Chances anyone?

[Albanski]

Hey!

I am currently a Masters student at CUNY and am wondering what my chances for a PhD program are at SUNY ALBANY, RUTGERS, INDIANA,UCI and CINCINATTI:

A)UGPA: 3.7

B)Master's GPA: 3.94

C)1 co-author publication in a Communication journal

D)4 Presentations at conferences (2 as a co-author and 2 as the primary author at the ACJS, ASC, and ESS

E)TA for Research Methods class

F)Work as a Research Assistant at a Substance Abuse facility (1 year)

**I will hopefully have 2 additional publications in a criminal justice journal by this January (but probably right after the admission deadlines)

After I graduated from my undegrad, I applied to Rutgers but was rejected and the primary reason being that my GRE was 1000. I have not had time to study for the GRE so I can guess that its only going to be a 1090 at best.

[Albanski]

Wow, no advice?

[A_Murphy]

Sorry Albanski, I didn't see this before. I'd say to do whatever you can to raise that GRE score since it's the only thing really lacking (unless you forgot to mention that money-laundering scandal you were in or something). Mine was almost certainly the highlight of my application, and several schools stated that they more or less sort the applications by the score to start with. Is there any way you think you could get to 1200? I think that might make a dramatic effect on your chances. I can give you some advice if you'd like. What is your first application deadline? When is your GRE test date?

[Albanski]

Thanks A-Murphy! I have been wroking really hard at my current institution, getting involved in research, hopefully publishing at least two papers soon. My weakest point is the GRE. I do not have time to study fro the GRE until June, when I am done with my Masters. I will be applying this December, so I can devote a considerable amount of time to the GRE. You are right about the 1200 score. That is the score that I am aiming towards, but I don't know if I can reach it, especially with the new GRE test. It sucks that the GRE matters to them so much, when they know it doesnt measure didly-squat!!!!!!

[A_Murphy]

I memorized about 350 of Kaplan's 500 GRE flashcards and scored well on the verbal part, so that definitely helped. I just tried to do a few a day over the course of a few weeks, then about 2 days before the test I tried to cram in as many as I could get. Most of the 150 words I didn't know were ones I had never heard or seen in my entire life, so I had a difficult time establishing a context to memorize them. Instead I focused on knowing the other 350 words cold in the thought that I would get enough context from the words I knew if I ran into one I didn't. As for math I just got the Kaplan study guide and started going through all of the problems. I worked as a college math tutor for a while, so I probably had an above-average retention for math, but it had been 5+ years since I had taken a true math class. I felt confident about the rest of the test, so I continued to do practice math problems right up until about 10 minutes before I showed up to the test center. The hardest part of the math portion was how they increase in difficulty as you go along. By the end of the test, they were giving me problems that I thought would have taken me at least 5 minutes to figure out (things that aren't even in the study guide). As for the essay portion, I didn't really study at all beyond looking at sample questions and the grading rubric. I honestly thought I was going to score slightly higher on the essays than I did... perhaps I was a little overconfident in retrospect.

I would also be remiss to not mention the significance of prayer, in addition to all of the support I had from my wife (especially with those flashcards) and the rest of my family--that obviously helped too.