Another Am I Competitive?

[crock1255]

Am I competitive?

UG: Well known research university

GPA: 3.56

MGPA: 3.76 - Poli-sci

MGPA: 3.81- Sociology

GRE: 680V, 620Q

Should have really solid recs from well known professors in soc.

Good writing sample focusing on networks.

Goal programs: Duke, Irvine, Princeton, Maryland

Thoughts?

Thanks!

[Bukharan]

As you said yourself, it is yet another post of whether one is competitive.

No one knows better than yourself.

What else is there in your CV? Do you have research experience? Languages?

What are you research interests and do they fit with the faculty in Princeton, Duke etc.?

From the information you provided, sure, you are competitive. It is the edge over the others you need to be distinguished from a pool of others almost all of whom will have GPA > 3.6 and GRE > 1200.

[crock1255]

That's fair. I was just wondering if I was gonna get tossed into the "who does this punk think he is?" category.

As you said yourself, it is yet another post of whether one is competitive.

No one knows better than yourself.

What else is there in your CV? Do you have research experience? Languages?

What are you research interests and do they fit with the faculty in Princeton, Duke etc.?

From the information you provided, sure, you are competitive. It is the edge over the others you need to be distinguished from a pool of others almost all of whom will have GPA > 3.6 and GRE > 1200.

[Bukharan]

My personal opinion is that your stats are good. Your verbal GRE is very good. Don't worry about the 'numerical' aspect of your application.

[JohnBom]

Your Quant is on the low side for any of these programs. Your stats overall are about average for an applicant. Here is info from UCLA website whose department is in the same general ballpark as those you are looking at:

What is the average GPA? 3.66 for all applicants; 3.8 for admitted students.

What are the average GRE scores?

Verbal (2009): 557 for all reviewed; 679 for admitted.

Quantitative (2009): 657 for all reviewed: 730 for admitted.

That is not to discourage you. Your letters and SOP are the parts of your app that get you in.

[crock1255]

I had a feeling my quant was on the low side - that's probably what I'm worried about most. I definitely thought about retaking it, but figured if I don't get in anywhere this year, I'll have time to take it again before they change the test and study more/hopefully do better.

Your Quant is on the low side for any of these programs. Your stats overall are about average for an applicant. Here is info from UCLA website whose department is in the same general ballpark as those you are looking at:

What is the average GPA? 3.66 for all applicants; 3.8 for admitted students.

What are the average GRE scores?

Verbal (2009): 557 for all reviewed; 679 for admitted.

Quantitative (2009): 657 for all reviewed: 730 for admitted.

That is not to discourage you. Your letters and SOP are the parts of your app that get you in.

[jacib]

I had a feeling my quant was on the low side - that's probably what I'm worried about most. I definitely thought about retaking it, but figured if I don't get in anywhere this year, I'll have time to take it again before they change the test and study more/hopefully do better.

It's a holistic process. Yes, your quant isn't going to wow anyone, but it's probably not going to keep you out of anything, especially if a) you're doing qualitative work or you have any advanced math classes on your transcript where you did well. I'm going to a top ten school and my undergraduate GPA was 3.26--talk about not going to wow anyone. What I did wow people with was other parts of my applications. You have two masters and presumably you did math work in those fields, I suspect no one will really care about your GRE score all that much. With two masters, I expect they'll care much more about your writing sample and the recommendations of onprofessors (if they happen to know them, especially). As always, I encourage you to look at other places on this site because there is just so much useful information here; On the second page there's a whole discussion of GRE scores, but I think almost all of the advice on that thing is surpsisingly useful (including a few people who gave the advice that could be summed up "Apply widely, but appropriately").

Four seems like on the low end in terms of number of schools to apply to, especially since you don't seem to have a geographical restriction, and the schools you're applying to seem to be all over the place in terms of prestige. Princeton and say Irivine will have very different admission requirements (and even Princeton and Harvard will weight different parts of the application differently). When applying to school, I got lucky: after I got here, I realized that of all the possible professors, the adcomm last year at my current program for various reasons was absolutely the best I could have hoped for. Maybe if different professors had been on it, I wouldn't have gotten into this school, maybe if it had been more in my favor at other schools, I would have gotten those places. I got into this top ten program, and definitely got rejected at another program ranked outside the top twenty that I know was doing work similar to my to my propse project. Things like that (and I don't think that's that anomalous a story) show that it's hard to guess where people will end up simply based on their application, and it's even harder to guess after just seeing the numerical portions. As someone else said in that advice thread, "[C]ast a wide net. I will be attending a university actually ranked higher than my erstwhile top choice, but in the application process I dismissed said university because I thought my chances of getting in were very slim."

[crock1255]

Sorry - those are major GPAs, not Masters...

I don't have any advance math courses. I do have some science courses. Ideally I would be in DC, but I haven't been able to find enough programs. I have really been doing my homework on the programs and I thought these would be realistic. I could apply to Harvard and/or Columbia, but I didn't think those are too realistic. And Columbia kind of rubbed me the wrong way...

It's a holistic process. Yes, your quant isn't going to wow anyone, but it's probably not going to keep you out of anything, especially if a) you're doing qualitative work or you have any advanced math classes on your transcript where you did well. I'm going to a top ten school and my undergraduate GPA was 3.26--talk about not going to wow anyone. What I did wow people with was other parts of my applications. You have two masters and presumably you did math work in those fields, I suspect no one will really care about your GRE score all that much. With two masters, I expect they'll care much more about your writing sample and the recommendations of onprofessors (if they happen to know them, especially). As always, I encourage you to look at other places on this site because there is just so much useful information here; On the second page there's a whole discussion of GRE scores, but I think almost all of the advice on that thing is surpsisingly useful (including a few people who gave the advice that could be summed up "Apply widely, but appropriately").

Four seems like on the low end in terms of number of schools to apply to, especially since you don't seem to have a geographical restriction, and the schools you're applying to seem to be all over the place in terms of prestige. Princeton and say Irivine will have very different admission requirements (and even Princeton and Harvard will weight different parts of the application differently). When applying to school, I got lucky: after I got here, I realized that of all the possible professors, the adcomm last year at my current program for various reasons was absolutely the best I could have hoped for. Maybe if different professors had been on it, I wouldn't have gotten into this school, maybe if it had been more in my favor at other schools, I would have gotten those places. I got into this top ten program, and definitely got rejected at another program ranked outside the top twenty that I know was doing work similar to my to my propse project. Things like that (and I don't think that's that anomalous a story) show that it's hard to guess where people will end up simply based on their application, and it's even harder to guess after just seeing the numerical portions. As someone else said in that advice thread, "[C]ast a wide net. I will be attending a university actually ranked higher than my erstwhile top choice, but in the application process I dismissed said university because I thought my chances of getting in were very slim."

[jacib]

Sorry - those are major GPAs, not Masters...

I don't have any advance math courses. I do have some science courses. Ideally I would be in DC, but I haven't been able to find enough programs. I have really been doing my homework on the programs and I thought these would be realistic. I could apply to Harvard and/or Columbia, but I didn't think those are too realistic. And Columbia kind of rubbed me the wrong way...

I'm just saying there's a big range of programs, not just the Ivy League programs out there. I remember one girl on the boards last year really regretted applying to a school ranked in the top ten, a few in the top twenty-five/thirty, and a few below that (for what ranks are worth); she felt like in retrospect, she should have applied to a different mix of programs.

I applied to five sociology programs and I thought that was the absolute maximum I could have a realistic chance at, considering my interests. Afterwards, I found one more I could have applied to that could have fit my interests (in a place I didn't really want to be) but I understand feeling that you've scoured and hit your maximum. I was just initially surprised that you had a small list with both Princeton and Irvine on it, is all. It seemed like a big range for a small group. In thinking more about it, though, I realized my five schools took up about the same range as your four schools do in whatever ranking system you want to use, they just had a distribution that skewed slightly differently within that range.