SOP: The Dont's

As promised in my previous article on Writing Statement of Purpose (SOP), here's the article that discusses what's the stuff that shouldn't go onto your SOP.

But before that, I want to share one thought.

"SOP is really important for those of you targeting the top 20s. A thoughtfully written SOP helps you stand out. However, for those of you who are not very keen - you don't have to break your head on crafting the ultimate essay! If you just get a few basics right (as discussed in my previous article), you'll be good to go. Even if you are targeting Top Universities- GET THE BASICS RIGHT "

Back to the topic, it's easy to craft a concise and impressive essay to the admission committee if you don't do the following things mentioned below-

Don’t go beyond the word limit and/or Page Limit. Admissions committees takes this seriously.

Don’t just rewrite your Resume on your SOP. In the SOP, you need to get more personal and dig deeper into writing about stories of inspiration, your experiences and learning outcomes, motivations, etc.. You have to give the human angle to it.

Avoid making generic statements. You have to go deep. For example, instead of writing “Your college is well-reputed, has amazing faculty, is ranked 10th in the world etc etc…… You can write, I really like Dr.XXXX’s research in thermodynamics and see myself being a part of it” or “I Like that the university is tied up with various companies which I think will benefit me to build industry-relevant skills ”. Avoid generic statements even while writing about your goals, your academics, work etc. For example, instead of writing- “After finishing my Master’s I want to work in the IT sector…” you can write something like” I want to work as a Developer/Data Analyst in a company that develops innovative products of the future, where I can apply the skills I developed during my graduate studies". Follow this rule throughout your SOP.

Do Not Boast about yourself too much- Instead, you can simply mention both your achievements and failures and what have you learned from them.

Don’t get the course name or college name wrong.

Don't mention Grades, Percentages, Test Scores, etc. All these are on the resume or reported by you already. Don't re-do it.

Don’t start with a childhood story, When was the first time you used computer, why you picked MPC in intermediate, etc… Unless you have had rare experiences in your childhood that really motivated you to apply for this course, skip it. It has become quite common. Here’s what a top university recommended to its students- “You should not recall your earliest remembrances of exposure to a computer or some other life story about why you are interested in Computer Science or Computer Engineering. Talk about career goals or research interests”

Don’t have to start your SOP with a quotation by a famous person. If you really want to, then pick a rare and relevant quotation. if not, you can skip it.

Don’t copy-paste SOPs of past applicants. Admission committees do plagiarism checks.

Don’t over-use those tough vocabulary words you learned for the GRE. Yes, we get it, you want to make a good impression, but flowery language that's hard to understand doesn't do the trick. Remember, it's easy to complicate things- try hard to keep it simple silly.

Don’t hire professionals to write your entire SOP. It’s ok if someone helps you make edits, paraphrase your sentences to convey your ideas properly, etc. but, if a professional writes it entirely for you, it would turn out to be a very generic SOP and not unique. Rather, you can ask someone (Master's students preferably) to review your SOP once you're done writing by yourself.

That's about it! Now it'd be a bad marketing move if I don't promote what I do for a living-

Having reviewed SOPs of 1000s of students who got admits to university across all rankings, big and small, I developed a knack for reviewing and editing SOP drafts (sorry I don't write SOPs unless you make me watch The Batman Trilogy for the first time again :P). So if you want someone to help you in reviewing your SOP- do get in touch with me.