Tailoring SOP to each school

[hippyscientist]

How do you tie in the department themes in your SOP? I'm struggling to figure out what makes my schools different (other than research and location obviously). Ideally I'd go talk to professors, get a feel for the place, see how it's organised but I don't really feel like a 2000+ mile journey and lots of money gone to figure this out! 

 

The schools I'm applying to all have similar research areas, multiple POIs, good reputations within the field and I could see myself living there. I've written and woven through my SOP research interests tied to researchers in the department & what I could gather from the lab websites. I guess I'm trying to figure out how to tie in research facilities, access to sports teams and research subjects (I'm in a very sports focused discipline) without having seen all of this first hand.

 

Any help greatly appreciated! (I'm in Kinesiology if that makes a difference)

[random_grad]

I did not talk about how great facilities are at all although in ny discipline certain rare library collections might be relevant. It would be appropriate if there is a specific piece of equipment that _you_ want to work with (e.g. in kinesiology that could be a cutting-edge motion-mapping device), but otherwise I d say just focus on profs. And it should not be just you saying how great they are but also why they matter to your project.

[fuzzylogician]

In general the thing to focus on is how your research fits with that of the professors/labs at each school. To do a good job at that, you need to choose schools that can complement and support your research. If you've done a good job at that, the fit portion of the SOP more or less writes itself, because it should be obvious. Sounds like you're well on your way to doing that. It's also useful to mention facilities, labs, libraries, access to special communities or any other unusual resources a school has to offer, as long as it's linked to your research in some way. It shows that you've done your legwork and have actually given some thought to why each school is right for you. You can learn a lot about what a school is proud of by reading their website. If they stress the importance of working within the community and that's something you at least find interesting, comment on that. If they talk a lot about the importance of teaching experience, talk about why that's something drawing you to that school. You get the idea. You can have a couple of sentences about these unique things that draw you to each school, but I would put them after explaining the fit with the professors, which should be the primary reason you choose to apply to a school. 

[hippyscientist]

Thank you for the responses - they've really helped. I'm curious, one of the schools I'm applying to has strong links with my international university (one of my LORs got his PhD there, one of the main professors there got his PhD from my MSc university, collaborations on research projects etc). Should I mention this in my SOP or just assume that they see my university name and know professor X is from there and professor Y teaches there? I feel like mentioning it is treating the admissions committee like idiots but I also feel that anything that can strengthen my existing links to the school couldn't hurt. Opinions?

[PoliticalOrder]

Don't mention it.