You are applying everything you built across Strand 1.1. Values, aptitudes, achievements, interests, skillset and feedback stop living in separate documents today. They become one piece of writing: your first full personal statement.

ALT 1 begins now. Open your ALT 1 Source Material document from Lesson 24 and keep it beside you. If that Source Material is missing or thin, open Self Assessment v1, Strong Skills Evidence and Values from your Strand 1.1 folder and draft from those instead. By the end of this lesson you will hold Personal Statement Draft 1: a four-paragraph draft (target 300–500 words), banked as ALT 1 evidence in progress.

Three terms you will use for the rest of ALT 1:

First, study Oisín's draft in the worked example below. Use the six beats to see how each paragraph earns its place: who he is, what he is good at, what he is interested in, and where he is going. Notice where he uses a specific occasion instead of a vague claim.

Then write your own. Open a new document in your Strand 1.1 folder called Personal Statement Draft 1. Using your ALT 1 Source Material from Lesson 24 (or Self Assessment v1, Strong Skills Evidence and Values if you need the fallback), draft four paragraphs. Target 300–500 words:

1. Who I am: a concrete starting point only you could write
2. What I am good at: one or two strengths with a real occasion behind each
3. What I am interested in: interests that connect to where you might go, not a hobby list
4. Where I am going: a direction that fits the person in the first three paragraphs

Write for a reader who has never met you. Prefer a named place, a dated stretch of time, or a checkable action over any sentence that could sit in anyone's draft. If a line has no evidence underneath it, cut it or replace it before you finish.

A complete four-paragraph attempt is Draft 1. Aim for 300 words or more; if a line is unfinished, leave it in brackets and keep going. Save what you have by the end of the step. This is ALT 1 evidence in progress.

Talk these through with the person beside you, then lock in one fix before you leave:

• Read your four paragraphs in order. Does every paragraph earn its place, or could one be cut without the reader losing anything that matters?
• Underline one sentence that could sit in almost anyone's personal statement. What specific occasion from your source material could replace it?

In the same Personal Statement Draft 1 document, add two lines under your draft before you close the file:

• Weakest paragraph: (name it)
• Before Lesson 26 I will: (one concrete fix)

Those two lines stay with Draft 1 and feed the ALT 1 refinement in the next lesson.

Today you started ALT 1 by applying your Strand 1.1 source material to a real draft.

• You studied a four-paragraph personal statement and the moves that make each paragraph work
• You drafted Personal Statement Draft 1 in four paragraphs (target 300–500 words): who you are, what you are good at, what you are interested in, and where you are going
• You banked Draft 1 in your Strand 1.1 folder as ALT 1 evidence in progress, with a two-line fix note underneath
• Next lesson you will revise vague claims into specific evidenced lines