xypathos

That's an incredibly serious charge to levy and I don't see a faculty member referencing that in their notification. So, I'm curious as to how they could possibly know.

I forget the exact numbers, and it does fluctuate a little each other, but Syracuse admits 2-4 M.A. students a year with full funding and no TA/GA obligations. From my unofficial interview there several years ago, all M.A. students are eligible to continue on into the Ph.D. through an internal application process (interviewer mentioned that in their nearly 30 years there they've only denied one internal application and that was because he kept taking courses in other departments and they no longer felt he was a suitable potential Ph.D. student in Religion). Most opt not to continue into the Ph.D. there but through no fault of the school - a lot of their M.A. graduates transition into another field, go onto higher ranked Ph.D. programs, or someone just doing it for personal reasons.
FLAS funding at Syracuse is pretty pervasive though I can't speak to Religion specifically. I knew a lot of students in History, Sociology, and Political Science that had it.
My wife did her Ph.D. in Disability Studies at Syracuse so we lived there for about five years - glad to talk about the city and school if needed!

Yes. In particular there are schools that have a strict policy of no interviewing *stares at Yale* so faculty use social media to get an idea of who you are. Some faculty violate this but that's a slightly different issue.
Academia.edu is a route that many check to see if applicants use. On a personal level, I strongly suggest people not use Academia as it's a front to steal your intellectual property and monetize it.
I know for a fact that my advisor does extensive searches on everyone they might take on as a student. They also print it all out and keep a folder and for your annual review they show it to you.
You can take that as you will but speaking to my own experience - my advisor is amazing and requires bimonthly meetings with all of their students over a meal. They go above and beyond to cultivate a personal relationship with you, check in on life stuff, make sure you're not studying too much, etc.

Yes. In particular there are schools that have a strict policy of no interviewing *stares at Yale* so faculty use social media to get an idea of who you are. Some faculty violate this but that's a slightly different issue.
Academia.edu is a route that many check to see if applicants use. On a personal level, I strongly suggest people not use Academia as it's a front to steal your intellectual property and monetize it.
I know for a fact that my advisor does extensive searches on everyone they might take on as a student. They also print it all out and keep a folder and for your annual review they show it to you.
You can take that as you will but speaking to my own experience - my advisor is amazing and requires bimonthly meetings with all of their students over a meal. They go above and beyond to cultivate a personal relationship with you, check in on life stuff, make sure you're not studying too much, etc.

It’s applicants with poor preparation (bad grades, no M*, inappropriate coursework) and things like disastrously bad GRE scores that don’t survive the institution’s minimum.
Regarding the M*, very few schools explicitly state that they won’t take students without a M* but a lot won’t take them.
With GREs, usually there’s an institution minimum that is low 150V but then the department sets a screen (example) of 161 (really it’s whatever they think reflects their ideal student). 1-2 faculty are required to read all of the screen-out apps to see who should be moved back in. A number are always moved back in but you’re still fighting against a deficit.
My school gets a number of NT/HB apps that loved biblical studies but only took 1-3 seminars with minimal language preparation and/or they didn’t sit down with an advisor about how their application needs to shift when applying to a graduate program in Arts & Sciences and to avoid confessional statements.

A lot. It depends on the program but a lot of people want to be NT scholars so I'd say that and ethics tends to always get the most applicants in any school. At my institution, of the ~150 I'd say close to a 1/4th are for NT but only half of those are taken seriously, so 20'ish.

Poo!
I'm colorblind so I can't tell if your coloring is green or red but hopefully green! I've visited for conferences and to see a HS friend that went there for UG - lovely school.
I'm curious to know who the admit went to. I had heard rumors that it was Paul Lim's choice and that he verbally promised the slot to a former student of his when he taught at Gordon-Conwell. Which is all fine and dandy but when a student at VDS, the faculty said explicitly "We choose the best candidate for the field, as a whole." Yet fellow PhD students and faculty members after a beer or two, would confide that it's acually rotational and when it's your time, you get to choose your student - done deal. I don't understand that if that is in fact the case, tell us! Say, "We're taking one Americanist this year in Historical Studies! That's it!" Save yourselves the time to slog through applications on Reformation, save us the money, etc.

Blind reviews aren’t universal but some level of it is common.
As far as connecting apps, generally when a student reaches out it’s a mix of “I’m interested in X, Y, and Z and I did my undergrad and/or grad at Schools A and B, etc.” Profs then note the candidates that they’re the most interested in and willing to throw some elbows for during review.
It’s different with each school but at my current school and where I did my M*, field faculty could only vote on applicants to their field. They could read applicants from other fields and comment, but they couldn’t vote. So, while the department got ~150 applications, fields only got 10-20 making connecting names to applications very easy.
 
 

I know late applicants aren’t welcomed but most schools I’ve encountered will take a late letter of recommendation. That said, I don’t know if Duke does!
I’d suggest emailing Carol Rush for this kind of question. She’s listed as the GDR Program Office Coordinator or something like that. They’re generally the first point of contact for admissions questions.

6 down, 2 to go (due 1/2 and 1/7). Not sure at all how I feel. ?

I'd go ahead and reach out. Let them know that you're applying (or already have), shared research interests, etc. I'd keep the emails short - a paragraph perhaps, no more than two.

Hi @NTGal! As others have noted - meeting prospective advisors isn't required and I can't immediately name a single faculty anywhere that wants or prefers that. That doesn't mean much, obviously, but I just don't see faculty wanting to meet prospective students before they apply.
Now, many faculty - most even (maybe!) - prefer a quick email where you lay out what your interests are, academic background, etc, before you name drop them in an application! This way they know who you are, they can maybe go to bat for you come evaluation time, and on the off chance that they're not accepting students they can save you the $100+ in fees and/or suggest other faculty to you.

We're seeing this at my school as well. Classically trained biblical studies PhD grads are sitting on the market longer and longer, while those with unique interests - disability studies and NT and had a grad in May that did a NT interpretation of transhumanist philosophy. Both of the latter had multiple TT offers, those with a more classical approach equipping them to teach NT and maybe Paul are all headed for one year visiting positions.
It's anecdotal but its caused a lot of tension among the older faculty as they're getting less inquiries from prospective students, and general fear that they're going to be "pushed out."

Absolutely ask about what the department and POI value in prospective applicants, and what you can do to maximize that.
Some programs are sticklers for language - they want them done before you enter. Others want a modern done, and you’ll pick up the second before comps. A number of modern programs, though not at top schools, don’t really seem to care. By that I mean they don’t require any evidence of language before entering and from students I’ve met at AAR, they don’t require any before you go.
My department largely doesn’t care for those of us in modern. I came in being pretty decent in Latin and Czech (odd professional sidetrack - I was raised Moravian and wanted to work at the intersection of Moravian and American religious history but a number of faculty already in the area confirmed that it’d be career suicide Due to being unemployable because I’d be too specialized).
 
I did a couple group sessions of French and German translations for reading proficiency and was asked to go and take the translation exams. I’m 100% my work was garbage but it was also stupid easy - could use a digital dictionary and we had four hours to translate a 500 word chunk of text. I essentially went through and translated the major words, and using context clues placed them in an order that made sense.
Never got notification of Pass/Fail. I asked my advisor and he said I was marked as satisfied the second I stepped into the exam room. The department doesn’t require language exams for modern fields but the university says they have to - so you show up, they mark you done, you move on.

Just apply straight for the MDiv programs, they have high acceptance rates. Unless you have very poor grades, there's no real reason to do a PG.Dip. If you're worried about having a foundation, a significant number of your classmates won't have any religious studies/theology background either and from my experience, many of them were better students for it.

You won't get into a reputable PhD program with a 3.2 GPA straight from undergrad and it absolutely won't happen in Philosophy.
If you want a PhD in Philosophy you need to get your MA in Philosophy. If you go the MTS route, be prepared for 1) PhD programs in Philosophy to reject you outright or 2) refer you to their MA program. Philosophy Departments do not like their students having graduate degrees in theology without an MA in Philosophy to go along with it. Some programs don't like students with M* in Theology, no matter how many MAs in Philosophy you pick up. You'll be forever tainted to them.
Apply for every funded, several partially funded, and a few unfunded MA programs that you can afford to send materials to. Unless you just destroy the GRE and/or clutch LORs, you'll ideally land 2-3 acceptances if you apply to 10+ schools with some strategic choices.
I think philosophy applicants still tend to stick to one MA. So, if you produce good solid graduate work, you should count on being closer to 24 when you get accepted into a PhD program. That said, if you don't make it on your first cycle of PhD applications, don't be discouraged! I took a grad course in philosophy and my classmates were almost all later in their 20s and a couple in their 30s - all first and second year students.

I'm fine with you being upset with what I wrote. I could've sprinkled some sugar on it and beat around the bushes, but you need someone in your corner to tell you the hard truth. You clearly didn't have that someone this cycle.
I worked full-time in undergrad, as a line cook and pantry chef. Plenty of people before you, your classmates, and future students worked full-time and still slammed out high grades at probably every university in the US/world. You're nothing special there.
More than five schools work on continental philosophy and religion. That's just poor planning.
If you want to be in a competitive philosophy department you need a M.A. in their field. You can get in to a PhD program without an M.A., your chances are higher than 0% but not by much. If you haven't seen it yet, the PGR (Philosophical Gourmet Report) is considered the preeminent ranking system but it also has a fair share of detractors. Recently Brian Leiter (founder) stepped down from running it and that's for the better - they have a solid Advisory Board in place now. Dailynous.com is also a top site to learn about the field itself, what prof is moving where, where the leaders in the field think the next hot subfields will be, etc.
The people in the Philosophy forum here at GradCafe are far better equipped to handle philosophy questions. I can direct you to some funded M.A. options but they'll know even more. If you're wanting to do a PhD in Religious Studies (or Theology) with a focus in philosophy of religion, I can certainly help there.
My intent was not to hurt your feelings but to simply tell you the truth, nothing more, nothing less.
EDIT: Thanks for the kind words @Boolakanaka!

That's not really something I can answer.
So many applicants with a MTS went somewhere like Duke, Yale, Harvard, etc and were able to cater their coursework to their specific field. That's a lot harder to do with a MDiv.
It's why the MST (one year post-MDiv degree, some schools call it something else) is popular. My professional advice, unless you've already got a solid application and (ideally) the MST is at the same institution you did your MDiv and it's a Top Five school - they're a waste of time. You just can't build the rapport with faculty there for it to mean anything and often your grades for your first semester won't post to a transcript before evaluation.
If you're going to do the MDiv, being encouraged to do a second M* is becoming more common. Doing a second M* after a MTS is also becoming more common, just at a slower pace. If you're doing something language heavy and you didn't also do it in undergrad (i.e., Biblical Studies), you're going to do 2-3 M* degrees. I'm exaggerating on the Biblical Studies front but not by a lot.
Go with the degree that feels right at the time. Damn near all institutions allow students to swap between degrees with permission of their advisor and by signing a piece of paper - that's it. Often, barring a denominational scholarship or something, your aid tends to come with you too. We don't advertise this but we're not looking to lock students into a life they've learned isn't for them.

An MDiv can prepare you for a PhD if you go to a school that'll help you prepare for it. When at all possible, my advice has been: If you want a PhD, go to a school that grants PhDs. It'll put you around such students, you can take courses with them, and the faculty you're around know how the current Admissions game is played. So many faculty at smaller-medium schools graduated in 1978 and haven't sat on a PhD Admissions Committee their entire career.
Being admitted to a MDiv is easier than a MTS but you have to spend an extra year in school. If you have no interest in serving in ministry, running a non-profit, etc -- think long and hard about doing a MDiv.

As a newer episcopal priest myself, here's some things to think over:
1) Ultimately it's going to come down to your bishop. There are minimum guidelines/objectives that all bishops must follow but they have significant freedom in how they meet these guidelines/objectives. Some dioceses have internal formation teams where you study under a priest(s) and fill in holes in your preparation. Some bishops will take your MA/MTS and just send you to do an Anglican year. Some take you as you are and limit your ministry. Some won't ordain you unless you have a M.Div, no ifs, ands, or buts! Unfortunately it's inconsistent and will depend on their and the COM's mood.
Getting through the bishop is, IMO, the easy part. Getting through your PDC (Parish Discernment Committee) and the COM (Commission on Ministry) is the struggle because you're bound to have at least 1-2 people in each group who are stuck in the 1950s model of ministry and worldview. These people will create busy work and throw shit tasks at you just to see if you'll play their game. Just take a deep breath, remind yourself that this process isn't a reflection on/of you, and cross their tasks off. Thank them, pump up their ego when needed to keep them quasi on your side, and move on. Fighting them isn't the hill you want to die on.
2) Decide which of these two options is the most important: PhD or ordination. Do that thing and focus your energies on it. Do the second one as you can. Either of these will be difficult part-time, certainly more so getting a PhD. If you get your PhD at a seminary or divinity school it'll likely put you around episcopal academics and/or priests.
3) You can take the usual Anglican courses that would constitute an Anglican year (history, ethics, theology, liturgy, etc) for personal growth if you want. If the school accepts you to take the course, that's all that matters. You don't need the bishop's permission to take a class. DO NOT though ever frame your conversation with the PDC, COM, or bishop as you taking these courses because you want to be a priest and decided to get a head start. They'll take that as you having already decided rather than discerning. The standard model in TEC (The Episcopal Church) is that you go through a year long discernment process and if they, and you, discern a call to seminary, you sit down with your bishop and they give you a list of schools that they're willing to let you attend. You visit and apply to those and then both parties make a final decision. If you deviate from that it only creates hurdles for you to jump over.
Your next step is to sit down with the priest of your church and tell them that you're discerning a call to ordination. The standard is that you need to be a member in good standing and an active member of the congregation for one year before you can have this conversation. Most bishops will not deviate from this. I have heard of some making slight compromises like being a member and active for six months but then the PDC must meet for six months too. I also have known of seminarians who were about to graduate and their bishop "dropped" them for whatever reason. In those cases you go "Bishop Shopping" to find one to adopt/buy you. Your situation doesn't seem likely to fall into this kind of situation. You'll definitely be told to find a church, be active for a year, then talk about discernment.

Agreed. If your numbers are low, you're going to need the GRE and you're likely shooting yourself in the foot if you don't supply them.

Union Theological Seminary also allows its M.Div students to specialize in Buddhism and Interreligious Engagement.
https://utsnyc.edu/life/institutes/buddhism-program/
 

While true in most fields, Harvard Divinity is a whole different beast. Their 3.0 GPA was, it seems, under conditions that most of us would drop out and merely fight for survival, let alone graduating from college.

While true in most fields, Harvard Divinity is a whole different beast. Their 3.0 GPA was, it seems, under conditions that most of us would drop out and merely fight for survival, let alone graduating from college.

In short, yes - you stand a chance. In reality, probably a very good one.
The situation you find yourself (life events, political culture around you, etc) will all be evaluated by HDS'  Admission Committee when you apply. In your actual Personal Statement, I'd mention just enough to wet their appetite and then have a separate document where you go into more detail, so that they may have a fuller view of what you've gone through. I don't recall HDS' application process on their website so you may need to email this document to have it attached. Odds are there's an additional information section on the actual application though.
The reason I suggest this is that the MTS is an academic degree, so you need to place most of your emphasis there. Simply, you don't want to take up critical space if it's not directly relevant to research interests. You won't be given the same freedom to speak to life events like a MDiv applicant, unfortunately.
Was your MPhil from a university in Pakistan? I only ask because the primary Admissions section says that applicants with an advanced degree can waive the GRE without filling out a waiver form. However, under the international section it says to contact the Admissions office if you're an international student with an advanced degree, to discuss your options about waiving the GRE. This tells me that their waiver process is only automatic for American students, maybe UK/European and Canadians too.