Where to place illness related to performance

[Alicia1593]

While writing my SOP, I decided that it would be best to address a low spot in my college career.  It did not result in horrible grades, my GPA is still over 3.2, but I want to address that I was dealing with outside mental health issues.  Despite these issues, I am still working on an honors thesis and have been able to recover and continue working hard to excel in school.
 

My question is this: Where do I place this information in my SOP?  I am afraid of finishing my SOP with this, because I don't want to finish on something potentially negative.

Roughly this is what my outline is:

- Discussion of current research project
- Other larger projects I have worked on, involving primary research (I am a history student)
- Why I want to attend each specific school


Any critique of this would be appreciated as well, I am not sure what exactly to included in terms of other projects that I have worked on.

[TakeruK]

Note: I anticipate that there will be a lot of differing opinions on this topic and I'm not saying my advice here is the only good one. But I hope my opinion below helps you decide what the best path for you will be!

 

WIth only these details, I think my advice would be to not mention this at all in your SOP. As you said, it didn't result in horrible grades and it does not sound like there was significant impact in your performance. So, unless this experience/difficulty has direct impact on your academic decisions / reasons for attending specific schools, then I would not include it in the SOP at all. This is because in my opinion, the SOP is a place to discuss the professional / academic aspects of your life, not the personal ones (except for the reason I just stated).

 

Instead, I think a more appropriate place to mention this is your Statement of Personal History, or Statement of Diversity, or whatever each school calls it. In my opinion, this is the place to discuss more personal aspects of your life and how these experiences have affected your performance. i.e. this would be a good place to show that you persevered through a difficult time and were successful.

 

Not every school asks for the personal history statement though. However, almost every school gives you a chance to provide additional information about your application, sometimes in the form of a text box on the last page of the application (or sometimes as a separate uploaded file). If there is no personal history statement, I would put this information in this section. However, it's up to you whether you really want to include it since it does not seem like there is anything in your academic profile that needs explaining. In this case, the risk of stigma against mental health issues might be greater than the benefit of letting the admissions committee know that you persevered through difficulty circumstances.

[Alicia1593]

This is really helpful because it helps me differentiate between the different documents.

[bsharpe269]

Just wanted to let you know that I have a similar circumstance. My undergrad gpa is 3.28 due to pretty bad ADHD. Now that it's being treated, my masters GPA is 4.0. I actually asked one of my LOR writers to address the undergrad GPA for me because I think it sounds a bit better coming from them and then you don't draw attention away from your achievements in your SOP. In your case, one of your LOR writers could put a really positive spin on it and say something like "he is such a great student despite dealing with health issues... Blah blah." There are so many different ways to handle it and there isn't a right or wrong answer. That is one possibility though!

[TakeruK]

I'd second bsharpe's suggestion!

[danieleWrites]

I have a seizure disorder that didn't come under control until after I'd gotten my MA. My undergrad GPA sucked rocks for PhD stuff and my MA GPA was good enough, but meh. Absenteeism was a huge problem for me. I decided not to address the epilepsy thing directly because (the USA at least) it's one of those things covered by the Americans with Disabilities Act and puts reviewers in an icky position of trying to find this information non-prejudicial while still be prejudiced about it.

 

I didn't ask my recommenders to discuss it for me, even in a roundabout fashion, but when I supplied a bunch of materials for their use (samples of writing I did in their classes, CV, some class discussion memory-joggers, etc.) I gave them blanket permission to mention the seizure disorder if they felt it was necessary, along with a line that took me quite a while to write, that they could include in their letter, that indicated they had my permission to mention the seizure disorder if they felt it was necessary.

 

When I applied for my MA, I went to the professors I was interested in working with and had a conversation with them about my seizure disorder. I didn't do that with my PhD simply because I didn't have the time. Otherwise, I would have opened a conversation about the trials of being a good student with epilepsy, introducing my health issue in a conversation where we could spend time talking about it. I did not mention my ADHD as it was not relevant. My professors discover that at the beginning of each semester.

[Alicia1593]

Thank you for your post!

I'll definitely open the conversation that way with the people who write my letters of rec as well as with professors I am interested in working with at the various programs I'm applying to.