Satori

Well, apparently yesterday was rejection letter day for those that applied to Emory's Institute for Liberal Arts, the interdisciplinary Ph.D. program. Though I was among them, I have some consolation to offer everyone else who was rejected yesterday. When I met with the head of the department last year, he told me that they had over 100 applications for 3-5 spots. Doing the math, that is (along with Emory's philosophy department and GDR) the worst acceptance rate of any department I've ever applied to. The stats that I've seen of the people who get in vary so much that I know it's not just a matter of a particular GRE cutoff or what have you. My impression is that this has recently become a more competitive program - perhaps the most competitive for this type of program? Anyway, I saw a lot of other folks who were rejected along with me yesterday... and since I had some inside information that may make everyone feel a little less jilted, I wanted to try and help best of luck to everyone

Good stuff... thanks for the post... As entering students, there's an awful lot we can learn from those who are further along. Thanks for taking the time to write this up...

Wow... with scores and academic interests similar to mine, this is interesting to read indeed! Your 0 for 13 record makes me think that you may've applied to all the Ivys... In addition to all of the criteria mentioned so far, it sure doesn't hurt to come from an undergrad school with a big name. I've spoken wtih representatives from several departments over the years (like UVA) that enjoy getting Ivy league undergrads to the extent that they make a point of mentioning it. This is a real blood boiler for me since I went to a state school with a small group of people who all had SATs in the 1500s.... and to think that we're at a disadvantage because we didn't pay > $100,000 for our undergrad degrees is more than a little infuriating. Unfortunately, the liberal arts Ph.D. programs tend to be somewhat elitist. If you're applying to religion, I'd say that the math probably doesn't matter much anyway and I'd go ahead and retake the test. Besides, since you already hit 780 Q, you may get that last question right and score 800. Stupid mistakes are the only real thorny part of the quant section anyway...

Since many of the above comments call out my own experiences, I wanted to chime in with an important tidbit: If you take time off, you risk never coming back. I'm not saying you'll lose interest. After 10 years, my interest is as hot as it has ever been. But after I left my first MA/PhD program with only an MA, I had every intention of reapplying to schools the next year and getting the ball rolling again. But during that time, I took a job that paid a seductive salary (having an additional degree in mathematics can be almost too good in this way) and met the girl who was to become my wife. So even though I only took one year "off" to finish my master's thesis (which I did), I was far enough removed that it made returning to school very difficult. The way I like to put it when people ask why I didn't finish the Ph.D. the first time is that "unfortunately, I'm good with numbers." Now, ten years after submitting my first round of apps as an undergrad, I'm fighting to get back in a Ph.D. program - but without the mobility and general freedom that I once had. One of my good friends, who is now a medical doctor, received a piece of advice from an older doctor that stuck with me when he was in school. He told my friend to finish his M.D. as top priority and not to worry with relationships or much of anything else until it's done. People that take time off, get married, have kids, and whatnot are far less likely to finish their terminal degree. The same goes for moving away from the school where you're doing grad study ... things to keep in mind.

I just wanted to let everyone who has posted here know that their stories are appreciated. Since I have a small child and two jobs with a wife that works, I also feel like I'm tempting the symplegades in applying to Ph.D. programs at this stage of my life. Not everyone understands, to put it mildly. And I'm competing with people that are much more mobile, sometimes younger and in many cases, from better universities with better scores. But since we're talking about Literature, we're also looking at a ubiquitous academic presence and similarly commonplace job availability. Since I don't have any illusion (or desire) to go Ivy and compete at the highest levels - I just want to study what I love and to teach - I believe I can make it work. My confidence has increased by reading some of the stories here at least.

Thanks. Yeah, I picked an awfully difficult year to apply. I've heard from several faculty now that they're receiving more applications than normal... as it turns out, when we have a recession, a lot of people look to head back to school. Hopefully next year will be better. Since I already have my master's, I don't really need another... the foreign language bit is a good idea though. I'll definitely be working on that, whether formally or not.

With all the success reported here, perhaps its time to report a casualty. I got rejected from the last program that I applied to yesterday. So no grad school for me this Fall. I'm currently trying to figure out which departments/schools its even worth bothering to apply to again next year. One of the most frustrating things about this process is how difficult it can be to get any useful information out of the schools. Many professors just simply don't answer emails and are never near the phone. I was told by one faculty member that I met in person about this as he said "...and you might take that as a good indication of who is and isn't going to be good to work with." More than anything else, I just need to know if the decision was even close... and getting that information from the departments can be VERY difficult. What I want to know is, why? With something that you know is so critically important to someone else, is it really that much trouble to spend two minutes answering an email?

If it makes anyone feel any better, the news I'm hearing says that the GRE is up for major revisions next year... no analogies, antonyms... moving away from the computer adaptive test (CAT)... finally! Oh, and am I the only person here who feels like they have a scarlet letter on their chest for being a part-time Ph.D. applicant? I can't be the only one with a family that needs me to be something other than a full-time grad student, but still has all the motivation in the world to get through a program.... right? I think I have a strong application aside from that... but that one immutable thing may spell defeat. And if I get just one more rejection this year, then that's it (only one department has yet to respond... so there's still hope)

No, that doesn't follow... it's like any other intelligence test. There's some variability in the scores, but ultimately, it's hard to raise your score above a certain mark no matter how much you prepare for any given person. This is why they say it's unlikely that you'll see an increase of over 100 points... because that would make your two scores statistically different. And that's unlikely for an individual. There's actually a lot of literature out there about this... I'm not just guessing or making it up. The analogy and reading comp questions are perfect examples of the type of questions you'd see on traditional intelligence tests. It's no coincidence that you see the same thing on the GRE. And what is the best overall indicator of intelligence with language? Vocabulary. So that's a big component too. Sure, you can study for it. And you'll improve. But the colleges like this too since that measures intelligence + motivation... which is also a key characteristic. So it's a win-win for them. I don't know about you, but I've taken the SAT, ACT, GRE and GMAT at various times in my career. And my scores are very close.. varying to about, well, the delta that I mentioned above for the GRE.

It's basically an intelligence test... so I don't see them getting rid of it. It'd just be nice if it were more accuracte and less subject to a few lucky or unlucky guesses.

When I met with a graduate director last year, he told me that their applicants "generally have a five or better" on the written section, but that it didn't matter that much since they get a writing sample from the students and a statement of purpose. Personally, I think ETS needs to double the length of the verbal and math sections and eliminate the analytical section altogether. It takes about half of your time at the testing center to write essays that no one really cares much about... then you have half an hour (which may be at the very end of four hours) to answer 28-30 questions which do the most to determine your destiny than almost anything else in your application. And this results in an accuracy of +- 50 points for a section (this is something that ETS officially states in their literature). I was willing to study for about a month for my GRE... I certainly would be willing to spend longer than 30 minutes to get an accurate verbal score since it matters so much! By the way, if you look at the percentages, a lot of people score a five or better anyway (73rd percentile). So it's really and truly not all that useful to the schools, especially the very competitive programs.

Naturally, as soon as I posted my bit about Duke, I wandered around and discovered something even more interesting... They report a LOT of statistics for their entering grad students (and have the information as far back as 2000). Here's the one for their grad school in general (http://gradschool.duke.edu/about/stats.php) and here's the one for religion in particular (http://gradschool.duke.edu/about/statistics/admitrel.htm). What you'll notice is that the 760 that I found to be a staggering statistic was, in fact, just an anomaly. Their real average is in the low 700s, a much more reasonable number. The GRE is all messed up, though, since the 95th percentile for math is at 800 while it's at 670 for verbal... but that's topic entirely, I suppose... Unfortunately, from what I know of admissions committees (my wife sits on one for a grad dept in a different discipline) and despite ETS' admonishment to the practice, there really is a cut-off. Even if it's not a hard and fast rule, in practice, there is one. So, the tired phrase follows that a good score won't guarantee admittance, but a bad score will preclude it. The only personal issue I have with this aspect of the process is that unless the student makes an effort to get to know the faculty, the faculty do not frequently make much of an effort to get to know the prospective students. Especially for people on a waiting list (as was my experience in 2000-2001 with Duke), it surprises me that more effort isn't made to get to know the students and gauge their "fit" and likelihood for success based on direct conversation with the student as opposed to the admissions committee meetings with only a few papers and numbers.

I know this was last year, but it's always relevant, right? This kind of information is notoriously difficult to find. It's really obnoxious, honestly. As an applicant, obviously, I don't want to waste my time and energy getting excited about working with certain people and attending certain schools if my GRE scores are not in the ballpark for them. So here's some information that I hope everyone will find interesting and useful. From the Duke GDR website at http://www.duke.edu/...ssions/faq.html "For the 2007-2008 admissions cycle, Ph.D. students admitted to the Graduate Program in Religion presented a mean GRE verbal score of 760 and a mean GRE quantitative score of 720." For those of you who don't already know GRE statistics intimately, this is an astronomical average for the verbal score. You hit the 99th percentile at 700. So 760+ is very, very rare. Unfortunately, it's somewhat in the department's best interest not to publish these things. They don't want to unnecessarily eliminate candidates up front who might otherwise be a perfect "fit" for the program. The problem is, if you are not otherwise networked with the school and don't have that perfect "in" with a particular faculty member, these statistics are awfully useful. When I applied for Ph.D. programs in philosophy back in 2000, my impression was something like this: ~1300 for fellowships at state schools, ~1400 for lower-tier private and ~1500 for upper tier private. Here's the other bit of information that I found while scouring the ETS information on the GRE. Statistically speaking, you cannot meaningfully differentiate two GRE scores on a single section that are within 50 points of one another. So, if you have a 670 and a 720 from two different students, you cannot justifiably say that one student has more verbal ability as measured by the test. This extends to 100 points for the composite score. What this means is that any score above 1500 is, unless the variation is entirely within one section, indistinguishable from any other in that same range. I'd be interested in what others' expereinces are with this.... I've gotten the impression that the GRE scores for a particular school don't vary all that terribly much in general from the SAT scores for their undergraduates. You have some programs that stick out, for sure. But in general, they seem somewhat similar... this is perhaps because of the "university-wide" nature of the fellowships. That would tend to favor the creation of departments with similar constituencies. Anyone have any insight on this?

Interesting to hear from someone in the same boat. I'm also pinned down to Atlanta (with Emory offering the only Ph.D. in Religion in the entire state of Georgia) and only applied to Emory.... and I also haven't heard yea or nay from them yet. I'm in ARC, though, so we shouldn't be in competition with each other since you're in HS. Good luck!