Personal Statement Technicalities

[kippermr]

I just finished cutting my personal statement down to 4500 characters exactly, but when I copied and pasted into the box on PTCAS, the indentations for each new paragraph were gone. Because it’s a statement as opposed to an essay, do they care about paragraph breaks?

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[ljgissler]

I just finished cutting my personal statement down to 4500 characters exactly, but when I copied and pasted into the box on PTCAS, the indentations for each new paragraph were gone. Because it’s a statement as opposed to an essay, do they care about paragraph breaks?

This is my first time applying and I had the same issue. I figured the whole point of a personal statement is to show your personality and voice. Schools won't care about paragraph breaks, on my statement, it was clear when there was a new paragraph without the breaks. Make sure you're only putting one space after periods instead of 2, this was my issue. Or cut out an adjective or two if you feel the breaks are necessary. Overall though, don't let the character count and look of the statement take away from your voice! For a lot of schools, this is the only way they'll see your personality aside from numbers.

 

[kippermr]

This is my first time applying and I had the same issue. I figured the whole point of a personal statement is to show your personality and voice. Schools won't care about paragraph breaks, on my statement, it was clear when there was a new paragraph without the breaks. Make sure you're only putting one space after periods instead of 2, this was my issue. Or cut out an adjective or two if you feel the breaks are necessary. Overall though, don't let the character count and look of the statement take away from your voice! For a lot of schools, this is the only way they'll see your personality aside from numbers.

Thanks for the advice!!