Personal Development Plan for Higher Education Students

Running head: PERSONAL DEVELOPMENT PLAN
PERSONAL DEVELOPMENT PLAN
Name of the Student:
Name of the University:
Author Note:

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PERSONAL DEVELOPMENT PLAN
STUDENT NO:
OVERVIEW:
The process of personal development planning can be defined as a sequential action planning
based upon personal values, awareness and self-reflection so as to attain positive goal outcomes.
The personal development plan has been found to be extremely effective in context of education,
relationship and professional life. According to Blatta and Bless (2013), it has been said that the
personal development plan serves as a platform to perform self-assessment and identify the
underlying strength and weakness on an individual level. Further it has also been mentioned by
Specht et al. (2014), that the individual development plan can serve as a medium for self-
correction and self-evaluation. Philosophers recommend that an ideal personal development plan
should be framed with respect to a time period of minimum five years so as to effectively
compare and contrast the level of improvement (Reitz and Zimmermann 2014). It should be
noted here that the efficiency of an individual development plan broadly depends upon the
successful ability of the individual to stick to the action plan and present a positive effect in
comparison with the preexisting in-built attributes (McAdams 2015). An individual development
plan comprises of a formal statement of aspiration, strengths and potential, academic details and
certification and strategies to successfully acquire skills to realize the set-goal (Hennecke et al.
2014). Studies reveal that while pursuing higher education, undertaking a personal development
plan can facilitate self-regulatory and independent learning (Eysenck 2013). It should further be
noted that with respect to higher education, it is suggested that the development plan should be
designed from time to time so as to frame objectives in accordance with time-based priorities

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(Parkay et al. 2014). Personal development plans form an integral aspect in terms of managing
human resource. It should further be stated that personal development plans form a critical aspect
of an individual’s curriculum vitae willing to undertake a business certification. This academic
portfolio would highlight my personal development plan as an individual entering University to
pursue higher education. It would critically highlight the challenges encountered by me on
entering higher education and my identified strengths and weaknesses. Further, it would
elucidate my area of interest and skill expertise required in order to successfully attain the
designed objectives of the action plan.

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ENTERING HIGHER EDUCATION:
Entering higher education has been extremely challenging. The major transition from school
level of education to higher education has been extremely complicated. The journey of
encountering difficulties started off from the initial level when I had to prepare for entering into a
reputed university to pursue higher studies on my area of interest. I would like to mention here
that the preliminary stage of selecting an appropriate university was also challenging. A thorough
scrutiny based upon multiple considerations helped me in short listing some of the reputed
universities that offered my subject of interest. The consideration criteria included my subject
expertise at an undergraduate level, fees-structure feasibility, facilities offered and scope of
research and placement in future. After the process of successful shot listing, the major challenge
was to prepare and get through the entrance criteria so as to be an eligible candidate for
admission. The initial requirement was to present a formal record of academic achievements and
expertise along with a high impact statement of purpose. The statement of purpose can be
defined as a short academic essay that underlines the strength, weakness and skill set of the
aspiring student along with the vision, interest and expectation to join the University. The
Statement of Purpose or the SOP must be academically presented and be an influential one as it
constitutes maximum impact value. I was not aware of an academic style of writing and neither
had a clue about the format in which the statement of purpose must be presented. I found it
extremely complicated and had negative thought implications about my capability to qualify as
an eligible candidate. I researched on the internet extensively in order to retrieve sample formats
of academic writing and statement of purpose. From the gathered information, I compiled my
SOP but realized it had a lot of flaws in terms of sentence construction and Grammar. I realized I
had to work a lot on it and amended it several times to formulate a proper piece of academic