Please provide few tips of writing good SOPs (Statement of Purpose)?

Please provide few tips of writing good SOPs (Statement of Purpose)?

Few tips which may help to build good Statement of Purpose (SoP) -
The Statement of Purpose (SoP) is most important part of your application that will tell the admissions committee who you are, what has influenced your career path so far, your professional interests and where you plan to go from here.
- A good SoP will certainly improve your chances of getting admission to the school of your choice, and even compensate for weaker portions of your application such as less-than-perfect grades. A bad SoP, on the other hand, has the potential to drag down an otherwise strong application. - To make yourself stand out from among a multitude of similarly qualified candidates. To convince the committee that you have the spark. (This should be well defined why committee should choose as his or her potential student) - So writing precise SoP is very important. - Every paragraph should somehow be related to your research area, interest, experience, and future.

Some Don’ts
* No spelling mistakes.
* No grammatical errors.
* Do not highlight any text in SoP.
* Do not write any word in upper case until and unless important (off course new line should start with capital letter)
* Avoid Excuses (Like why your grades are low or why you didn’t fulfill something)
* Do not over use “I”: they already know it is your SoP.
* Do not use s Acronym (short form) like SoP, spell it out Statement of Purpose (No matter how popular that short form is).
* Do not overuse quotes

There is no any standard format for SoP. It is very much based on major as well. Here are some important factors which need to be explicitly mentioned. General descriptions of a student's positive qualities are not as useful as detailed examples that illustrate the student's abilities and achievements. (You need to mention specifically how these qualities can help you for your achievement of research goal).
Some important questions need to be answered in SoP:
* What you want to study at graduate school?
* Why you want to study only this degree?
* Why do you want to study at this particular college?
* What do you like in us?
* Why did you choose to study in this particular country?
* What do you like about it?
* How much and what kind of experience you have in your field?
* Is your experience related to you choice of degree?
* If you are already experienced, what additional skills are you planning to gain from the degree?
* What you plan to do with your degree after graduation? Would you choose to end up with a job or take up research?
* What are your expectations from both the graduate program, and the university?
* Would you like to study or do research under any particular professor? If yes, why only them? How can you contribute to our university and our program?
* What specific skills do you bring to the table?

1st paragraph: Write specifically the topic or area you are interested in, you can mention why you are interested in that area and with whom you want work with (the potential advisor). You can mention how the work of advisor influence you.
2nd paragraph: Here comes your background. You can mention about what influence you to choose particular major and tie some childhood and past experiences with the research area.
3rd paragraph: You can extend background which can tie with the graduate studies and some work or internship experiences which help you to enhance your skills. Off course this paragraph should be also related to your research.
4th paragraph: You can write about your project details which is related to area you are choosing for graduate studies and mention the qualities and skills you learned. You can talk about how these qualities and skills can be helpful to carry out research work.
5th paragraph: Personal background’s impact for your topic selection. Mention your journey from childhood till your last education.
6th paragraph: Summary which will tie all the paragraph meaning what qualities and knowledge will benefit you to withstand in graduate program. Give emphasis on all positive points you mentioned before.
7th Paragraph: Your future and ultimate goals after finishing graduate studies. Write something that can impact the country (the country you are applying to and not home country) in some way.

The process of writing SoP is continuous and not one time (I know everyone is busy with different aspect of admission but take out at least an hour a day…You are best person to judge yourself). Take your time to write it up. And go over it many times to enhance its impact on admission process.