<p>What would you need to get into top graduate programs, provided you score well on the GRE, 3.5+?</p>
<p>Depends on the field, the year, your LORs, your level of preparation, etc. As you will soon discover, if you haven't already, graduate admissions can be almost completely unpredictable. Read over the first page of posts in the "Graduate School Admissions 101" thread for a sense of what's what.</p>
<p>That said, I would be concerned if I had less than a 3.5, but not confident if I had more. In some fields, people with very high GPAs may be expected to also have other accomplishments. </p>
<p>I have a 3.63 in Classics (Ivy), 710/700/5.5 GRE and enthusiastic LORs, research and writing awards... and I completely struck out this year. I applied to only one "top" program, the rest were good, mid-level places with the specialty I'm interested in.</p>
<p>All the anecdotal evidence I've heard indicates admissions really stiffened up this year and is expected to be as or more competitive for Fall 2009 admissions. </p>
<p>Good Luck!</p>
<p>well I am in between my sophomore and junior year at a CC top LAC. Hopefully I still have time to improve my resume for graduate school. I am just puzzled by what I would need to accomplish in the next two years.</p>
<p>I'm at a NESCAC school to be exact, and my GPA is a 3.3+ halfway through, but I received faculty honors last semester, so I should hopefully be headed in the right direction. I have not taken the GRE yet though.</p>
<p>@ WilliamC</p>
<p>I'm sorry to hear the bad news. Do you plan to apply in the same field a couple of years later? It's one of the reasons why I postponed my grad school plans. I'm hoping that my years of work experience related to my field and career interests will help my graduate application.</p>
<p>"Depends on the field, the year, your LORs, your level of preparation, etc. As you will soon discover, if you haven't already, graduate admissions can be almost completely unpredictable. Read over the first page of posts in the "Graduate School Admissions 101" thread for a sense of what's what.</p>
<p>That said, I would be concerned if I had less than a 3.5, but not confident if I had more. In some fields, people with very high GPAs may be expected to also have other accomplishments. </p>
<p>I have a 3.63 in Classics (Ivy), 710/700/5.5 GRE and enthusiastic LORs, research and writing awards... and I completely struck out this year. I applied to only one "top" program, the rest were good, mid-level places with the specialty I'm interested in.</p>
<p>All the anecdotal evidence I've heard indicates admissions really stiffened up this year and is expected to be as or more competitive for Fall 2009 admissions. </p>
<p>Good Luck!"</p>
<p>And to show just how random admissions can be I also had a 3.63 in Anthropology from a top public with lower GRE scores, LOR's from top profs in my field and significant research experience and I got in everywhere I applied. It really is a cr*pshoot and I think your personal statement/research proposal makes a HUGE difference.</p>
<p>tenisghs: I'm in the post-bac program here at Penn this year (and likely next). I have a house to sell as well, so hopefully the market will be at least OK by the time I manage to get in somewhere.</p>
<p>Classics and related fields have gotten ridiculously competitive recently. The Penn post-bac was originally designed for people who just needed another year of languages but these days we have people who already have the MA (from good schools) but haven't been able to get into a PhD program. Regular folks like me, with just the BA, now seem to stick around for at least 2 years, and then go to MA programs before hitting the PhD level. In just a couple of years the post-bac has grown from about a dozen students to 46 this year. The actual graduate program has only about 20 students.</p>
<p>CWalker: Congratulations! Which kind of anthro do you do?</p>
<p>metsfan1rar: we can't really tell you much without knowing what you plan on studying. You are in a good place coming from a NESCAC but you'll definitely need to bring up that GPA. Fortunately, in many fields your last two years will carry more weight than the first two and your major GPA will carry even more. Don't worry about the GRE until next summer. Just be sure to leave time for a do-over in case you choke or ETS screws things up. Everything else is in "Graduate School Admissions 101".</p>
<p>WilliamC: Biological and archaeological...so I suppose that you'll be the one making sense of a lot of what I dig up :)</p>
<p>Adding to the randomness, I had a 3.4 from a tier 2 LAC, 740q/790v/6.0aw, solid letters of recommendation and good research experience, and I got into all the schools I applied, too. And I only applied to the top 10 schools in my field. I thought that my GPA was going to shut me out but it didn't -- apparently the other good pieces of my application came together and convinced everyone that I was a good candidate.</p>
<p>My advice to the OP is to also apply to a few master's programs as backups.</p>
<p>I also have to wonder the ways that graduate admissions actually considers GPA, which could easily vary from institution to institution. Considering only major GPA, giving more weight to grades from higher level courses, consider coursework from the last two years--I think GPA isn't a simple number, which makes it even more difficult.</p>
<p>juillet: If you're willing to share, what is your field?</p>