Hi!
Thanks for your reply. I did both the BA and the MA at the same university. People from my faculty that pursue a Ph.D. tend to aim a bit higher. Most of the admits are in Brown, UBC, UC Davis, NYU, Georgetown, Rutgers, UCL, and U of Maryland. The best of them go to Stanford, MIT, Oxford, LSE, and the like, though they are not representative. I'm actually pursuing programs in a lower tier due to the fact I don't have research experience in an academic environment.