shuniankuaile

Yes. I know someone last year who got into Harvard, Stanford, Berkeley, Columbia; another who got into Yale, Harvard, Columbia, Princeton (did not apply to West Coast schools); Stanford, Harvard, Michigan, Yale; Berkeley, Harvard, Yale; etc, etc. There's something of a snowball effect for many applicants, especially those who get into both Harvard and Stanford. But I also know some who got dinged at several top schools, but then got into only Stanford, or only Harvard. That happens, too.

Harvard, for comparative politics. Thanks for all the discussion. It's been fun!

There's no doubt that the training and guidance I got from my department helped, not to mention letters of recommendation from prominent faculty, but I think that has more to do with being at a top department than my school's name brand. Just to illustrate this point, on these admit weekends, I've been finding that many non-Ivy admits come from places like WUSTL, Rochester, UCSD, UCLA and Northwestern. Anyway, I've had classmates with higher GPAs and test scores fail to get into any graduate school when they applied, which is why I think numbers are far less decisive than the focus of this thread implies. I think the strength of your previous research, your statement of purpose, your letters of recommendation, your letters of recommendation and lastly, your letters of recommendation matter a lot. At least, that's my guess. Who really knows? But maybe that's why this process seems so opaque: letters are the one part of your application over which you have absolutely no control, and which you will never be able to read!

For posterity's sake ;-) BA from a top ivy 3.4 cumulative, 3.7 major GRE: 730Q/720V/6.0W Accepted: Harvard, Stanford, Berkeley, Columbia Rejected: Yale My numbers=it's about a lot more than numbers. Good luck to all the future poli sci graduate applicants of the world!