<p>I am currently a non-traditional, 26yr old, junior history major at a state university. I always wanted to go to college but felt it was beyond my means. I began working full-time at 17 and have since then. After high school I initially just worked. I found this too boring and took classes at 2 local community colleges. Since I never thought I would go beyond CC I didn't always do very well. I ended up with a 3.3 GPA at one school and a 2.4 GPA at the other. At 23 I landed a career path sales position making 40k a year. I felt I would be promoted so I dropped out of school for 2 years. It became clear over the 2yrs, however, that I had hit my ceiling. The thought of spending the next 40yrs trapped in a cubicle was too much. I started taking classes again. The company I worked for made things difficult and I realized I was going to have to pick the job or college.</p>
<p>Clearly, for better of worse in this economy, I chose college. Having now given up a great job, I have been extremely motivated. I have a 3.9 GPA. I'm in the Honors Program and working on an honors thesis that will be 50-75pgs. I'm translating previously unused primary documents for this project. This work is being presented at a national academic symposium in the spring and is being used for an online museum exhibit. The professor I'm working on this with thinks I should be able to get the work published. My advisor offered to be on my thesis committe. Both of these professors have already made it clear they will write me some pretty enthusiastic recs. I've taken practice GREs and I'm sure my scores will be relatively good. I've researched what universities have history departments that are strong in my area of interest. Within these universities I have already picked professors that I feel would match my research interests..but...</p>
<p>My question for these forums is if (in your experienced opinions) what I am doing now will be enough to offset my uneven academic history. If not, what more can I do? I've considered upgrading my polisci minor to a double major. This will add an extra year of solid high performance. This will also add to my debt burden and that's always a concern. Basically, given my history, am I maximizing my chances at getting into a grad program? </p>
<p>Any comments, advice, etc are greatly appreciated!</p>