As a professor, I offer to read students resumes and personal statements. In fact, Colleen (my wife) and I enjoy grabbing our red pens and having at a student’s resume at the kitchen table. Obviously we enjoy to do this because we care the students and not some EVIL DESIRE TO POINT OUT ALL OF YOUR MISTAKES.

Seriously, the thing people so often do in these personal statements is write about things from their point of view.

I want to do X and your internship will me do that.

But as someone who might hire you, I don’t find this reason compelling. You have to dive into why someone might want you to do an internship or an REU. Convince me!

Internship: If you are looking for an internship, what the company (or organization) wants to do is hire you if you and they have a good experience after the internship.

REU: If you are looking for an REU, the University usually wants you to go to graduate school in the program the REU is in if a good experience is had by all.

So if you want to be a doctor and are applying to a biology research opportunity, its okay to tell them about your desire to be a doctor, but you also have to tell that you are considering doing a PhD in Biology research. Don’t say “I am doing this internship because I want to be a doctor.” They will not be inspired by your letter.

So if you want to be an engineer and are applying to a physics research opportunity, its okay to tell them about your desire to be an engineer, but you also have to tell that you are considering doing a PhD in Physics. You want to use this experience to help determine what the best path is for you.

etc etc

So is this lying? Nope! If you are a college student you are by definition someone who is considering different careers.

The folks at the other end of your letters what to read passion in what they do.