strokeofmidnight

You seem to be assuming that the Ivy's/private schools will give out better packages. This might be true as a very general trend, but there have been so many exceptions that this trend isn't very useful. I've applied to most of the top 25 English programs over the course of 3 rounds (long story), received offers from about half of them--all funded. If my (admitted antedocotal) offers are any indication, the Ivy's are actually in the middle in terms of funding. I've received perhaps 15 offers over the years. The top 6 funding packages (for me, at least) ALL came from public schools (and I have a knack for applying to schools that are facing the biggest funding issues). They offered not only a higher stipend overall, but more years on fellowship (ie, no teaching). And 2 out of my 3 application years were in the middle of this recess/crisis. This isn't to say that this is always the case...but I think it would be unwise to shy away from public schools simply because one expects them to have poor funding.

I wish that there was a way of predicting this...but from my previous experience, there doesn't seem to be. My top offers each round always came from the strapped-for-cash public schools...that ones that you hear about in the news because the education system in said state is about to drop into the ocean. Ironically, the funding packages from those programs frequently topped out my Ivy league offers--sometimes by 5 figures each year. It's hard to make comparisons, since "fellowship" can mean different things at each program. At some schools, I would have had guaranteed teaching-free years for 2 or 3 (or even 4) years. At others, I was being offered a lot of cash, but would have had to teach the entire way through. Some programs let me combine TAships with fellowships, resulting in a pretty cushy salary. Others did not. Some schools offered the same funding package to every single accepted student. Others might give out offers that differed by 10,000...or more. (Some schools that claimed to offer the same package actually gave me a much higher offer, which makes me wonder about the across-the-board funding claims). One note about the UC fellowships.... the information that you heard isn't quite true from my (not unconsiderable) experience. This varies from UC to UC, but Berkeley, UCLA, and Irvine at the very least tends to give out more fellowship than non-fellowship offers to their English PhD admittees, though the fellowships are distributed very different and at are different amounts. I would pay attention to the fine print on any UC offer and ask lots of questions (ONCE you're admitted--it just looks obnoxious to ask questions before you have an acceptance letter). The DGS's are expecting it. From my experience, the UC offers are (often--do ask around) far more generous. English Lit PhD students at one UC school, for example, can earn over $30,000 a year (for several years) when their fellowship, optional readerships, and summer funding stipends are taken into account. That isn't obvious from the acceptance letter...so it's something that you should poke around for. The situation may have changed in recent years, but Irvine and UCLA typically give out 5 year offers. Berkeley's offer letter is confusing, but one can assume 6-7 years worth of support for students who are given a fellowship (non-fellowship students are in an odd position for the first two years, but will receive full support from years 3-7). The support actually tends extends for much longer than that, as needed--but one can count of 7 years.

This is going to sound redundant and a bit naive, but from my experience...it's REALLY, TRULY, not about playing to the trends. On the one hand, you don't want to be the lone wolf, working on a project that has absolutely no currency, which no scholar understands or cares about. On the other hand, one of the biggest mistakes that I see (constantly!) are candidates who try to sniff out the "hot topics" and tailor their SoP accordingly--and artificially. It shows and will turn people off. Take the time to figure out what actually interests you. Read more about it. Then, write, research, and read some more. Rethink your interests. Explore the critical conversations around those interests. Repeat over months (and for many of us, years). It isn't lost time--this background will put you in much better shape once you enter grad school. If you take the time to actually figure out what draws you--and why, and how, and what contributions you might make (yes, even at this level), and which programs are the best fit for those interests, you WILL be able to write a strong SoP and writing sample. The writing sample is your contribution to that critical discussion. The SoP is the context for it. If you cut corners (as I did), it'll will show in your application. It always does, even in the apps of candidates who are actually very bright, but went about this process in a way that leaves them feeling as though they have to pretend that they more than they do.

It might not be a bad idea to scroll through some of the previous posts, even if they don't address your precise question. The repeated refrain among successful applicants in these forums is that the numbers (GRE, GPA) and reputation (your CV, your school's rank) count for FAR LESS than most applicants imagine. I can cite dozens of students from no-name schools, with poor GRE/GPA (or all of the above) who had the luxury of turning down multiple ivy league PhD offers. I can also cite dozens of peers with tip-top grades/scores from tip-top schools who got in nowhere...not even into their so-called "safety" schools. It's the writing that counts. Seriously. Your writing sample and SoP will trump almost anything and everything else. Focus on that--not on your grades. Take the next 3 semester (long, if you need it--the vast majority--like, 95%--of extremely successful applicants that I know of did NOT apply straight out of undergrad, but either went through an MA program or simply took a few years to explore non-academic avenues) to develop your skills as thinker and writer, to figure out what projects, topics, ideas, thinkers, writers, etc...that you gravitate towards. To find your own project (however rough), and to make sure that this career path (because a PhD in English is definitely a career path, and an extremely risky and unrewarding one at that) is something that you can't live without. THAT is what is going to get you into strong programs, not a good gpa/test scores.

As everyone noted, this is probably not the right approach. Programs pick students (mostly) based on the strength of their writing/thinking/analysis/research, and how well suited your particular project is for the program's current strength and weaknesses. For the most part, your background won't come into play. If you tell us more about your field, project, training, etc...we might be able to offer suggestions...but not based on your non-MA/international status. If you don't have a good sense of a project (or series of related questions in one or two fields) that you might want to pursue...well, I always hesitate to suggest MA programs (particularly since they're often not funded), but it might be a good idea in this case. If you're hell-bent on PhD programs, that are some programs which admit international students in doves...and make most of them pay tuition. I *really* wouldn't recommend that route, but it's out there if you're interested.

Someone else applied to only 2 (maybe 3?) schools last year, due to severe geographical constraints (including not selling a house). She got into her top choice, with funding. Here's hoping that her luck will rub off on you.

I have serious moral reserves about recommending a non-funded Master's program, but given your situation (and the fact that you're already looking at unfunded MA-esque programs), this is perhaps looking into. I know nothing about Oxford, so I'll leave that for someone else. Romanticism is one of my fields. There are the strong programs (that I'm aware of) which offer terminal MA's. Unfortunately, none of these are funded. UC-Irvine: They actually have some really strong Romanticists, so this might be worth a look. This is a summer master's program (which does have its down sides). You'll want to make sure that the professors you want would be teaching during the summers. If you're interested in theory (and if you're doing Romanticism, you'll need more than passing familiarity with theory), Irvine may be a good bet. UVA: strong program for romanticism. Their master's students take classes with the PhD students, so you should have access to outstanding professors. It is pretty gosh-darn pricy. Brown: the romanticist faculty isn't deep, but from my vague recollection...they have some strong people (if you can find a good match). Again, expensive, but since they take a tiny MA cohort (2-5 each year, I think), you should receive the attention you need. It's possible to do this in a year--but really, ridiculously intense. * There should be funded MA's as well...I'm just not familiar with the strengths/weaknesses of those particular programs.

Are you looking at English programs or Lit/Comp Lit? For English, Brown and Columbia comes to mind. Possibly Berkeley, though that doesn't see to be a strong interest among the grad students.

I know of plenty of "smart writers" who scored under a 5. Much of this has to do with the way grading is done. They're looking for a certain "clear" (read, heavy-handed and blunt) writing style that we--as English academics--are trained to use far more subtly. Ambiguity (even teased out) is not a virtue. They're looking for you to take sides, to make very clear-cut analysis on issues that (even as presented) that are often not that clear-cut. They want heavy transitions (often looking for transitional words, rather than a logically structured argument that can function without an in-order-face work like "Secondly..."). You will be docked for NOT doing this, even if you otherwise handle the assignment correctly. Yeah. Freshman writing style.

I don't know what to make of this. For what it's worth, I also scored a 6 on the AW. I was able to do so NOT because I'm a good scholarly writer (though I hope I am), but because after teaching the GRE for years, I do know how to write for it. (I also grade the AW as a practice exam for a major testprep company, supposedly trained to the same standards as the actual GRE graders). The sort of writing skills needed to score well on the AP is precisely NOT the writing skills needed for English academia. Whenever I teach the AW portion in my classes, I warn my students (particularly my humanities students) that they if they write like this in my classroom, I'll fail them. I'm only half-joking...the sort of writing skills that I'm forced to teach for the AW are precisely the things that work to UNteach my undergrads. It's a blatantly obvious writing style that is valuable for some fields, but far too bunt a tool for English. The AW IS taken seriously by some fields. (Some of my nursing students take the GRE ONLY for the AW score), but not for our field. This isn't to say (I hope!) that we're all one-trick ponies. I can write in a scholarly manner for my field, but in an entirely different manner on, say, my journal. It IS to say that because the AW doesn't accurately reflect our writing abilities for our field, and the ad-comms know this. And yes, actually, I have spoken to the ad-comms. I asked two professors (former advisers) about a friend's "5." One of them burst out laughing and said that she doesn't even remember looking at AW scores while on the committee. The other one waved his hand and said that it doesn't matter, and he never quite understood the AW scoring criteria to begin with.

Cornell baffled me last year. I was one of those accepted but I did not visit (since they refused to pay for my flight), so I can't tell you who or how many others were accepted. Last year was definitely rough. I'm not sure that I understand the mentality, but I suspect that some well-qualified candidates who couldn't find jobs decided to give grad school a shot. That was certainly the feedback that I received from other places (both places that accepted me, and places that did not). Other people who might have been thinking about going to grad school eventually might have either lost their jobs, or couldn't find a new one...and decided that this is the year. Considering that the vast majority (90-95%) of my peers enrolled in my PhD program took at least some time off after undergrad, it wouldn't surprise me that the recession caused people who were thinking of waiting longer to apply now instead.

Echoing the chorus. (It's actually kinda eerie that dietc0ke says that ad-comms view them as a "joke"--I was going to use that exact same phrase). I absolutely would NOT recommend re-taking the GRE's. However, I do want to address a tiny misconception: "It's probably too late to retake the general GRE." It isn't. GRE scores are not that important. With most programs, it won't matter at all if your official scores do not arrive by the deadline, as long as you have unofficial scores to enter in. So technically, you can take your GRE the day your application is due and simply put down your unofficial score from the final page. I wouldn't recommend it, but it's a possibly for anyone who's really down to the wire.

Exactly. I actually wouldn't over-emphasize teaching, at least not for this field (where it is assumed that we will go into academia and inevitably teach. Obviously, the job market suggests other realities, but you don't want to go into this on the SoP). Many schools do seem to pay lip service to teach (and actually take their pedagogy seriously), but I think I can safely say that no one ever admitted a PhD candidate on the bases of their teaching skills alone. With very few exceptions, you're being vetted for your research potential and your research potential only. It's assumed that the program will teach you how to teach, whether or not you came up with some teaching skills under your belt. I wouldn't specifically emphasize research either. It's far more powerful and persuasive to discuss WHAT you'll be researching and the demonstrate through that discussion that you're well equipped to undertake it...rather than to actually state, "I want to research."

I'm curious why you would suggest contacting faculty? The links that inafuturelife gives traces our debate on this matter. I think most of us involved--particularly those who fared well in the application process--were more cautious about advising applicants to contact professors. I'd be interested in hearing a strong response for the other side, though I'm hardly impartial. My own experience (both with giving advice and through several rounds of applications) is that the vast majority of candidate who are asking on an internet forum whether or not one should contact professors...are not well positioned to benefit from doing so. It can be rewarding (though I'd argue that unless one has very compelling reason to do so, the returns are not significant enough to warrant the risk--even for applicants who CAN pull it off). However, it requires such a level of finesse, subtlety, and ease with academic protocols that very few applicants have had the opportunity to master it prior to entering a PhD program. As the debate in the threads emphasized, very few professors will actually let you know if you've annoyed them or crossed the (unspoken, variable, and often arbitrary) line. They'll frequently remain polite and professional even they've acquired a negative impression from that email interaction. Personally, considering our field, the applicant would be contacting someone who is a professional expert at reading in between the lines. A thinly veiled excuse to contact for the sake of getting one's name out there can potentially backfire. Sure, some professors will handle it well and some might even be flattered enough to overlook the potential indiscretion. But from my experience, many of them will be annoyed but are too poised to let that annoyance show through in their response. Perhaps another way of saying this: I absolutely agree with the two caveats that you noted and would in fact add to them: 3) the applicant should be *quite* familiar with the unspoken academic protocols before attempting to contact faculty. (Personally, I would have ruled myself out with the final caveat, despite having been a graduate student for two years during my most recent round of applications. I know professors [at least mine] too well to take that risk).

I don't know if they have a program with that specific name, but it may be worth checking out Notre Dame. They have a strong theology department, and many professors within the English department that deal with the intersections of the two. What are your precise interests? Which questions? What period? What methodologies do you prefer? My guess is that you might have to do some creative researching. Most schools might not have a designated R & L program, but several English departments (I can't speak for Religious studies) might be very receptive to work that dips heavily into religion....depending on how you configure the two fields.