Mentioning illness and its affect on my yearly grades for my PhD personal statement.

AstridBean

Hi,

I am getting ready to apply for a PhD programme that I am hugely interested in and think I will have an aptitude for. This PhD will have a lot of competition due to a generous stipend.

We are expected to write a one-page, font 12 personal statement (just added that detail to show that it is to be a fairly short statement) as part of the application and also must state our yearly results from our degree programme.

I had a serious illness throughout my degree and it took six years instead of four. As a result, some of my yearly results are absolutely terrible, lots of repeats, lots of thirds. However, I gained a good degree in the end (a 2:1) because my symptoms improved before my final year.

I want to address these issues in my personal statement. Do you think this would be a wise move? I have shown aptitude for areas pertinent to the PhD studentship even in my less than stellar years and don't want it to be thought that my bad results were down to slacking. I think the fact that I came back, put my head down and got a good degree is something positive but am not sure they'll see it this way. The illness is under control now but also affected my first job after graduating. But it is not a problem any more.

How should I play this?

gutenberg

AstridBean wrote: »

Hi,

I am getting ready to apply for a PhD programme that I am hugely interested in and think I will have an aptitude for. This PhD will have a lot of competition due to a generous stipend.

We are expected to write a one-page, font 12 personal statement (just added that detail to show that it is to be a fairly short statement) as part of the application and also must state our yearly results from our degree programme.

I had a serious illness throughout my degree and it took six years instead of four. As a result, some of my yearly results are absolutely terrible, lots of repeats, lots of thirds. However, I gained a good degree in the end (a 2:1) because my symptoms improved before my final year.

I want to address these issues in my personal statement. Do you think this would be a wise move? I have shown aptitude for areas pertinent to the PhD studentship even in my less than stellar years and don't want it to be thought that my bad results were down to slacking. I think the fact that I came back, put my head down and got a good degree is something positive but am not sure they'll see it this way. The illness is under control now but also affected my first job after graduating. But it is not a problem any more.

How should I play this?

I was always told that this was something your referees should address in their letters, rather than for you to discuss. That said, since you have to include your yearly marks you should perhaps just mention at the start that your degree was broken up a bit due to illness. Then make sure your referees expand on that, highlighting where you've done well & relevant modules for the PhD etc. Your PS should focus on your academic strengths and interests, and why you want to do the PhD programme. So don't waste too much space on this, let your referees do that for you.

esperanza1

I would produce medical certificates and a letter from your doctor(s) to back up any statements made by you or by your referees. Good luck!