文档介绍：PERSONAL STATEMENT
By Shi Yuntian
在对这篇文章的修改中,我们把让原作者心中惴惴的劣势转化为他的优势。原作者提到所受中专教育时闪烁其辞,似乎想躲开他这段历史。不得已而进行的记述非常defensive,似乎干了什么见不得人的事。其实,他的担忧是完全没有必要的。老外们非常看重的是你的智慧和潜力。如果你的起点比别人低得多,经受的磨难比别人大得多,而你取得了和别人一样甚至比别人高的成就,那恰说明你不仅勤奋努力而且聪明过人。本作者没能上大学本科原不是自己的过错,但他在劣境中不断向上,最终进入了国家最高科研机构学习。这完全没有什么不好意思说的。所以,我们开篇伊始,就将他的背景和经历进行了概括的介绍,用他贫苦的出身和他日后的成就进行鲜明的对比,同时又提到他现在还志存高远。这样就可以给人以深刻印象。
Born into a family beset with poverty, I had to give up a normal undergraduate university education in favor of vocational training before I finished high school. Exercising diligence to give full play to my intelligence, I parlayed my vocational career in the provinces into graduate studies at a top university in the nation's capital, Beijing. Now a . candidate with China's topmost research institution and a postgraduate in a world-renowned program run out of Paris, I wish to vault to the forefront of the field of spatial statistics by pursuing doctorate studies at your university.
I made a most reluctant choice in 1986, when I finished my junior high school. In the entrance examinations for senior high school, I scored the highest total of grades in my county that year, making me eligible to join the privileged band of students at the best senior high school in my native Jiangxi Province. If I enrolled in that school, I would be virtually guaranteed acceptance into one of the country' top universities later on.