bad grades should we justify? linguistics/literature

[umniah2013]

Do we include an explanation for bad grades in SOP? 

 

My GPA is 3.39 

 

Most of my grades are inconsistent like I have courses with 99, 92, 88,....then 66 

My major was literature and I took about 4 courses in linguistics. 

These 4 courses also range from the highest 98 to  the lowest 76 ! 

 

I'm applying to  a Master's program in linguistics. 

 

Should I mention something about my grades? 

 

When I was an undergrad, my nephew was kidnapped and I was a witness in a trial outside my home country. 

Is this something I should mention? 

 

 

 

P.s. my nephew is back with his mom now after being away from her since the age of 1 month to 5 years !

[Lisa44201]

Great news about your nephew!

 

Normally I don't support addressing academic difficulties in your SOP.... but admittedly yours are outside the realm of what we encounter here. 

 

Can you address those deficiencies briefly? As in, one or two sentences.

 

I'd suggest writing an outline of your SOP - if including that information throws off the overall theme of your SOP, leave it out.

[danieleWrites]

I applied to my PhD programs with an F in an undergraduate literate course. I never explained it in my application materials. Actually, I never explained it.

Honestly? As a person with zero experience on the school side of the admissions process, I wouldn't mention it in my SOP. The SOP is like any other application material. It's there to sell you. It should address weaknesses if that's necessary. Your GPA isn't going to show the percentage you got in a course. It's going to show A, A, B, C, B, B, and so on. The variation will not be as noticeable. Unless the GPA in your major is hovering at the minimum cutoff, you may not need to address it at all. It might be a good idea to contact the linguistics professors you're interest in working with and discuss your research interests. You could use these conversations (email or otherwise) to figure out if the courses you have less than stellar grades in are ones that you should address in your SOP.

One way you could address is in the "personal story" several SOP writing guides recommend. Not every SOP guide recommends a personal story, but you could use that if it's true. For example:

The time I spent in Canada as a witness in a lengthy trial that returned my nephew to my sister helped me focus my interests on pragmatics. Syntactic ambiguity seemed to play a role in the communication between the attorneys and the jury and the attorneys and the judge. Sausserian blah blah blah...

Personally, for me, I had a nasty weakness hiding in my academic background. My MA degree was in creative writing and my thesis was a book of poetry. I applied to get a literature PhD. No theory. My literature courses were theory light. I took something called creative writing "theory", and scraped by with a B. Seriously, it's not theory. I needed a few sessions with a shrink to deal with the cognitive dissonance that threw up all over my work in the course. Especially when this one poetry "theorist" brought in fractals. O. M. G. I'm giving myself a complex as we speak. I had to address my glaring lack of qualifications as a researcher of literature. I did that by clearly discussing my research interests with relevant theory. I didn't have to discuss in depth, but use the theory/theorist correctly. My "personal story" also shored up my transcript weaknesses because it displayed not only why I was into getting a PhD, but the theory, methodology, and literary works that went into that.

Huh. So I guess, yeah, address it in your SOP, but don't assume you have to address it directly.

[umniah2013]

Thank you Lisa.....It was really a difficult time especially that she didn't recognize her own son. She was devastated. The boy also had trouble adjusting in the beginning. 

 

 

Daniele, thank you for your reply.. My nephew's story, though, has nothing to do with my interest in the field of linguistics at all. 

 

I was just thinking of discussing some of my low grades as I have no doubt in my mind that I could have gotten a higher GPA  

I thought maybe I could shed light on the circumstances during  my undergrad years in which I was involved with the case. 

 

I'm still thinking...I'm hesitant as I also don't want to give excuses for myself!