short vs. long personal statements

Started by aoselby
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aoselby

Full Member
10+ Year Member
So here's my question: Do schools perfer short personal statements (such as 1,000 words) or the max which is 4,500 words. I recently sent in an app. to sullivan university and the max was 1000 words which i did. I feel that my personal statement addresses EVERYTHING that I needed it to. Pharmcas max is much more so i don't know if i should try and add to it or leave it the way it is which is exactly 1000 words. I don't want it to be too short 😕 but dang 4,500 words is ALOT
 
OK so i copy pasted my personal statement which is 1,000 words into pharmcas and it turns out to be TOO long. I thought they meant 4500 words, instead it means 4500 characters which is very short!
 
thanx for asking that. I tried mine too, and it turned out to be way too many characters (10000+) OMG, and it's only a draft. B-O
 
4500 characters isn't short. Mine was a few hundred characters shorter than that even.

You aren't writing an argumentative essay, try taking out the filler and make it more direct and to the point. Then go from there.
 
Go by the length of 1 page, single spaced, 1" margins, size 12 Times New Roman or Arial fonts. That is how long the LONGEST personal statements should be.

If residency programs will automatically reject longer statements, then what do you think pharmacy schools who receive ten times as many applications will do? You got it - they'll skim it at best, toss it at worst.

Stay focused, and to the point. Effective brevity with superior word economy is your friend.
 
aoselby said:
So here's my question: Do schools perfer short personal statements (such as 1,000 words) or the max which is 4,500 words. I recently sent in an app. to sullivan university and the max was 1000 words which i did. I feel that my personal statement addresses EVERYTHING that I needed it to. Pharmcas max is much more so i don't know if i should try and add to it or leave it the way it is which is exactly 1000 words. I don't want it to be too short 😕 but dang 4,500 words is ALOT
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This is a good question; your statement should be short enough to make it easy on the eyes/bored admissions reader, yet long enough to get your point across.

Think of it this way- if your statement loses the interest of your reader and they look ahead to see another page or two remaining, that won't be in your favor.
 
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