what are my chances?

[Sophia345]

Good Day!

Congratulation to all of those who got accepted and good luck to those who, like me, have had no luck this cycle. 

My situation, however , is not a very typical one and I would appreciate your thoughts and suggestions in order to improve my chances for the next cycle. 

I'm an international student and my background is in science. I hold am MBBS degree (the equivalent of an MD in the US but it is a BA in the British system) and I have practiced in a psychiatry department for a year and a half as a physician. I have also an MA from a good US university (not very prestigious though) in global ethics. The master's was instructed by both the school of philosophy and the school of international affairs in the university. I have had few courses during the MA on political philosophy, Neurotics, feminism philosophy and metaphysics. My interests include moral theory, esp in relation to bioethics and political philosophy, and feminism. 'm expected to start a teaching position soon in bioethics in a local university in my home country. 

I have been applying to a very very limited number of philosophy schools in the last 2 years. Tbh I have put all of my efforts to get into one PhD program I particularly liked because of its strength in bioethics but I got rejected every time.

he best chance I had to make my application stands out during the last cycle was through investing in my WS, my SOP, and the LORs. I have asked a few people with academic experience to comment on my WS, including my mentor (Harvard research fellow in bioethics and the chair of the bioethics committee in a university hospital) and I have revised and edited the paper multiple times accordingly. I did the same with my SOP. As for my LORs, I have had a recommendation from my mentor and the other two from academics who work on ethics, one of them is a philosophy professor in a top 20 philosophy department who was my thesis advisor during my MA. My GREs were not that great; I had an average score in the verbal section:160 and below average scores in both the quant and writing sections.

For the next cycle I'm planing to apply to much more schools. but I'm still concerned that me coming from outside the field will always put me in a risky position no matter how hard I try. 

Do you know people share similar background and got into a good graduate program or is it totally unheard of? Do I have to have another more focused MA in philosophy to stand a chance? since this last option will be very unlikely for financial reasons, are there any intensive courses you recommend to strengthen my application? I know that Harvard has a 7- weeks introduction to philosophy course but I'm not sure how an introduction to philosophy course should make any difference in my application since I already have master's, I was thinking it might hurt it actually.

 

Any thoughts will be highly appreciated. 

 

 

 

Edited March 3, 2020 by Sophia345

[akraticfanatic]

My advice:
- Apply to more than "a limited number" of schools. It's really competitive out there and if you're not currently in the field, you might not realize how much. Top schools get hundreds of applicants competing for around 6-10 spots. (Last year, out of Brandeis MA, I applied to 26 PGR-ranked PhD programs. I was accepted to 2 and waitlisted at 3.) 
- Apply to MA programs, if you can afford to go to a not-fully-funded program. Without a strong academic background in philosophy, this is your best bet. 
- If it's feasible, retake the GRE. It's not the biggest deal, but the 160 verbal score might be hurting you somewhat. 
- Make sure your sample lines up with your stated AOIs, and that it's appropriate in terms of scope and structure-- the best way to get a feel for this is to read others' successful samples (preferably read some within your subfield). It's great that you're getting feedback on your sample from advisors; it can also be a good idea to get feedback from peers who have more recent experience with the app process from the applicants' side. 
- Join the facebook group! It's more active than this forum, and there's a lot of info there. IME, it can help to be part of a group (virtually or otherwise) of peers who are going through or have recently been through the app process. 

[exaznable]

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Edited March 3, 2020 by exaznable

[Coconuts&Chloroform]

I'd focus on MAs first if I were you

[je peux pas j'ai angoisse]

This won't be the most practicle advice here  but if you conclude that you need to do an MA but can't afford one, you can consider Sorbonne (Paris IV), the Phil Sci track. There is at least one person in your AOI. You could  even try to make your past degrees count and start from the second year right away and still recieve the degree. It is very possible to do this without speaking french since it is an analytic philosophy oriented track (an exception) and they accept work in english. However I don't know if you can actually enroll if you don't have any ceritification for french language skills. This is probably a long shot but it may be a solution, especially if you have B2 level French from highschool or anything like that. 

[Sophia345]

Thank you all for your suggestions. I really appreciate it. 

Right now I'm still waiting to hear back from an MA program in the UK. Meanwhile, I would really appreciate any suggestions about intensive short courses.