aphelion

Thank you for your reply! (And sorry for my own late response -- I only saw it this evening.) I'm mostly interested in NRMs with Christian roots, but I take an interest in UFO religions as well. I wasn't aware of the Western Michigan program; most of the information I've seen on the Web has focused on a small handful of programs, and I feel like there must be a lot of great programs out there that I'm just not hearing about. I'll definitely be taking a closer look at that program. UCSB's program looks great and they've been on my radar for a while; so I'm almost certain to apply there. Up until a few days ago I was very interested in the UVA program, but my spouse is Jewish, and with the reports coming out of Charlottesville about lack of police protection given to area synagogues during the rally I'm no longer sure we would feel safe in the area.

Thank you for such a kind and thoughtful reply! I'm still in my last couple of years of undergrad, so I've got a little time to figure this out before I start applying to M.A. programs (I have a previous master's in an unrelated field, so I'm a second-degree/second-career student) and making concrete commitments to an area of study, but I didn't want to leave looking at programs until the very last minute. I'm actively considering a few areas of interest, but I'm particularly drawn to new religious movements and American religious history. The former has been a particularly difficult area to research in terms of graduate schools.

I hope this isn't a stupid question, but I figured it was worth asking since my own research has turned up surprisingly little. I've seen a lot of references on here to first-tier and second-tier grad schools for religious studies. Is there some ranking of programs that is accepted as more or less definitive (or as close to objective as you can ever achieve when looking at an overall program)? I've seen one from theologydegrees.org, but I'm not sure how helpful or applicable you all find it, or if there is another list out there.