<p>i've basically been thinking about professional schools or jobs so far, but now grad school has entered as one of my options. i really have no clue what to do to prepare for grad school. </p>
<p>what do grad schools look for? what should i do to prepare? is it common for social science majors to do research?</p>
<p>(looking at political science, international relations, or something similar).</p>
<p>DO NOT go to political science grad school until you have at the very least done a significant research paper in the field.</p>
<p>Political science grad school is heavily skewed toward quantitative analysis these days, and you can expect to be doing a whole lot of regressions, calculus, and data crunching as a grad student.</p>
<p>Hmm...you don't necessarily have to have a quantitative focus. There still is qualitative social research out there. If you apply to a program that is focused on interviewing, content analysis and the like, your personal statement does not have to be algebraic.</p>
<p>I did my BA political science at the University of Copenhagen, Denmark. The MSc political science degree there is definitely not quantitative.</p>
<p>And UCLAri is right about the research. Do some papers.</p>
<p>I'm of the opinion that there is no point in going to a political science grad program unless it's for the PhD (or PhD track) and you can be competitive for tenure-track positions. To that end, you'll need at least some statistical and caluculus training.</p>
<p>Top ten programs are leaning very heavily toward significant experience in quantitative analysis these days. Yes, you can do without it, but look at the top guys in the field, and you'll notice that they're all mostly numbers whizzes.</p>
<p>Hmm...</p>
<p>How can you tell if a scholar is a numbers whiz or not?</p>
<p>When you say top guys, I am thinking scholars who are widely respected and cited. For example:</p>
<p>Elinor Ostrom
Robert Putnam
Kenneth Waltz
Robert Keohane
Peter Katzenstein
Andrew Moravcsik
Hedley Bull</p>
<p>Are they all numbers whizzez?
Truly, I don't know, since I've never met them. But most of their texts aren't very quantitative.</p>
<p>I will start m PhD in Political Science in less than two weeks. I have to agree with UCLAri, perhaps not in Europe, but in the United States PhD's in polisci tend to be very quantitative (even if you do theory). Without that you wouldn't be published in most peer reviewed journals, and you would have a hard time finding a tenure track job. Most competitive departments have a median quantitative GRE of more than 700 -if you don't believe me, check their web pages-.
mtc1: About Keohane, have you ever read King, Keohane & Verba "Designing Social Inquiry"</p>
<p>what do students who get a master's in poli sci usually end up doing? or what's the opportunities that will be opened if one gets a master's in poli sci?</p>
<p>(just asking for other opinions since UCLAri brought up that one should only go for the PhD).</p>
<p>Basically, most schools do not even have a masters progarm in political science</p>
<p>Is Sociology very quantitative? What about History?</p>