Ph.D. Admission Requirements

harvestmoon
Thu, 07 Jul 2016 22:54:45 +0000

@SeinfeldFan1 if you’re looking at English PhD programs, there definitely aren’t strict ranking cutoffs (that I’ve ever heard of)… A certain GPA minimum/recommendation usually (3.0 or so), but English programs are especially more interested in your writing sample, personal statement, previous research and teaching experience, etc. Maybe the “requirement” you mentioned is more of a recommendation/what most students who were previously accepted had.

I’ve read about cases where departments accept students with below a 3.0 and have to fight to get the student admitted through the graduate school. That’s sometimes the catch - a department can wish to enroll a student all they want, but if they can’t get the graduate school to accept the student, they’ll have a problem. It’s actually the graduate school who admits students. The department just recommends them for admission.

It’s usually not an issue, though, because English PhD programs (in all of its subfields) are extremely competitive and there are tons and tons of cream of the crop students applying. You can maybe get into a lower ranked PhD program with a low GPA, but usually, if your undergrad GPA is a detriment, you pursue an MA first, which can be used as a stepping stone (or, for some subfields of English, is what pretty much everyone does first). It’s then your MA GPA that matters most for PhD admissions, which should also be pretty good to get into top programs.

This isn’t to say that no one with below a 3.0 can get into an English PhD program but that it’s a lot harder to do so. Generally speaking, though, lower GPAs can be overcome with excellent everything else because English PhD programs are more holistic than number-driven like law school or med school.

And then… there’s funding, which is the actual area of concern here. Even if you could get into a PhD program with a low GPA, would you get funding? If not, then… one should really reconsider pursing the PhD.