vitaminquartet

I submitted my form several minutes before the deadline...which I realize was ridiculous...but it was nonetheless time stamped as having been submitted on December 15, 2017, with a time stamp in PST indicating it was still December 15, 2017 eastern time when it was submitted. I do not not see any "checklist" on applyweb either.

Its really great to see a lot of people posting GREs/GPAs in the results since this is extremely useful information to future applicants. Can I again seriously ask people though: post subfields. If someone posts a desirable school acceptance with low Quant GRE scores but without a subfield, applicants wont be able to know whether to infer "this school not care about GRE scores" or "this school does not care about Quant GRE scores for Theory students." Useful to theory and non-theory students alike (and same for verbal GRE and methods, political economy, potentially). Likewise if a school sends out acceptances in batches (but perhaps rejections at the same time) it would be at least a bit useful to know if those batches were grouped by subfield or if it was something less clear than that.

So about program rank, you've referred to top 5, top 10, and 15-25. What are the top 5? What are the top 10? What are the top 25? Are you just going by US News and World Report rankings or what? Are those rankings stable over years? Whats the practical difference between a 'directional' and a 'regional'? Just the name?

Yeah then one troll will just post multiple times. The results page is useful for looking at past years concerning when notices came out and what kind of GRE/GPAs were accepted. If a school made a decision about your application, it will send you notice. If you applied and haven't gotten notice, probably no one else has either.

When people post results, can they please post GRE/GPA and subfield?

The Berkeley acceptance is listed as "Accepted via E-mail on 17 Jan 2017". Which is to say that if the report was accurate...they got an email after 9pm CA time on a holiday? I don't think so. These are all big departments and we have enough 'data' from previous years to see that almost all of these departments send out large numbers of acceptances and rejections on the same day. "1.) This forum (and the results page) are not a representative sample of all the people who apply to grad school. The shoe-in candidates who aren't worried about getting in probably don't check this forum or post, (and thus we would never know if they got admission early in January)." There is no one who is a "shoe-in" to the point of not being worried about admission for top 5 departments. Thats just not a thing. There are too many elements of randomness. And anyways, even if some people are functionally "shoe-ins", they still wont be notified early because departments don't want to let people know where they stand in their order of preference since this would undermine recruitment efforts. "2.) The early bird gets the worm. Admissions committees outside of the top 15 want good candidates too, early offers = higher likely hood they get those candidates to sign on." But every research university signs up to the same pact that requires them to set their acceptance deadline on April 15. I don't see much of an advantage in early admissions for the departments.

Deadline was extended to Monday.

This is the political science version of this thread. You should ask here: http://forum.thegradcafe.com/forum/33-computer-science/

Send another reminder! Call his office! Call his assistant! Show up at his office! It is okay for a professor to decline to write for a student it is not okay for a professor to agree to write for a student and then not submit recommendations to all of their schools, and they know this.

Philpot, you should just send a reminder to your recommender. It was surely just an oversight.

What faculties do you consider to be the strongest in political theory and why? What professors influence program strength the most? What programs place the best in political theory, which is obviously a very hard field.

As the title states, what are your top choices for political science department, and why? What programs are most desirable and whats most desirable about them? If you're already a political science graduate student, what do you like about your program and what do you dislike (please name it or it is not very helpful information!)

I have heard in lots of places that book review writing is 1. good to do for phd students 2. doesn't 'count' for anything 3. but teaches you about publishing! I am not sure how to reconcile these bits of advice. Writing a book review and having it published is totally different than writing an article or even a response paper and having it published, so I don't see how the former informs the later - and since only the later counts - I don't know why anyone should spend time writing book reviews (unless it is purely for personal enjoyment or because they want to promote or undermine some book - but not for self-development or career reasons).

You have to do what is best for you - a PhD is a huge commitment and no professor is going to be as sad that some student withdrew after accepting, even after april 15, as a student will be to spend 5-7 years of their life in a sub-optimal program. If you need to withdraw after April 15 you can do so by requesting a release from the program that accepted you - no one wants to keep a student who doesn't' want to be there. Yeah, its not a nice thing to do, but its your life and the stakes are too high to sacrifice it out of not wanting to hurt any feelings.

I published 4 single authored law review articles and two minor academic publications prior to beginning my PhD (next year)...however I am 1. manic 2. in law which is an easier field to get published in then probably any other.