balderdash

Sorry, but it's entirely dependent on your research interests. If you're a post-structuralist African knowledge systems theorist, I'm guessing George Mason isn't for you. If you're approaching the admissions process from a numbers perspective, I would recommend switching to a "fit"-based set of applications.

Like Sindikumva said, there's little anyone on here can tell you - you seem to have well-defined research interests, your background is strong, etc., but your personal statement/writing sample/recommendations will really decide your application. As for the MIA and MPhil courses, the government subforum will probably have a better sense of your chances - though as a Cambs grad (with many friends doing MPhils at Ox), I'd say you're definitely getting an offer to at least one of the two. Well, we're officially in the waiting game now. Anyone want to create the Poli Sci "Waiting it Out" thread?

Who's jumping all over whom? I know tone can be difficult to read over the internet, but I'm not annoyed or anything, and I didn't exactly sound off on OP. And I would think that assuming OP's English was poor would be more patronizing than anything... But in any case, OP, I would say that if the school is a really good fit, it's probably worth the application even if funding is unlikely. If it's middling or one of the borderline applications, then you might want to just save the application fee and only apply departments that have more funding for international students.

The question isn't whether or not they take them, but whether they fund them. Public universities' central funding is bound by both the factors I mentioned above (for instance, at Berkeley, see here and here), which leaves the overall pool available to international students smaller than it is for domestic students. The funding issue you mention for UCSD is a result of such regulation, as (from what I understand) you're ineligible to gain residency. But I'm not saying that it's impossible for international students to win funding, just that it's more difficult - hence the the declaration OP flagged.

If you already have a job in development, definitely keep it until the economy picks up. There are so few devjobs these days that you're unlikely to be able to get back into it right after your master's.

No need to be rude, especially given that you didn't specify. If by "most" you mean most in the top 20, then yes, but it's a different game for the UC schools since they are legally required to favor residents/citizens and California is broke.

I didn't apply to UCSD, but I'm pretty sure they're talking about funding, right? If so: You've left out the more important part, which is the sentence preceding. This probably says something to the tune of, "we're a public school, so California residents get funding priority, then American students, the international students. If you're in the last group, you're not likely to get much money from us, if any at all. As a consequence, very few non-citizens enroll in the program." This doesn't mean that they won't accept you, it just means that you'll be asked to foot the bill - notice that they used the phrase "enroll in," not "are accepted to." Not many students are willing to pay $300,000 for their PhDs, and rightly so. (But again, I'm just extrapolating based on where I've seen similar statements at other schools.)

I did the exact same thing. It took me about 20 minutes to write, had the fiancee read it, then sent it in. "How have you helped advance access to higher education for women?" Gender equality is certainly worth societal/university attention, and its an admirable thing to work on or volunteer one's time for, but I doubt if many of the applicants have specifically devoted much of their lives to it...

Hey, congrats on that! You must be psyched. Also, it's easy to stop working on the SoP when you have a wedding to plan, as I do. So if you want to be mentally able to "put down" your applications, just get engaged. And for newcomers, bookmark this page. It will be very helpful in two months.

8/8 submitted, 20/24 recommendations received, and the remaining four should follow by the end of the week. Transcripts and GREs were sent ages ago, so now just to follow up on their receipt. As for the marginal returns: after I had all three recommenders and a few doctoral student-friends read the personal statement and give it their OK, I stopped fiddling.

They want a clear thesis, strong topic sentences, concise conclusions, and good transitions. A varied vocabulary helps, too. Think of it this way: the average time spent on each essay is somewhere in the range of a minute and a half. There's no way the human grader can read the essay that quickly, so they're essentially going to read the introduction and the conclusion, scanning the rest. It's entirely acceptable, then, to have 5 sentences in the introduction ("interesting" lead, situate the question in a larger problem, give the thesis, list your body paragraphs, then transition to the body) and pretty much the same thing in the conclusion (though in reverse), with three quick examples to support your argument in the middle. (I only took the GRE once; I got a 6.)

The answer is always 27. They don't want you to know that.

The funny thing is that if he had come here and just said "I'm in a bind, can any of you direct me to a good summary article that discusses this issue?" then he'd probably have got some help.

That's not true. They're usually funded by the department or the university, especially at the top.

It doesn't really surprise, to be honest. Admissions rates at the best graduate schools are insane - within my own field, they're around 4-5% in the top 10, slipping only to 8-10% in the top 25. With twenty-five applications for each spot, it's no surprise that adcomms pass over the guy with a 3.9, 1540 GRE, and 1 published paper from the University of New Hampshire to accept the girl with a 3.9, 1540 GRE, and 1 published paper from Stanford. Added to this is the fact that the professors at elite schools are generally known within their field, so their recommendation letters are viewed more favorably than from relatively unknown scholars at less prestigious schools. Finally, there's the fact that elite colleges train their undergraduates to apply to graduate school; the recurring award of Rhodes, Marshall, Fulbright, Gates, et cetera to students from a specific set of schools evidences such programs' preparing kids to apply. My former academic advisor was a Yale undergrad, Rhodes Scholar, and later UW-Madison political science PhD. He had been picked freshman year at Yale to receive special training and advice urging him to take up a year-round sport, devote time to charity, and apply for research funding. Without this advice, he never would've done some of the things he did, and even though he'd have probably applied to graduate school anyway, having a few years to develop scholarly ambitions gave him an edge when it came time to apply. Anyway, all of this is to say that in addition to the "name brand" of elite universities, there are numerous factors that help students from such colleges gain an edge in applying for graduate school.

Echoing Penelope, based on the info you've given, you're just as competitive as the rest of them. But further information and specific interests are required for a bit more fine-grained commentary. (For example, I won't be applying to Columbia's program this year because of the relative lack of comparativist-Africanists who do the same work as me. You might be in the same boat, or you might have chosen schools that are deep in your specialty).

It's definitely the former, not a terminal degree. For both Ox and Cam, the traditional politics departments are for research. They're heavy on methodology, state formation, and theses. But Oxbridge is moving toward creating professional schools to compete with HKS-type institutions, with Ox ahead of the curve with Blavatnik. PM me if you have more specific questions that I can help with.

Hey, I'm an MPhil (Cantab), and half of my work was in Politics, so I think I can help. It's not ridiculous, and admissions are pretty reasonable for the MPhil (the University is poor, and MPhils are a cash cow), so you shouldn't have a problem getting in. The Adcomm probably won't care about the PhD in philosophy as long as you can explain the switch to Politics beyond "I'd like to live in Cambs." I have a few friends that already had MAs from other universities before they studied at Cambridge for their MPhil. I also knew one guy who was getting a second PhD and a girl who had done BA and MPH in the US before going to Cambridge to start her undergraduate studies again as a medical student. So it wouldn't be unheard-of. I recommend choosing Jesus College on your app - great mix of history, location, size, graduate community, et cetera. I had 5 friends there last year. As for Cambridge the city, it's gorgeous. I've lived in Cambridge, MA, Washington DC, London... and Cambridge (UK) was my favorite by far. For costs, you can expect a minimum of 30,000 pounds for the year (all inclusive), but 35-40k would be more comfortable.

Thanks. I agree, it would seem they're focusing on percentiles now more than ever, which is good. A score means nothing except in relation to how your peers have performed.

I didn't want to get too involved, but... That's a lovely line to take, but the problem is that it's an empty talking point. First of all, I presume you're talking about the pollster Douglas Schoen, whose findings got widely circulated as definitive, especially the part about them being "an unrepresentative segment of the electorate that believes in radical redistribution of wealth, civil disobedience and, in some instances, violence." Problem is, the findings - drawn from a tiny sample - show only 4% agreed with "radical redistribution of wealth," and roughly the same for the bit about civil disobedience and violence. So no, they're not out for "explicit re-distribution of wealth." Only 4% are. Unless, of course, you mean by restructuring taxes, especially on corporate earnings and capital gains. That is definitely a distributive policy that most support. But here's your fallacy: the rules already have distributive consequences that were engineered by the people who wrote the laws. To decry the OWS protesters as being in favor of redistribution is to ignore the lobbyists, bankers, and corporations that are also in favor of redistribution, with the only difference being that they want wealth to go in the opposite direction (upward), and that they have been more successful at getting what they want. The point of the protests is that these rules are out of sync with societal - and economic, given the global financial meltdown - good. That's not socialism, contra FOX News or the GOP. (Edit: And this is why your argument about "gross misconduct by bankers and corporate execs" is short-sighted. It's not the actors within the system that are the problem. It's the way the institutions - the market, the regulatory agencies, the tax structure, the legislative relationship with Wall Street, et cetera - are structured.) This "socialism" canard is a technology of power. The neo-liberalism strand of capitalism depends on the argument that "the market is neutral," but this is simply a rhetorical tool that allows the beneficiaries of economic liberalization and deregulation to impose their preferred distributive outcomes on voters who don't know the difference. (There's a reason why the great income divergence I wrote about [on page 2 of this thread] began in 1980; it coincided with the ascent of neo-liberalism and the Reagan Revolution.) The market is not neutral. Protesters who want to adjust its functioning to improve the lot of those at the bottom are not socialists. End of.

I took it July 2010. V: was 770, now 170, 99%. Q: was 800, now 166, 94%.

I'm inclined to agree with mv0027. From what I understand, GRE scores aren't that big of a deal with adcoms. If I were you, I would probably add a safety-ish school to your list just for backup, but I don't think it'll come to that.

Thanks, dudes. Also, 3 more recs came in, so we're up to 15/24 here. How're you all?