rate my chances

<p>i don't know much about US admissions, so can you give me an idea if i stand much of a chance at Yale, Chicago, Cornell and maybe Harvard for a PhD in English?</p>

<p>I have a BA in English Lit, equivalent of GPA 4.0. I won a prize from the university for having the best overall average. I got all A grades except 2 courses, which were very high Bs. I did a 10,000 word dissertation too, and got an A for that</p>

<p>I'm doing an MA now and so far have very high B grades (As are harder to achieve here than in the US). I'm expected As on the rest. I have a lot of experience in research- I'll have to do a 20,000 word dissertation for this and have done lots of other papers. (apparently UK students do much more research writing than US ones?)</p>

<p>I have good knowledge of French and German. I plan to take up Latin before applying.</p>

<p>I'm sure I can get 3 very good references, and possibly one reference from a very well known professor at Rutgers. </p>

<p>I have a strong idea for my doctoral dissertation already. it matches interests of staff at those places</p>

<p>I didn't take the GRE yet, but on practice ones I get about 750 verbal and 400 quantitive. I'm confident I can the highest score on the writing bit and raise those two scores a bit. I think my subject test score will be high too.</p>

<p>extra curricular stuff includes hosting a radio show, editing parts of the student newspaper, proofreading the paper, being in the drama society, volunteering at local schools. I also play the violin, bass guitar and banjo.</p>

<p>I'll need full financial aid.</p>

<p>what do you think my chances are?</p>

<p>Not full financial aid to the Ivies</p>

<p>Srry</p>

<p>Yale and Cornell both say on their websites that for that program any admitted student is given an 18,000 stipend for the year and all tuition is paid.</p>

<p>Chicago say as of next year the same will be true.</p>

<p>Harvard's the only one which doesn't guarantee it</p>