Touchy Subject in Personal Statement

[coopachris]

I am hoping you all can help me phrase a touchy subject in my personal statement. I apologize for the length of the post and thank you all for your help.

A little background:

Last application cycle I applied to many Biomedical Engineering/Bioengineering PhD programs. I was met with a few rejections, a few waitlists, and a couple acceptances to both master programs (not my first choice) and PhDprograms. I was having a tough time making a decision as nothing seemed to be perfect. That is when a professor contacted me from a program that I was placed on the waitlist of. This was exciting because the program was among my top choices! We had a long conversation and he said he would be happy to accept me into the program but, his grant would not come through until the middle of the Fall 2019 semester. He would be able to cover tuition but not healthcare and a smaller stipend. I thought it smelled fishy but my research advisor at the time vouched for him so, I accepted his terms.

Now here is where it gets interesting, after the deadline to make a decision had passed for the other programs he contacts me letting me know things have gotten a little more complicated. His funding has been postponed and now all he could offer me is an unfunded masters program position that would transition to PhD after the completion of the masters. This was very frustrating and disheartening. I obviously did not accept. It did not make logistical sense to move out of state and pay tuition. I just felt totally screwed over!

I am now stuck reapplying to PhD programs many of which are the same ones I already applied. I also took this as a valuable life lesson and will not make the same mistake again.

My question:

I figure I will need to talk about this at least briefly in my personal statement. How do I phrase this so that I am not throwing this university/professor under the bus but also making it clear that I was not at fault for this? I find this especially difficult in the case of programs where I was already offered some type of position.

[AP]

1) Do not by any means ask him to write a letter. He has no reason to explain anything to no one and you requesting that after rejecting his (very bad) terms will not help you.

2) do not waste your time with this experience. I am not sure why you think you need to talk to about this. You had a bad experience about funding that has nothing to do with your research or your potential. If you want to account for the time you “lost”, you can say something like “in the past application cycle I received offers from several programs. After much consideration, I committed to a programs whose funding did not follow through. This taught me that our academic endeavors sometimes depend on external factors. As far as I am concerned, I do follow through”. That’s it, own your decision and not shed any spotlight on anyone other than yourself. The SoP is about YOU. 

 

[HTM18]

Ask him write a letter of recommendation explaining what happened on his side and how you would be an asset to any program that accepts you. I don't feel you need to write it into your personal statement.

[coopachris]

On 10/14/2019 at 12:07 PM, AP said:

1) Do not by any means ask him to write a letter. He has no reason to explain anything to no one and you requesting that after rejecting his (very bad) terms will not help you.

2) do not waste your time with this experience. I am not sure why you think you need to talk to about this. You had a bad experience about funding that has nothing to do with your research or your potential. If you want to account for the time you “lost”, you can say something like “in the past application cycle I received offers from several programs. After much consideration, I committed to a programs whose funding did not follow through. This taught me that our academic endeavors sometimes depend on external factors. As far as I am concerned, I do follow through”. That’s it, own your decision and not shed any spotlight on anyone other than yourself. The SoP is about YOU. 

 

Thank you this is great! I was never going to ask for a letter since in reality he knows very little if anything about me.

I was not planning on including this in my personal statement but one of my letter writers brought it up.