Features
What to be avoided in your letter of motivation
In my last write up, I focused on the processes for applications by foreign students seeking an admission to Finnish universities.
I wrote among other things about how to find information or guidelines on the processes for admission to Finnish universities and issues such as assessing applicants and their letter of motivation, which can be found on the Study in Finland portal (www.studyinfinland.fi/admissions).
As I said, the key documents that applicants need to attach to their application and which form the basis of the applicant’s success or otherwise are the relevant certificates, your resume or curriculum vitae (CV), and a letter of motivation.
Today, I focus on the letter of motivation and what should be avoided in that letter.
The letter of Motivation
For many Finnish universities, the letter of motivation can be a key point for a successful application.
A strong letter of motivation can determine whether the applicant is really ready for the study programme he or she wants to pursue.
As I mentioned the last time, the letter of motivation needs to go straight to the point.
The huge number of applications to Finnish universities means that there is always a high competition for admission.
Therefore, a strong letter of motivation is likely to do the magic and result in a successful application.
I mentioned that the applicant should consider telling about how the programme would impact on his/her (future) career.
Avoid playing the emotions card
Many an applicant may think that telling about your plight would draw sympathy from the assessors. This may be far from the reality.
For example, many years ago a friend told a story to me and others about an applicant in an African country who applied to study somewhere in Europe. The applicant wrote in the letter of motivation that the university authorities should consider poverty in the applicant’s country and minimum opportunities for further education.
I do not know how far this story is true. But, according to the narrator such a request rather diminished the chances of the applicant.
The narrator said it was inferred later that the application was unsuccessful because one wondered how the applicant would be able to find the financial resources to travel abroad and pursue the programme. Would anybody want somebody to struggle or be a burden on others?
This story was narrated as a joke or to create fun, but each of us also picked some important points from it.
Again, I do not think that many evaluators would be convinced if you played the gender card by simply saying that women/girls in Africa do not have opportunities or equal rights, for example.
Rather, what may convince an assessor is, for example, when you say how determined you are to pursue the programme to set an example to encourage other women/girls to aim high despite their status.
Stress on your strong/positive points
As I pointed out the last time, the applicant should emphasise his/her strengths (abilities or competencies) that can help or enable him/her to pursue the study programme.
It is important to stress your strong or positive points. You can even boast of your achievements, abilities and what you are capable of doing. As they say: be bold.
In my experience, I can say that sometimes talking boastfully about oneself or one’s achievements sounds convincing and can do the trick for an applicant.
There is the need for you to go straight to the point and the letter of motivation should have no room for unnecessary or unclear information. As much as possible, use active and persuasive voice or words and avoid using passive ones.
Finally, your chances can be slim if your letter of motivation gives the impression that your only aim is to get the opportunity to simply travel abroad.
Also, as I said the last time, I think it should be a huge motivation and something convincing to the assessors if one of your strong motivations is to get an education that would eventually help you in your career when you are back home after your studies. Thank you.
The author is a senior lecturer
at University of Helsinki, Finland
By Perpetual Crentsil
One of the issues we have been grappling with as a nation is corruption, and it has had such a devastating effect on our national development. I have been convinced that until morality becomes the foundation upon which our governance system is built, we can never go forward as a nation.
Our traditional practices, which have shaped our cultural beliefs, have always espoused values that have kept us along the straight and the narrow and have preserved our societies since ancient times.
These are values that frown on negative habits like stealing, cheating, greediness, selfishness, etc. Our grandparents have told us stories of societies where stealing was regarded as so shameful that offenders, when caught, have on a number of instances committed suicide.
In fact, my mother told me of a story where a man who was living in the same village as her mother (my grandmother), after having been caught stealing a neighbour’s cockerel, out of shame committed suicide on a mango tree. Those were the days that shameful acts were an abomination.
Tegare worship, a traditional spiritual worship during which the spirit possesses the Tegare Priest and begins to reveal secrets, was one of the means by which the society upheld African values in the days of my grandmother and the early childhood days of my mother.
Those were the days when the fear of being killed by Tegare prevented people from engaging in anti-social vices. These days, people sleeping with other people’s wives are not uncommon.
These wrongful behaviour was not countenanced at all by Tegare. One was likely going to lose his life on days that Tegare operates, and so unhealthy habits like coveting your neighbour’s wife was a taboo.
Stealing of other people’s farm produce, for instance, could mean certain death or incapacitation of the whole or part of the body in the full glare of everybody. People realised that there were consequences for wrongdoing, and this went a long way to motivate the society to adhere to right values.
Imagine a President being sworn into office and whoever administers the oath says, “Please say this after me: I, Mr. …., do solemnly swear by God, the spirits of my ancestors and the spirits ruling in Ghana, that should I engage in corrupt acts, may I and my family become crippled, may madness become entrenched in my family, may incurable sicknesses and diseases be my portion and that of my family, both immediate and extended.”
Can you imagine a situation where a few weeks afterwards the President goes to engage in corrupt acts and we hear of his sudden demise or incapacitation and confessing that he engaged in corrupt acts before passing or before the incapacitation—and the effect it will have on his successor? I believe we have to critically examine this option to curb corruption.
My grandmother gave me an eyewitness account of one such encounter where a woman died instantly after the Tegare Priest had revealed a wrong attitude she had displayed during the performance on one of the days scheduled for Tegare spirit manifestation.
According to her story, the Priest, after he had been possessed by the spirit, declared that for what the woman had done, he would not forgive her and that he would kill. Instantly, according to my grandmother, the lady fell down suddenly and she died—just like what happened to Ananias and his wife Sapphira in Acts Chapter 5.
NB: ‘CHANGE KOTOKA INTERNATIONAL AIRPORT TO KOFI BAAKO
By Laud Kissi-Mensah
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BY ROBERT EKOW GRIMMOND-THOMPSON
