<p>Hi all,</p>
<p>I recently applied to some Ph.D. programs in criminology and would like to know your opinion about my chances of getting accepted. Also, I'm interested in knowing how competitive these programs are. Even though there might be a lot of qualified applicants, I can not imagine that it is as competitive as psychology, business or biology (but probably also less positions). So, I would really appreciate your opinion and maybe even personal experience.</p>
<p>Well, here we go:</p>
<ul>
<li>I'm an international student.</li>
<li>AAS in criminal justice with summa cum laude</li>
<li>finishing up my BS in interdisciplinary studies in criminal justice and economics (GPA: 3.7)</li>
<li>several academic awards</li>
<li>interning with one of the nation's largest police departments (includes research work)</li>
<li>starting next year I will intern with a Think Tank (more research work) and continue my work with the police as a Citizen Volunteer</li>
<li>I consider my SOP and writing sample as pretty good and relevant to the field I'm applying to. My SOP also shows my deep interest in research work.</li>
<li>LOR: one from my dean, one from a really high police official who also is a professor, another one from someone who also is with the police and a former criminal justice program director at a top 20 US university</li>
<li>GRE: <300 That's the really weak portion of my application. However, I'm not sure of the weight of this component, since a lot of schools told me that they take a holistic approach. I think I will take it again, but some applications are already out. I'm afraid that some admission committees will simply eliminate all applications that have a too low GRE. But then again, how much applications do these programs really receive that would make it impossible for the admission committee to take a look at every single application?</li>
</ul>
<p>There is a pretty interesting survey from Association</a> of Doctoral Programs in Criminology & Criminal Justice which states the following (I think it's from 2011):
"The twenty-seven participating programs that provided data on master’s students received an aggregate total of 1902 applications from prospective students, with application counts ranging from 8 to 313 across programs. The 31 programs that responded to similar questions about doctoral programs took in 1192 applications for doctoral study, ranging from a low of 7 to a high of 92."
At the end it says that from 1192 applications 444 were accepted (mean = 42.7%).</p>
<p>However, I don't know how to compare it to other programs. Is it within the national average to other majors or is the acceptance rate much lower? Obviously, you can not generalize, but I'd really appreciate your opinion. Last but not least, does anyone know which schools have the highest acceptance rates (the 92 stated in the citation)?</p>
<p>Thank you.</p>