Applying to American PhD Programs (history) from a British University

Graduate School
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<p>Hi, I am in my final year at a British university and am applying to medieval history PhD programs at American unis, specifically University of Chicago, Stanford, Notre Dame, and Yale. Admissions information generally seems geared towards those within the American education system, so I'm having a hard time determining my chances. Bear with me, I have many questions!</p>

<p>As it stands my GPA is 3.8 overall and 3.9 for my major, but this is a loose calculation because my university does not use the GPA system - over here I would just say I have a predicted first class degree, a 17.1 out of 20 (18 is a 4.0). My GRE scores are (if I remember correctly) 590 verbal, 640 quantitative, and I have not yet been informed about the essay section although I imagine it's better than the other two sections. I speak one foreign language (Spanish) but am at a disadvantage for not knowing Latin. I plan to take an intensive Latin course this summer and am mentioning this fact in my SoP's. Other credentials include Deans List awards, being a student representative for my department, and receiving a grant from the university (kind of like a paid summer internship) to work on an independent research project, which turned out to be the equivalent of a senior thesis project (14,000 words). This year I am working on another such project as part of my coursework. As far as recommendations are concerned, I am guessing that I will have 3 very strong recommendations, coming from one quite well known tutor and 2 somewhat younger tutors. That will probably be the strongest part of my application. I am working on my SoP and I think that it is quite good. I have several potential writing samples, just have to choose which one to use.</p>

<p>GPA: the unis I am applying to do not release the average GPA of their admitted students. Obviously my GPA is strong but I am afraid everyone else applying will have equally strong ones. Any thoughts on this?</p>

<p>GRE: According to the standards of people on this website, I am aware that my scores suck and are both about 100 points below the average of those admitted to my desired programs. There is no way I am taking the test again though, because it is very inaccessible in this country (and more expensive) and I think it's too late anyways. Has anyone here applied to PhD programs with similar scores? Do they seem to make much of a difference?</p>

<p>Recommendations: All programs seem to ask for 3 letters of recommendation, but they say that you can submit more. Would having 4 letters help me, or just make me seem self-absorbed? The 3 letters I have asked for are sure to be very good, but there is another professor who has taught me who is extremely well established within the field. While I am sure he would write me a good recommendation, I doubt it would be as good as the other ones. Should I ask him for a recommendation as well, and submit 4 letters?</p>

<p>Writing Sample: Exactly how related to my desired area of study should it be? My summer research thesis is very much in line with what I would like to study, but it is twice as long as the maximum page limit and is not the best thing I have ever written. It's still good, but I have written shorter essays that I believe are far higher in quality, and are about topics of medieval history, but are not specifically about my desired subject. Should I submit an extract from the long piece, or one of my other essays?</p>

<p>Thanks for reading my questions and considering my situation. These are scary times!</p>

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<p>

If Medieval Studies is at all like Classics (my field), I suspect this might kill your applications. Most programs would likely require a minimum of 2-3 years work in Latin or Arabic, depending on your concentration. </p>

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Your GPA is fine.</p>

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It probably wouldn’t hurt and may help. I wouldn’t send more than 4.</p>

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Submit the best piece of writing you have. The other essays would be fine.</p>

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<p>for the writing sample, submit a research essay that uses primary sources. book reviews or class assignments are not good enough. if you have a research essay that uses sources in a language other than english, submit that. REWRITE your writing sample so that it is an example of your best writing. don’t just grab an essay and send it in. most students who will be applying to the places you’re looking at will rework their samples many times, getting input from their advisors, so you should be doing this too.</p>

<p>if you want to study medieval history, you will need: 3 years of latin/2 years of greek or 3 years of greek/2 years of latin, plus french and german (would be great if you had 2 years of each, but having one is okay too).</p>

<p>so… you’re clearly a long way off. a friend of mine got into princeton for medieval history and she had 4 years of latin, 3 years of greek, 2 years of french, and a year of german. she took two years after her MA just to get all her languages, working two jobs to support herself at the same time. i would recommend that you do something similar. take a few years off and get all of these languages under your belt, or your application to the schools you mentioned won’t stand a chance.</p>

<p>OR apply for MA-only programs at schools whose reputations for medieval history aren’t as strong. you can probably get into these programs with your profile although not having any greek or latin at all at the time of application may kill you; programs don’t tend to care too much about what you say you will do, only what you can prove you have done. while you’re doing your MA, however, you’ll need to get 3-4 languages under your belt at the same time, and that’s a lot of work. without latin and greek and french or german, you will have a lot of difficulty getting into any PhD program for medieval history. perhaps spanish can substitute for french or german, but you’d probably still need one of the two, and you’d need the ancient languages for sure.</p>

<p>this probably isn’t what you wanted to hear, but if you want a good shot at top programs, a year or two to get these languages will be your best bet. and hopefully a higher score on the GREs. you don’t need to do much better, but something below 600 on the verbal section can sometimes raise red flags.</p>

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<p>Thanks guys.</p>

<p>About my writing sample: Like I said before, I have one long essay (14,000 words) that is directly related to my desired research topic, but is far too long to submit whole. One the other hand I have an essay (3,000 words I think) that I believe is higher in quality, and addresses the same time period, but is not geographically related to my desired research topic. Both of these utilize several primary sources - all coursework written for my degree is supposed to be written in the style of an academic journal article. The longer one utilizes Latin sources and the shorter one utilizes a source written in Old English. That’s the thing - I know some Latin from school and can translate things when provided with adequate time, but have not taken it for 10 years and have no official qualification. So, which piece do you think I should use for my writing sample, a section of the longer one, or the entirety of the shorter one?</p>

<p>FYI, Greek is only necessary for Byzantine studies, which is part of why I decided not to become a byzantinist! The Latin thing is frustrating because in the UK medievalists generally don’t take Latin until they enter a masters program. I tried taking it last year and was not allowed! I know that’s my problem, but it really ****es me off!</p>

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<p>Hi JerryLandis,
I’m planning to do the exact same thing in a couple of years (graduating from medieval history at the University of Edinburgh this year and have a place on Teach first) and when I emailed to enquire last spring, I was given similar advice about the languages. It’s also worth noting that several of the programs I emailed said that as a British undergraduate degree is so much more specialised, it was possible to skip some required classes as you would have covered said material at undergrad, obviously depending on where you’re currently studying. A couple also recommended completing your MA in the UK then applying, but quite apart from the financial implications of this, my understanding is you STILL wouldn’t satisfy the language requirements. Feel free to PM me if you want.
Katie</p>

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<p>i’d recommend taking a section from your longer essay, cutting it down to their length requirements and rewriting parts of it so that it reflects your best writing and argumentation. showing that you’ve used sources in latin will be a huge help to your application.</p>

<p>you don’t need actual language courses on your transcript to satisfy departments’ language requirements. by listing how many years you’d need, schools are really only letting you know the level of proficiency expected. you can get that proficiency anywhere. so if you can read and translate latin with the use of a dictionary, you should be fine.</p>

<p>MA/PhD programs will usually ask students to prove their language proficiency by completing translation exams, whether they have university courses in the language or not. those exams look like this, almost across the board:</p>

<p>you are given 2-3 paragraphs, in academic prose, in the foreign language. you have 2 hours and a dictionary (the bigger, the better) to translate the passage. some schools require near-perfection, others simply need you to get the gist of the passage. in addition to this, some schools’ translation exams include a second section, again 2-3 paragraphs of academic prose, and this time you simply write a 1-paragraph (or less) summary of the passage in english.</p>

<p>if you can do that in latin, you have enough latin. to demonstrate this to departments, you would be VERY well served to have your writing sample include latin sources, and to footnote that all translations in the work are your own.</p>