Hamb

Awesome, that's fairly close to what I've been doing. I have overall subjects and variables within my subfield of choice, I was mostly just worried about not posing specific questions. My topic is inherently broad and covers a wide spectrum of variables, but I've been posing topics with roughly the specificity you included.

One thing I've researched a good amount but can't seem to get a grasp on is how specific we should be with our research proposals? Is the concept to have a specific region or area of interest, but versatile enough to appeal to multiple members of the faculty? Or should we really be describing specific questions and specific methods? Seems like a hard thing to balance, being specific enough to ensure that research fit is there, but vague enough to make sure more than 1 professors work interest me. Am I doing something wrong or is that kind of the intention?

When it came to writing papers for classes, I had a professor make a statement that has stayed with me for years. Every word that goes over the limit must have substance behind it and make the paper better. If you repeat yourself or insert unnecessary information in a paper that goes over the limit, then it's a double whammy because not only is it poor writing, but you're ignoring instructions to include poor writing. I'm just another applicant for this round, and you'd have to ask admission committees to know for sure. My guess is that if everyone else is writing around 500 words, and yours comes across their desk at over 700, then it will be noticeable. Only you can decide whether you feel the it's worth the risk.

I've seen a lot of mixed things on this forum and elsewhere on writing samples, so I'll see what all of you are planning. Thoughts on using the most well written paper you have versus one that is a bit more quant heavy? My standout paper is in Political Theory even though I'm not applying for that, and I can't decide whether it's better to submit a weaker paper with a more standard political science approach or just stick with the best paper. Some seem to suggest that having a paper that replicates your focus is best, while others just say that professors want to see what your best writing level is.

Alright, I'm not a professional writer and others are going to be far more qualified to critique, but I did get a 6 on the writing and here's some advice. Feel free to accept it or reject it however you like. If you really want a high writing score, look for paid resources, they'll be better than a random person such as myself. Regarding the 1st paragraph, I feel like you're better off splitting it in two. Start the paper with your 2nd sentence, it's a much smoother opening to the paper. Then hit them with your thesis, your first sentence. Your thesis clearly states your position, which is good, but in almost too straight forward of way, if that makes sense. I took these suggestions and reworked it a bit. "Technology has offered humanity a set of tools to simplify everyday activities, since computers, microwaves, freezers, laundry machines, etc. While the statement in the prompt has some merit to it, I disagree with the present passage because it states a bias and incomplete argument." Careful about calling it a bias, that term carries a negative attitude. While you are disagreeing with the person and presenting why you believe they are incorrect, it's generally better to do so by considering the benefits of their argument and discussing why other things are outweighed. You do that in your paper, but the term bias feels out of place and a bit harsh in my opinion. Then you can continue on with the 3rd, 4th, and 5th sentence all making a case backing up your initial claim in what would be your new 2nd paragraph. By breaking it up into 2 smaller paragraphs, it's more clear to the reader where your opening thoughts/thesis, and then body paragraphs are. 2nd paragraph is good. I'd warn against too many "howevers, on the other hand, or Thus's". Use these to really highlight the statements where you're shifting from benefits to negatives, or want to emphasize a point. Too many, and I don't think you have too many but it's close, lowers the impact. Use these to highlight to the reader a key point that must be understood. Your 3rd and 4th paragraphs have a fair amount of grammatical errors. Make sure you're leaving enough time for review (I left 5 minutes and found it about perfect, you may need more or less depending on length and reading speed). Your word choice is pretty impressive and would get you some points, but the amount of grammatical errors is noticeable. The very first thing when reviewing is making sure there are no grammatical mistakes. Beyond that, I'd try to work on sentence structure a bit (though it's not bad), because right now it reads a little choppy due to what I mentioned about the 2nd paragraph. This hopefully won't come off as too harsh a critique, because I don't think it's that bad and your positives are there for sure. I just think that GRE readers are likely to hit you for the grammatical errors, especially those in the 3rd, 4th, and 5th paragraphs so try to work on those. While now I review my critique I notice I spent a lot of time on your 1st and 2nd paragraphs, know that those are more stylistic and nit-picky, the grammatical errors in the 2nd half of the paper should be your #1 focus. I would hazard a guess from reading it that you were in the process of reviewing it and the 30 minutes ran out sometime towards the end of the 2nd paragraph?

Undergrad: (B.A.) World Politics Major, Philosophy Minor from a mid tier Big 10 institution. 3.8+ GPA Master's Degree: (M.Sc.) Interdisciplinary program in Politics, Economics, and Philosophy from a European school. The university has an ok reputation overall, but our program is pretty selective at around a 10% acceptance rate. A- equivalent GPA GRE: 160s Verbal, 160's Quant, high AWA LOR: 2 from Undergrad institution. One I had 2 courses with and they also supervised my bachelors thesis. Another I only had one course with but it was a smaller class and I'm extremely comfortable with their ability to speak to my academic strengths. Both wrote LoR's that helped me get into selective master's. Finally a professor with a PhD from an ivy league school who I had all semesters of my master's and is supervising my master's thesis. Research: Probably the weakest part of my application, I have my bachelor's thesis, master's thesis, and mostly just work in class. Any internships and jobs I've had haven't really had an academic research side to them, which is why I'm hoping that my LoR's can sell my research and writing ability. Focus: I would describe my focus more on specific topics themselves (almost all within global governance issues) and not the standard subcategories that schools typically pursue, and so depending on which department I'm applying to will apply to different fields. One question for those uncomfortable with evals but open to other questions, how hot is interdisciplinary studies these days? I've heard extremely mixed attitudes from Professors, some saying it's really attractive and other's saying that subfield loyalists are often times dismissive. Which have you experienced more? Schools: Planning on applying to 3 top 10's, 3 top 20's, and 4 in the 20+ category. I'm really unsure if my application is competitive enough for top 10's or 20's, as my limited research experience seems a detractor. However; I'm also hopeful my master's might carry a little bit of weight, but once again I'm unsure if interdisciplinary will help or hurt. Thoughts on the range of schools I'm likely to be accepted to? Am I doomed to 20+? Thanks for any feedback.

Undergrad was a 3.82 and a 3.81 was the cutoff for top 10% of graduating class.

I went to an american Undergrad with a 3.82 GPA before pursuing a masters degree in Germany. I'm now looking to apply to US programs for a phd. They use a different system over there, and in my program I finished with a 2.1 (without my thesis grade). Now a 2.1 in their scale isn't great, but it is above average in my program (2.4). I was told by our program head that historically the grade would place me 9-12th in my program of 30. Has anybody run into issues with converting their grades from a system that hasn't suffered from grade inflation? The common quick conversion formulas put my GPA at a 3.5, but like I said it's still top 1/3rd of my masters program, but I'm extremely worried that some schools might disqualify me because in the US a 3.5 graduate GPA is pretty poor. Is this something I should mention in one of my statements, or are they generally aware that other countries haven't necessarily suffered from GPA inflation like us? Does my pretty solid undergraduate GPA make up for this at all, or should I be worried?

>It's not the score I wanted, but after taking the real GRE for the first time I can't imagine doing much better than +- 1-3 points. Would a 162 V/159 Q (3 points higher than your scores) change the schools you would be comfortable applying to? If yes, retake. If no, enjoy the fact you were above the median score in both departments and find programs that fit your scores.

This is a tricky question to answer because most of us probably haven't used a variety of services enough to grade them against each other. I will tell you that I went from a 152 Q on my first practice test with Magoosh to a 161 on the actual test. If you are good at learning through short video lessons, I'd highly recommend Magoosh. I wouldn't say that it is better than other services as I didn't use other services, but in 5 weeks of prep I went up a good amount. Do you have experience with the type of math covered in the GRE section? I'm not trying to be rude, but a 140 is rather low, so advice might come from someone who's climbed from that score in the past. The magoosh videos worked well for me because I was just learning things again from previous math courses I've had. Refreshing things I'd forgotten, not really learning anything new. So my advice that their product worked well for me might not apply if you aren't familiar with the concepts previously. They have a number of free lessons though, and I think a free trial on their product.

Magoosh Test 1: 161 V, 152 Q Magoosh Test 2: 158 V, 160 Q ETS Test 1: 156 V, 161 Q Magoosh Test 3: 162 V, 154 Q Magoosh Test 4: 162 V, 156 Q ETS Test 2 : 158 V, 159 Q Expected Score Range on Magoosh (on test date with roughly 75% of practice questions completed) : 157-162 Verbal, 152-157 Quantitative Actual Test: 164 V, 161 Q Unlike others I didn't think the exam was much easier than Magoosh prep. I found that my attention to detail and dedication to actually getting the correct answer was much higher on test day, where in practice exams I was far quicker to move on from a challenging problem. The only test prep that I thought was off was ETS quant practice. The questions were loaded with easy ones both times I took it, but punished me hard for the few challenging ones it gave me. It could be that Magoosh gives you lower scores than the actual test in order to incentive you to continue using their products to then get you a higher score, but as far as actually difficulty of problems it seemed spot on. Also, since a lot of people reading this are about to take the test: I promise you that you will run out of time quicker than on your practice tests. I think I could have done better on the quant section if I had moved along quicker on my first section. On my practice verbal sections I was regularly finishing with 10+ minutes left. Due to being careful and reviewing answers before moving on, I finished each verbal with little time left. Watch the clock!