shavasana

Something also to think about: most universities have central computing that you can get into from you personal computer, so you don't have to have a lot of power with you as long as you're on campus or can hook up a VPN.

Sure. I'm a current student and they told us.

Sorry to break the news, but all Stanford acceptances are out. I swear I'm not a troll, just trying to keep people from stressing too much.

While I did apply to a couple (2) non-Top 10 schools, I am not sure I would have attended a lower ranked program. All of my advisors told me NOT to go to a non-Top 10 school because job prospects are abysmal. That's true of top ranked schools as well as lower ranked ones. The probability that you'll be an adjunct after the process is high, but it's slightly lower for the highest ranks of political science programs. It's not necessarily fair, but only applying to the tops schools does have a logic to it.[And that logic isn't just elitism.]

As someone who doesn't have a horse in this race, I really don't believe that people use the phrase "safety school" out of insecurity. Rather, out of a sense of security. While I didn't use that phrase (I don't think) on these boards, I definitely used that phrase when discussing my application chances last year. There were a multitude of reasons: 1. It is a term that is widely understood (even by those not applying for PhD programs), and so one way simply be accustomed to using it. 2. There are some applicants that are very well qualified, and may have applied to lesser-ranked schools knowing with a high degree of certainty that they would be admitted. 3. If someone is insulted by the thought of someone calling the school they like/will attend a "safety", they should grow a thicker skin. People will say much more difficult to hear things about your ideas and you when you're actually in school. But no one made a specifically disparaging comment (as far as I've seen) about any individuals attending such programs. Sure, it's not a preferred term, but name calling isn't exactly the correct response to the situation.

He goes by Jim. [Not kidding.] ...and Stanford isn't done making decisions, at least the last I heard. (That was last week.)

3.84 is not mediocre. People get into the top programs with lower GPAs than that. 3.7 is a pretty good cutoff point: they don't care what you have above that, as long as you meet their minimum expectation.

Look at the threads from previous years where people post their SOPs. That's going to answer your question

Just some helpful tips from the Duck of Minerva: http://duckofminerva.blogspot.com/p/academia-and-graduate-school.html

I'm going to agree with RWBG. While it's clear that basically no one knows what they will study, the SOP provides 2 VERY important pieces of information to an adcomm: a demonstration that you can write clearly and succinctly and that you can formulate an appropriate research question.

You'll probably get better advice here: http://forum.thegradcafe.com/forum/11-government-affairs/ [This is largely a Poli Sci PhD program forum]

About Princeton, I have obviously never been there. And what's important to know is the difference between the requirements of the department and the culture. I know that Princeton doesn't REQUIRE its students to take the quant sequence, but there's a pretty heavy cultural expectation that you will. So, depends on the way you want to go about things, I suppose. And for the record, I'm going to one of the most intense quant programs in the country and I haven't taken calculus since high school. I took some stats in college, but that's it. They don't require you to know a ton of stats/math, but getting a very good GRE Q score will really help you! Good luck!

Stanford: one of the heaviest quant programs there is Princeton: Also has a pretty heavy quant emphasis Michigan: Really good at American and PE by many counts Yale: You could get away with doing less quant (but I don't know many people there who actually don't do quant) Just some thoughts.

Not to sound harsh, but honestly we're not any more qualified to make a guess at where you could get into than you are. In a lot of cases, it's a crapshoot. Although math-heavy schools probably wouldn't be for you (unless you had exceptionally high math/econ grades in undergrad). So I would bet against SAIS. But other than that, nobody really knows.

I am going to second (or third) what has been said, but it's worth hearing. A Poli Sci advanced degree (assuming you mean a PhD) is really not going to help if you want to be a lawyer. That being said, there ARE combined PhD/JD degrees (I know Stanford has one.) But you should also keep in mind that you might not LIKE doing academic Poli Sci if you didn't even write a thesis in it. (Poli Sci at the grad and undergrad level are very very different, especially when it comes to the amount of math you'll be doing.) Another thing to consider is the rank of the program you're looking to get in to. For a high level program, the GRE is actually pretty important (more important than it should be, in my opinion, but I'm not an adcomm). For other advice, just peruse this forum for how to put together a strong PhD app! Good luck!