Diversity Statement as Personal Statement? Forum

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OrangeMarmalade

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Diversity Statement as Personal Statement?

Post by OrangeMarmalade » Sat Nov 25, 2017 9:08 pm

Hi everyone,

I am having trouble deciding whether I should send my diversity statement as my PS, or whether to send both essays. My background coming from an immigrant family is why I want to become an immigration lawyer, so its hard for me to talk about why I want to be a lawyer without mentioning diversity.

As it currently stands, my diversity statement discusses the obstacles I faced growing up due to my immigrant background, how I turned that into a positive when establishing a new student org for interaction between american and international students and taught ESL to immigrants, my current work in an immigration law firm, and ending with why I want to be an immigration lawyer.

My personal statement talks solely about establishing the new student org and growing in a leadership role. Basically, I tried highlighting a specific situation where I could demonstrate my work ethic and ability to grow. However it's definitely not a complete picture of who I am and doesn't really answer why I want to study law.

I can think of other topics to write about in my PS, but none of them answer why I want to be an immigration lawyer as much as my diversity essay would. While my work experience would be great, I just started so I can't say much.

Another idea would be to cut my diversity essay in half. I could talk about my childhood, growing up etc in my diversity essay, and talk more about my recent accomplishments and work experience in my PS. But I am worried that would make each essay weaker.

I have read posts that say to send just one essay if there is so much overlap. That makes sense to me, except I am worried about schools like NYU that say, "if you are part of an underrepresented group, check the box below and write a diversity statement". By not checking that box I'm afraid of putting myself in a disadvantage.

Any advice is greatly appreciated. Please let me know if anything I wrote was unclear.

Thank you!!

Jjbb938483

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Re: Diversity Statement as Personal Statement?

Post by Jjbb938483 » Sun Nov 26, 2017 1:23 pm

What are your other options for a PS? If your background/major is somewhat related to law/government/politics you probably don't have to answer the typical "Why law school?" question. If you want to send me what you have I'll be able to offer you more advice though. It's hard to comment without seeing exactly what is written.

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