commreader

Hi everyone, I'm a new user of this forum, and I was wondering if any of you might be willing to offer input on my situation. I finished my undergrad degree last May, and am working on applications to Comm Master's and PhD programs right now-- specifically schools that are strong in the areas of political communication and/or new media. I've done a decent amount of research already-- a thesis (an experiment on user-to-user online interactivity and political emotion), two research assistant positions with prominent professors in my field (one of which led me to be an author on a conference presentation), and a research associate position at the U-M Institute for Social Research. Most of my work is in political communication, though some is in survey methodology as well. My top two schools are UPenn and Stanford-- both strong in my areas of interest, both well funded, both with excellent faculty, and both extremely selective (obviously). I have been advised to seek out programs that allow students to start in the PhD program rather than getting a Master's first, but I'm a little nervous about not having a Master's degree or a lot of outside experience (right now, I'm a survey manager for a private organization). I'm also applying to the programs at Wisconsin, U-Washington, USC, UCLA, Michigan, Illinois, and UC-Santa Barbara (some of which are Master's-first), as well as a few others. I have strong grades, pending GRE scores (2 weeks to go...), but no published articles (though a paper from my thesis is under review). Knowing all of this (sorry for the long post!), do you think any of these programs are realistic? In your opinion, how much does post-undergrad experience matter? Thanks! I would love to hear from anyone with an opinion!