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I wouldn't apply with anything less than a 4.3

He's getting his Ph.D. in history/religion. McDonald's is not out of the question. <duck> But yeah, it's a good thing that you're emotionally connected to your grad school applications. If anything, your passion will come through in the paragraph and increase your chances of getting in.

Oooh. Where are you at? I'm teaching in Hanzhong, outside of Xi'an, until February.

I'm currently finishing up my essays for Fletcher's early admissions. They require two essays: a forward-looking statement of purpose and a past-looking supplemental essay. I finished my statement of purpose and am mostly satisfied with it, but I have run into some difficulty with the second. This year, the questions are: 1. Share something about yourself to help the Admissions Committee develop a more complete picture of who you are. or 2. Tell us more about how you first became interested in international affairs, or in pursuing an international career. or 3. Describe the elements of your personal, professional, and/or academic background that have prepared you for your chosen career path. I ended up doing #3. I thought it was decent until I attended a recent Fletcher chat where they advised a student to avoid repeating their resume in their essay. I'm finding it very difficult to avoid repeating my resume when it comes to describing my preparations for graduate school. As someone who did not become interested in international relations until undergraduate and is applying with only one year of work experience, I don't know how else to explain my background without using the extra-curricular activities and work experience found in my resume. I included my educational background, of course, but that's about it. Any advice? Edit: I realized after looking over this post and my essay that I'm not even answering the question. It's asking for my preparation towards my desired career, not graduate study. With that in mind, I think I'll be able give that essay better direction, although I'm still unsure how to avoid repeating my resume.

And like this <poof> he was gone. Your results may vary.

Exactly. There are lots and lots of soft rules. That's why this board is here. However, breaking one of the few hard rules shows the adcomms that you aren't willing/able to follow simple instructions and that can only look bad on your application.

Oooh, good thread. I am applying to Korbel, Tufts, Georgetown, and George Washington. Georgetown is my long-shot school, and if I get into that it is going to be very hard to justify not going there. I think my choices are going to come down to Tufts and Korbel, much like you. Both of their programs are interesting to me. I particularly enjoy Korbel's emphasis on human rights. On the other hand, Tufts seems to fit me perfectly, and I haven't seen one thing that I haven't liked about their program, faculty, or students. I don't have any particular questions at the moment but I'll be watching this thread.

Don't sell yourself short. Why do you want to study international relations? With the exception of your GRE scores, I think your stats are good enough that any adcomm would take a decent look at you. If you can set yourself apart with a solid statement of purpose, I don't see why you should settle with middle-of-the-road graduate schools. What are you specific interests in regard to international relations? There may be some schools that are considered "average" but have excellent faculty in a particular area. Do you have any experience abroad, and if so, in what capacity? As for your GRE scores, do you think that they can be improved on if you spend a few months studying? If you feel that your scores may be significantly improved by taking the test again, I would highly, highly recommend doing so. Even if you didn't raise your Q score at all, raising your verbal score by a hundred (I know it sounds far-fetched, but it is certainly possible) would give your portfolio some added strength. That being said, I guess I didn't answer your original question. I'm sure some of the regulars can answer much better than I can, but I don't think any conclusive ranking exists for terminal MA masters programs outside of the top 20 or so.

Can you get in what?

Grad school ad-comms are looking for a diverse group of people to come to their school every year. That being said, I think it's about 20-30% of students who come straight to work. The average age for most of the programs I am applying to is anywhere from 25-27 with work experience of 2-3 years. I'm applying to the top graduate schools with what will be only one year (at matriculation) of work experience in a field that isn't directly related to my interests (I'm teaching ESL in China). My lack of work experience is one of the things I'm *least* worried about. I'm more worried about being able to convey my passions and interests in my statement of purpose without using the words passion and interest half a dozen times. Don't worry too much about your work history. They use it to evaluate 1) a demonstrated interest in the field, and 2) your ability to handle grad school. You only need to worry if you don't think your GPA, GRE, LOR, and SOP can't do that.

And this is why I sometimes have to bang my head against the desk while reading these forums.

Just got back from taking the GRE, ended up with 600V 770Q, and I'm concerned my verbal is too low to be competitive in top IR schools. I was hoping that the GRE would round off an other-wise mediocre student profile. 3.62 GPA from a (barely) top 100 school. Majored in history/philosophy minored in poli sci / sociology. President of a religious org. for a semester. President of a current-affairs forum for a semester. 3 years as a Resident Assistant. No applicable work/internship experience. Decent amount of volunteer experience. I know that the most important thing is having a solid SOP, but does my low GRE score eliminate my chance of getting into top IR masters programs ? (Tufts, Stanford, American were my top 3).