MattDest

You have to realize the irony in claiming that undergraduate studies are "almost always BS" but attempting to apply to graduate school. Given that the vast majority of philosophy PhDs teach undergraduates, are you just intent on keeping up the "BS"? It's wrong to think that GREs are meant to point to "superior abilities" - clearly you have them . They are meant to assess one's ability to succeed in graduate school. The predictive ability is limited in scope (just like the SAT/ACT), but that doesn't mean it is completely useless. GREs are actually a decent predictor of graduate school success [this is ETS' website, but it cites valid research... you can see more on Schwitzgebel's blog about data from UCR]. I don't think that good scores will necessarily be a huge boost in an application, but I would say that low scores would be a strike against an applicant.

I never knew whether it was more fitting to say congrats or best of luck, but those are the two phrases which come to mind!

Ulixes, I found myself with elaborate summer plans to read/write/submit but it also turned out quite differently from what I expected. I haven't done much in the way of preparing. We bought a house in Tucson and now it's an issue of coordinating shipping our cars/stuff and flying with cats. Absolutely miserable. I've mostly taken a break from doing anything studious. In the next few weeks I'll probably go back into the grind, but it's been nice to have a bit of a vacation from it. It seems like I'll be able to better immerse myself in the work when fall comes.

This is very true! I would even take my own input with a huge grain of salt, because I am willing to bet our applications look significantly different in many other ways (you could have a better/worse writing sample, letters, test scores, etc.) which will impact the decision process.

I had an awful undergrad GPA (somewhere around 2.9ish?), and got into a Leiter-mentioned terminal MA program with funding, and managed to get into a good PhD program (Arizona). The things that I learned: (1) the first two years matter little compared to the last two years, (2) philosophy grades matter more than overall grades, (3) if your letter writers can explain the pattern, do it, and (4) work on improving every other facet of your application.

Wowza, impressive.

Thanks! Yes, it came with a funding offer as well. My metaphysics couldn't be awesomer.

I got one just over a week ago, FWIW. I turned it down (I honestly didn't think I had completed the application... it still showed a lot of outstanding materials), so good luck!

ARIZONA, ASSEMBLE! (Is there nobody else on this board? I could have sworn...)

Agreed - and UMSL which also has a pretty good placement record the last couple of years.

I don't plan on signing off entirely (hence me posting this!), but I know that I've friended a lot of people on Facebook so that I no longer need to check in here. Plus, TGC can be a huge timesuck, and while it's a really good place to hang out - I think it's better if I can spend that time elsewhere.

Great to hear about your success. I don't know that this would separate you from others on this forum. I think we all love what we're studying (at least, most of the time), otherwise we'd be doing something else. We're not in it for the job prospects, at least.

Bummer to hear, ian. Good luck with your law school decisions!

Congrats, and best of luck at Mizzou! I have a friend who is attending there now.

Agreed - by the way, anybody here going to Arizona should message me. It'd be cool to see other students who will be incoming.

I don't think it's really fair to suggest that professors have a responsibility to maintain working relationships with students who are no longer enrolled in their university. Everybody might wish that they had the time to do so, but they've got students who are enrolled that they need to make time for. I understand why you are frustrated, but continuing to send e-mails to these faculty members if they have previously ignored your communication isn't likely to help your cause.

While the highly subjective aspect of polls like this is a problem, I think the bigger problem is that most of us don't know very much about these departments. One of the good things about the PGR is that these faculty have tons of experience in the field, and know about the reputation of various departments. New and prospective graduate students aren't the best people to poll about the quality of graduate programs. Polls are useful when the target population is well-informed.

I'll be interested to hear what others have to say, but I don't feel comfortable ranking them myself. Not only am I partial to certain schools, but I don't really feel I am a good judge about the overall quality of faculty, or about placement records (without having more information from all of them).

Ditto this. logos, are you still at CUNY then?

I just turned down funded offers from Arizona State and Iowa. Hope that helps somebody!

The Ultimate Warrior, obviously.

I'd like to toot UMSL's horn a bit as far as funding goes. The funding situation is decent - a full tuition waiver, and I think it's now up to ~$9k a year for most students. We didn't have an extensive placement record this year (only 2 applied to PhD programs, more applied to and all were accepted into law programs), but I had a pretty good showing and the other person got accepted into Marquette.

I'm more excited for John Oliver's HBO show, to be honest.

Nice! Congrats BSG, was pulling for you.

Thanks for the thoughtful response, Wait For It. I'm glad to hear that the courses aren't as they are described, although that seems pretty troubling by itself. The idea that philosophy courses need to be infused with religious commitments to appear less scary is not my ideal version of a philosophical education, but I think that's probably less worrying than the courses being as described. I don't doubt that Talbot can produce good philosophers, but I'm just not a fan of philosophy that's guided primarily by religious commitments.