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I had a hard semester which resulted in my being in the hospital for three months. This resulted in 2 Ws and an F in a one-credit history course. I am still graduating with three degrees and a minor, general studies honors, and in the ballpark of 3.5 or higher GPAs in all three degrees. I am active in my community and know I can get good letters of recommendation. Is there still a chance of my getting into a good MDiv program? Should I re-do the course I got an F in? I would still have to explain the semester it was in, so is it worth it?

Thank you for your response, sorry for not responding sooner. I never thought about that and it's super good you let me know that. It does make sense, it's the honors college at my school that is pushing for publication but if it's going to damage my opportunity, I will stick to presenting at conferences. I agree with everything you said about how unfortunate it is for the BA institution to count the way that it does. Sometimes you just have to work with what you have, I guess. I just got a job as a teaching assistant and I do volunteer, but I will dig my hands in deeper and keep working to develop my CV and myself. Thank you again! I do have one professor who would offer to do independent studies at School A who would do something with Buddhism in China. He's teaching Chinese PHL and a lot of his research looks at Buddhism and peace building, but he's an East Asia religionist so I am sure he could/would do this. I honestly had not even thought about learning Tibetan now, but it seems like a no brainer looking at your message. I appreciate you bringing this to my attention. I will look into this FLAS program and aim for next summer, and until then I will starting looking for ways to study it now. Thank you, I've never heard of this and I appreciate it. I will work this summer and have for traveling and presenting research/an abroad trip to Japan. I will make sure this is top on my list for next summer. Thank you.

That is one good thing about this school, they took my IB credits well and the degrees overlap an amount that allows me to get multiple. I will work on getting published before I apply, that's a good point. I will start the heavy research now and hopefully be able to get published by the end of my Junior year so it can go on my application. I will join the honors society and keep up my GPA, as well as maintain these relationships with my professors. I really appreciate this feedback. Congrats on all the good news and I hope I can say the same in the future. Congrats on the graduate school success! It's good to see a success story from a little school. I will keep working towards those relationships and learning everything I can from them. thank you! Congrats on getting into such good programs. I've said it before in this thread but I am being genuine, I hope I can say the same in a few years. I will take advantage of the relationship I have with my professors. Thank you. This makes sense, I'm not deadset on teaching at an Ivy League or anything. Obviously that would be nice but in the end, getting into a grad school is my main worry. I totally agree with your second paragraph as well. I if I had the money (and therefore the opportunity), I would be at an Ivy League, but I didn't so I'm not. All I have to worry about right now is getting into a good grad school.

Sorry for the late reply, I have been working on research all week and trying to avoid forum distraction. This totally makes sense! I doubt there ever really is a case when undergraduate from a no name school versus an ivy league wouldn't make a difference, that would just be foolish to believe. This was actually one of the most helpful comments in contextualizing the jump from a no name school to another no name school isn't going to be the magic pill for admissions. I have started looking at T50 undergraduate schools, since that would be a jump that matters, if I still feel the need to transfer. That being said, their transfer scholarships are such shit, almost always, which is frustrating. Realistically, I probably won't transfer because at my current school I have a place to live in the summers and a good relationship with my professors, but I will look for sure. Thank you. This is a super interesting article and I hadn't even considered implications on hiring because I was so hung up on implications for grad school (sigh, another thing to worry about). It is really good to see that and be aware of it now though, I will just have to keep making myself competitive. Again, all of this makes a lot of sense. I do for sure think that UG prestige makes a difference and to claim it doesn't would be willfully ignorant, I guess it's good to know it doesn't damn one either. I really appreciate your feedback on the M* vs. Mdiv, specifically. It's good to know that it impacts M* more than Mdiv, which is what I figured but wasn't sure. I will just have to make myself more competitive and apply to a few safety schools, as well as make sure I do more prep work on my GRE this summer. thank you for all the feedback, it's good to hear from different people, especially from people already in graduate school.

This is comforting to read, I appreciate it. I will focus on learning a language and it makes sense what you're saying. It's good to know that my masters will matter more when I am looking at PhD programs. I'm not really looking at MDiv programs but I am assuming a lot of what you all are saying applies since it's the same nature. I really appreciate it, and I will take your advice on the independent studies. Thank you! I appreciate the feedback. It helps soothe some of the anxieties I have been having the past few weeks as deadlines roll up. Congrats on your acceptances, those are awesome. I hope I can have something similar in my bio in a few years. I'm not really looking at Mdiv, but like I said, I guess it's a similar process since the field is housed in the same school (in most cases)? I hope to get into a TT PhD program and I guess that's what stresses me out, but in the end, my UG doesn't matter very much (as in name) as long as it gets me into a good Masters program, so that's what I should focus on. Thank you.

Hey everyone, I aim to attend a masters program in religions, focus in East Asia (i.e. Hawaii or Toronto) or history of religions (i.e. Arizona or in a world where hell freezes over, University of Chicago), with the very end goal being University of Chicago's Tibetan Buddhist history. EDIT: I should add my first choice for my master's is FSU, since it's such a well funded program for those studying Chinese Buddhism. So, currently, I have a full-ride at school A(with the occasional loan that is never over 500ish dollars to pay for personal things, since I don't like living at home). I have a good Philosophy program here (focus in religious studies, non-theology) doubled with history, I am studying Chinese, and minoring in Peace & Conflict Studies. I am an honors students, and about to begin work on my senior thesis. I work a few leadership positions and my GPA is fine, I got a few Bs my Freshman year. I've presented research before. My professors have offered to do independent studies with me to bridge any gap I feel I am lacking where they can. That being said my school right now is very small, an open enrollment state school and doesn't really have a name for itself. It's no major state school like UMD or UCLA. I go here since I did so well in high school, I was able to get such good financial aid (plus a few other reasons that don't matter, it just goes that way sometimes). School B is a public honors college where I would have to take out loans, they have a similar program (I would take Japanese instead of Chinese). The coursework is more diverse, such as my current history department doesn't have a history outside of Europe or the US, while this school has a few more historians in other areas. I may be able to keep doing research, maybe not to the same extent to which I am now. This school has gotten people into UoC, Yale and even Oxford from my department but some of my professors have been saying the debt wasn't worth it and I can do that from here (which other professors are doubtful of). School C has offered me money to come be on a team for them, plus a good amount of academic scholarship. This is also a smaller state school, but it is above my current school. There would be loans my first semester but not much after that (I assume, it's out of state which would be new for me, maybe some loans for living). They have an awesome history department, with a chance to work with a historian's whose focus is in East Asia as my senior thesis. The honors college is much better here, I would get a chance for funding research (I fund my own and any travel that comes with presenting it). Plus, they pay for travel to other countries in the summer. They don't have a religions program, which is an issue when that's my graduate school area. I know academia and graduate school is hard and competitive, my dad is a professor so I've seen it from the inside, but I can't imagine doing anything else. I love teaching and researching, and maybe I am being compulsive planning this far ahead, but I would never forgive myself if I don't do what I can to go to the best graduate school. Maybe it's just because I was originally going to a much better school, at least planning, before some last minute issues with family that landed me here. Is a good master's program enough to bridge me into a T16 PhD program? Can I get into a good masters program from this open enrollment school that's very small with my CV and work I'm doing with my professors? Are loans and debt worth it? Sorry for the novel, everyone is telling me different stuff so I thought I would get input from people who have gone through graduate school recently, or just get a clearer picture of this. Thanks in advance.