Does personal statement carry much weight?
We are on second child going to college. What we learned from talking to admissions counselors is anything that is said to be optional, treat as NOT optional and a good personal statement can indeed be the difference between you and another candidate
I work in Admissions at JMU. Honestly, not a lot of weight is put on the personal statement. I usually recommend doing this out of all of our optional requirements, since it can provide some perspective and more information beyond just the required transcript. All students are primarily reviewed based on their academic performance in high school, but students can choose to submit other items they want us to review.
Oddly, when we met with an admissions counselor on our recent tour at JMU, he told us that these “optional” parts were not strongly considered. He told us that GPA and class rigor were the priority. We were shocked, not to mention disappointed. She will still submit, but we are not hopeful.
Being they put so much weight into the high school transcript, personal statements are a good way to explain any reasoning behind some underlying issues behind say a bad semester/year.