[send additional score reports]

For old scores: you can order additional score reports through the phone system, but online is giving random error messages. As of yesterday evening.

what genius at ets thought it would be a good idea to make this grand change NOW in the middle of application madness?

Amen.

[What is your ranking breakdown?]

I'm applying to programs in history, religion, and various mixes thereof. My history programs are all 30-40 (US News), for some reason--this is just where the people with my speciality happen to teach. Religion rankings are...screwy, and don't really apply to my sub-subfield, but in the overall accepted hierarchy it is one undeniably top 10 (where I will be rejected; yay for app fee waivers or I wouldn't bother) and one top 30ish (where I am fairly sure I will be accepted).

[Switching fields]

I don't see how I could justify it to an adcomm

I am considering switching from an MA/BA in religion to a Ph.D (well, probably MA/Ph.D combined programs) in history, and the people at the departments I have talked to seem much more interested in whether I can write a historical paper than in my justification of the switch. I realize that history and religion are much more closely linked than, say, classics and astrophysics, but I think that something similar might apply. The applicant would have to have the relevant background--it's not like you can start an M.A. program and enroll in Rocks for Jocks your first semester, right? So the interest would already be there, on your transcript. I think it's fairly common for people to get far enough into one undergrad major before realizing they're not cut out for it that it becomes sort of pointless to drop it.

[Anyone Visited Schools Yet?]

::goes and asks people she knows::

::returns::

"I meant the students. The faculty owns all."

"The students. If Jesus came back he would fit in with the faculty there."

"Are you on drugs? Never say anything bad about Duke, ever."

"Hauerwas and Jesus can fight it out for the place at God's right hand." (Response: "Hauerwas could make God grow a second right hand to sit at.")

Sorry for the confusion and any offense. I really, really, really did not mean to imply any sort of smear on the faculty. At all. It's tops in the world for a reason.

And honestly, I have no personal experience with Duke (not applying there, either). This is from ex-Div students, giving their perspective on Ph.D students there. And they all said that the Ph.D students felt roughly the same way about them. ;o) So maybe it's more of a Div/Rel rivalry there?

Eh. What do I know.

[Anyone Visited Schools Yet?]

Mm...no personal experience with either Harvard. But theology as a whole is sort of a douchy discipline, I think ("odium theologicum"...you all have heard this term, right?).

Incidentally, there are several people at my current school who came from Duke Div, and they are all (a) perfectly wonderful people who ( thought the people in Duke's Department of Religion (not Div School) were "asshats--and I can say that because they're all atheist sorcerers and going to hell" (his words, not mine ). (But you're applying to Classics, not Reln, right?)

So maybe it is a div school/academic department thing? I am at a university, and we consider ourselves somewhat unique in our non-douchiness.

["List the other programs you're applying to"]

So some of the online applications want you to fill in the names of the other programs to which you're sending applications.

Is this just for statistical purposes? I mean, there is no way that, say, Yale (I'm not applying there) would say, "Oh, she's not applying anywhere else, so we better accept her." Or is it a sort of check-up on "is this person serious about this subject, or is he just applying to our program in Comic Book Collecting for the heckuvit?"

What are you all doing for this?

(Admittedly, this is a problem for me mostly because I'm still not sure where all I'm applying...)

[How many schools are you applying to?]

I PMed you about St. Louis.

I haven't fully decided yet where I'm applying. That's a bad thing. 4 places for sure...maybe 5, *maybe* 6, but that's a *very* maybe. I keep getting "our medievalists don't work with grad students..." /sigh

[discouragement]

Why not apply for M.A. programs? That way, instead of having to be so specific on a direction, you can just say something like "I am interested in further exploring the economic history of early modern France" and "I am very inspired by the work of [insert name of Rock Star Historian]."

The theology equivalent of that got me into great M.A. history of religion programs, for what it's worth. I didn't apply to any Ph.Ds the first time around (I will let you know how round #2 goes in the spring, haha), but I imagine the committees would have had a raucous laugh at my application if I had.

[Other than US history?]

You'll be considered as an Europeanist so you'll face stiff competition from others interested in Europe, including Britain, France, and Germany.

Is it really that straightforward, though? I mean, some schools have a separate Eastern Europe division or subdivision, and at (some, at least) larger programs it has more to do with availability of professors in specific subject areas rather than broader field. Of course, if it's an admit-1-per-subfield program, we're all probably screwed anyway, right?

I do medieval Euope (western, though...probably focusing on Germany because I find Middle German the easiest of the vernaculars), which at some places is its own field and at others is lumped into "Europe." Joy.

[Denominational affiliation - does it affect your chances?]

I am a Protestant student in an MA program at a Catholic school, with full funding. I can let you know this spring how it works out for me and the Ph.D. However, of the current Ph.D students whose denominations I know, it's probably about 50:50::Prot:Cath. *Most* Ph.D students get either full or half funding, but I'm not sure what the numerical breakdown there is. The Ph.D program is strictly historical theology, though, and for some reason attracts a large number of "recovering Pentecostals" nevertheless interested in studying Pentecostalism.

Some programs are (in)famous for denominational favoritism--it is, reportedly, nearly impossible to get into Notre Dame's systematics Ph.D/Th.D unless you, um, check "Catholic" on your application.

People have also mentioned that theology programs (I'm not sure about biblical ones, though) in the (Deep) South are prejudiced against applicants from evangelical traditions, or maybe just degrees from evangelical colleges. I have no firsthand knowledge of this.

I would think denominational affiliation might make a difference at a seminary versus a university-based program, but that's more of an assumption than anything else. And certainly if it's a religious institution of any sort you would want to see if they make you sign a pledge of belief in scriptural inerrancy (well, duh, sorry to state the bleedingly obvious).