Volition

What is the minimum average that the program requires you to maintain for the required courses? Thanks!

Anyone here that received the phd admission offer from the university of waterloo?

For those who have applied to SFU, you can check your admission decision.

Also yesterday I left the McGill PS department a message pleading to them to take a look at my application in absence of the GRE -- up to that point my application status remained frozen as 'submitted' and never 'under review'. Well anyways, they responded by giving me a rejection letter today... Hey at least I tried ;).

Sorry to hear. Was this just a general rejection letter? May I ask what your specialization is in?

I did not know that McGill required a GRE exam from Canadian applicants -- yet another Canadian university with a strange admission requirement... Damn, that's $100+ down the drain. Oh well, thankfully all my eggs weren't placed in that one basket.

I've been signing all my emails off with 'regards'.... I did not know it has passive aggressive connotations... Though I would say 'kindest regards' so perhaps that helps. But while I am here: Don't fret. Reference letters always seem to have a later deadline than the actual application for most programs; however, I have seen one program who required the reference letters by the application deadlines. I think you should be fine, and your program should allow you submit the reference letter at this point in time.

Has anyone applied to the PhD program for the University of Ottawa? I really want to apply, but it seems that they want the applicants to have their research projects all figured out (which is not the case for the majority of the other applications that I have encountered!).

I was just curious to know how your ESL test will be conducted. Traditionally, unless I'm mistaken, ESL exams always tend to be written, so I'm wondering how a written test would assess your accent, which leads me to suspect that its not your accent that they're taking issue with. In any event, I think you have some valid concerns on being selected for the ESL course, so tell her what you told me in the quote box above, politely affirming to her that you have been exposed to a lot of English for the predominant majority of your studies, if not life. But if you find that she won't budge, then the best you can do is to take the test and take it from there (as the other poster has noted). But to be sure, escalating this benign issue with anyone but the ESL Director will not bode well for you; the negative outcomes severely outweighs the positive ones!

I'm a minority myself, who also happens to have a slight accent, so I hope you don't take too much of an issue with my response that follows. Even though you're feeling discriminated (it's a horrible feeling, I totally get it), I believe you're making a bold claim that your university is singling you out for an ESL class because of your name which suggests a "certain national origin", and unless you have something substantive to actually prove that allegation, I don't believe you'll be successful in this endeavor; I believe they have enough grounds to suspect that you need ESL classes based on your residency in "multiple countries." For now, I would strongly advise against escalating this any further with anyone but the ESL director. With that being said, I'm confused as to why you're required to take the ESL test if its just your accent that they're taking issue with. Unless the ESL test is that of an oral variety, I fail to see its relevancy to your case -- and I believe you should stress this very point with the ESL director!

Being slightly taken back by the massive (yet faintly manageable) reading load for my upcoming courses, I've spent the past short while browsing the forums for reading tips, and although I found several great reading tips hidden in the History subforum, I couldn't find any over here! Over there it is implicitly acknowledged that it's "unrealistic" to read from cover to cover the assigned book readings, and that the main focus of the readings should merely be to identify the thesis, the methodology, and the argument/structure, and this can be done by two ways: 1) thoroughly read the introduction, conclusion (and sometimes the first line of each and every paragraphs) or 2) Read journal book reviews, if available. But to be fair, their reading load seems to be quite brutal! It doesn't seem like our reading load for Political Science is nearly as unbearable as it is for History, and it seems like we're primarily dealing with articles, which, due to the nature of the medium, tend to be more succinct (though we are required to read a lot more of them). I suspect that since our reading load isn't brutal we are expected to read it from word to word; however, I did find a post on here from a graduate student saying that it's not expected for us to read the articles word-to-word, but I'm curious to know if is this true? I have always been used to reading from cover-to-cover during my time in undergrad, so I wouldn't know any better. I was hoping that the Political Science graduate students from this forum can weigh in on this matter, and describe their approach to their reading load in Political Science, and if they can, describe their reading strategy as well as any reading tips that they may have! Thanks!

I got that generic email at around the same time as well, but I did apply to UW. If you didn't apply to any other program save for the one that you got denied, then it is quite likely you may have received that email in error. But.. it doesn't hurt to follow this up with them!

Sorry to hear. Usually funding packages come with conditions, some of them ongoing, so I'm curious to know if yours came with any as well? Chances are they can easily cut your funding if some of your conditions are not met. Did they go in detail as to why your funding is being cut?

Hey guys! I was curious to know if anyone here had a good recommendation for a guide book for writing a solid thesis for Political Science. Throughout my search on Amazon I have came across numerous books -- some generally dealing with Master level thesis while others dealing specifically with Political Science -- so there is a lot to choose from. Does anyone here have that ultimate book they use for thesis writing, preferably for Political Science? I'm looking forward to hearing your recommendations! Thanks in advance.

Hey guys, I was about to create a separate post regarding this topic but I was fortunate to find this one here instead! Just like the OP, I'm in a similar predicament where I'm currently faced with the thesis vs. non-thesis option for my MA in political science (which is a one-year program). But while the OP's program alternative to the thesis is three 25 page papers, my program's alternative is a major research paper of 50-60 pages (in contrast to a thesis of 80-100 pages). The other chief difference between the two options is that the major research paper route requires the completion of six graduate courses but the thesis just only requires four. Considering the fact that the thesis is the more prestigious option, and seeing that the major research paper is merely 20 pages below the thesis at minimum but with a larger course load, would I be correct to think that the thesis option is the best in terms of academic recognition and time investment?