What are my odds and how to improve them?

[UWC_Diplomat]

Hi everyone,

I did not think I would be back here so soon, but I decided that I do want to apply to PhD programs after the first year of my two-years MA degree. I would like to get into one of the top 10 PhD programs in the US and specialize in the international security and/or the Balkans and Russian foreign policy. Here is my profile, I hope that some of you might help me in figuring out what my chances are and if there is anything I can do to improve them.

Because of my girlfriend's career, I looked primarily at schools in cities in which she can realistically get a job in her industry (publishing), so I plan to apply to: Harvard, MIT, Columbia, U Chicago and UC Berkley. I would also like to apply to Yale or Princeton, but I do not think that she can find a job in these tiny towns. If you think I am overlooking something, please let me know.  

PROFILE

 

Undergrad Institution: A private college in the Midwest which is normally ranked in the top 25 colleges in the US  
Undergrad GPA: 3.76 (Political Science 3.91, History 3.91)
Major(s)/Minor(s): Political Science and History (double major) + Russian Studies minor

GRE: 158V, 156Q, 4.5AW (This was the score that got me into Georgetown, I am not sure if I will retake it as it is expensive and I do not do well at standardized exams, so I do not think I can improve it much)

 

Graduate Institution: Georgetown University, School of Foreign Service

Program: MA in Eurasian, Russian and East European Studies + Honors Certificate in International Business Diplomacy (a fancy name for international business, not much to do with actual diplomacy)

GPA: 3.91

 

Quantitative/Economics courses: Two undergraduate statistics courses, Intro to Micro and Macro, Intermediate Micro, Business, Accounting, and Finance, graduate level International Trade, graduate level quantitative analysis course which focused on data visualization. I am skilled in a few data analysis programs (Tableau, STATA, R, advanced Excel)          

                                                                                                                               

Fellowships: PPIA fellow who completed junior summer institute at Princeton. I received multiple merit fellowships at my boarding school and both my undergraduate and graduate institutions

 

Letters of Recommendation: 1. Undergraduate professor whom I TAed for and who taught me six courses and supervised my political science honors thesis. 2. Graduate school professor who taught me two courses and will likely be my MA thesis supervisor. 3. My work supervisor and a mentor, who sometimes teaches, but I never took his class.

 

Research Experience: Worked part time for the biggest think tank in my country. They commissioned me to write a book in both English and my native language about a highly interesting but under-researched topic - the political situation in Bosnia and Herzegovina since the Dayton Peace Agreement. My book, which comes out this month, will be the first book in English that looks into this issue.  

 

Teaching Experience: 1 semester as a TA for International Security course. I graded papers, advised students during office hours and occasionally taught lectures.

Work Experience: Full time at an international telecommunications giant as an operations consultant for three months. Part time experience at my graduate institution as a research assistant and at a major think tank in my home country. Semester long internships at: local government in a major US city, marketing internship at a small retail company, consulting gig at one of the big four consulting firms. Applied for a grant and organized a $10,000 project that helped reconcile students in a post-conflict society and provided them with a better education.

Research Interests: Modern Bosnia and Herzegovina, Russian armed forces as foreign policy tool, international security, modern military history.  

Languages: Croatian/Serbian - native, English - fluent, Russian - intermediate, Italian - beginner

 

US/International Student: International student with an EU passport

                                                           

Conferences: Three undergraduate conferences (History and Russian Studies), one 1^st place                    

Awards: A few minor awards (best History student, best paper, etc.), but nothing worthy of mentioning in a one-page resume.

Edited August 2, 2016 by UWC_Diplomat

[PoliticalOrder]

A few things here:

Applying for MA programs can be a little different than applying for Ph.D. programs. You want to focus all your attention on academic experience. For the most part, admission committees won't care whether you worked X job in the private/public sector. A few things stem from this:

Considering you are just out of undergrad and currently in grad school, do you think it is wise to not have three letters from tenured professors? You should have plenty of options here and I am not sure your third letter might be the best even though he/she might know you well. They are an adjunct, not a professor engaged in research which is what you should always be aiming for (especially someone currently in a undergrad/grad program).

About this book, what exactly is it? Is it actually academic work with a solid puzzle, theory, and methodology that is akin to political science? If it is, then this is a major boon to your application. But honestly, I have the feeling it is kind of a like an extended policy report or something along those lines. That being said...you need to be careful when you state things like 'this is the only book in English written on the political situation in BH since Dayton Agreements.' A quick google search reveals that to be patently false. Saying things like that in a SOP has the potential to be extremely detrimental to your application.

The nice thing about your app is that you have a lot of things going for you. It's just a question of framing it, being selective about what you highlight, and showing your strengths while also showing that you can develop research questions in your SOP. If I were you, I would only highlight your solid education background, your ability to do some elementary quant already, your research experience (esp. that you were research assistant for professors - not random things like at X think tank), and some kind of well defined research interests.

Lastly, make sure you are applying to programs with scholars that support your interests. Being constrained marginally by location is okay, but make sure it's not reducing your academic fits in the process.

[UWC_Diplomat]

Thank you so much for the feedback PoliticalOrder. 

I ended up in a hybrid professional/research program for my MA, but most of my applications were for a professional degree, so I guess I am still in that mindset. Thank you for pointing that out, now I know what to focus on. 

All of my applications for MAs required one recommendation from a work supervisor, so I just assumed it would be the same for PhDs. I will ask another professor for a letter. I am way closer to my undergraduate professors than to my grad school ones, so do you think I should ask a grad school professor whom I had only for one course, or an undergraduate one whom I had for three courses?  

The book is very short (120-ish pages of text, around 300 pages for both languages together with maps and foreword written by my boss), but it is the format they asked me to write. I tried to write it to look as much as a Poli Sci book as possible, but in the end the goal of it is to point out current issues in the system and offer a few policy solutions for the internal reorganization of the country (the book will be send to foreign embassies and international organizations in the country). I am sorry if my statement was misleading, I had no intention of boosting myself. It is the only book in English that talks about the democracy deficit in Bosnia and Herzegovina and the place that Croats occupy in the current political structure. There are a handful books about this topic in Croatian/Bosnian/Serbian, but not a single one in English. I was not specific enough as this is a forum after all, so I would still like to have some anonymity (the same reason why I did not write which college I went to).    

[PoliticalOrder]

It's just important to submit the best letters possible, although a good letter from your graduate school would be marginally better than a good letter from your undergraduate, it doesn't really matter in the grand scheme of things. Ideally you want to pick professors who you have developed some kind of relationship outside of class, either in some kind of mentorship/research capacity, or as a supervisor of some sort.