Umar

Hi, I'm going to be applying to grad schools in the '13 season and was hoping my chances might be evaluated. I took the GREs today and got 720V/710Q. My cumulative GPA is 3.94 (qualifying for summa cum laude), and my anthro major GPA is about 3.93 (4.0 just counting upper division courses). There are still four or five more anthro courses I'm going to take before I graduate, so my GPA could shift, but I'm expecting it to stay fairly even. Modern languages are a bit of a handicap: I'll have 3 years of Latin and 2 of ancient Greek, with one year of German. Anyway, assuming fairly strong LoRs and a writing sample in line with those statistics, what are my chances of getting into PhD programs in any of the Ivy Leagues, Stanford, Berkeley, NYU, Northwestern...? Any feedback would be greatly appreciated! Thank you, Umar

Thank you both for the input. I think I'm going to spend an extra year at my undergrad school to work on my languages - that way I'd have 3 years of Latin, 2 of Greek, and one year of German by the time I enter a postbacc program. For the postbacc, money isn't really an issue: I'm interested mostly in Columbia, UPenn, and Georgetown. What are my chances of getting in to those programs with these statistics? I took the GRE earlier today and got 720 verbal/710 quantitative, and my GPA is 3.94 cumulative, 4.0 in Latin thus far (assuming it will be around 3.9 by the time I've taken all the language classes I'm planning). Assuming a writing sample and LoRs in line with those statistics, should I feel good about my chances of getting into a postbacc program? I realize that this is a question better addressed to the program coordinators, but again I'd appreciate any input. Thank you, Umar

I'm currently finishing my junior year with an anthropology/classics double major and education minor. My eventual goal is to earn a PhD in classical philology, but I'm somewhat overwhelmed by the linguistic experience most grad programs seem to require. Right now I've only had one full year of Latin courses (neither Latin nor Greek was offered at the junior college I attended for my AA) and although I've taken to the language fairly well, I'll still only have two years by the time I graduate. Even worse is my Greek (nonexistant). I'll take Greek 1 in the fall, and only have a year of it by the time I graduate, and I'm totally lacking in French, Italian, or German. Should I be applying to grad programs despite my limited experiences with Latin and Greek, or would it be better to spend a few years as a postbac student honing my skills in the ancient languages and acquiring a modern one? If I take that route, could I get letters of recommendation now and save them for when I apply in a few years, or do programs prefer recent letters? Apologies for all the questions, any help would be quite appreciated! -Umar