ukarthist

Doug, It's hard to say specifically how long this would take. I suggest that if you pre-order the documents you will require, this could save you a lot of time. If on your arrival you registered for a readers ticket, this would enable you to order documents to view for the next day and save you a lot of time. I believe that, as standard, you can only do this for 6 items. However, and I haven't actually done this myself, there is also the ability to 'bulk order' if the documents you require are in the same department (allowing up to 50 docs to be pre-ordered). If you won't be spending too much time with the originals (and just require them to photograph) there is no reason why you couldn't work through your sources fairly quickly. If you were to find that you ran out of time you could, of course, use their own copying service - copies could even be provided to you electronically so you needn't still be in the country. Personally, for hundreds of documents, I'd allow maybe a week or so. That gives you a day to figure out how the system works (and register so that you can pre-order) and a few days to work through photographing the documents you require.

That's a great help. Thanks for clarifying.

Thank you for your reply. To clarify, I wasn't suggesting that a sample should be 'tuned' to what a certain professor might like, nor was I intending to adapt my writing sample for different applications. Perhaps this was a poor choice of words on my part. My (implicit) question was rather, whether, in a case where your proposed field of study is somewhat different to that of your previous research (I already have an MA), you should provide a writing sample that reflects this rather than rely on your previous work. I was really wondering what was common practice as I am an applicant from the UK where we have a very different process. However, your answer has confirmed what I had suspected - that my time might be better used reworking my existing writing- so thank you for highlighting this here.

I am in much the same situation. I wonder though, is it common practice to tune your writing sample to fit with your application? I am unsure whether to write a new sample or to select from my existing work. Good luck with everything!

I am a British graduate student also in the humanities, so perhaps I can help a little. Firstly, Durham and Edinburgh are both extremely well respected universities here in the UK. In terms of employment,Durham is a particularly small university town so would perhaps not offer you the same access to work and networking opportunities as Edinburgh. That being said, wherever you study in the UK, there are good transport links allowing you to commute easily and quickly to neighbouring cities for work etc. Whilst I do know plenty of US students who have successfully transitioned from a Masters degree in the UK to full-time employment, I must admit that they all did so before the changes resulting in the current visa law. As I understand it, once you are accepted to and confirm your place at a university they would sponsor you for a tier 4 visa. Whilst studying on such a visa you would be permitted to work for up to 20 hours a week during term time (and full time during holidays) and you would also be able to participate in a work placement if it constitutes part of your course. The tier 4 visa would be for the length of the course plus an additional 4 months. After your course is completed, you can use the remainder of your visa time to look for work in the UK so you can transition into another visa category if they wish. Otherwise, you must leave the UK once their visa period ends. In terms of transitioning to another visa category, this would probably require you to find a employer to sponsor you. Whilst this would be possible (you would have the 4 months after your course ends to find employment), you should be aware that the job market for humanities graduates and related fields (including those relating to archeology) are very over saturated at the moment, with large rates of unemployment. That is not to say that you yourself would not find a position and someone willing to sponsor you, but you should be aware of the current situation and factor this into your approach. If you have any further questions, please feel free to message me.

I am a British student. Hopefully I can clarify the issue here. The UK does have a number of different terms for postgraduate degrees (MA, MSt, MLitt, MPhil etc.) but they can, in fact, mean different things. In the case of Scottish Universities, an undergraduate degree is four years (as opposed to three in England and Wales). As such, you automatically graduate with a Master of Arts rather than a B.A. Thus, in order to distinguish this qualification from a terminal (one year) Masters degree, the latter is referred to as a MLitt. An MLitt from say St Andrews does not differ in structure or content from a MA at an English university. There is some variation in terminology from University to University with the biggest exceptions to the rule being Oxford and Cambridge. Much like the Scottish Universities, an undergraduate degree from Oxbridge is converted to an MA six years after graduation. Thus, a Masters degree from such an institution cannot simply be referred to as an MA degree and is instead given a different title (eg, an MLitt or an MSt) What is important is that an MLitt, like an MA, is a taught Masters degree, whereas an MPhil is a Masters by research. Put simply, a MLitt from St Andrews is exactly the same as an MA from elsewhere. The university would probably provide literature to support this fact should you be looking to continue with a Phd outside of the UK. If you were to continue your studies in the UK, no explanation would be required.

I'm not sure if this will help you: I was an undergrad at York, which is, of course, very close to Leeds geographically. Leeds is a well respected and popular University in the UK. It has good train links and a short journey time to London and other major cities for research purposes/ conferences etc. The UK doesn't really have a ranking system for graduate programmes but I believe the Medieval Department of Leeds to be highly regarded within its discipline. Anyway, hopefully this will allay some of the concerns that you have regarding your application to Leeds.

Thanks Atlantis, I will message you about this if that's ok?

This is as I expected, thank you for your help.

If you are still interested, the History of Art Department at the University of Glasgow offers an MLitt in the History of Collecting and Collections. I don't know anything about it but could be worth looking in to.

Thanks for this. I'll be sure to look into it.

Thank you all so much for your advice, such a great help. I guess more than anything I was looking for the reassurance that I wasn't alone in all of this. It is a relief to hear I don't need to worry too much about the U.K grading system unless it stipulates otherwise. I think, as you advise, I will hold off emailing departments unless I absolutely cannot find anything online regarding the transfer of credits. However, I had already resigned myself to the fact that my Masters probably won't make much of a difference in this respect. Sio68, as a UK student did you take a different approach to your personal statement/statement of purpose than you would have done had you been applying to UK universities? Only, from the research I've done looking at samples online, they seem to take a rather more creative approach than perhaps you would expect for a U.K application. I'm sure I'll have plenty more questions along the way but thank you all for your responses and good luck with your own applications.

Hello all, I am so relieved to have found this informative forum. I am a graduate (masters) student of History of Art from the U.K and am looking towards completing my PhD studies in the U.S. My problem is this, coming from the U.K education system the U.S application process is very different from anything I have experienced. As such (and predicting that the process will present many obstacles), I am already starting to prepare my application for Fall '14. I have a number of questions that I hope somebody here will be able to address. Firstly, with regards to the GRE, how much time should a native speaker devote to preparing/revising for this? And how much weight is given to your scores during the application process? Secondly, as my academic transcript does not comply with the U.S mark scheme, how would I go about calculating a g.p.a? I know that there are companies that provide this service, does anyone have any experience with these? Finally, I have a Masters degree from the U.K. I understand that whether or not the transfer of credits from a terminal masters degree will be allowed varies from university to university. Would it be worthwhile emailing my prospective departments to clarify or would I just be making a nuisance of myself by doing so? I'm sorry if these questions are extremely basic or if they have already been answered elsewhere. I am still trying to get to grips with it all.