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Posted

First and Foremost, this is such a great site with an abundance of educated people helping each other out towards a common goal. I am pleased to have found this site and hope to gain advice as well as offer it. Here is my issue:

I desperately want to get into USC for Communications Management. It has been my dream school ever since I lived in California for 11+ years. I just recently graduated from UC Davis in June 08 and amplanning on applying to USC (top choice) UCSD, UCSB, and UC Davis again. The problem is that I have a 2.93 GPA with a major in Pol Sci and minor in Communications. I recieved a couple A's, a lot of B's and B-'s and I have one C and one P grade. I'm not that well of a test taker, I study hard but it just doesn't click that well, but I'm great with essays so those pretty much got me through college. Also, I worked full time to pay for school but that's no excuse its just i felt I could've done better. I'm worried about my GPA when applying to grad school but I hear there are some things around this:

1) GRE score: I am studying for the test right now, it is scheduled for May '09. I am confident in the writing part but the Vocab and Quant is pretty tough. If I am applying for Communications, should I be more focused on the verbal part of the test? Anyobody have any tips on how to tackle the vocab?

2) 2nd Transcript: I am planning on taking non-matriculated grad classes at UC Davis extension to provide a 2nd transcript to USC showing that I could do well in a grad class and hopefully the credit can be transferred over. Is this a good idea?

3) Prestige of school: I graduated from UC Davis and I think it's an okay school, not that prestigous but I hear that some people think otherwise. USC says it accepts a lot of applicants from the UC's and believe that they are the best set of public universities in the nation. People have said that if you have an average GPA from a pretty good school then Universities will cut you slack when reviewing your application. Is this true? Has anyone had similar experiences?

Here are other facts about my potential application, I have three internships under my belt in marketing for health-care, which shows a trend towards my career goal. I have done a lot of volunteer work as well. Can anyone please offer some advice, similar stories, words of encouragement,etc because I feel overwhelmed. Thank you

Posted

I don't know much about grad school in communications management, but I would suggest a few things:

a) Your GPA could be a little low, depending on how prestigious a school you want to attend. However, in many fields it's not the GPA per se that matters, but rather how you did in the field (and english program would not care at all about a C in orgo for instance). Also, programs care not just about grades, but about which courses are on the transcript. In other words, do you have the pre-requisite skills for graduate school.

B) Generally, all of the UC schools are considered excellent. That doesn't mean that schools will cut you slack for low grades.

c) Probably Verbal is more important than Quant (but don't let you Quant get too low!) GREs in most fields are not given much weight. Usually they are only used as a sorting device; get above a cut-off and they don't matter anymore.

d) Vocab is hard to tackle in two months. The common approach is simply to make flashcards and memorize words. Any good test-prep book will have vocab lists of commonly seen GRE words. (Try Princeton Review or Kaplan--the books aren't great and the practice tests are worthless, but the word lists will be usefull).

e) most liberal arts grad schools won't care at all about community service, but a management program might (a little). You're work experience is more relevent. Be sure to discuss it in your personal statement.

Hope this was helpful

Posted
I don't know much about grad school in communications management, but I would suggest a few things:

a) Your GPA could be a little low, depending on how prestigious a school you want to attend. However, in many fields it's not the GPA per se that matters, but rather how you did in the field (and english program would not care at all about a C in orgo for instance). Also, programs care not just about grades, but about which courses are on the transcript. In other words, do you have the pre-requisite skills for graduate school.

B) Generally, all of the UC schools are considered excellent. That doesn't mean that schools will cut you slack for low grades.

c) Probably Verbal is more important than Quant (but don't let you Quant get too low!) GREs in most fields are not given much weight. Usually they are only used as a sorting device; get above a cut-off and they don't matter anymore.

d) Vocab is hard to tackle in two months. The common approach is simply to make flashcards and memorize words. Any good test-prep book will have vocab lists of commonly seen GRE words. (Try Princeton Review or Kaplan--the books aren't great and the practice tests are worthless, but the word lists will be usefull).

e) most liberal arts grad schools won't care at all about community service, but a management program might (a little). You're work experience is more relevent. Be sure to discuss it in your personal statement.

Hope this was helpful

Hey thanks a lot, I didn't get fantastic grades but they were average (B's and B-'s) I hope to tackle this vocab by may, have Barrons GRE book for that. Was wondering if anybody used any computer software for GRE verbal? Can anyone recommend me any downloadable software?

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