Hopefulhistoryapplicant

Hello USUKHFfan! How are you? I went to Queen Mary, University of London - not very well known, but they have excellent History Department. From your name, I'm guessing that you are a fellow islander? Where did you study? Thanks for your encouragement! I remember a few months after I had just finished the slog of applications, telling an American acquaintance where I had applied to etc, and he looked at me with great pity and said "honey with those GRE scores... I don't want to be mean, but it's going to be very difficult..." I know he is only one person who probably knows nothing, but it makes you feel really shoddy about the whole thing - especially after the monumentous effort to get all the applications in... I had never heard of Summa cum Laude, but after quick google, I am very pleased with your suggestion that my grades are equivalent to that! According to UCL first class = 4.00 GPA (at least according to Wikipedia..), however, with some schools, such as Duke, they ask you to add up and divide the module results in such a way that I ended up with a 3.2/3.3. Also there is an online grade conversion website which Duke suggested that int applicants use, which also concurs that my grades were in the low 3 of GPA.. All very confusing and irritating to say the least! Anyway, for the moment, as much as I promise myself that I will receive four rejections, I can't help but spend most of my days refreshing my inbox... very sad! How are you holding up? Where did you apply?

Hi Everyone. I have been reading the History forums on a daily basis, but have not yet posted anything.. I promise I am not a total freak! Its probably just a sign of my anxiousness.. I notice that many people have impeccable records, so I am posting this for those of you, who like me feel that your qualifications aren't quite brilliant, yet still really really want to do a Graduate Programme in History. So here goes: Applying for early modern Iberian and Atlantic History, with a specific focus on cultural exchange between black slave and liberto communities, processes of integration and marginalisation, and European expansion. As a secondary subject I am looking to focus on medieval Islamic social and cultural history, with a view to also studying the Islamic cultural and intellectual remnants in early modern Iberia. I completed a BA in History in the UK and received a First Class Honours, which depending on who you ask, can be between a 3.3 and 4.00 GPA (ridiculous isn't it!). I also received a University prize for my dissertation, which was a comparative analysis of black African religious confraternities XV-XVIII in the Iberian Peninsular, focusing on social and cultural history. While completing my dissertation I was invited to become a collaborator on a research project with a University in Spain. I am bilingual in Spanish and English and advanced in French. Planning to take Latin and Arabic too. I have a lot of University level teaching experience - I was a Teaching Fellow of English for Academic Purposes and Academic Study Skills in the language department at a UK University. And now the really bad part : GRE V 500, M 530 and writing 4.5 (ouch!! - I didn't have enough time to retake the test). On the up side, I have a very solid personal statement and good LOR's, I'm an international applicant (could be helpful) and my writing sample is the dissertation discussed above. Because of my horrendous GRE's, I'm sure that I probably won't get offered a place anywhere this year, so this is most likely going to be my first round of applications. I have Applied for: funding for an MA History at my current UK institution Princeton Austin, Texas, Duke Columbia Good luck to everyone!

Do you think that Universities can tell how many times applicants have checked their online application status? Suppose they could, do you think this would bode well or badly with the admissions committee? "Well so and so checked his online status 100 times yesterday. Perhaps he's psychologically imbalanced" Toss the application in the bin...