Avalanched

I've accepted OSU's offer!! Let's do this!

Re the Yale letter: note that the sender was from the Biology department, and the letter was sent from the Grad school office. That's the entire graduate school. It was in no way English-specific

@urbanfarmer I feel like my rejection letter got lost. Surely they'd have reached out by now if my status were anything else. Lordy. May be time to send the ever-obnoxious email to the DGS, mua ha ha.

Does anyone know what's up with USC (SoCal)? That's the last Band-Aid I'd like ripped off, and I see only one rejection on the board.

To all the programs who have not yet sent out rejections: please do so. Most programs have sent out acceptances, including you. At this point, waiting much longer is simply trolling.

Congrats to the Ertegun nominee!! That's one of the coolest scholarships I think I've ever applied for. I hope you get it!

*sees post about an email to check the Yale website for a rejection letter, hurries to own portal, sees nothing, immediately tries not to lose lunch*

@Bumblebea How is the cycling/biking? Would I get smushed in Columbus, or are there bike routes or respect for cyclists from drivers? That's my preferred means of commute outside of public transportation...

I won't be able to go for logistical reasons, but I'd love to hear what you all think as well!

Another grumble into the void-- no email from U of Toronto kicking me in the ovaries a bit this morning. I cracked and did the thing you don't do--emailed to ask about my status, part of my justification being that I live so dang far away that if I'm going to manage any visiting days, I'd need to know now, which is 100% true. But I fully expect them to respond with a rejection or radio silence. Sigh. I swear I'll be excited about having an acceptance and waitlist once my gut recovers from ~9 rejection punches and a 10th likely on the way. I know it's not personal, at least not entirely. I know this. But it still--feels bad! I just want all the rejections to come through so I can make a decision and start getting excited about what IS there instead of getting sucker punched by what ISNT.

I was just looking at that @Yanaka. Seems like one person added the acceptances from nearly every Ivy across the past couple weeks. Lucky duck!

Can programs do that? At least in the USA I don't think most programs can legally require a response until April 15 (at least if the acceptance comes with funding), and we can withdraw acceptances any time through the 15th. This thing. I have no idea if it applies to you!

Honestly, and this is coming from someone who had to choose between four top ranked programs a few years ago, the only way I found to decide was to visit, be on the campus itself, talk to the people in person, meet the other grad students, and so forth. Numbers went in all various directions, and departmental reputations were of course spread out across my interests from innovative to tried&true, but none of that ended up mattering when it came down to it. My gut ended up telling me where I would flourish the most. For example, I went to visit one school I was really excited about and almost settled on (one of your options actually), and in <24 hours I realized that I could never live there and feel okay about the place, and the people there just didn't click. If the environment is miserable for your taste and the people unpleasant, it may come back to bite you in the quality of your work. If you get somewhere and feel like, "Yes. This is home. This place makes me feel really excited to get started," then you've found your choice. Maybe this sounds a little flimsy, but it worked for me. As many lists as I made comparing, I ended up just *knowing* where I wanted to go after I saw the place.

Yeah, I was looking at the results page going, "It's quiet. Too quiet..." before realizing that the results submission page is broken.

Actually the other one is in Religion (religious studies, not seminary.) It's on liturgical rhetoric and halfway an archival project. I made a whole flipping archive of 15 years worth of weekly essays. I don't want to see OCR software again for a very long time

I applied for the PhD. I have 2 MAs because I'm insane like that.

@ThePomoHipster I am so glad to know this!! Thank you very much!

Dear Toronto, Please send me an acceptance. It would make my life. And if it's not too much trouble, please send said acceptance notification sooner rather than later. My spirit is a bit broken from a week of 6+ rejections and implied rejections, and I am really anxious to stop WAITING on everyone. I would be most grateful for any assistance in this matter, especially of the fully-fundeded-and-awarded-all-of-the-awards type. Thank you. Avalanched. *grumble*

Do we know if Yale is done notifying their lucky applicants?

If my UVA portal hasn't updated to reflect a rejection but I never got an email or phone call, clearly the department is waiting to call me to inform me that I won their most prestigious scholarship to increase the suspense, right? I mean, phone signals are so dodgy in Hawaii anyway, naturally.

I'm thinking if we haven't heard anything from UVA yet, it's an implied rejection perhaps? I only see once acceptance on the board, but if the waitlist notifications have gone out, it makes sense that no news is bad news, yeah?

Re my work in Religion-- I don't see how it would. I'm working on creating an archive of a little known theologian who and some really cool theories around the language of the Anglican liturgy and its role as both a literary work as well as an inalterable speech act that the Church councils ... well, completely screwed up from an appalling misunderstanding of the nature of liturgical rhetoric. It's basically a rhetoric/archival thesis playing stowaway on the Religious Studies boat ?? and dovetails really well with my Lit thesis. Either way. I know I'll never know what is different this time around for certain. I'm simply using this thread for what it is-- an opportunity to vent and spare my officemates the noise ?

@Silabus That's definitely what I keep trying to repeat in my head, my little mantra. Four application cycles have worn me badly. But today I think I just needed to spit that frustration and from-the-hip annoyances out here so it wasn't sitting around murking up my mood or any other thread Congrats on your own acceptance in your sig!

Here is why I'm so frustrated this application season even though I really ought to be more chuffed that I have once acceptance (and I really am grateful, truly, as it IS a good option and thank everything that someone still sees me as a good choice): Three years ago I had an AMAZING run. I got in 8/9 places I applied, top names, everything I ever dreamed and never imagined I was good enough to deserve. And then life went BOOM, and I had to pull out of arguably the top ranked program in the country to deal with it. When I reapplied places the next year, *no* luck in English, but an MA program in Religion gave me a funded offer, which I had to take since I had no other options. Well, I'm almost done with this 2nd MA and applied to 12 places this year, and with one exception, I am striking out pretty badly. I'm so frustrated because having to take those life and academic detours/pauses seem to be screwing me over in most cases. If programs are strapped for money and offer fewer jobs, the straight-through-BA-to-MA-to-PhD people look like good, reliable investments, those people that didn't have to divert and thus look like they're flighty. My CV looks flighty. And my recs are no longer from English professors, but they're the only ones that have seen my work in the past couple years. UGH. How do you get into places like Stanford and NYU and UVA and basically everywhere you wanted when your CV was a neat line, and then after 3 years of more work, more conferences and papers and work and more developed ideas, very few people want you because your CV looks funny? UGH. (And maybe I just happen to be unlucky this year, but I feel like I've fallen from the top of the hill to almost-but-not-quite the bottom of the bin as far as Smart Prospective PhD Student goes.) /rant

No worries-- the rejection email showed up in my inbox a minute ago! It wasn't a long stress period