this GPA hurts?

[gaygaygay]

First sorry for taking your time again...

I have a score of 85.14 out of 100 in MA degree... in BA, my score is 81,83 out of 100... I do not know the GPAs right now.

Possibly, according to chart in Turkish system they are: 3.36 (MA) and 3.22 (BA)

Master is in Women's Studies and Undergraduate was in English Teaching.

I want to apply Northwestern, NYU, Santa Barbara, Rutgers, Brandeis and some more.

I am a hardworking student when I do research. They will see from my writing sample. But in Turkey, the situation is a bit different. They did not rate my work in thesis and in my specific field. And very respectable professor can tell that i am in top 3 out of 20 people if there was any recruitment possibility.

The rest info about my degree and education is here:

Thanks,

Bye

[DustSNK]

Only in terms of GPA, you might have a hard time getting in at Northwestern and NYU. Many programs list a B+ as there minimum cutoff, but it's a minimum. You can bet most of the applicants they accept to these schools (your first 2) have an A- average at least. But I think it is something you should factor in but not deter you. Many professors factor in your country when grading. Your B+ could be an A at a school you apply to! Also if you have strong letters, a very focused and interesting research plan and so on, you could win the hearts of the people reading your application. Oh and to make up for your GPA (esp your graduate GPA which I would say most PhD students going in have an A-) get a very very competitive score on your GRE!

One other problem you might face is being an international student. From my experience it is a tough road. I am trying to get into a Canadian MA program, and most schools in Eastern Ontario only have 2 spots open for international students. Just 2 spots per program! It is an issue with funding. For me I am up against people with A- GPA's and already have published papers on an undergraduate level! I talk to lots of graduate students (MA and PhD) who don't publish anything until maybe the end of their MA or mid PhD! Now this is Canada, I don't know about American schools and their policy on international applicants, so right now you should be contacting all the schools you want to attend and ask them questions. Contact their faculty with your research interest and ask if you would fit in well with their program.

Also do you have any published work? If you have a hard time around your first time applying for PhD, you should seriously consider writing articles to submit for publication in Journals. Since you have an MA, you can apply to some serious publications and to get an article or two published would make you very competitive indeed! Most importantly don't ever give up if things are difficult

Edited August 10, 2011 by DustSNK

[hoobers]

It's pretty hard to translate GPAs between countries. I don't know anything about Turkey's system, but there is a chance that high grades are much harder to get there than here. I would ask around to see if that is the case. If so, point this out in your application. But the best thing you can do to make up for a low GPA is high GREs. GPAs are notoriously hard to compare between different departments and schools, even within the United States. If you can manage to get a high GRE score, you should be able to convince the ad com that the GRE is the real indicator of your intellectual abilities. Good luck!