Would anybody mind reading my personal statement?

[Leros]

I'm applying to graduate school for software engineering. Would anybody mind reading my personal statement and providing some feedback?

Prompt:
Describe your reasons for pursuing graduate study and your academic and professional interests and goals.

My personal statement is located at (I don't want to post it here):
Edit: Thanks guys. Got some good advice.

 

[DougK62]

Post the text in here for a better response.

 

[darkxshade]

Post the text in here for a better response.

deleted at OPs request

 

[SpatiallyAware]

Great... hopefully the person reading that doesn't google anything in it, looking for plagiarism, and find all of the OPS threads lol...

 

[Sea Moose]

Speak to guyver! He can tell you how to do the needful

Free ipod?

 

[skace]

For a second... I thought better nate than lever was the original format of it....

 

[Leros]

Great... hopefully the person reading that doesn't google anything in it, looking for plagiarism, and find all of the OPS threads lol...

That was my reason for not posting here. Posts on these forums get on google pretty fast.

 

[TecHNooB]

Architected.

 

[PhaZe]

I like justify instead of left text alignment, looks cleaner. Hit control + a then control + j to see how it looks.

comment1: I architected, designed, (redundant?)

c2: In doing this, I was exposed to new design patterns and new methods for thinking about software architecture. This experience got me excited about the future potential of software engineering. - Not sure how to reword this, but "new methods for thinking about" and "got me excited" sound informal..maybe try peaked my interest in software engineering or greatly increased my interest

c3: try academic environment instead of university environment, sound better?

c4: I am currently interested in working at a company which has projects involving distributed control systems or projects involving dynamic extensibility
- at a company whose projects involve distributed control systems or dynamic extensibility

c5: I want to work for a large software development company with products that push the barriers of current technology. remove "with products"

c6: The paragraph starting off with "my academic goal" You use "I would like to take classes" a lot. You may try to change it up so that it doesn't sound the same. You can try:
Topics discussed in advanced data structures and algorithms, distributed systems and networking, would strengthen my understanding of software development. It seems like you can make this paragraph shorter while conveying the same message.

just my comments after skimming through, don't change anything if you don't agree with it.

 

[Farang]

Overall it is very good. But

"I would like to attend graduate school so that I can further my education in software engineering. Due to the enormity of the field of electrical and computer engineering, my undergraduate classes were unable to provide a great deal of depth for any specific subfield. As a result, I have only taken a few courses concerning software engineering. These courses have taught me a great deal and I am capable of developing software, however I feel that there is still much more that I can learn within the university environment. "

Not really sure of the point of this paragraph. It seems like you're trying to say 'I want to learn more about software engineering. A graduate program is the best way for me to study in-depth a specific subfield of software engineering.'

Talking about the enormity of the field, or using a negative tone to describe your undergraduate studies, isn't really necessary. It isn't like you're complaining but you aren't being positive either. 'I didn't learn enough from my undergraduate study. I mean, I learned a lot, and I'm very capable in the field, but I feel like I can learn more of I go back to school.' I think that's a pretty accurate paraphrase that maybe shows you why that part of your essay should be changed to be positive, or gotten rid of entirely.

'My undergraduate studies provided me with strong foundational knowledge in software engineering, but only graduate school can provide me the setting to delve into specific subfields such as bla bla bla and bla bla bla.'

Not exactly in those words but you see how that is positive and saying the same thing. Really you can probably just delete the whole paragraph since it seems redundant

 

[Tsavo]

Wickedly, painfully passive.

 

[Leros]

Architected.

Duly noted and duly ignored. We use the word 'architected' all the time.

I like justify instead of left text alignment, looks cleaner. Hit control + a then control + j to see how it looks.

They want plaintext anyway, so its ok. Thanks for all of your comments, I took all your suggestions.

Overall it is very good. But

Thanks. I fixed that paragraph a bit and added some more content. It makes a big difference. Thanks.

Wickedly, painfully passive.

I know. It was my rough draft. I fixed most of them and ran it by my english major friend.


Thanks everyone.