Alright, well I have officially decided, so I'll post now.
Accepted: Cornell, UC-Santa Barbara
Waitlisted: Michigan (interviewed at prospective weekend, waitlisted, but ultimately rejected), Stanford (still up in the air, but most likely rejection)
Rejected: Princeton, Berkeley, Toronto
Attending: Cornell
AOI: ancient philosophy, intellectual history
Degrees: B.A. from large public university w/ a Ph.D. program, double major Classics and Spanish, studied abroad for one semester in Rome
GRE: 166 V, 158 Q, 5.5 AW
GPA: 3.86 cum., 3.96 classics
Professional: 1 year full-time Latin teaching experience (grades 7-12), no publications
Greek & Latin: 10 semesters Greek (including 3 grad seminars), 7 semesters Latin + 1 year in high school. Extensive reading in Greek, slightly less in Latin
Other languages: second major in Spanish literature, German (5 semesters), French (3 semesters), Italian (1 semester). I recommend doing a Romance language as much as you can, since it really helps with reading other foreign languages. I felt like Spanish and Latin reciprocated and each helped me with developing skills in the other, and after so much Spanish, learning French was ridiculously easy. Of course, I was lucky to have chosen a Romance language as a second major, but I will say it was worth the extra investment, even after I decided that I was going to pursue Classics professionally.
Writing Sample: Taken from my honors thesis, which focused on characterization and genre in Plato's Symposium, roughly 30 entries in the bibliography, showed some competence in French critical theory.
Letters: Three from Classics faculty with whom I had worked quite a bit. 2 Greek literature specialists and 1 late-antique historian.
Advice: Honestly, I could have put more effort into my applications, but I don't believe the payoff would have been guaranteed. All the schools that showed interest in me remarked on my writing sample, and I think decisions really do come down to it. Greek and Latin are important, but there seems to be a threshold that if you pass, you are okay. I recommend putting more effort into your sample rather than, say, taking another language course (if you have to decide between the two, and you are at the advanced levels of both languages). My statement of purpose was well-polished, but I think I spent too much time worrying about perfection. If I had to do it again, I would now write something rather simple and direct, and tailor it more to each school. I only changed small portions of the statement for each department. I think it helps to mention particular articles/books which influenced your work by the faculty at each school. If you are writing a thesis, try to incorporate material from potential graduate advisors so you can show a real interest in their work.
Skype interviews suck. Mine with Cornell felt like a disaster, but I still got an offer. The visiting days are intense, but generally great.
I should have applied to more schools, even if I felt like the fit was tenuous, sometimes it is hard to read exactly who will like you and who won't. Don't take rejection personally, there are tons of qualified applicants and only so much funding. Even though I only got two acceptances, serious interest from two other schools feels like a great achievement. Remember that these schools are taking a bit of a risk investing in you, but they do want to produce good scholars who will reflect positively on the department.
Anyway, good luck to everyone next year, and feel free to PM any questions. I probably won't be on here much anymore, but I may check back every once in a while.
