ARealDowner

I'm merely a fellow applicant, so take what I say with a grain of salt. From what I've gathered on here and elsewhere about the admissions process, I think that anything outside of academics (the aforementioned GPA, GRE, research, throw in letters of rec from professors), while it may help you slightly, will have only a marginal effect on the outcome. That said, ceteris paribus I think coming from a military background (especially special forces of some type) would both make you a more interesting candidate as well as send strong signals about your discipline and work ethic. So while I don't think that's going to get your app thrown in the accept pile at an elite school if it wouldn't be there otherwise, if it's coming down to you and a similar applicant without it, I think it would give you the boost over that person. Just my two cents worth.

Indiana Bloomington's was December 1st for international, Jan 15 for American students. It was buried too, they put the international deadline in bold in the middle of the admissions page, and only by digging did you get to the domestic student deadline, I had to tell my recommendation writers to change the date because I didn't see it until later.

Same with Indiana and Vanderbilt's applications, they all have a Jan. 15 deadline. I've got the applications to all 3 of those programs done, but I'm waiting till closer to the deadline for Vandy and WashU to turn it in, just in case I want to tinker with them (Indiana doesn't send out letter requests until you turn it in, so I already finished that).

We had this discussion a page or two back...I think the general consensus was probably not, though if it's more than a day late it's probably a good idea to email the graduate department with an apology and an assurance it's on the way.

Just curious, looking at last years results page (already trying to figure out when to expect to hear back from these places)...how many of you who are applying this year have publications? If so, are you coming straight out of your undergrad or have you been out a few years? I didn't think that was particularly common, at least for those not in a Master's program currently, but I'm noticing quite a few admits posting they had some (plural!)

Though I definitely have sympathy for those who are more qualitatively oriented. Particularly on subjects such as religion, the idea that a statistics- or mathematical modeling-based approach is the best for understanding that type of phenomenon seems a little too unconnected to reality for me. The subtleties and interpretive difficulties for things like that make me feel that something is lost if we assume quantitative research is the only way to conduct political science...

This was my experience completely. Always very good at it, utterly uninterested in the applications I knew of, particularly since I wanted to study politics, something I thought totally unrelated to math. Fast forward to a sophomore year seminar on schools and sects of thought in political science, and I did quite the 180.

That's how I took it...I think BFB has also said before in some thread that they're not draconian about the rec writers having their letters in exactly on time, so I'm not terribly worried. I just hope any other school that his recommendation ends up a bit late to is similarly understanding, because I wouldn't be surprised if this is a recurring problem.

I'm applying to 8 schools, and even that felt like a lot to apply to/ask of my letter writers...but I also wanted to stay within a relatively limited geographical area, eliminating some West Coast schools I might have otherwise applied to. Speaking of letter writer difficulties, I have one professor writing mine who's a chronic procrastinator. He missed the Duke deadline by an hour (which I'm hoping won't be a big deal), but as Ohio State's deadline looms today, he still hasn't gotten his in, and with final exams and papers to grade, I'm not sure when to expect him to. Much time has been spent trying to determine where the line is between frequent reminders and outright obnoxious nagging.

It's my understanding based on advice from several people you're not just supposed to explain what subfield and niche you're interested in (2), but also have a concrete research question you can pose within that area of interest (4). The first post in this thread illustrates what I'm referring to as far as the latter goes: in the second to last full paragraph) I know it might seem counterintuitive to have the two separated, but because my research question derives directly from observations made during research I've done already, I want to briefly talk about said research so the reference to it makes sense.

Wow, that seems like a lot of schools, particularly if you think those are all reaches...if you're pretty unsure, I would take a few of those off the list and include a few schools that might not be quite as competitive to get into. Then again, if you have the additional time and money it would take to apply to those schools (and willing LOR writers!) no reason not to go for it I suppose.

I'm applying for political science Ph.D. programs this semester (several of the same schools as you, actually), and I too wrestled with this for my statement of purpose. My structure looks something like: 1) Introduction - one paragraph 2) What I want to study/why it's an interesting avenue for research - three paragraphs 3) Previous research experience and academic development - one (longish) paragraph 4) Potential research project to pursue - one paragraph 5) Why school X and associated faculty would be a good fit for my research - one (longish) paragraph 6) Short conclusion It's definitely the full two pages that appears to be the limit for most of those schools (trimming it down to 500 words for UNC is going to be difficult). The part of it dealing with a concrete research idea is quite synoptic, I don't think you could adequately address the other sections if you went into excessive detail. I'm a tad worried that I don't devote enough attention to demonstrating fit, but I'm hoping the extended discussion of my research interests is enough to give the committee a good idea of why I would fit in there. As far as examples of previous (successful) Ph.D. applicants' SOPs, I'm not sure...you might try asking in the political science subforum to see if anyone knows anything.

I know, it's been pretty dead compared to previous years it seems. I have to work on sending in the transcripts too, hopefully this week I'll have time to get around to that. I did just hear back from a POI for the first time, only emailed her because I wanted to know if she'd be retiring anytime soon. Got a response back very quickly from both her and a fellow professor she thought was a good fit for me. Both mentioned they thought I'd fit in well at the university, so that was good to hear.

Just took the GRE today, felt good to get it off my back. My quantitative score ended up being higher than my verbal score (which really surprised me, as a former English major who hadn't taken a math class in four years until this semester, I was playing catch-up on math). Did do a four month version of the Magoosh six-month study plan, really helped me a lot. The most recent practice tests I can remember, might be most useful for people to compare: ETS Book Test 1: V 169 Q 166 ETS Book Test 2: V 169 Q 169 Manhattan Test 1: V 162 Q 164 Manhattan Test 2: V 162 Q 163 Manhattan Test 3: V 162 Q 163 ETS Powerprep 1: V 170 Q 167 ETS Powerprep 2: V 166 Q 163 ACTUAL SCORES: V 165 Q 169 Obviously very happy with the Q score, more important for my field. I noticed that the math problems on the real GRE were slightly more difficult than the ETS practice tests, slightly less difficult than the Manhattan and Magoosh problems I did (at least the hard and very hard - there were some at that level, but not many). As far as the verbal, the Manhattan practice tests quiz vocabulary that is way more difficult than the actual test. There were a few questions Manhattan would give me where I didn't even recognize, much less know the definition of, a single word. On the actual GRE, there might have been a couple questions where I didn't know one or two of the words. Magoosh and ETS seemed pretty spot on here. GRE actually seemed more focused on some colloquialisms and common speech when it came to vocab words.

Hello there! I made a poll earlier concerning the subfield of all the 2014 season applicants, it looks like most people here are IR or comparativists. I personally am an American guy, I want to look at legislative institutions (Congress/state legislatures), particularly examining the ways that certain theories of Congressional organization/processes hold true across state legislatures and vary. I'm also interested in the effects of things like polarization and religious identification. So you're not the only one who has broad interests. : )

I could definitely see that, RLemkin. On a related note, I could see them giving more discretion to non-native English speakers on the Verbal score, especially if offset by good TOEFL/writing sample/SOP.

The only thing I would consider is that the mean GRE scores most schools report online somewhere are going to be weighed down a lot more by outliers on the low end than the top...since the ceiling is 170 on each section, and the average reported by top schools is probably somewhere between 160-165 on each section, there's not much room above it. However, if someone got a pretty low score on a section but had an outstandingly good rest of the application, that one very low score is really going to weigh the average down, while the median incoming student's GRE score is actually going to look higher than the average GRE score. More anecdotally, I just noticed that by looking at the data provided by one of the schools I'm considering where the average GRE score per section was something like 162 or 163, but when it broke it down by person, it was a lot of 165-167 range people with a select few sub-155 people thrown in. So take that with a grain of salt - if your GRE happened to be close to that low end, maybe you end up becoming one of the people whose application is great enough in toto to be one of the few that makes it in. However, just keep in mind that something else in your application will have to be that much better than the people applying who are closer to those median scores.

Taking the GRE on Thursday, so it'll be nice to get that out of the way. Other than that, I think I just finalized my list of schools I'm applying to...7 for sure, 3 others that are a maybe. Tweaking/working on my SOPs too.

Well, I just submitted my research honors project for the MPSA conference on the recommendation of my advisor...I wish I was going to find out if I'm accepted before I have to send applications in, but the website only says that submitters will be notified by the end of December, unfortunately. Is it worth mentioning in my Statement of Purpose that I've put in a proposal, but am waiting to hear back, or is that pretty meaningless without an official acceptance?

Well, I listed the options in the order I expected, from most responses to least. It's just a tiny amount of people, and probably not that representative, but it seems to me there are a lot more people interested in international relations and comparative politics than the other subfields. This corresponds with what one of my professors told me about the number of applicants for job openings by subfield too. Does this seem true to you guys?

I've hit a snag in a research project I'm working on, and was wondering if anyone here might be able to assist me. I'm working on a project involving a content analysis of newspaper editorials from the 2009-2010 period, but I'm having trouble finding a comprehensive database of newspapers (and fear one suitable for my purposes might not exist). Ideally, I need something that has full access to at least one major newspaper for each of the fifty states (or some large number of them) during that time period, and that can be searched digitally. The closest I've been able to find is ProQuest's National Newspaper Premiere; however, it's only gotten me through 11 states. Lexis-Nexis doesn't appear to have many more states either. I'd prefer not to have to resort to going to individual newspapers' online archives for reasons of cost and varying quality, so I thought I'd ask here on the off chance someone's done something similar to me and has some useful advice. Thanks in advance for any help anyone can offer.

Just testing out a hypothesis of mine...answer if you're planning on applying to any PhD departments in political science this year. Interested in the results.

Disappointed by the vote, definitely, but greatly encouraged by the demographic splits...16-17 years olds voting Yes at 70+%, and the Nos coming primarily from the 55 and older crowd. While it didn't end up being particularly close this time around, a revisit of the issue a generation from now could have a decidedly different outcome.

Thanks Rlemkin, those viewpoints are actually very helpful, I think I have a better idea for what they're looking for now. Now I just need to keep digging through people department by department. Definitely been lots of article reading this past month.

And potentially all of England. I can't imagine what Scotland's gonna be like the day after if they do vote Yes, I'd do anything to be back in Edinburgh for that. I've even seen the American media start talking about the impact of Scotland leaving the union and making it sound like the end of the world (as far as our relations with Europe, at least). But that's good to know about the SOP. I've just seen some guides online that made it sound like part of the SOP should be a demonstration of your ability to pose an interesting research question and answer it, which I feel is just way more specific than I want to be right now. I feel like if the rest of my SOP can demonstrate my general interests and the types of questions I'd be interested in answering (as well as specific independent research I've done in my undergraduate experience), that will be enough.