xypathos

Fellow Vandy student here (M.Div) - it's a wonderful school with lots of opportunities should you be willing to seek them out. I just wrapped up my first year and have been asked to TA undergraduate classes (in R.S.) at a local university. You've already visited the campus but if you have questions, shoot me a PM. As per killing the time, find something(s) and throw yourself into it.

If it impacts your research interests, go for it. To be honest, I don't know of a Catholic in the divinity school so having that perspective would be nice - though I'm sure there's some hiding somewhere.

I think you'll be fine. I can't speak to the MTS admissions specifically but there are MTS students here that entered with a noticeably lower GPA and a shorter and less impactful CV than you. The GPA cut-off use to be 2.75 but they've since raised it to 2.9. Your involvement in ministry at Hispanic churches is going to be a big asset. VDS has recently hired an Adcom Rep whose sole job is to diversify the student body with primarily Hispanic and Asian-"minded" individuals. "Minded" in this case is people with claims to the heritage or strong ties/interests to those regions.

You'll need to email him to ask.

The idea of Islam as a reform movement of Christianity is certainly known (at least by me and it's something taught at Vanderbilt Div), but it's a controversial topic for both sides. Some speculate Islam is more a push against Islamic Paganism and merely Judaism and Christianity repackaged - again, controversial and rather insulting but still a point of discussion. The conversation I had with David Michelson at Vanderbilt is that if you want to make a unique name for yourself in Islamic Studies - study Quranic literature and its exegesis. Its only taken off as a serious scholarly endeavor in the last decade so its ripe for students to make a name for themselves and produce field-defining work.

Presumably if 104 is the minimum, it's the minimum - that's what is implied with such a term. As far as percentages - are you applying PhD or M*? If PhD, it's about 10% overall but varies across field. MDiv is about 40% (For MDiv, about 75 apply and 30-35 are accepted but packages are structured in such a way that they try to aim for only 12-15 accepting their offer). For your SOP - If PhD, if your personal background ties into your research interests, go for it but go for it carefully. If MDiv, it's more acceptable but still not a green-light for an autobiography. Research interests - PhD students are generally required to develop proficiency in at least one minor/subfield so if you already have an idea of what that might be, go for it. If MDiv - it's more or less icing on the cake. In both cases, the expectation is that you'll grow while in the program so some things will change.

This should answer your concern about the residence requirement: https://uni-of-oxford.custhelp.com/app/answers/detail/a_id/1148 (Oxford) and http://www.admin.cam.ac.uk/students/studentregistry/current/graduate/programme/workaway.html (Cambridge). I think you'd have to have a specific need to leave one university to study at another, without actually transferring schools. Graduate schools generally don't have study abroad programs (fieldwork is the exception here but fieldwork is vastly different than study abroad). From Oxford and Cambridge's sites, leaves of absence are primarily meant for 1) fieldwork or 2) health reasons. Now, Cambridge does list the possibility for taking a leave from the school in order to attend another university but the work done there cannot count for your degree - they specifically mean the degree itself, though I'm not sure what "other qualifications" entails exactly. Probably a certificate, so in theory individual courses might be okay. EDIT: I can't find anything from Oxford that is as detailed as the Cambridge page. The best I've been able to find is that if you need to break the residence requirements for any reason, whatever you do during that time cannot count toward your degree. So, in theory, you could do three terms (a year) at Oxford, take a leave of absence to do a year/a Masters/'whatever you want,' and then simply pick back up with your degree at Oxford when needed.

Thank you all. I suspected that citing the "ultimate source" is ideal when I'm able to prove its accuracy, just wanted to be sure. I guess I was just worried about some perceived misrepresentation when I didn't find the source through my own research but rather through someone else. So I was unsure if I should acknowledge that someone led me to a certain point. Though I do see the eventual problem if we followed that process, "as cited by D, who cited C, who cited B, as originally stated by A."

I'm in the process of writing a longer research paper and have a question regarding the citation of a source within a source. A situation where I'm reading Source-A who cites Source-B directly (directly being defined as a quote or a summary of a quote that I can nail down to a specific section without any extra scholarship from Source-A). Do I cite only Source-A, even if I've verified that the text in B is accurate? Or, do I just attribute it to B? In past papers I've erred on the side of caution and cited A but I've had professors get on to me, telling me to cite B. I've also tried the "as cited by A, found in B" approach but told that it makes citations cumbersome. I'll be using Chicago, and my professor is out of touch over the holiday. While I'll await a reply from him before finalizing any work, I'm curious as to how others have handled similar situations. My school/department doesn't have an agreed upon citation style but they also take citation mishaps very seriously and expel pretty liberally for them. So it's something I want to tread lightly with.

VDS has been interviewing other Hebrew-related applicants but I don't know where that process is currently. They very well could have already made an offer to someone. Regarding Seow, I'd just email him and ask. The times he's been on campus, he's been very cordial and receptive to every question someone has tossed his way. I'd also suggest asking Azzoni and Marbury regarding their status and if they're taking students. They're really the only ones who know.

Knight and Sasson are both retiring this year. EDIT: From a dean, the general advice of the university is for profs not to take on doctoral students their first year. That said, it's entirely up to the prof and they're not aware if Seow has made a decision.

Are you defining Church Slavonic as 13th century through the present? I ask because I'm aware that there's a difference between Old Church Slavonic and Church Slavonic, but where people draw the line is a point of contention. 10 years ago or so, I'd have told you to reach out to Victor Kamkin Bookstore as they carried a very nice selection of grammars and other books on OCS and CS - many of the texts quite rare. Unfortunately when they went under they incinerated several hundred thousand texts. That said, I know a guy that teaches CS as a layperson but from what I understand, he teaches it to people that are already familiar with Russian. I'm sure he'll have some advice anyway though.

It sort of falls under the fallacy of accident, due to the use of misleading statistics. That said, it's not a perfect match but the situation you're describing is very well documented. I just don't know if it has its own name.

Not all schools readily spell it out on their site but many offer waivers if the fee is a financial burden. Though what constitutes as a burden differs from school to school.

If you're applying to an MDiv program, this is fine. If you're applying to a PhD program, not fine. MTS would be somewhere in the middle

Middle Tennessee is another place to look at. In fact, it also happens to have a PhD in Public History.

You can list more. I used four myself, but I don't recall if that was the max or if you could use more. Doesn't seem to have affected me negatively.

It's acceptable in so far if you share interests and want to know if they or others will be running courses in that area. You can certainly inquire about them being your academic advisor. I don't know how Yale does it but at Vandy you're assigned to a professor in your area and potentially switch to a more specific advisor later on. I don't see a professor being able to, or willing, to "go to bat" for you like they may a PhD applicant.

While this is concerning the MA, I'll add some basic info on the MDiv that the director shared with me: Approximately 75 applicants every year. Out of which, offers will be extended to 30-35. From that pool, they aim to have 12-15 matriculate.

I haven't applied to PhD programs yet but I have had this conversation with a VDS faculty member. I mentioned people giving advice of percentile scores of 90+ for verbal in order to be taken seriously and they described that as complete garbage. That from their assessment of applicants while at VDS, Yale, and Harvard, and from discussions with other faculty - 160 (or about 85%) will get your application seriously considered. Students expounding this notion of a 165V and 3.9 GPA simply fail to understand the incredibly subjective nature of PhD applications. So, they look for some quantifiable data to explain why they weren't accepted and what they have is GPA and GRE. In reality, it's much more likely that your writing sample didn't connect with the faculty, the faculty member you wanted to work with was barred from taking a student this year because of politics or funding, someone simply sold themselves better, etc. That said, the faculty member encouraged hitting 160+ and after that, focus your efforts on your writing sample. It's largely the strongest aspect of your application. While LORs are important and you should discern who can write you the better recommendation, what they write is out of your control.

Vanderbilt does offer some full-funding awards but they're few and far in-between, generally one student per award though some award as high as three. That being said, the vast majority of merit awards only cover tuition and do not assist with university and Divinity School fees, living allowances, etc. So, you're still looking at about $20-30k/year in loans with no outside assistance.

Is anyone familiar with programs that have faculty which are particularly interested/work in the preservation and management of religious spaces? I've done consulting work in preservation and archive management for the town of Mount Vernon, IA; same style of work in Bethania, NC, and just wrapped up a HP project in Nashville, TN for the Nashville City Cemetery Association. I've struggled finding faculty with religious interests in the field of HP, though I do realize that some programs lump this into cultural management/preservation - which is fine, I'm just looking for faculty with particular interests in religion, sacred space, American religious history (you get the idea).

Given your basic stats provided, what's to be gained from doing another M*? Is it a language issue? Was your MA in history focused on (loosely even) early Christianity?

It really depends on what you need the German for. If it's solely for admission, German for academic reading will be enough. If you're looking specifically at the German school of thought/development and NT/EC scholarship and intend on relying strongly on German thinkers, then extra familiarity with German would be useful. That said, since you only have a year before applications, I'd stick to academic reading and familiarize yourself with German more intimately as you go and as needed.

I've already spoken with trinitymatthew but I'm hoping to get some additional opinions on McGill. I've been to Montreal several times and love the city. The member colleges of the Toronto School of Theology have recently lost their access to US Department of Education funds. While still a possibility to attend, I do want to consider all my options. I've recently found out through the Montreal Diocesan Theological College that if I attend McGill my tuition and fees would only amount to about $5000, in addition to living expenses. So it's certainly economical. That said, what about McGill as a whole? Reputation of the school, faculty, etc. I'd love to hear what others have to say.