Political Science + Economics PhD.

sakky
Tue, 02 May 2006 23:38:01 +0000

My question is GPA the most important element of the admission process?



Nah. By far the most important aspect will be your professor rec’s. If you can get a bunch of very strong rec’s from highly regarded prof’s, then you are basically a shoo-in as long as your GPA is at least half-decent. By the same token, there are plenty of other students who get stellar grades who nevertheless have great difficulty in getting admitted to good PhD programs because their rec’s are lukewarm.

The 2nd-most important attribute would be your research experience, especially your publication history. Authorship of a strong paper in a respected journal will help your cause immensely.

A distant 3rd would be things like GPA, course selection, and GRE.