customizing personal statements

[Guest]

Hi all,

An advisor suggested customizing personal statements for individual programs.

Fine, but doesn't this seem a little disingenuous?  Of course I'm applying to many programs I'm really excited about, but it's such a tough applications process that we are all applying to a ton of places so we can just match somewhere, and programs surely know this.  Is this customization expected?  

Not to mention the statement is so short that it's hard to figure out how to fit this in...

What are your thoughts on this?

[Focus]

I gave the one student I saw do this props for doing it but it didn't ultimately change their ranking. Personal statement is a fairly low tier part of the application from my POV at least.

[Guest]

(08-20-2017, 09:06 PM)Focus Wrote: I gave the one student I saw do this props for doing it but it didn't ultimately change their ranking. Personal statement is a fairly low tier part of the application from my POV at least.

Thanks for the reply Focus -- this is sort of my understanding as well, that personal statement can hurt you if it's too weird or has mistakes but otherwise isn't going to change much.  I'll maybe put this on the list of things to do if I have the time, or maybe will do it for a few programs that I'm truly excited about.