Crucial BBQ

If you are in disaster and emergency management I would suggest a "traditional" laptop if money is not an issue. Since you mention sometimes going to places without Internet access it seems silly to get a Chromebook--unless of course you can use your cellphone as a hotspot. I have had a tablet since the first iPad was released and have tried to go paperless numerous times. For many reasons it seemed more annoying than practical (I also had a Kindle Fire, gave it my mom). I think tablets are a great form factor for certain things but in my opinion they are still years away from fully replacing laptops (and maybe decades for desktops?). If you want to use a tablet as an eReader while traveling then why not get a cheap[er] tablet and a mid-priced laptop? I mean since you are considering a Chromebook and tablets my guess is that hardware specs are not much of a concern for you. I am currently on a 13" MacBook Pro (Retina) and my previous laptop was also a 13" MacBook. When I got my first MacBook I was concerned I would find the screen too small. Initially, I did, but quickly got used to it and it is no longer a concern. For comparison, I also have an old 17" Toshiba and a 2012 15" Asus. Both the Toshiba and old MacBook have been turned into Linux machines, by the way.

I dunno. You say that three faculty members in this program are interested in working with you, with one of them being tenured (and having nothing but good things to say!), but one newbie is telling you to apply somewhere else. At this point you can only speculate why Prof Y said what she said, but the current tally is 3 "against" 1. Personally, I would get back into contact with Prof Y before you talk to your main POI, mention that you feel this is your "best fit" program, and if she can elaborate on what she initially said.

Professors receive a ton of email every day, have meetings and committee work all long, and are just generally busy people. Some profs even teach at more than one institution. First and foremost be sure to find out if it is even necessary to contact profs/POIs. At the Master's level it is not as important, however some Master's programs do require, or suggest in the least, that applicants contact a faculty member prior to or during the application process. The general advice I have come across suggests to only contact professors (for Master's programs) if you have to (that is, it is required by the program) and to proceed with caution if it is optional. I don't think area-of-interests fit is as crucial for a Master's program as it is for Ph.D., but as always you need to check with the specific programs to be sure. You definitely do not want to sound superficial, which can be avoided as long as you sound professional no matter how much of a n00b you may be to the prof's work/interests. If the Master's program is one that requires potential applicants to contact professors than those professors more-than-likely will know that contacting them is a part of the application process at the school and you are just looking for someone to sign off on your application and not someone to fund you for five years. Unlike a Ph.D. program where an applicant is applying to a specific program based on research interests/fit, applicants to Master's programs are generally applying to the program as whole and not to work in a specific lab or under a specific prof. In your initial contact email open with who you are and why you are contacting that person, follow with a brief mention of your past courses/experiences that have led you pursue graduate school in this area, and close by asking if they would be willing to continue this conversation. Or something like that. With that, I would avoid contacting profs at programs where doing so is not a requirement.

By excited I mean the feeling of euphoria one gets from the anticipation of the favorable outcome of a "big deal" future event, even with the knowledge that the outcome may not be favorable. You may call it fantasy if you like, but I like to think of it more along the lines of "fingers crossed" with the lean tilting towards I know I have a decent chance. It could be nervous excitement, too, I suppose.

I like to write, so that is just me. Besides, I have some explaining to do in my own SOPs so I'll take as much length as I can get. Your SOPs should really be as long as they need to be without being extraneous. Just keep in mind that at 500 words, if you give them 300 you're in trouble but at 800 words you can probably get away with 700. It is okay to go over a little, too. I just checked one of my SOPs from last year: 1466 words.

The only specific length I have seen so far was in terms of characters, and that is capped at 4000. My essays are between 1000 - 1200 words. If a program specifically asked for 500, I'd give them 500. If they want 800, they'd get 800. And so on.

My ex-GF went through the Archives program at Simmons and I had two other friends from Boston who also went through the program. She was originally in the dual Archive/History program, but dropped the History as it was too much work for her. She had friends from the program but not sure if she hung out with any of them much. She worked 2-3 jobs (one at Simmons, one at another college, and one was a paid internship). When she wasn't in school or at work she was doing homework. As far as I know she liked the program and the school although she had one prof who she despised. My understanding is that no one liked her. The only things I know about Simmons are that it is all female for undergrad, co-ed for grad, a part of the Colleges of the Fenway, Emanuel is to the left, Wentworth to the right, Harvard Med and Northeastern are within walking distance, it is near Fenway Park (both the actual park and the baseball field), is generally safe, and is near the D train of the Green Line, which aside from the C train is probably the only Green Line train worth taking (seriously, avoid the B train at all costs. This is the line that passes Boston University and stops like every five feet. It ends at Boston College).

This is old news. A few offers were made, nobody bought. Then CEO Heines was canned and John Chen was brought in. They are doing way better now than they were a year ago (when the linked article was published), but still a long ways away from where they were in 2010. The OP asked for opinions, I gave mine.

Not quite. Most schools only require a cumulative GPA of 2.0 to graduate, but some majors at some schools might have a higher standard. Also, typically in the U.S. 70% = 2.0 GPA = C = average. At 50%, that would equal a flat F in the U.S. Over the last ten years or so high school students in the U.S. became obsessed with GPA, which spilled over into undergrad when they all started to go to college. The result is an entire generation who believes that a 3.7 is low and anything 3.5 or lower is absolutely horrible. The good news is that most professors, and thus those on the adcoms, went to college a long time before this generation did-many even long before they were born. These profs know that a 3.0 means mastery of 80% of the material, and that is pretty darn good.

In reality I started writing mine a few years ago, but that is a story for another thread. I am going to start hammering out some first drafts beginning with next week and hope to have completed the final drafts by mid-Novemeber.

It is an ambiguous statement. How can a program both recommend that you do something and say it is also not required in the same sentence? The way I read it is as follows: your application is recommended but not required. This is one of those things that will produce just as many different answers as the number of people giving those answers. I have heard some say that "Recommended" really means "Yes, we really want you to take it" and others say "it's only required if...your uGPA is low/you majored in a different subject or area/you went to an 'unknown' school..." In my opinion if something is recommended but not required, and you give it a shot anyways, it shows intention.

No. I suggest reading (cr)Blackberry centric sites. Fanbois, yes, but also the most critical.

I have seen such deadlines as well. What it means is that shortly after 12/18 the adcoms will convene to begin the application review process. The final deadline of 1/4 is just that, the absolute latest one can submit their application. Various departments have various policies but in general, it seems based on my understanding of how this works, that the majority of admits will come from the by-12/18 stack with those from the 1/4 pile filling in slots as necessary. I could be wrong, though That is just how I understand it. For the record, why can you not get in your applications early? You have two months until the 12/18 deadline, you can send in your applications today if you like. *afterthought: one of my programs has a deadline of 1/1 with a final deadline of 3/15. Only those applicants who apply by the 1/1 deadline are eligible for fellowships, and perhaps most other forms of aid.

I would invest in BlackBerry (formally RIM). Their stock dropped from ~$160 down to ~$6 a share a couple of years ago, but they are slowly rebuilding and rebranding (with a renewed focus on Enterprise, QNX, security, and the Internet of Things). If you are an American you probably think they are dead, and most will advise not to invest in them. However they are far from dead and the stock will at the very least hold at ~$6, otherwise it has nowhere to go but up.

As evidenced here on Grad Cafe, those with sub 3.0 uGPAs are often times admitted into Master's programs while being denied straight access into Ph.D. programs from undergrad, the Redemption Degree as GC forum member Lifesaver called it. While there are many reasons for a sub 3.0 uGPA, and many of those reasons stemming from insinuating circumstances that may not be directly related to one's own academic ability, I find it fascinating that so many in the sub 3.0 club are now reporting gGPAs in the high 3.Xs. Just as there are many reasons to have earned a sub 3.0 uGPA I am sure there are also many reasons for how each rectified their issue to earn their now high gGPA. That is, however, not the concern of this OP My question is what do you all think of graduate level courses in terms of academics and how they relate to the undergraduate courses you took in terms of academics? I have not taken a single graduate level course but I have sat in on a few, have dated a few girls while they were in graduate school, and know a few others who either went through graduate school or are currently in graduate school (both MA/MS and Ph.D.). Based on my own limited exposer it seems to me that graduate level courses may not be tougher academically, but perhaps only more rigorously scholarly. Recently I came across a blog that discussed the differences between graduate-level coursework in the U.S. and that of graduate-level coursework taught abroad from a foreign students perspective. One of the participants in the blog made the comment that in his Mathematics Ph.D. program getting the answer correct was not what is being tested, your approach to the problem is. He went on to write that even if you got the answer correct, if your approach was ambiguous it was still wrong. I have also read accounts of how mathematicians can spend weeks or months contemplating a problem and working through how to set it up instead of working on how to quickly crank out an answer. If both of these are correct than grad school is right up my alley! So what do you think? Graduate level courses tougher? Easier? Just different? *an aside. One of the courses I sat in on was for graduate-level biostats. The prof spent the lecture laughing at his own corny jokes that apparently only he understood, regaling the class with corny "life stories", marveling over his own cleverness in general, and then 10 minutes with a few Power Point slides discussing epidemiology.

I read an article not too long ago written by a guy who went through a Ph.D. program at UC Berkeley during the 1960s. He wrote that his cohort began with ~160 students, but ended with only 5 earning the Ph.D. The premise of the article was around the high attrition rates of Ph.D. students, which is roughly around 50% and discussed the many reasons why. One of the top reasons being that they realized they simply do not like doing research. This is also evidenced in the "Officially Grads" section here on GC, where many users are considering dropping out. So the more research experience one has prior to graduate school the more likely they are familiar with the ins/outs of doing research and the least likely they will be to drop out. You also got to keep in mind that in the U.S. it is generally one professor who is carrying the majority, if not all, of the graduate students funding. It is in their best interests to take on the students who are least likely to drop-out. Also in the U.S. students have many opportunities to take part in research both on and off campus (volunteer, paid, internship, research-focused course offerings, etc.). Many (most?) schools in the U.S. have policies that try to limit the amount of work a student can do both on and off campus, some even flat-out prohibit it. However, these policies are loosely, if ever, enforced for anything happening off-campus.

If the record that you present here is true, I would say that you are already a competitive applicant as it stands. Just continue with the research, keep your grades up, and you'll be gold.

First off, yes, I find it extremely annoying that those with sub 3.0 GPAs do not bother to really tell their story. For the rankings, and some may disagree with me, but there really are no "best" programs. Some might be worst than others, sure, but unless you want to go to into academia "real" employers really do not care where you went or how prestigious your mentor's name may be. Only high school kids and undergrads care about rankings; the rest of the world does not give a hoot. Apply to where you think you will fit in the best, rankings and prestige be damned.

Scores are displayed for the timed tests only.

Maryland was the only school that specifically mentioned it as a reason for why I was not admitted. Perhaps it was a consideration with the adcoms of the other programs I applied to, but it never came up when I spoke with them about my applications, deficiencies, and so on. I went back and forth for near three months over whether or not to include that info in my SOP. The advice I had received from various sources were conflicting: some said to not discuss it, let my transcripts and CV do the talking, and if the adcoms want clarification they will ask; some said Heck yeah, you want that in there!; and yet others said to only mention it if I had a "good reason". That last one was the source of my dilemma. While I am sure adcoms have heard every excuse and reason under the Sun, I felt that my reasoning would be taken as so bizarre that it might seem as though I were spinning a Forest Gump story. I was afraid the path I took through undergrad, on paper, would appear as if I were aloof. Or totally nuts. I did some community college here and there after high school but I did not really start undergrad until the age of 24 (I was 23 at the beginning of the semester, 24 by the end). At that age most of my friends and acquaintances had already finished undergrad and were transitioning to grad school-if they went. That included my GF at the time (I also later dated a girl from during the time she went through the process of applying and acceptances, and then another girl after she had already applied through to acceptances). I took all of their advices, all of their "what I wished I had done differents", and so ons, and armed with that "knowledge", blazed my own path. I am leaving some stuff out for the sake of anonymity, but suffice to say I now have a fantastic CV at the expense of my GPA. So my reason: I put heavy emphasis on gaining experiences, not grades. I am aware of all the mistakes I have made, regardless of their intentions, and I know what I would do differently in grad school. My second dilemma is how to explain all of that without sounding like a nutter.

ETS allows for a few misspellings and grammatical errors. What constitutes a few, I dunno, but they do state in their official guides that some amount is okay. I know of a few people, all excellent writers, who scored 3s and 3.5s. Some people say Stephen King is a great writer. I happen to find most of his works tedious and boring. It is my opinion that you are scored by how well you can frame your response and not by how well you can write. The AW section is still timed. It is also first. From my experiences as an undergrad I think it is safe to say that most students loathe essay questions on tests, or writing assignments in general. As a standardized test the GRE is meant to be the same test to every major, but it is not. Those in the hard sciences are more likely to do well in QR. The History and Creative Writing majors will more likely do well in VR. That is why ETS cautions against "total scores" and suggests adcoms consider each score individually. ETS also spends a lot of money and time researching questions. They need to keep the GRE hard in order to keep it relevant. Most college students would probably write awesome Response and Argument papers if given enough time. However, this comes after first creating an outline, rough draft, and subsequent drafts, until a final draft is completed. Even a skilled writer would want more than a half hour to draft a one-page response. That is perhaps why the AW comes first, to help instill anxiety in all test takers. So it seems pertinent that some practice is done with AW. If for anything else just to see how well you can formulate a response within the given time frames. I scored a 4.5 the first time I took the GRE. Both responses ended mid-paragraph, they had no conclusions. And that was with zero preparation. The second time, and I swear I got the same two prompts, a 3.5. Even though I tidied up the second AW responses with conclusions, the only difference between the two (er, four) responses were length. The first two were long and most likely no where near conclusion. That is why I ran out of time. The second two were shorter as I placed an emphasis on the tidying things up with conclusions. I have seen a few schools that specifically mention a minimum AW score of 3.5, 4, and 4.5. The majority of programs that I have looked at, however, do not mention AW. I would suspect that an AW score of 3.0 or less would raise some flags, though.

Well, all it takes is one admit, right?

I have worked as a cook for a long time. So yes, I cook at home nearly every day. Anything relating to diet that has a name, a claim, or movement behind it is a fad. Why can't people just eat? Ah yes, I am on the Paleo Atkins diet with a raw food vegan twist. I pretty much just drink water that I harvest from rain clouds myself. Ironically not only is the whole "clean eating", "real food", "your grandmother's cooking" or what ever you want to call it how the world ate for a really, really, long time it is still the way many around the world eat today, except they just call it eating a meal. Really? Processed foods are generally food items that have gone through a transformation process (hence the name) where certain properties of the food item are altered either by chemical process or by aggressive milling, mixing, etc. Sometimes this is done to make things easier (just add water!), or to make something more appealing (hot dogs). What ever the reason, processed foods are typically treated with additives and flavor enhancers to extend shelf life and improve taste. Here is an experiment you can do: try to limit your sodium intake to as close to zero as you can for one month or two. You won't completely eliminate sodium from diet, which is good, but you should still try to anyways. Then go buy a bag of reduced salt chips. They will taste like the they absolute most saltiest thing you have ever eaten, I guarantee.

Because of my low GPA I am doing a mix of both. One program I am an interested in only confers Ph.Ds. and a few others either require a Master's first or only confer Master's degrees. So despite my GPA I have not much of a choice

I think the Signo 207 is the best "cheap" pen on the market. Outside of that I prefer Staedtler drafting pencils.