FAQs for Applicants

We consider a number of different factors in combination, including

• Undergraduate (and sometimes graduate) GPA and record
• GRE scores
• Research experience
• Interests that fit with department strengths
• Recommendation letters
• Scholarly potential.

Students for whom English is not a first language will, in most cases, need to take either the TOEFL or the IELTS.

Information regarding the number of applications versus the number of graduate students admitted can be found here.

We usually invite top applicants to a recruitment weekend in early February.

Due to various constraints, we are not able to host all outstanding candidates for that visit. We therefore consider a pool broader than the applicants who visit during the recruitment weekend.

We typically admit about about four-to-five new students each year.

Of course, there is some variation that occurs from year to year. But, over the long run, it averages out to four new graduate students per year.

Statistics regarding our admissions and enrollments can be accessed here. 

Yes, we provide each admitted graduate student with five years of funding. That funding covers the costs of tuition while also providing a monthly stipend.

For the 2023-24 academic year, the standard stipend level is $36,376 plus 100% coverage of health insurance premiums.

There is also a variety of competitive fellowships available on campus that has allowed a fair number of our graduate students to secure sixth year funding.

We are located on three floors in Tarbutton Hall on the main campus of Emory University.

You can find Tarbutton Hall on campus with this map.

The campus itself is in a beautiful enclave in the Druid Hills area, an inner neighborhood of Atlanta with ample housing, dining, and other facilities in close vicinity.

At any one time, we have approximately 25-30 students at various stages in the program. This number stays stable because, while we consistently enroll about four students per year, we also see about four completing their PhDs each year.

Comparative data about our graduate student numbers can be found here.

While our overall diversity varies depending on incoming cohorts, we typically admit a good number of both domestic minority and international students each year.

We also are strongly committed to enhancing further the diversity of our graduate student cohorts and the diversity of our faculty and staff. 

Statistics addressing the gender, ethnoracial, and nationality composition of our graduate students can be accessed here.

We currently have 21 regular faculty in Emory Sociology and an additional 4 graduate faculty. 

We have experienced remarkable growth in recent years: we have hired 11 new faculty since 2015.

That hired trend not only shows that Emory Sociology is dynamic but also that it has been supported by the administration in terms of funds for new faculty.

Information regarding our faculty can be found here. 

Students are assigned an advisor upon enrollment but are free to change advisors at any time. 

We take pride in a record of strong mentoring, and two of our faculty have won university-wide mentoring awards.

In many ways. For instance, we 

• Require presentation or publication of at least one research paper
• Encourage and facilitate regular attendance at conferences
• Conduct in-house seminars on professional matters, etc. 

The Graduate School provides Professional Development Support funds to all students. 

Yes. Students have access to computing resources, various data sets and statistical packages, a large university library, extensive journal databases, support for conference travel, etc. 

We also have sufficient funds in Emory Sociology to cover the occasional, unexpected costs that accompany those serendipitous opportunities that our graduate students encounter.

Yes. Many of our students have taken courses in areas such as anthropology; business; history; political science; public health; religion; and women's gender, and sexuality studies.

Several students have conducted research with faculty in disciplines others than sociology and/or worked on dissertations linking sociology to other disciplines.

Given that we also require students to have a dissertation committee member drawn from outside Emory Sociology, our students regularly make connections with professors across campus.

This connection to other disciplines on campus is also facilitated by our Emory Sociology faculty: many of whom share affiliations with other department and units on campus.

Yes indeed! To give but one example, we have faculty sharing joint-appointments and affiliations with the following units:.

• African American Studies
• Anthropology
• Candler School of Theology
• East Asian Studies
• Environmental Studies
• Emory Center for Ethics
• Emory School of Law
• Emory School of Medicine
• Film and Media
• Goizueta Business School
• Graduate Division of Religion
• Political Science
• Rollins School of Public Health
• Quantitative Theory and Methods
• Women's, Gender, and Sexuality Studies. 

Time to completion is about six years, shorter from some students who enter with extensive prior training, longer in some cases due to personal factors or complex projects.

You can inspect these times to completion by looking here.

About a third of our graduating PhDs take jobs at research universities, a third do so at teaching colleges, and a third take positions in applied research.

A growing number of our students also pursue post-doctoral fellowships before taking on permanent positions.

A full listing of our PhD alumni earning their degrees since 2000 (and their locations) can be accessed here.