<p>I'm sitting down to write the personal statement for the UC system, but I'm kind of lost concerning what to write about. Basically I'm not quite sure what kind of response each question wants to get out of me, and I'm not a strong essay writer, so I'm wondering if some people could give me their opinions or recommendations to point me in the right direction.</p>
<p>Question 1: How have you taken advantage of the educational opportunities you have had to prepare for college?</p>
<ul>
<li>The obvious answer seems to be to talk about the advanced college-prep classes you have taken...but that seems a little boring, and everyone is writing about that. But the question doesn't seem to ask much else from you. Is this all they want you to discuss here?</li>
</ul>
<p>Question 2: Tell us about a talent, experience, contribution or personal quality you will bring to the University of California.</p>
<ul>
<li>I'm guessing this is just telling them about yourself, focusing specifically on one aspect of your life, but the phrasing "you will bring" at the end of the question makes it sound like whatever you talk about needs to some kind of positive contribution. Should I focus on how it will positively contribute, or just pick something about me to talk about in general?</li>
</ul>
<p>Question 3: Is there anything you would like us to know about you or your academic record that you have not had the opportunity to describe elsewhere in this application?</p>
<ul>
<li>This is the one I'm really lost on. My initial response would be "No", but I doubt that's a very good idea. What exactly are they looking for here?</li>
</ul>
<p>UC's are the only colleges I'm applying to that require an essay, so I can put a lot of effort into this to make it nice. Maybe my questions are kind of dumb...I feel like maybe I'm reading too much into them, but I just don't want to be way off base when giving my answers. Any help would be appreciated.</p>
<p>just want to let you know im in the EXACT position you're in. the last question is especially strange. i dont have any significant "disadvantages" i can describe...</p>
<p>the last question is quite simple, here's what im planning to write : my school does not have an open ap class enrollment setting, you either need to meet a requirement of gpa, past grades, test, teacher rec, etc.. i wanted to take ap english for my junior/senior yrs, i wasn't allowed in, i felt robbed, etc.</p>
<p>Ok, here's my take on it:
For the first question you can talk about any summer program you've attended, or talk about an academic subject that you really enjoy, or even an extra-curricular that you're really passionate about that relates somewhat to motivation and learning. It's pretty broad, in my opinion, though the focus is "academic preparation" so keep that in mind.
For the second question, you just pick one particular quality about yourself that you think is pretty strong and discuss how you will contribute that quality to the UCs. I think that the positive impacts of good contributions are pretty self-explanatory, but you can still elaborate on that if it works.<br>
For the third question you can talk about anything that relates to yourself. Anything! That's the beauty of the open-ended question.<br>
Hope that helped...</p>
<p>yeah... if you try to sit down and answer one of these... it's really hard!But I don't think there is no wrong answer (unless you start talking about your family pet or something really off) because the subjects need to be vague and broad enough that there could be diversity in these essays.. can you imagine reading personal statement about something specific 100 per day??? It's like the collegeboard people...</p>
<p>The best approach is simple once you have the right ideas in mind. The UC schools were forced to give up affirmative action by a state initiative, and shortly thereafter they adopted "comprehensive review" as a way to legally side-step this. While they can't directly give points for minority status, they have identified characteristics that help them achieve many of the same ends.</p>
<p>That being understood, you should find out what they are looking for and make sure you bring any of the factors you legitimately possess to the table. Fortunately their is lots of info out there about what they're looking for. One of the best is from the alumni magazine at UCSD, which gives the points for each category. While UCSD may change the weighing each year, and other UCs may not use the same weights, the article gets across what they are seeking. See the article "Demystifying Admissions" at <a href="http://alumni.ucsd.edu/magazine/vol1no2/features/admissions.htm%5B/url%5D">http://alumni.ucsd.edu/magazine/vol1no2/features/admissions.htm</a></p>
<p>I'm planning on making my 3rd essay the long-response one and writing about how I've moved around so much due to the military and though I always cringe whenever I hear we have to do it again, the new experiences always make up for all the brown packing boxes I have to see, and how this has given me the chance to do things some other people don't get the chance to do (like live overseas), etc.</p>
<p>Is this something they're looking for in that 3rd question?<br>
Or should I change the essay to fit #2 and make it so I'm talking about how I an adapt to any situation</p>
<p>Thanks mikemac, I found that article to be very interesting and quite helpful.</p>
<p>One thing I was wondering that would perhaps clear things up a lot for me: Are UCs looking for creative responses for their essay questions? I know a lot of colleges put emphasis on the creativity aspect of the essay, and good writers can flourish there, but these seem to be pretty straight-forward. For example, for the first question, should I just talk about the college-prep classes I've taken and anything else I've done to prepare for college? That would be the straight-forward answer...or are they looking for something creative here? I think that seems to be my main source of confusion with these: how to approach answering each question, rather than what to answer for each.</p>
<p>My understanding of the UC essays is the idea is to provide further information about who you are. It is not to show what a creative writer you are (eg forget the haiku). </p>
<p>If writing about someone who inspired you, be careful not to just describe the other person. At an info meeting with UC admissions people at UCSB, the adcom indicated that he read one essay where he didn't want the applicant, but would have accepted her grandmother in a heartbeat.</p>
<p>S1's essays dealt with 1) an experience he had at a summer job 2) his experience tutoring someone, and 3) experience starting a club at HS.
None of these were life changing, but all the essays conveyed something about my S - his values, interests, etc.</p>