Criteria for getting into a good M.A. program

[souslespaves]

Background: I went to a good large private university (think BU, NYU, USC), double-majored in Economics and English and minored in a language and business. I have OK grades (3.65 overall, 3.85 in English), but didn't take the vast majority (8/10) of my English classes until senior year (I had been discouraged by two lackluster classes as an underclassmen; I got straight A's senior year), by which time it was too late to apply for grad school (or to do a thesis).

I have two tenured/track professors who I believe will give me good/strong recommendations for an M.A. program (I have to decide who to ask for a third, but I believe at worst it will be generically positive - I am wondering whether or not it would be better to have a strong recommendation from a PhD student or a more generic one from more prestigious names). I am studying for the GRE now, and am scoring low 700+ in verbal (will have to deal with the literature one in October/November). All my friends who were good English students were primarily focused on English and are going straight to PhD programs, so I don't know anyone going through the same process. I believe my statement of purpose and writing sample are/will be fairly strong.

I know my application isn't strong enough for the caliber of PhD programs I want and have no undergraduate debt, so I would like to get into a competitive M.A. program.

Question: What exactly does one need to get into an M.A. program like Brown, Penn, Columbia? (Or: where should I be looking?) I'm going to cast a wide net, but am having a hard time figuring out where I lie on the continuum of hopefuls.

If this is a repeat of another thread, I'm sorry! I failed with the search function.

[bluellie]

I can't speak for the top tier MA programs, as I didn't apply. I will say my numbers were worse than yours: upper 600s on the verbal, upper 700s for quant, and a dismal AW score; I had a GPA from one of the universities you mentioned of 3.3 overall and a 3.5 in my major, which was not English or even English-related; I didn't take the subject test or write a thesis.

Based on these factors alone, I don't think I would have gotten in anywhere. I wasn't expecting much, given that I have NO coursework in English literature or any in literary theory, criticism or composition. (I have taken a fair number of lit courses, just not English/American lit.) That, taken in addition to the extremely competitive applicant pool this year, made me believe that I was bound to get rejections across the board. So, I tried to be realistic in my expectations and aimed for mid-level MA programs that promised funding. While funding has yet to materialize, possibly due to the fact that I'd have to learn the material as I was TA'ing it, I've managed to hear back positively from all the programs to which I applied. All were acceptances, except for one wait-list to a tiny program that wasn't a great fit.

While I will say that I do worry I might have been admitted for the wrong reasons, I'd like to think my writing sample really opened doors for me. One professor has written to me saying that he really enjoyed reading it, so I don't think I'm completely off-base. Similarly, I think my SOP explained my interests, albeit what I want to study at the Ph.D. level in a related field, and why I needed an MA in English/Literature to get there.

My point is that your writing sample and your SOP, both aspects of your application over which you have complete control, can get you into programs beyond what the numbers might lead you to believe. If you can prove to the admissions committee that you are capable of writing a compelling, original research paper, they're probably going to be more inclined to want to have you as a student than if you just have good stats. Plenty of students have good stats; you need to WOW them with what you can do. Your writing sample IS your application.

That being said, I would hesitate to just submit one of your undergraduate papers, even if it earned you high marks. More than just editing and patching holes in your argument, I would comply re-do it. Take the summer and start over completely, from re-reading the piece you want to comment on to re-doing the research, to writing draft after draft after draft until it's perfect. Thus, you create a paper whole-cloth, rather than just trying to find and repair all the weak points in your original argument. It is a lot of work, but it pays off (at least in my experience).

Thankfully MA programs are not as competitive as PhD programs, though funding is much harder to come by. Programs that say they offer funding don't necessarily make funding available to every admitted student.

I do wish you the best of luck. You're way ahead of the game when you start the application process this early. =)

[stormydown]

Background: I went to a good large private university (think BU, NYU, USC), double-majored in Economics and English and minored in a language and business. I have OK grades (3.65 overall, 3.85 in English), but didn't take the vast majority (8/10) of my English classes until senior year (I had been discouraged by two lackluster classes as an underclassmen; I got straight A's senior year), by which time it was too late to apply for grad school (or to do a thesis).

I have two tenured/track professors who I believe will give me good/strong recommendations for an M.A. program (I have to decide who to ask for a third, but I believe at worst it will be generically positive - I am wondering whether or not it would be better to have a strong recommendation from a PhD student or a more generic one from more prestigious names). I am studying for the GRE now, and am scoring low 700+ in verbal (will have to deal with the literature one in October/November). All my friends who were good English students were primarily focused on English and are going straight to PhD programs, so I don't know anyone going through the same process. I believe my statement of purpose and writing sample are/will be fairly strong.

I know my application isn't strong enough for the caliber of PhD programs I want and have no undergraduate debt, so I would like to get into a competitive M.A. program.

Question: What exactly does one need to get into an M.A. program like Brown, Penn, Columbia? (Or: where should I be looking?) I'm going to cast a wide net, but am having a hard time figuring out where I lie on the continuum of hopefuls.

If this is a repeat of another thread, I'm sorry! I failed with the search function.

I think my success with strong MA programs comes on a variety of fields -- nothing inherently special, but when combined, it was an approach that worked. I didn't apply to "top top" programs like Columbia, and I got the expected rejections from the PhD programs I went for, but my MA program acceptances satisfy my interests and have a really good name in the literature field.

I'm an English major with an Economics minor at a small liberal arts Catholic school. When I decided in the fall where I wanted to apply, I didn't have a writing sample long enough to apply to most programs. My longest Lit paper was maybe 11 pages; I had History and Economics papers that satisfied the page limit but were totally useless in this regard. I was originally going to apply to Rhet/Comp programs, so I had a great Rhet paper that was going to be my writing sample that I ultimately trashed.

I then re-discovered two papers I'd written sophomore year in my Gothic American Lit 400-level class that were, quite by accident, related to each other and approached similar themes. I decided to combine the two papers (yes, this sounds nuts) into one Epic Writing Sample. This took a while and made me return to the library to check out books I'd checked out in Spring 2008, as well as new books and articles I'd never looked at before. It killed my soul a little bit, but I really cherished the end result.

After I sent in my applications, I considered throwing myself on my sword because I had terrible misgivings about my writing sample ("Oh shit, did it suck? What the hell did I just do?"), but it seems like it worked. I think the uniqueness of my subject, my treatment of it, and my strong writing was convincing enough that MA programs didn't want to kick me to the curb. My interests are in Irish history and politics as represented in Irish literature (particularly poetry), and my writing sample discusses several examples of American gothic lit in a historical context. I pointed out this connection between my writing sample and my research interests in my Statement of Purpose, and I think I sold it convincingly.

The rest of my app seems to have backed up my writing sample. I had 3 great letters of rec: 2 from PhDs who are famous in their respective fields, and 1 from a PhD assistant professor who knows me the best out of all the professors I've had. He's also been my primary poetry professor and probably spoke well to my talents in the study of poetry.

My GPA was a 3.87 (3.9 in English courses), and on the GRE, I scored in the high 600s on the Verbal, high 500s on the Math, and a 5.0 on the Writing. My Lit GRE was in the 82nd percentile, which wasn't fabulous, but it was good enough for me.

In the end, your writing sample and statement of purpose seem to be the most important part of the app. Work on those and they'll make up for anything else.

Edited April 5, 2010 by stormydown

[strokeofmidnight]

Our undergrad backgrounds are virtually identical. I also went to a "good large private school"--well-regarded overall, but a bit less so for English programs. I doubled-majored in English (alongside another, related field). I took virtually all of my English courses senior year, and was not able to do a thesis. Our GRE scores are in the same ballpark. Although my grades are a bit higher, YOUR grades are good enough that it shouldn't hurt you in this process. Like stormydown, I combined two related papers into a single writing sample (obvious, it required heavy revision--6 month's worth, in my case). I took 2 years off (did not do anything vaguely academic) before applying straight to PhD programs, and fairly pretty successful right off the bat: half of the 15 programs (virtually all top 20) that I applied to accepted me.

It's impossible to tell from the information that you posted whether or not you'll be competitive for strong PhD programs (as noted, it really is ALL about the writing sample and SoP), but there's nothing that raises a red flag or suggests that you *shouldn't* aim for PhD programs. Would you be willing to mention why you think you're not ready? You might be entirely right--but I'm not seeing the reason from the numbers/background info alone.

Also, I would caution against applying to a "big name" for the MA for the sake of perceived. I think you're far better off going to a funded MA--prestige doesn't work the same way as with colleges (or, though it shouldn't, even with PhD programs). Vaguely speaking, a funded MA from what might be (to the layman) a no-name school is often viewed far more positively then paying for your MA at an Ivy. The overall name/funding status of your program also matters far, far, far less than what you learn/produce. Although this is a generalization with many exceptions, most funded MA's are in programs without a PhD cohort, where you are far more likely to have access to your professor's time/attention then if you were competing with (usually funded) PhD students. I've cited these numbers elsewhere, but at the (top 5) program that I will be attending, only 2 out of the 10 MA holders came out of "well-known" programs. The rest came out of "no-name" schools that obviously prepared them very well for the PhD pool.

Background: I went to a good large private university (think BU, NYU, USC), double-majored in Economics and English and minored in a language and business. I have OK grades (3.65 overall, 3.85 in English), but didn't take the vast majority (8/10) of my English classes until senior year (I had been discouraged by two lackluster classes as an underclassmen; I got straight A's senior year), by which time it was too late to apply for grad school (or to do a thesis).

I have two tenured/track professors who I believe will give me good/strong recommendations for an M.A. program (I have to decide who to ask for a third, but I believe at worst it will be generically positive - I am wondering whether or not it would be better to have a strong recommendation from a PhD student or a more generic one from more prestigious names). I am studying for the GRE now, and am scoring low 700+ in verbal (will have to deal with the literature one in October/November). All my friends who were good English students were primarily focused on English and are going straight to PhD programs, so I don't know anyone going through the same process. I believe my statement of purpose and writing sample are/will be fairly strong.

I know my application isn't strong enough for the caliber of PhD programs I want and have no undergraduate debt, so I would like to get into a competitive M.A. program.

Question: What exactly does one need to get into an M.A. program like Brown, Penn, Columbia? (Or: where should I be looking?) I'm going to cast a wide net, but am having a hard time figuring out where I lie on the continuum of hopefuls.

If this is a repeat of another thread, I'm sorry! I failed with the search function.

[stormydown]

I agree a lot with strokeofmidnight re: which programs to apply to. Don't apply to a program just because it's a big name -- make sure the program is a good fit. I saw a lot of really good programs that I passed over so I could apply to programs like BC and NYU that had specifically what I was looking for. I want to get my PhD in Irish Literature (probably poetry specifically), so I knew I wanted an Irish Studies program or nothing.

It's good to have at least a somewhat-specific idea of what you want to do so you can write about it in your personal statement. It helps you to demonstrate how EXACTLY you're a good fit for the specific program you're applying for. So if you do decide to apply to a place like Columbia, you won't just say, "I want to go to Columbia because it's a top program," you can say, "I want to go to Columbia because the program offers X, Y, and Z, and that closely fits my experience and particularly my research goals."

Edited April 5, 2010 by stormydown

[soxpuppet]

Yeah, some of the fancier-name MA programs attract people with money and no specific plan for the future and thus are not as useful for students hoping to continue to PhD programs as they may appear. On the other hand, there are certain other MA programs that tend to only attract students hoping to continue on to earn their PhD - sometimes these programs don't accept many of their terminal MA students to continue on in their own program, but they do specifically aim to prepare them to successfully apply to other PhD programs. I don't know how these lines are drawn because I never researched MA programs, I just heard things in passing from friends and during school visits. I do know that Buffalo is one school that really aims for MA students that are hoping to eventually earn PhDs. Beyond that I can't tell you where to look.

But indeed, as everyone says, focus on your writing, not your stats or other CV entries.

[souslespaves]

Thank you all so much for the considerate and extremely helpful replies. And yes, I will kick my butt preparing my SoP and Writing Sample =)

I have many of the funded MA programs I could find on my list, but since financials are not a concern I am just trying to focus on what programs would prepare me best for a PhD program (and admittedly am having a hard time determining what constitutes this).

strokeofmidnight, re: not applying straight to PhD - A couple of reasons - firstly, to make sure I want to get a PhD, and to figure out exactly what I want to study. Right now my interest seems to be coalescing around trauma/disability studies, which isn't really established as a program or area. I am also concerned about my lack of background in theory, and do not want to struggle to catch up, and finally I'm pretty sure my literature GRE score is going to be sub-par with the rest of my application as my courseload was very heavily skewed toward the 20th century (I'm going to study as hard as I can, but I work 60 hours+/a week).

[strokeofmidnight]

Thank you all so much for the considerate and extremely helpful replies. And yes, I will kick my butt preparing my SoP and Writing Sample =)

I have many of the funded MA programs I could find on my list, but since financials are not a concern I am just trying to focus on what programs would prepare me best for a PhD program (and admittedly am having a hard time determining what constitutes this).

strokeofmidnight, re: not applying straight to PhD - A couple of reasons - firstly, to make sure I want to get a PhD, and to figure out exactly what I want to study. Right now my interest seems to be coalescing around trauma/disability studies, which isn't really established as a program or area. I am also concerned about my lack of background in theory, and do not want to struggle to catch up, and finally I'm pretty sure my literature GRE score is going to be sub-par with the rest of my application as my courseload was very heavily skewed toward the 20th century (I'm going to study as hard as I can, but I work 60 hours+/a week).

The lit GRE score should be the least of your concerns (seriously!). Many schools don't require it, and even some programs that do will not actually look at it. Programs that require and consider your lit GRE score won't weigh it heavily...it is probably the single least important piece of your application. (for what it's worth, an acquaintance who scored disastrously is currently choosing between Berkeley and Harvard, alongside a slew of other peer programs).

How seriously are you looking at trauma studies? You might also want to look interdisciplinary studies and/or some comp lit programs. This isn't necessarily a decision you have to make now--an English MA can still be a good springboard for those programs.

For future reference (since they don't have an MA program), you might want to consider Michigan if you do indeed go into disability studies. I've heard UIC mentioned as well, largely because of Lenny Davis. I'm sure that there are many others.

[diehtc0ke]

I'm also going to say that I really don't believe the Lit GRE is weighed very heavily either. I don't know how "disastrously" translates quantifiably but I know that I received sub-600 scores on that God forsaken test and I did just fine this round. There was another thread in which some found that funding at certain schools was distributed somewhat on the basis of GRE scores but I haven't come into contact with that so it was a moot point for me. Don't bomb it but don't let it get in the way of your writing. As we've all said for Ph.D programs (and I can't imagi this would be much different for master's programs), your writing is what is really evaluated.

[jb3ka]

souslespaves: I'd really recommend applying to at least a few PhD programs when you apply for the MA. My stats are nearly identical to yours and strokeofmidnight's, and I was accepted to 6 top 20 programs. It's at least worth a shot, even if you aren't sold on completing the PhD; if you get into a decent program with good funding, you could try it out for a year or two to see if you like it. If you hate it, what's the harm of leaving after a semester or a year?

Do your advisors consider you 'ready' for PhD work? I'd spend some time talking it over with them. If they think you aren't, why not take time off from school and work on that writing sample? And don't think that you have to know precisely what you want to study in graduate school. Plenty of people change fields when they get there.

Thank you all so much for the considerate and extremely helpful replies. And yes, I will kick my butt preparing my SoP and Writing Sample =)

I have many of the funded MA programs I could find on my list, but since financials are not a concern I am just trying to focus on what programs would prepare me best for a PhD program (and admittedly am having a hard time determining what constitutes this).

strokeofmidnight, re: not applying straight to PhD - A couple of reasons - firstly, to make sure I want to get a PhD, and to figure out exactly what I want to study. Right now my interest seems to be coalescing around trauma/disability studies, which isn't really established as a program or area. I am also concerned about my lack of background in theory, and do not want to struggle to catch up, and finally I'm pretty sure my literature GRE score is going to be sub-par with the rest of my application as my courseload was very heavily skewed toward the 20th century (I'm going to study as hard as I can, but I work 60 hours+/a week).