gre scores VS percentiles.

UCLAri
Sun, 15 May 2005 16:46:46 +0000

To further what was stated…

Most people who haven’t taken political science at the advanced undergrad or graduate level don’t know just how much math is involved these days. The best programs, such as Harvard, Stanford, Mich, UCSD, Cal, and UCLA are all heavily based on both quantitative and rational choice analysis. Maybe Cal a bit less than the others, but still.

Having at least a 700 on the AW portion of the GRE is going to affect your ability to get into good programs quite a bit. Unfortunately, with a 3.4-3.6, you might not be a choice candidate, however. I recommend that you do a few things to help improve your chances for top programs:


Work a couple of years and show that you have a strong work ethic that will help overshadow your good but not great grades (My 3.7 GPA along with college and dept. honors at UCLA was enough to maybe get me into one program, but no top 5s)
Make sure you know at least one full professor, and well-enough that they can write you a GREAT letter of rec. Kissing arse really helps in this game.
Get that GRE as close to 99th percentile in all sections as possible. You are unfortunately in a Catch-22 situation. If your GRE is low, it will be a red flag that you are not competent enough. If your GRE is high, but your grades are what you say they are, you will be seen as lazy. The latter is of course preferable to the former.
Reconsider grad school. Why do you want to go? You aren’t going to political science grad programs to teach, remember that. Your ability to effectively articulate your reasons for going to grad school are very important to your overall image as an applicant. “I love political science and want to teach it to the poor children in Africa” is not getting you anywhere. “I want to explore the notion of disposable income growth as an inverse indicator of incumbent party success in reforming former-Soviet satellites” is a better answer. You are being taught how to be a political scientist, not a politics teacher.