OriginalCaptainPrice

I’m planning on going, I’m not enrolled yet. It’s interesting from what I’ve read online people who have been there seem to love it but there isn’t a lot of information about what kind of grad schools they’ve ended up going to.

It's been my goal for a while now to get a PhD in Political Science. My major field would be International Relations and American Politics. My main concern however is about where to get my undergraduate degree from. I'm a working adult in my 30's with bills to pay and am too old for a "traditional" college experience. Harvard Extension seems to meet my needs. My main concern however is whether I would be competitive for a top graduate program in Political Science if I were to obtain my degree from this school. Will it be looked down upon? As I'm sure everyone on this forum know, the job market for Political Science is awful. A top school is one of the best ways of making it a little bit easier. Of course I'd like to go to Harvard, Princeton, or Stanford but I realize those may be out of reach. What about schools like UCLA, MIT, Columbia, etc.? Are those out reach to because of my undergraduate institution? Am I destined to end up somewhere mediocre with no real career prospects? This is of course assuming my GPA, GRE score, and writing skills are top notch, am I destined to be filtered out because of Harvard Extension?