Hello there,

I have just finished a life sciences MSc and am now preparing my first PhD applications. The MSc research project went amazingly well and left me knowing exactly what I wanted to do next, so drawing up a list of supervisors has been no problem. The real problem is knowing what to write in a personal statement...

My department's careers advisor suggested a three-part structure: "Why I'm interested", "Why you should be interested in me" and "How this PhD would fit in with my career plans". This makes sense to me but some sample personal statements would help, and I'm having difficulty finding them. I'm also concerned about the tone such a statement should take- some I've found seem a bit *too* personal and border on sounding cheesy, with quotes from novels, sections about the applicant's childhood interest in science and upbringing etc which seem irrelevant.

In short I'm totally clueless- could anyone please recommend a resource for help and advice, or post their own advice here?

Anyone? I've been discussing personal statements with friends of mine who have successfully applied to PhD programmes, and will be asking my MSc project supervisor for advice, but is there any good general advice, or any resources which would be a good place to start? For any subject really, it would be nice to have a little thread full of links for students of all subjects to refer to.

In my opinon the best way to do it is to be honest. Im doing a phd in the life sciences and for my personal statements i wrote when applying for phds, i just basically wrote about how the whole world of molecular biology fascinated me and the challange of trying to understand how life works at the molecular level was what i defiently wanted to do in life. I had previously done an undergraduate degree in a physiology based subject and so i talked about how the physiology answers didnt satisfy me as i wanted to know how things worked at the genetic protein level and so be able to manipulate it. this seemed to generate lots of interest from my potential supervisors and i ended up with 2 offers of phd positions. unfortuneately for me I choose the wrong one and ended up at a rubbish university for life sciences reseach :(

Thanks Myostatin, sorry it's taken me so long to reply. I've just submitted my first PhD application and in the end I consulted my MSc supervisor and a friend who'd done my course, and they were both really helpful, mainly in lending me their common sense! This one was for one specific project in a four-year programme so I tailored it to the supervisor, hopefully it'll work for me, and hopefully your PhD will lead to greater and more enjoyable things!

[quote]Quote From Risfy1994:
Hello, dear author! I have found your thread with the question aboutbiology personal statement [url...........................................

Risfy, it looks like you are marketing this website/organisation again, are you on commission? I think so.

Haha, that teaches me to check when an OP was posted before writing a paragraph in response....(deleted).

So this is the new tactic then. Join the forum, post a few seemingly genuine enquiries and responses to others posts to boost credibility. Once "credibility" has been achieved, start advertising scam companies services.

Sigh! Many, if not all, of these companies are probably run by organised criminals. You would need to be insane to use them.

That is great of yo that you just finished your project because almost every students of the University is on pending and is unable to complete so