mike609

Hello everyone. I'm thinking about applying to several PhD programs this fall. I'm a little bit lost now and hope that someone can help me a little bit. About my background, I am a senior in a private university (us news top 50) and have triple majors in Political Science, Economics, and Applied Math. I speak Chinese and English fluently and I am studying French. I have been TA for math department for four semesters. My disadvantages are my research experience and reference letters. My researches are very limited. I did a short paper about econometrics and another longer one in political science related to statistical analysis. I think that I can get only one good reference letter from a good political scientist. My GRE is unknown so far but suppose that I can get 95th percentile in math and 80th percentile in verbal (I'm not a native English speaker).Also my GPA is around 90th percentile and my major GPA in Political Science is lower than my math/econ major GPA. So I am thinking about applying to top 15 programs (except top 3). I am interested in methodology and political economy. I hope that I can get into one of: Berkeley, Duke, Chicago, NYU, Columbia, MIT, Washington University in St. Louis. So guys, am I being unrealistic or I actually have a shot in getting admitted by one of these programs? Thanks everyone! I really appreciate it.