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29th-Jun-2008 09:39 am - studying abroad?
akademiks
[info]prozackittie
Long time lurker, first time poster, yadda yadda.

A bit about me: I'm a senior at USF, majoring in Ancient History and will be declaring a second major in Anthropology with an Archaeology focus when I get back to Tampa. I'll be a 2-year senior at least due to transfer losses so I've got a bit of time to take my GRE. My goal is to go into academia and do some archaeology as well.

I'm looking at grad schools both in the US and UK, earliest possible start would be Fall 2010. I'm liking the UK options as I feel they've got better programs for what I'm studying. I've got several reach schools, but I'm having some issue with finding MA/PhD programs specifically for Ancient History that I know I'd have a snowball's chance in hell of getting into. More about that below. If anyone could help point me in the direction of additional programs to consider, I'd be grateful.

Here are the schools I'm considering applying to, most are *extreme* longshots:
- Harvard
- Oxford
- Cambridge
- UMN
- Vanderbilt
- UNC - Chapel Hill
- USF

For what it's worth, I'm in good with faculty that went to Harvard, Oxford, and UMN. I understand also that the GRE is not required for UK schools, but are there any tests that are? Does my non-impressive alma mater hurt me when applying for schools in the UK?
---------------------------------
Here's the second question and my biggest concern: I have a 3.8 GPA at USF, 4.0 major, 3.0 overall. The 3.0 overall hurts, I know, but it's going up. My old school refused to believe that I withdrew properly (medical reasons) and gave me all F's for that semester. I retook as many of the courses as I could and made A's in all before transferring in Fall '07 to USF. One of my profs didn't seem to think that the poor overall GPA would matter as long as my major GPA stays strong and I can explain the withdrawal -- he had a worse overall GPA and got in to Harvard. As far as extracurriculars, I'm a member of several clubs and I'm trying to get a RA. I'm hoping to present at least one paper before I graduate, and I'm in field school now with plans to do a short-term internship next summer. I also have good relationships with several faculty members both in and out of the classroom so I know I can get stellar LOR's.

What else can I do to make my application look better? I'm a fairly well-rounded person, but I just have this notion that I need to do everything bigger and better to compensate for my age (I'm 29, married, no kids) and overall GPA.

Thank you for any advice you can give!
13th-Jan-2008 11:55 pm - International programs.
Globe
[info]duckgirlie
Is there anyway of checking how non-US programs rank alongside US-based ones? All the university rankings I can find are basic university rankings, and don't say anything about specific programs and how they compare to programs in the US.

Basically, I'm wondering if I want to do my masters in a non-US university (and not Oxford/Cambridge or another big name), or if that'll end up hindering me if I want to do a Ph.D in the US later.
7th-Nov-2007 11:18 pm - Schools outside of the U.S.
[info]bobwhoops
Hi all,

It's pretty easy to find out about the best programs in the U.S., but I want to consider schools outside of the country as well. Is there an equivilent to U.S. News' list of the best U.S. grad schools? Or a good site for information on this sort of thing? I'm particularly interested in computer science, but something more general would be great, too.

Edit: ok, after some searching, I found some good rankings. Too tired to find them again now though, but I'll try to put them up in the morning.
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