one more motivation letter...please i need your help!

0 Hello everybody,02br
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00I am Italian and I am applying for a very competitive Graduate Programme in the UK and, as usual, I have to write a personal statement to be attached to the application with my personal motivation. I have been through this forum and found plenty of useful suggestions and information.02br
00Now it's my turn. Can you please check my letter and make comments (the nastier the better), especially about the structure?02br
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00Thank you so much!02br
00Paola02br
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00Dear Sir/Madam,02br
00My name is ……….. With this letter, I would like to apply as a graduate student for the Master of Science in Local Economic Development at your School. 02br
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00I got a degree in Construction Engineer in December 2000 from the 00 in 00. 02br
00Ever since I was a young child I have always been extremely interested in knowing new cultures and new languages as a way to widen my mind and my capacity of understanding people. That’s why I have always actively researched possibilities to live and study abroad. In fact, both at the High School and at the University I participated in exchange programmes that gave me the possibility to spend a period abroad studying in local educational institutions. When I was 17 years old I spent three months in 010200 where I had the possibility to attend the high school and be integrated in the local community. Later, during my university studies, I won a scholarship to be an Erasmus student in 00 for a year in one of the Faculties of Architecture in 00firm. My first year in 010200 had a very strong impact on my ideas about my future career. In a Faculty of Architecture the approach to the world of construction was completely different from the one at the Faculty of Engineering where I was studying. During that year I got exposed to new perspectives and in particular I learnt about the social aspects related to the world of construction. For the first time I realised how designing buildings could affect people’s lives and how the correct planning of cities had the power of improving their living conditions. I started realising then that I could give a very strong social and ethical meaning to the rather technical job of engineer. I can trace in that period the birth of my interest for the development as a subject to study and to be involved in. 02br
00Therefore in the last period of my studies and at the beginning of my career as a young engineer I tried to build up a parallel personal knowledge on this sector. Through the reading of articles and books on development and cooperation, and through the participation to conferences and public events, I became more and more aware of the fact that this was really the sector that interested me and I tried to reorient my working perspective and move forward.02br
00I realised in fact that working in the field of development would fulfil two important needs I had and still have: to give an ethical dimension to my work and at the same time to satisfy my thirst for travelling and discovering new cultures. 02br
00I eventually succeeded to start working for an Italian NGO which was searching for engineers for post-war reconstruction projects in the Balkans. It is four years now that I have been working for that same NGO with increasingly higher responsibilities and positions and I shifted my main area of work from a technical participation to a more strategic one. In particular in the past two and half years I have worked as country representative of my NGO in 010200 and 010200. 02br
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00The fact that my studies are not related to the way my work has shaped up hasn't really affected me nor created major difficulties. On the contrary I think that my degree can be considered a very important point of strength. In fact my studies provided me not only with a specific technical knowledge related to construction and building related issues. In fact, more than anything else, they gave me methodological tools to be used in different fields of research and provided me with a very methodical and systematic mental structure. In particular I developed strong analytical skills and the capacity to elaborate models to study the reality by seizing its most relevant aspects. I also developed a capacity of creating logical links among phenomena that apparently don’t bear any relation with one other. Moreover my studies gave me the mental habit to always go into depth of things and not being satisfied with only the superficial evidence that comes out from the first approach. 02br
00In my working experience I have had many confirmations that the methodological skills provided by my studies can be a very powerful tool. In fact it was for me relatively easy to get acquainted with the main development-related theories and to learn and internalize in a short time completely new concepts. In a fairly short time I became effective and competent, being able to undertake varied and different responsibilities on different specific sectors of intervention. People I meet for my work are often surprised to discover that I am and engineer and that I didn’t attend a specific course in development. 02br
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00Now, after having worked for a few years in development, in different sectors and with different duties, I feel that I am at a turning point of my career and that it is time for me to move up and forward. In this I am guided by two different needs. On one side I feel the personal need to give a more organic and theoretical ground to the knowledge I acquired on-the-job. 00 00On the other side I need to develop more specific skill and I want to specialize in a more specific sector. My goal would be to become an expert in a particular field instead of having only many different unspecialised skills. The field of specialisation I have chosen is local development. In fact in the last year I have been working on projects related to Small and Micro Enterprises and their growth and I have become more and more interested in all the aspects related the local economic development in general.02br
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00My experience in an Italian NGO has been a very enriching one from a professional and human view point. I will always be very grateful to all the people I met and worked with. They transmitted to me their passion and dedication and they gave me very precious knowledge and advice. Nonetheless in my position now I have few possibilities to learn new skills or new concepts and I feel that my work has become a unchallenging daily routine. My plans now would be therefore to work for bigger international organisations such as UN agencies or consulting firms with a more stimulating work environment. There I would have the possibility to follow larger programs with a larger impact and work with top professionals. 02br
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00I am aware that my plan is a very ambitious one and it needs to be carefully prepared. In order to achieve my goals a more solid academic background is absolutely mandatory because the competition is very high and I need to upgrade my skills and competencies. To take a year off from work is also a very challenging and radical decision. It implies a strong financial commitment both because of the actual costs incurred and for the waiver of a year salary. At the same time it entails absence from the working environment with no guarantees about the future possibilities. It requires therefore a very strong motivation and a very careful choice. That's why I think that the only winning decision is to study in a university providing the highest possible quality of academic training and with internationally recognised expertise02br
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00This is the reason why I have chosen the London School of Economics, for its international renown as leading institution in the field of development. 02br
00The Master of Science in Local Economic Development I have chosen would allow to improve my academic knowledge in the working field and to enhance my possibilities to pursue a career in an International Organisation. In fact the Master would allow me to deepen and widen my knowledge on development in general, to gain a very accurate understanding of local and regional development and to develop new specific skills.02br
00 could became a specialist in a sector that not only fascinates me a lot, but that is also growing and taking more and more place in the international agendas and that requires more and more professionals able to cope with the increasing challenges brought about by international situation.02br
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00I think I could contribute to this programme for in many ways. I am very tenacious and determined to pursue what I want to achieve and I never give up any challenge. I can bring to the program an overview from my experience in the working field, relating real problems that practitioners in the field of development are asked to tackle in real life and not only on the paper. I am used to studying and working in international environments that require very good communication skills, high tolerance and capacity of understanding different cultural behaviours and different ways to approach and solve problems. I am used to analyse and process large amount of data on complex issues in a quick and effective way in order to find solutions. 00 00 02br
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00I am determined and confident that I make an exceptional candidate for the program. I believe I will not only be able to achieve high results, but to contribute substantially to the London School of Economics as well. 02br
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00Yours faithfully,02br
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