valys

Apologies for the delayed response - I didn't realize I wasn't getting notifications. Thank you for your help. I've never applied to PhD programs... I wish I'd applied this year, but life, etcetera, etcetera. I applied to the M.A. program in March, after the PhD deadlines were all past. For LORs, I think they'd be average at best right now. I don't have anyone from the last four years who I could speak to my academic research skills. I don't really have a good GPA excuse; I took hard classes after transferring and graduated early, and I could probably have a LOR mention that but I don't know that that really qualifies as extenuating. Anyway, do you think that the grad school GPA will help even though it's from an entirely different field? And I didn't realize PhD transferring was a possibility. I think my major was around 3.7 too actually, but I'd have to look it up again to be sure. Points 1 and 3 are the main value I expect from this M.A., and a bit of 4 too since I'd think the professors will help me figure out exactly which programs I'd be best in. If you don't mind my asking, what tier of program were you ultimately able to get into?

Greetings - I'm new here so I hope this is the right place to ask my question. My goal is to be admitted to a top 30-ish PhD in political science program starting in Fall '17 - I think I'd like to specialize in political economics, but that's liable to change. I currently have an offer to get a MA at Brandeis this year, so I'm trying to figure out whether or not I should accept. The main downside (besides the time) is that the only guaranteed funding I'll have is from an alumnus scholarship, so the tuition cost will be at least 20k. Will the MA help my PhD applications this fall enough to justify the cost? To give you an idea of my background: I graduated in 2012 from a top-40 national university, but my GPA was only 3.47. However, I double majored with a senior project in history and a research honors thesis in politics (I also graduated early but I doubt that counts for anything) with a handful of school-level publications. I received a master's in industrial relations (business school program, top-3 of its kind nationally) with a 3.78 GPA, but there was no research involved. I did TA (grading mostly) for one course at the business school. I graduated at the end of 2014 and haven't really done anything academic since, although I've been reading a lot, slowly working on some theoretical stuff using public databases, and tutoring a few students. My old GRE is going to expire before this fall, but it was 164V/162Q/5.5. I didn't prepare for it and I've developed much stronger quantitative scores since I last took it, so I'm cautiously optimistic that I'll do at least that well when I retake this summer (I'm aiming for 165+ in both V and Q). My understanding is that my undergrad GPA isn't "awful" but is a serious weakness, and I don't know whether my IR graduate GPA matters to politics adcoms. My letters of recommendation would either be rusty, non-professors, or unable to speak to my research skills (but fortunately no more than 1 of the 3 in each case). My hope is that the MA would strengthen my LORs and remove any doubt about my GPA... but is it necessary for me to get into a top 30-ish school? On the other hand, is my profile flawed in a way that I probably won't be able to get into a top flight program even with the MA? I deeply appreciate any help or guidance!