POMEPS admissions webinar - 11/9/2021
Rich Nielsen
0.	I'm going to focus on just one of the questions before us: What makes for a competitive application, and what makes some applicants stand out from the crowd?  Of course I'm happy to discuss other issues in Q&A, especially MENA specific issues.  But my opening advice is general.  I'll talk as if you're applying to MIT's political science department, but I think you can just replace your target discipline and most of the advice holds.
1.	Develop a theory of who is reading your application and act on that theory.  How are they reading it? What mindset are they in? What information are they trying to extract from it?  What helps them advocate for you over opposition?  These are questions you should have an answer to, so that you can put those answers into your application.
2.	 I'll tell you my theory, based on a lot of evidence and a fair amount of autoethnography.  They are tired, bored, finding themselves sympathetic to too many of the files but knowing that they have to get from 500 applications to 25.  They are looking at 30 to 50 hours of tedious reading.  We are (mostly) nice people and it hurts to reject 475 people, so we are feeling bad.  It is impossible to read every part of every application carefully, or even skim them.  So about 15% of files will get 80% of the attention.  From there, it's close to random.  How do you get in that set?
3.	Applicants I talk to are very focused on whether their grades and GREs are good enough.  Grades and test scores matter, but we have no cutoffs.  We are experimenting with waiving the GRE.  Also, these are likely out of your control at this point.  You can control the statement and the writing sample.
4.	A good application should feel like a breath of fresh air. I want to feel joy.  The first sentence of every document should draw me in to read the next sentence (you don't know where I will start).  Short, clear prose.  It must be skimmable. But before I know it, I'm not skimming anymore. I'm actually reading.
5.	I prefer statements that start with a research question, nested in a broader area of interest.  Give me the background about your motivations, accomplishments, etc, at the end.  Better yet, weave them in as you discuss the research question.
6.	Connect that research question to three faculty members in the department.  I need to imagine who your thesis committee could be...and who I should ask about your application. I have a rule that I must be able to list faculty for everyone I advocate for.  Make my life easy!
7.	Don't go chronologically -- likely that your most impressive achievements are your most recent.  Start with your most impressive.
8.	Showing is better than telling.  Don't tell to me that you love the discipline of political science because you liked talking politics around the dinner table as a kid.  Frankly, that's pretty far from the actual discipline of political science.  If you talk about your passion for debating politics, I of infer that you don't really know what you're getting into, and you probably won't like grad school or whatever comes after.  Grad school is a pie-eating contest where the reward is more pie (and pie in this metaphor means writing original research and teaching).  So you've convince me that you understand and want the day job of a political scientist.
9.	Show me that you love political science by demonstrating that you're already trying to master what it is that political scientists do all day: idea creation. Make me think new ideas while reading your application.  Show me with a writing sample that looks like a working paper (and is formatted as such) and teaches me new things.
10.	Cliches do not help you.  Doing something really unusual in the way you write your application gets my attention, but does not help you much.  What really helps is making me think new thoughts.  If you make me have a new insight while reading your application essay, or your writing sample, you are likely getting in.
11.	Someone has to advocate for you to get in.  They have to say, "This person can teach us new things about politics that we never knew before.  Think just how great this person will be if we give them a little training."  Give them the tools to make that case.
12.	That sounds like a high bar, and it is, but here's the thing, I truly believe that each of you can teach me something new about politics.  Each of you brings unique perspective and experience that will help you illuminate some aspect of politics that I and the entire field have previously overlooked.  The task at hand is to figure out what that thing is, and figure out how to teach an admissions committee why it's an important puzzle and why you could solve it in the course of getting a PhD.  I believe you can, and I wish everyone who is applying good luck.