Personal statements for nursing and midwifery applicants
Introduction
Your personal statement is an important part of your application for a pre-registration Nursing course. Here is some information about what we look for in a statement and where you can find out more.
Personal statements for nursing applicants
Finding advice on writing your statement
UCAS has a wealth of information and guidance on preparing your personal statement which you need to look at as well as this specific advice on applying for nursing courses at University of West London.
The UCAS advice covers, key points, what to include, dos and don'ts and size and presentation.
UCAS also alerts you to the use of 'similarity detection' to ensure your personal statement include:
- your personal account in approximately 600 words
- why you want to become a nurse
- why University of West London should invite you to a selection day to be considered for entry to the course.
Why your statement matters
The statement is your only chance to speak to us directly about the reasons why you have chosen your course, whether this is Adult, Child, Learning Disability or Mental Health Nursing.
You may be tempted to put all of these options down but this could be seen as you not being focussed and committed to one area of nursing.
So choose one branch of nursing and give a clear account of why you have chosen that branch.
All this will help us to decide on whether to offer you a place on a selection day.
Personal experience
It is helpful if in addition to general statements about wanting to help people if you could identify some previous personal experience that has influenced your choice.
For example you would need to say more than 'I was cared for when ill' or that you have 'worked as health care assistant'.
The account of your experience can be helpful to your application only if you can say in what ways it has influenced your choice.
Understanding care and compassion
In healthcare generally and specifically in nursing there is an emphasis on being both technically skilled, being able to do the technical and physical tasks required in providing treatment but also to show that you are able to care and be compassionate in your work with patients.
Caring and compassion are easy words to say but very hard to translate into actions that show an ability to understand and respond to the suffering experienced by people and make a difference.
This is something you may want to think carefully about and how you can convey your ability to be caring and compassionate.
Understanding the demands of your nursing course
Your personal experience also offers you the chance to establish that you understand what the demands of the course are for you in terms of theory, practical work and study, and what you will do to ensure you will be able to meet the challenge you have identified.
Writing within limits
The personal statement is an opportunity to show us how well you communicate your thoughts and ideas in writing within limits. This is a skill you will need on the programme.
The list of UCAS dos and don'ts are really helpful for this, we would encourage you to follow it so that we can see that you are able to communicate your ideas and experience.
You will help yourself by careful preparation of the personal statement, making sure it is relevant to the course you have chosen and rehearsing what you will write.
UCAS recommend you to prepare the statement offline in advance and then copy and paste your work into the application system.
This helps you to communicate with us and tell us why we should choose to interview you.
Find out more about studying with us
-
Undergraduate open days and visiting us
Undergraduate open days and campus tours.
