Law School - ready for applying for a Chevening - leadership and influencing skills requirement

Chevening is looking for individuals who will be future leaders or influencers in their home countries. Explain how you meet this requirement, using clear examples of your own leadership and influencing skills to support your answer.

I am Colombian, I have never applied to a scholarship before, I tried to show my leadership skills, and I would be really grateful if I could get some comments on my essay to imporve what I have written. Thanks!!!

leadership skills presentation

I meet the requirement of having leadership and influencing skills because I am a hard working person who commits to goals and encourages others to work for their own achievements. For instance, as my mother could not afford my university studies, I managed to earn and keep a scholarship throughout the entire time of Law School at one of the top universities in Colombia, where I took advantage of every opportunity of academic and personal growth available. Simultaneously to my studies, I was a tutor to different subjects and permanently supported the Faculty's Dean and professors in many academic activities aiming to support younger students throughout their time in university. As a member of the Debating Society, I was chosen to represent my university in different tournaments, such as the World Universities Debating Championship in Spanish Language, held in Mexico City in 2014. In such scenario, I had the chance to debate with students from the most prestigious Hispanic universities about worldwide issues, going from environmental challenges to politics and economics. As one of the leaders of the Debating Society, I had the chance to influence others and to seed in them self-awareness of the importance of debating as rhetoric and intellectual exercise. Due to my skills and commitment I was selected to represent the university at the International Arbitration Moot Court held in 2015 at the Pontificia Universidad Católica de Chile. Acting as leading member, and main speaker of our team, we placed second amongst 45 teams from Latin America. To this date, I still support the training of students for this Moot Court. Through my academic experience, I was and I am still committed to be a leader every day by learning from others and setting example with my actions. Nowadays, I am supporting INALTA Foundation, which is a Colombian non-profit organization focused on young people's education, health and environment. I participated in the assessment of the applications received in mid-2018 from persons with financial and physical special needs seeking for scholarships granted by the foundation to access university studies in Colombia. Additionally, environmental topics have always been one of my greatest passions, and I am constantly reading, learning, and sharing knowledge about the role we all have as individuals in worldwide conservation and how to manage human impact in nature. For this purpose, I use different tools such as social media, specialized discussion forums, and every day conversations. In connection to my leading skills, in July, 2018, I promoted and convinced my family members to enroll in the volunteering programme "Debri Free Bonaire", in which we all learned about the plastic and marine debris in the Caribbean, and for various days we helped removing a great amount of marine debris and plastic from Bonaire's shoreline. I am a person with solid principles and positive family values, and I have no doubt that a postgraduate study in a world-class university will provide me with significant tools to become a much stronger leader for my country.

Valentina, first up, you need to be conscious of the fact that the Chevening leadership essay requires a maximum of 500 words. Any more than that and your application will be rejected. You need to whittle down your essay to 500 words or less than that. Next, this is not an essay that you can use because it is too scattered in presentation and does not contain any competitive elements that can help highlight your application as having come from a future leader and influencer in Colombia. You need to start from scratch in this instance. You cannot proceed with using this essay.

Now, I can tell you which parts of this essay can be used to draft a more prompt responsive version. These are the following topics:

1. Arbitration Moot Court
2. INALTA

I don't seem to see any professional leadership and influencing reference in your essay. Why is that? I hope you can add a professional one because that will be the one of most interest to the reviewer since that will prove that you are at a level of leadership and influencing in your profession that could very well have an impact on the future professionals of your country.

You cannot use the Debri Free Bonaire project as a leadership and influencing sample because that only involved your family members. The foundation is looking for future national leaders and influencers so your influence over your family doesn't count. Now, there are some applicants this cycle who have a similar background to yours. You may want to read the sample essays here regarding leadership and influencing so that you can learn from their presentation and improve your own accordingly.