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I would recommend retaking the GRE to improve the math score. I had a lot of trouble improving mine, because I was just so out of practice (I was once able to do all of the stuff, took Calculus and had an A in high school). Some small studying will help you jump the score a lot--in the end, I still had a pretty bad score in the 65-70 percent range, but it was enough to get me an offer.

In that case, my opinion would be in line with what seems to be the consensus, and say LMU (just voted, hadn't done so before).

If you got funding, go with the funding. Otherwise Boulder is probably the best for your options, because it would be the cheapest cost of living. Boston and LA are extremely expensive places.

Depending on your exact interests, another that could be worth thinking about is Duquesne. MA students are partially funded with tuition, which is not as good of a deal as the full-funding at MA-only places, but there are also some job opportunities with which you can end up with minimal debt. It's also free to apply online, and in fact, there may be a rolling deadline for the MA application if you are still fishing for next year. Duquesne is obviously a program focused on both Continental and history of philosophy, but there is a consortium with Pitt and the other local schools, so you can take up to 2 classes outside the department as well, to supplement analytic interests.

My opinion, for what it's worth, is similar to magog's. I would not have accepted an offer which required me to take out any more loans or do a substantial amount of work that is not related or only tangentially related to gaining experience as a philosopher. This is partly because I partially funded an MA for myself (I had roughly a 75% tuition waiver over two years, but still accrued about 12,000 in loans), so I told myself when I was applying that I would either accept a completely funded offer or else decide whether to take time off or just do something else. However, it's also because I decided at the end of my MA that my decision to pursue the PhD was concomitant with an acceptance of the professionalization end of doctoral work. My current stipend package is pretty nice in that it is not time consuming, and allows ample time for coursework, so I am able to consider my own development as a philosopher a full-time job within reason (in other words I also try to have a social life on top of the workload). For me, those all would be strong reasons to take the Kentucky offer and turn down the New School. The New School seems like an amazing place with exciting faculty and graduate students, but I just don't know how one either works a separate full-time job or ammassses so much debt. Doctoral students deserve to be paid a decent living wage for their work, and to me, an offer that doesn't even grant full tuition is a non-starter. I will not grandstand about the president of NSSR's salary and I acknowledge that funding possibilities can be beyond a department's control; I just don't understand how anyone could go into a PhD without full funding. From what you've said, I was basically of your mindset when I applied to NSSR during my year, but I was not accepted. As you wait for Oregon's waitlist, it could be worth contacting Kentucky to ask about additional funding potential such as support for conferences, summer workshops, and language programs abroad. An offer with some financial support for conferences, and maybe languages, on top of a completely livable TA package seems like an offer that is stupid to turn down for more debt and/or stress from another job.

It is also incorrect that Villanova has no one working on Adorno. Annika Theim is a specialist in the early Frankfurt School. And at DePaul, Rick Lee recently taught a two-quarter course devoted to Negative Dialectics, and several graduate students are working on Adorno. I don't mention this to enter into the Leiter debate, but thought it worth mentioning since it sounds like STM17 is applying next season.

I have no personal experience with the UK, but I have several friends who have done MAs or PhDs there who had very good experiences. Some other places to look at are the University of Dundee in Scotland as well as Kingston in London (I think the CREMP might be the best place to do continental work in the world). It sounds like we have similar interests, so feel free to shoot me a message on here to stay in touch.

I think your intuition is correct. I have some friends at SIUC and they like it there. I think the department just basically describes itself as pluralist... it's also a tremendous place to do American philosophy. I think the funding situation is a bit precarious, though, even for the PhD students, although I think it eventually works. I'm not sure why. I was admitted to the MA program when I applied, but the funding was still up in the air when I turned it down. The email correspondence that I had at the time suggested that if I did well in the MA program, I could be admitted into the PhD program upon graduating, which is actually pretty rare for programs with both MA/PhD programs. Another place you might want to check out is Kent State, who has pretty decent funding. I mentioned Loyola Marymount University in the other thread you posted, as well as Duquesne, although I'm unsure if Duquesne would fit your description of not necessarily leaning continental (although I would really say that the dept. is generally one focused on the history of philosophy--there are a ton of people working on ancient, some on early modern, and others on contemporary stuff but for example, there's nobody who really works on Derrida). I'm trying to rack my brain for other schools since I focused on MAs during my first application season. I think you may have mentioned Miami of Ohio in the other thread--they also have some fully funded spots and some non-funded spots. Perhaps Seattle University?

I'm not sure what your specific interests are, but another program you might want to look into is Duquesne, who has good coverage of the history of philosophy as well as the obvious focus of contemporary continental philosophy. You can apply to the PhD and MA programs at the same time, and you will be first considered for the PhD and then for the MA. I've seen various statements about Duquesne not having good funding for the MA, and while this is definitely true compared to schools like GSU and others who give out tuition + stipend, there is always some funding for the MA students in terms of credits. If I had to guess, I would say that the average MA student in the past few years has had at least half of the 30 credits taken care of (and several have had more than this), and there are also some other funding opportunities on campus, especially in your second year. It wouldn't be best case scenario in terms of the funding, and would require some additional loans, but as someone who's done it, I can say that it's do-able and I'm glad I did it. Additionally, Pittsburgh is a pretty cheap city to live in, and Duquesne also has other benefits such as the opportunity to take classes at Pitt as well as the ability to take language courses at no extra cost. To speak to your general concern, I would say that if you feel like you should be going for an MA first, then I would focus your attention on getting into MA programs. It is worth it to apply to PhD programs, especially those who waive application fees, but it sounds like getting an MA first may help you really develop interests and other components of the application, which will help in terms of really making yourself a good fit for a PhD program. When I was coming out of undergrad, I was in a similar situation, coming from an unknown school and also thinking that I needed to do more coursework in philosophy (my BA is in interdisciplinary studies with a focus on history and literature in addition to philosophy). I received the advice to just apply to PhD programs because of the funding situation, but in retrospect, I really had no idea what I was saying in my application and with my writing sample. After doing the MA at Duquesne and developing my interests, presenting at some conferences, and meeting a lot more people, I feel like I was much better prepared for the PhD applications, and it paid off as I was accepted into my top choice. Another MA program to look at is Loyola Marymount University, who I believe has some full-funded spots and some partial-funded spots. It's hard to speculate on MA programs without knowing your interests, though. In short, what I'd say is that if you can craft a very good application with a focused SoP and writing sample, then definitely apply for PhDs. Doing an MA will in no way hurt you other than financially if you aren't admitted to a place like GSU, etc. I think there are a lot of benefits of doing an MA, especially at a place where you will teach a little bit, because then if you have to take a year or two to get in to a PhD program, you will be able to stay in philosophy with teaching. As far as I understand it, getting into a PhD program is almost more of a numbers game than anything else, and requires a bit of luck. I have friends who had to wait through two or three years of complete rejections that I can say for a fact are smarter and more deserving than several people I've met who came straight out of undergrad. One other advantage of doing an MA is the opportunity to go to conferences and try to meet people at the institutions you most want to get into.

I think that the statement of purpose is fairly important because it seems to me that if it's concise, it's a good bet to be read by the committee, and I think the statement goes a long way in showing both that you are a quality candidate and that you are a good fit for the department. I would agree with the consensus here that the writing sampe is more important, but I might qualify that by saying that is true insofar as you've already made it to a certain cutoff which the other elements are helpful in getting you to. That's speculation, though, as always. ekant, I was admitted to two of the programs that you have on your list, and will be attending one of them in the fall. If you message me on here with your email address, I'd be happy to send you application materials and answer questions, etc.