opening.

This client was accepted to her top choice law school.

Lessons from Law School Sample Essay #4: Change 

This essay takes a different approach than the other three essays. The theme opens the essay followed by images and sounds that make the change she is experienced something the reader can also experience or at least imagine because the applicant uses sensory language. The writer also takes a chronological approach to tell her story of change and how it shaped her. 

The author in this essay chooses not to directly address her reasons for wanting to attend law school. However, the essay still works. The essay highlights her communications skills, research, international exposure, bilingual language skills, and initiative.

However here, too, there are lessons to be learned and some may sound familiar.

• Clear theme - Yes, this takeaway is in this essay as well as the preceding three. In fact, for any effective essay, you need a clear theme.
• Effective use of specifics and anecdote - Whether referencing the “bleak Wisconsin winter,” the fact her mother added “barbecued brisket” to her menu in Texas, or the cultural challenges she faced in Bolivia, she effectively illustrates her ability to deal with change and adapt throughout her life. 
• A conclusion that shows her evolution and growth - She subtly, but clearly reveals an evolution in her adaptability from complete adoption of the mores of her surroundings in New Jersey to more nuanced adaptability where she chooses what she wants to adopt and reject as she deals with change as an adult. Finally, while change is something she has to deal with throughout most of the essay by the conclusion she views it as an opportunity for growth.

Takeaways from These Law School Statement Samples

• There are an infinite number of ways to write a law school personal statement that will help you get accepted. 
• Begin your essay with an opening that grabs your reader’s attention. In today’s age of short attention spans and very busy people, there should be no long, slow warm ups. Put your reader in the scene as soon as they start reading.
• Use sensory language to engage your reader and help them imagine experiencing what you were going through. Reference scenes, sounds, smells, textures, and tastes as appropriate.
• Have a clear theme. Unless you are James Joyce, a stream of consciousness will not work. Know the core idea you want your essay to convey and ruthlessly ensure that every subtopic supports that idea. If it doesn’t, either make the connection clear or delete.
• Use transitions to take your reader with you through your story.
• Use specifics and anecdotes to support your theme in a distinctive way while highlighting your achievements.
• Write a conclusion that contributes to the unity of your essay. Highlight key points in your conclusion. While you can take your theme into the future in your conclusion, it still must relate to your core idea and build on what preceded it. If you can tie your ending back to your opening, your essay will have a stronger sense of coherence. 

How would I like to see these essays improved? I would like to see them, with the exception of Essay 2, address why they are applying to a given school. Essay 2 didn’t have room for that. 

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Cornell law personal statement: how to write + examples.

Reviewed by:

David Merson

Former Head of Pre-Law Office, Northeastern University, & Admissions Officer, Brown University

Reviewed: 03/03/23

Getting ready to write your Cornell Law personal statement? Unsure of where to begin or what to share? This guide has got you covered!

Cornell is a T14 , Ivy League law school that aspiring lawyers dream of attending. With such high rankings and prestige, it takes a lot to impress Cornell ’s admissions committee.

Aside from a stellar LSAT score and GPA, you’ll have to showcase your impeccable writing skills by writing a personal statement that shares a compelling narrative that showcases your potential as a future legal leader. 

This personal statement will give you a chance to demonstrate your individuality and commitment to law, so it’s essential you craft it with care! Read on to learn how to write a winning Cornell Law School personal statement and to see a few examples to draw inspiration from!

Cornell Law School Personal Statement Requirements

There aren’t any strict requirements when it comes to the Cornell Law personal statement . In an attempt to give students the opportunity to express themselves as they see fit, Cornell urges students to write about any topic they believe will present the most valuable personal information.

Your personal statement may address your intellectual interests, significant accomplishments, obstacles overcome, personal or professional goals, educational achievements, or any way in which your perspective, viewpoint, or experiences will add to the richness of the educational environment of Cornell. 

The length of the statement is also left to your discretion; however, you’re reminded that the admissions committee reviews thousands of applications! So, it’s best if you keep it short and sweet! It’s suggested your personal statement does not exceed two pages.

How to Write Your Cornell Law Personal Statement

Now that you’re familiar with the basic Cornell Law personal statement requirements, let’s delve deeper into how to write a statement that resonates with the judges and maximizes your chances of acceptance!

Step One: Research

You want to clearly prove your dedication to Cornell in your personal statement. To do this, your statement cannot be generic. Familiarize yourself with Cornell Law School’s missions, values, programs, and history.

Step Two: Reflect on Your Experiences

Before you write your first sentence, take time to reflect on your personal, academic, and professional experiences that have shaped your interest in law. Consider significant challenges, achievements, or moments of inspiration that have influenced your decision to pursue a legal education at Cornell. 

Step Three: Define Your Narrative

Once you’ve brainstormed all of the key experiences that define your identity, develop a central theme or narrative that connects these experiences and motivations. This could be a personal story, a passion for a specific area of law, or a desire to make a difference in the legal field. 

This narrative will give your personal statement coherence and help the admissions committee understand your unique perspective. You should use this narrative as your hook as well! Consider setting the scene for the readers with vivid descriptions or starting mise-en-scene at the climax of your story. 

Step Four: Brag a Little

You’ve accomplished a lot to get to where you are right now, and you should tell the admissions committee about it! While you don’t want to rehash your resume , you should highlight your key strengths, skills, experiences, and attributes that make you a strong candidate. 

Some traits Cornell values in its applicants are problem-solving, leadership, and a commitment to social justice and service. Provide concrete examples to support these strengths and share how they will contribute to your success as a law student and lawyer.

That said, make sure to provide examples of your prowess in context, don’t simply list your accomplishments and avoid arrogance. You’ve learned a lot- but not everything! You should be proud and honest while also highlighting your eagerness to learn and grow moving forward.

Step Five: Focus on Flow

Ensure your essay flows as you move through different experiences. Make use of transition words and phrases, maintain your tone, provide logical connections, and engage your reader throughout. 

Step Six: Include Your Research

Remember that research you conducted about Cornell? Now’s the time to show you did your homework. Students typically include their specific reasons for applying to Cornell near the end of their personal statement. 

Mention any relevant courses, clinics, or professors that align with your academic and career goals. Prove that you have carefully considered why Cornell is the right fit for you!

Step Seven: End With a Bang

Don’t neglect your conclusion! You want to leave a lasting impression on the admissions committee, so pay attention to your final sentences. 

You can either summarize your reasons for attending law school, and your hopes for the future, or refer back to the story shared in your introduction and provide deeper reflections on it. However you choose to end your Cornell Law personal statement, ensure it leaves your readers satisfied!

Step Eight: Be Authentic and Concise

Write in your own voice and be true to yourself. Admissions committees appreciate authenticity and want to understand who you are as an individual. Avoid clichés, unnecessary jargon, and only use language you feel comfortable with.

Step Nine: Edit and Revise

After finishing your first draft, edit and revise it until it is free of grammar and spelling errors. Ensure it flows, is clear, and impactful. Seek feedback from others to gain different perspectives on your statement and do not submit it until you’re completely satisfied with it!

Cornell Law School Personal Statement Examples

Here are two Cornell Law School personal statement examples that allow you to see these steps in action!

Growing up in a small town, my perspective on the world was limited. Opportunities to witness the challenges faced by marginalized communities were rare, and my understanding of human rights was confined to textbooks and news headlines. It wasn't until a life-changing experience during my college years that my passion for human rights was ignited.

It all started when I stumbled upon a documentary about a grassroots organization working tirelessly to combat child labor in Southeast Asia. The film featured brave individuals who risked their lives to fight for the rights of children subjected to exploitation and abuse. I was struck by their unwavering determination and the impact they were making in their communities.

Intrigued and inspired, I immersed myself in the subject, delving into academic research, volunteering at local NGOs, and engaging in eye-opening conversations with activists. Each encounter further deepened my understanding of the intricate web of social, political, and economic factors that perpetuate human rights violations.

During a summer internship at an international human rights organization, I witnessed firsthand the harsh realities faced by refugees fleeing persecution. I listened to their stories of despair, resilience, and hope. It was in those moments of empathy that I realized the power of the law in safeguarding human dignity and fostering social change.

Motivated by this newfound purpose, I dedicated myself to the study of human rights law, pursuing coursework and research projects that explored the intersection of legal frameworks and social justice. I eagerly engaged with professors, attending guest lectures and seminars to deepen my knowledge and broaden my perspective.

My passion for human rights also compelled me to take action beyond the classroom. I co-founded a student organization focused on raising awareness and advocating for human rights issues on campus. We organized events, hosted panel discussions, and collaborated with local organizations, striving to ignite a sense of responsibility and action within our community.

Through these experiences, I have come to appreciate the immense challenges inherent in protecting and promoting human rights. Yet, I firmly believe that change is possible, and it starts with each individual who refuses to be silent in the face of injustice.

It is my profound desire to further my education at Cornell Law School, renowned for its commitment to social justice and its distinguished faculty in human rights law. I am inspired by the opportunity to learn from leading scholars, collaborate with passionate peers, and immerse myself in an environment that nurtures both academic excellence and practical application.

Ultimately, my aspiration is to become an advocate for those whose voices have been stifled and rights have been trampled upon. I strive to dedicate my legal career to the pursuit of justice, working tirelessly to ensure that human rights are upheld and protected for all.

Cornell Law School represents the ideal platform to nurture my passion, provide me with the tools and knowledge necessary to effect change, and equip me with the skills to make a meaningful impact in the field of human rights. I am ready to embark on this transformative journey, committed to the pursuit of justice and the relentless pursuit of a world where human rights are not just lofty ideals or headlines, but tangible realities for all.

Why It Works

This statement is successful because it effectively captures the reader's attention with a personal narrative and engages them in the journey of the writer's discovery and passion for human rights. 

The writer demonstrates a clear understanding of the complexities surrounding human rights issues and their commitment to making a difference. They showcase their academic pursuits, practical experiences, and leadership initiatives, all while highlighting their desire to contribute to real-world human rights initiatives. 

The statement also effectively connects the writer's experiences and aspirations to Cornell Law School's reputation and resources, demonstrating a genuine interest in the institution. Their essay flows well, it is easy to follow, and it leaves the reader with a deeper understanding of who this student is and what they value. 

Jane Mendez, aged 13 years, a devoted daughter, loving sister, and cherished friend, passed away Saturday, March 17, 2018. 

As I sat, re-reading my sister’s obituary, I couldn’t help but wonder how she could be reduced to a one-page statement. A statement that seemed so matter-of-fact, that left out all her little quirks that I took for granted, like the way she still slept with her broken blue night light that buzzed when it was plugged in, or how she only ate her pancakes with whipped cream and strawberries because she hated the taste of maple syrup. 

This obituary wasn’t my sister, but it was all she was remembered as. The poor 13-year old with so much life yet to live, tragically killed by a drunk driver. The pain and grief from her loss were indescribable. I found myself grappling with questions of justice and accountability. 

Driven by a desire to transform my personal tragedy into a force for change, I embarked on a journey that intertwined my grief with a passion to do more. Through tireless research, I educated myself about the legal intricacies surrounding drunk driving and the devastating consequences it inflicts upon society.

Empowered by my knowledge, I actively engaged with local organizations dedicated to combating drunk driving. Collaborating with legal advocates, I participated in awareness campaigns, organized fundraisers, and lobbied for stricter legislation. Witnessing the impact of my efforts, I realized that the law possessed the potential to save lives and provide solace to those affected by tragedy.

This awakening fueled my academic pursuits as I immersed myself in legal studies, devouring courses on criminal law, torts, and public policy. In classrooms and debates, I sought to unravel the complexities of our justice system, exploring the nuances of accountability, rehabilitation, and victim advocacy.

In my journey, I discovered the powerful intersection between law and advocacy. Through internships at law firms and victim support organizations, I worked diligently to provide compassionate legal assistance to those navigating the aftermath of traumatic events. Assisting survivors in court hearings, I witnessed firsthand the pivotal role attorneys play in giving voice to the voiceless and restoring faith in a broken system.

I found solace in channeling my grief into compassionate action. I became determined to contribute to a legal system that prioritizes the rights of victims and ensures that justice prevails, even in the face of unspeakable tragedy.

Cornell Law School, with its unwavering commitment to social justice and academic excellence, stands as the beacon of hope for realizing my aspirations. The opportunity to learn from distinguished faculty members renowned for their expertise in criminal law and victim advocacy is a privilege I deeply covet.

My sweet sister’s untimely death forever altered the trajectory of my life. Her memory propels me to pursue justice, inspire change, and ensure that no other family experiences the pain I endured. Guided by my sister’s legacy and with her broken blue night light in hand, I emerge through the darkest period of my life with resilience, empathy, and an unwavering commitment to the pursuit of justice. I stand ready to make a lasting impact at Cornell Law School and in the broader realm of law.

This is an emotionally charged personal statement that does an excellent job of engaging the reader. They add personal touches, like the blue night light, that further immerse the readers into the narrative. Readers can sympathize with the reader, feel their sense of loss, and feel inspired by their resilience. 

They demonstrate they have clear ambitions and goals for the future, showcase their research, advocacy, and legal involvement in combating drunk driving, and determination to do more as a lawyer. They also tie their ambitions back to Cornell, showing their genuine interest in this school!

FAQs: Personal Statement for Cornell Law School

For any remaining questions about how to write your Cornell Law personal statement, read on!

1. How Long Is the Cornell Law School Personal Statement?

While there is no formal word count for the Cornell Law personal statement, it’s suggested your statement does not exceed two pages.

2. What Should Be Included In the Cornell Law School Personal Statement?

Students are encouraged to share whatever they feel is most important for the admissions committee to know and what is otherwise missing from their application. 

Most successful personal statements will include meaningful experiences that motivated students to join the legal field, experiences that shaped their values, and their future aspirations. You should also highlight the strengths and qualities that make you a strong Cornell candidate.

3. How Important Is the Cornell Law School Personal Statement In the Admissions Process?

While it is just one component among several that are considered, the personal statement offers applicants a valuable opportunity to showcase their unique qualities, experiences, and aspirations to the admissions committee.

Admissions committees carefully review personal statements to gain a deeper understanding of applicants' personal narratives, their passion for law, and their alignment with the values and mission of Cornell Law School.

4. Are There Any Formatting Guidelines for the Cornell Law School Personal Statement?

Cornell Law School does not provide specific formatting guidelines for the personal statement. However, it’s generally advised students use a standard format, such as Arial, Times New Roman, or Calibri, and size 11 or 12 point font.

Final Thoughts

As you begin your own Cornell Law personal statement, ensure you strive for authenticity, reflect on your personal and academic journey, and use your own voice! Craft a statement you’re proud of and feel connected to and embrace this opportunity to stand out and make a memorable impression on the admissions committee!

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Personal Statements: future lawyers share their stories

January 16, 2013

By GPA and LSAT scores, the Class of 2015 is one of the most highly qualified to study at Penn State Law. Students Susanna Bagdasarova, Talal Al-Ufasian and Megan Wells agreed to share their personal stories that helped them stand out from the crowd. Look for more in the next issue of Lexicon , the Penn State Law alumni magazine. 

Susanna Bagdasarova

Talal Al-Ufaisan

Megan Wells

That decision affected much more than I imagined it might. My daughter is a shining light for everyone who knows her. She made me a fighter. I fight for her, for me, and I fight for that in which I believe. She made me devoted to her, to myself, and to a world that no longer systemically denies women and children justice and protection. Nothing that I do is for me alone. I am her example. I am Mommy. I hope that she pays attention.

She will never see me stop. Through a difficult pregnancy at eighteen, a brief cancer scare at twenty, and bills to pay all the while, I made it this far. I made it for her. But I am not finished. While nearly all of my original life plans have changed, one thing has always remained a beacon on the horizon: law school. I have dreamed of it for most of my twenty-five years. She will not, nor will anyone else, see her mother give up, give in, fall away, or make excuses. She will watch her mother walk to her dreams, become a prosecutor, and fight for those who need to be fought for. I pray she takes notice that I have shown every person who has ever told me I can’t, that I can. I have allowed nothing to stop me. I am loving, I am strong, and I am exactly who I am supposed to be, going exactly where I am supposed to go, to do exactly what I am supposed to do.  

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