Frequently Asked Questions

On the online application, applicants can indicate that they would like to be considered for the M.A. program in case they are not accepted into the Ph.D. program.

If you submitted the application form online, you should receive an e-mail from BC containing a username and password to log into the Agora Portal. Through Agora you can check the status of your application by clicking on the Application Status tab. You must choose the correct school to which you applied. If you applied to a number of BC Graduate Schools, you will only receive one e-mail containing the above information.

Not necessarily. Having a B.A. in History helps, but it is not required. If your undergraduate degree is not in History or in a related field in the Humanities or Social Sciences, you will need to have taken some History courses and to demonstrate knowledge of the discipline in your statement of purpose.

The GRE general test and subject test in History are optional. There is no required minimum score. The code for submitting your GREs to Boston College is 3083.

The statement should explain how you have arrived at the decision to apply to graduate school in History, what you want to study, and why you want to study it here at Boston College.

Submit the best piece of historical analysis you have written. Usually, that will be a research or historiographical paper or part of a senior or M.A. thesis that has been evaluated and graded by your teachers. Do not submit more than 15 or at most 20 pages. In the case of theses, send a portion of the manuscript explaining how it fits into the manuscript as a whole.

Our incoming class typically consists of 10 M.A. students and five Ph.D. students.

Although you apply centrally to the Graduate School of Arts and Sciences, admissions are decided by the History Department. The departmental Graduate Committee seeks excellence in all aspects of the application: numerical scores, statement of purpose, writing sample, and letters of recommendation. The committee generally examines Ph.D. applications during the month of February and M.A. applications during the month of March.

The application deadline is January 2 for the Ph.D. program and February 1 for the M.A. program. We try to make offers of admission to the Ph.D. program by early March with an acceptance deadline of April 15th. M.A. offers are typically made in late March with an acceptance deadline of June 1.

We offer both M.A. and Ph.D. degrees. Getting an M.A. degree from the BC program does not guarantee entry into our Ph.D. program, which has a separate admissions process.

Ph.D. students must enroll full-time during their first two years in the program. M.A. students are welcome to enroll part-time but must take at least four courses (12 credits) during the regular academic year.

 All Ph.D. students receive multi-year fellowships featuring a Teaching Assistantship,full tuition remission, and an annual stipend. The department does not offer funding for M.A. students but, on occasion, we are able to hire M.A. students to work as Teaching Assistants. These positions come with a monthly stipend.

No.

Probably not. You may petition to get credit for one or two courses, but it is usually best to follow the prescribed course of study toward the degree and take as many courses as you can.

For Ph.D. students, Medievalists must pass three language exams (one of which must be in Latin), US historians must pass one language exam, and in all other fields, Ph.D. candidates must pass two language exams. M.A. students must pass one language exam.