Deciphering Grad School Application Question

altlat55 · March 2022

I recently decided to go back to school after a long break and get an ME in architectural engineering from Illinois Tech in Chicago and I'm currently working on my personal statement, which includes the following three questions:

1: Why are you looking to earn a degree from this program at IIT?

2: Describe any educational and/or professional accomplishments and why it would be a good fit for your personal assessment and outcomes?

3: Describe how this program will help with your future goals?

Questions 1 and 3 are simple enough, but I can't quite parse number 2. What do you think it's trying to ask? Is it asking me to describe any theoretical future educational and/or professional accomplishments and how they theoretically would be a good fit for my goals? Is it asking me to describe any past educational and/or professional accomplishments and how they have been a good fit for my goals? Is it asking something else entirely that I am just somehow struggling to understand?

Edit - I had read the question multiple times before posting this here, but I think I was just being a doofus and not reading it as a direct follow up to the first question (which it pretty clearly is). I believe the question is asking describe my past educational and/or professional accomplishments and why a degree from this program would be a good fit for my personal assessment and outcomes. I'm not exactly sure how the second part of that question is substantially different than the 3rd question (or even the 1st), but I think I got it.

Thanks and sorry for the waste of a thread.

Kupi · March 2022

My interpretation of the second question is that they're asking what accomplishments you've already notched educationally or professionally, and how that speaks to your favor as an applicant. Did you make a 4.0 GPA in high school / undergraduate? Did you participate in any honors programs? Did a company you worked for give you an award for achievements in your field? In the GPA case, it says that you're already a strong student and worth the college's time; in the company/professional case, it shows that you're a motivated and skilled individual.

Question 1 is about why personally you want to be an architectural engineer.
Question 2 is why you're worth their time.
Question 3 is how you'll use what they teach you (demonstrating that you actually know what their program is about).

altlat55 · March 2022

Kupi wrote: »

My interpretation of the second question is that they're asking what accomplishments you've already notched educationally or professionally, and how that speaks to your favor as an applicant. Did you make a 4.0 GPA in high school / undergraduate? Did you participate in any honors programs? Did a company you worked for give you an award for achievements in your field? In the GPA case, it says that you're already a strong student and worth the college's time; in the company/professional case, it shows that you're a motivated and skilled individual.

Question 1 is about why personally you want to be an architectural engineer.
Question 2 is why you're worth their time.
Question 3 is how you'll use what they teach you (demonstrating that you actually know what their program is about).

Yep, I agree. I struggled with the second one because if you read it in isolation, it's not well-written.

Penny Arcade

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