Grad school help

<p>I'm looking to apply to grad school in sociology (looking at Temple University in Philadelphia since they will let you apply for PhD without having a masters). My question is would I be competitive at other schools as well? </p>

<p>GPA: Overall: 3.22 Major: 3.9
GRE: 1230 V: 530 Q: 700 (this is based off of practice tests averages)</p>

<p>I don't know if other things I've done like organization wise would help any but I was my college Student Government Vice President and my Fraternity Secretary for one year each.</p>

<p>I don't have a clue where to begin looking for Grad school type stuff. I know I'm interested in sociology but also would like political science. Any help on ideas of schools to apply to?</p>

<p>If you take the GRE for real, your scores will no longer be on the 200-800 scale, but 130-170 scale.</p>

<p>However, did you take graduate courses?</p>

<p>No I have not. Temple allows to go from bachelor to PhD but your first two years are the courses you would take in masters program and if you don’t have a 3.4 at the end they remove you from the program. Should I avoid a program that is structured like that?</p>

<p>I think you would be competitive elsewhere as well, however I would encourage you to apply to several different schools, and after you start getting acceptances, go either where you get the most funding, or if the program is really, really excellent at a particular school, go there. (I’m in liberal arts too, so I know it can be difficult to get decent funding but it can be done!)</p>

<p>It’s hard to gauge where you stand without the scores for the new GRE, and each school weights things differently, but I do know that at my particular school, they didn’t consider the GRE as highly as GPA and Writing Sample-- so you want to make sure that is particularly strong.</p>

<p>No. If you can’t achieve a 3.4 in grad level courses, that’s a good sign that your professors are telling you that you can’t cut it. Master’s courses and Ph.D courses are essentially going to be the same thing - what really separates the two degrees is the level of research required: thesis/project vs. dissertation.</p>

<p>Stuff like frats and student government are entirely non-factors for graduate admissions - don’t even mention them anywhere. They don’t matter.</p>

<p>Moreover, you need to talk with your professors - they will be your best guide as to programs and interests. Also, track down some grad students and talk with them about what graduate school is like. Make sure you know what getting a Ph.D entails and what the job market is going to be when you’re done.</p>

<p>I don’t think Temple is the only place you can do a PhD in sociology without the master’s…I think most sociology programs are like that. I was looking into sociology PhD programs for a while (I’m in social psychology), and I remember looking at more than one sociology program that didn’t require an MA (Emory and UMass Amherst I remember specifically).</p>