What would one need....

[Albanski]

Hey, I have been doing some research and there is not a lot of data that gives you the scores of people who have been admitted into certain programs such as lawschoolnumbers.com (law school data)

I know that admissions is not clear cut but there have to be an exemplary candidate that has applied or the type of numbers/research background they are looking for.

Therefore I have 2 Questions

1: What are scores/extracirriculars one would need to get into top programs

2: What would one generally need in order to obtain admission at like top 20 schools.

[slothy]

I think that, in general for social sciences (at least poli sci and soc), a 1300 combined GRE tends to open the doors for a lot of the top ranked programs - that is, just as a very general starting point. I really have no idea about specialized criminology programs (refering to your profile specifically). The weight given to GRE's varies considerably from program to program; most would probably put more weight on research experience backed up by strong LORs. I know that, among the consistently high-ranking programs in sociology, Berkeley and Northwestern both post mean/median GRE and GPA data on their websites (although I don't quite get why Northwestern's applied verbal GRE is higher than its accepted student GRE mean... they can't seriously be getting an applicant pool that averages in the 98th percentile). I think I've seen data on the graduate school (broken down by department) websites for U Washington, Chapel Hill and Duke as well to get a sense of numbers in the 10-20 ranked departments and to compare disiciplines - you just have to search around.

'As for extracurriculars, I think the only thing you can do that carries much weight is research. Get as many RA-ships, conferences, even publications if you can in before you apply. A lot of people entering sociology programs tend to have work experience (typically not in corporate America though, more likely in the public or nonprofit sectors), although I get the impression that's more because the disicipline attracts people returning to school after a break than because adcoms are significantly predisposed towards them.

Hope that helps. I really wish more of the top programs (i.e. Ivies) would post quantitative information, but that would probably reduce the application fees they get to collect from cluelessly unqualified applicants every year...

[misterpat]

Hey, I have been doing some research and there is not a lot of data that gives you the scores of people who have been admitted into certain programs such as lawschoolnumbers.com (law school data)

I know that admissions is not clear cut but there have to be an exemplary candidate that has applied or the type of numbers/research background they are looking for.

Therefore I have 2 Questions

1: What are scores/extracirriculars one would need to get into top programs

2: What would one generally need in order to obtain admission at like top 20 schools.

1. Extracurriculars are unimportant, unless you consider research experience an extracurriclar. Scores required for top sociology programs are supposedly lower than other disciplines (since fewer people study it). You are correct, Law School admissions are based more directly on numbers. Sociology departments go with a student's fit. If you score a 1600, you might be on the fast track to getting admitted, but if your personal statement conveys the impression that you don't even know what Sociology is, there are no guaruntees.

2. Isn't this the same question?

[Tritonetelephone]

Extracurriculars are unimportant, unless you consider research experience an extracurriclar.

That's actually not true at all for Sociology. For us, schools do tend to highly value community experience, especially if it directly relates to your discipline - and it shouldn't be hard to argue that it does. I got pretty far (though not far enough) on my extracurriculars alone last time I applied to schools, considering that my GRE scores weren't that good, I had no research experience, and I come from a very low-ranked University as an undergrad. But I was an officer of my campus GLBT group and I'm applying to specialize in sex and gender. It depends on the school of course, but I would strongly disagree that extracurriculars are "unimportant." Although research experience is important, too.

Sociology departments go with a student's fit. If you score a 1600, you might be on the fast track to getting admitted, but if your personal statement conveys the impression that you don't even know what Sociology is, there are no guaruntees.

That certainly is true. If you can't specify what you have in common (regarding research interests) with any of your prospective professors, a good GRE score will not be enough.

I've also only seen GRE data on specific department websites - you just have to dig a little (usually it'll be in their FAQ). There is some helpful data on http://www.petersons.com and http://graduate-school.phds.org/ but I don't think they have GRE scores, and they're definitely not as up-to-date or accurate.

[slothy]

That's actually not true at all for Sociology. For us, schools do tend to highly value community experience, especially if it directly relates to your discipline - and it shouldn't be hard to argue that it does. I got pretty far (though not far enough) on my extracurriculars alone last time I applied to schools, considering that my GRE scores weren't that good, I had no research experience, and I come from a very low-ranked University as an undergrad. But I was an officer of my campus GLBT group and I'm applying to specialize in sex and gender. It depends on the school of course, but I would strongly disagree that extracurriculars are "unimportant." Although research experience is important, too.

I think that depends greatly based on the program - and it's difficult to say where and how it would help. Also depends on how one defines community experience; big difference between being an officer in the sociology club and working at a think tank or some other full-time, post-graduate experience. Probably matters most for programs that are heavily invested in the public sociology "movement" (e.g. Berkeley).