adaptations

New Jersey gets a bad rap from just about everyone on the east coast (have you watched Jersey Shores?). That said, I have heard nothing but positive things about Princeton and the area around it. Supposedly it's beautiful, which I certainly don't think you can say for the rest of Jersey. (I base my ill-educated opinion on South Park's "It's a Jersey Thing")

If memory serves me right, OSU doesn't require one either.

Much like Count de Monet, I did a one year master's degree (a couple years ago) and from papers I wrote in that program I did a couple conference presentations (MPSA) and submitted one article to a journal that was under review at the time I submitted my application (eventually rejected). I only listed one professional publication on my CV, as I don't think my non-academic articles were that relevant and my CV had enough other things to include (still keeping it to 2 pages). In the end, I got into some of the top tier programs and have great choices, so publications clearly aren't everything (or even that much). I think my success is based on strong LORs, SOP, and solid credentials across the board (but not 4.0gpa or 800s on the GRE).

Congratulations - that's fantastic!

I received an acceptance at Columbia today. What a week it's been!

In at Princeton (IR).

Just received good news from NYU

Here's a list of a few other discussions on this same topic. A point that I will add to the discussion is that schools are less likely to negotiate unless they view your other offers as being real competition. Meaning that if you are comparing multiple offers, they should be from peer institutions and you should also give consideration to the cost of living in each location. Best of luck.

Medievalmaniac - As others have pointed out, this is likely to differ a great deal across fields. I can't imagine that there is much math in English/Medieval Studies (correct me if I'm wrong). On the other hand, it is important in political science to be able to interpret a wide range of quantitative and formal models (even if not using them yourself). Thus, it is much more understandable that there would be a minimum cut off.

To the best of my knowledge, none of the ones you listed conduct interviews.

I am not claiming a Northwestern acceptance, but I am claiming the "Hello and congratulations on your invitation to visit Northwestern University during our Applicant Visit Weekend, March 3-6, 2011." The email is notably lacking any mention of being accepted to the program. It is just an invitation to visit, but I'll take it as a very good sign.

It states in the notes section: "Nothing official but judging by acceptances a couple days ago and the patterns from past years, I'm assuming I'll get the rejection email within ten days." Basically the person is just assuming they will be rejected.

Congratulations! That's great news.

Having gone through this before, I've seen admitted student days range from the first weekend in March to as late as April 6th. If you're lucky enough to have lots of invitations, you probably can't get to all of them since some overlap, but that's a good problem to have. Best of luck to all!

Yes - I love it! I did convince myself to drink lots of decaf, as I enjoy having coffee throughout the day, but have no need for that much caffeine.

Between the bread maker discussion and the PBR-box disguised bass player, I'm starting to enjoy the personality of this group. I'm glad to know some folks here have a few things going on besides applications. I can't fix the Italian bread problem, but I do recommend a a kalamata olive and herb bread. I've done it in the bread maker a few times and love it.

You should definitely notify programs of your current address and contact information. I would also recommend including a succinct explanation that your program in Egypt has been suspended and may/may not reopen this semester (I suspect you could cut/past this language from the Egyptian program's notice). I imagine schools will be sympathetic to your situation, as we all know what is happening in Egypt, but it is best to formally notify them so there isn't confusion later. I would hate for someone to look back in the fall and say "wait a minute, he/she never finished his program... he didn't complete what was expected before admission." I am sure this won't happen, so long as you just keep your schools informed of the situation. Good luck with everything - I hope you're able to return to your program sometime soon.

Two years ago I had some pretty good results, but personal reasons kept me from enrolling. It was hard to give up offers after working so hard to get them, but now everything is in order and I'm very eager to get back to school.

With a great sense of relief and joy, I got acceptances from Wisconsin and UCLA last night. Both full packages, details forthcoming from Wisconsin and a similar package as the other UCLA folks.

I hear that the OSU committee started meeting yesterday and is continuing today. They will possibly meet one day next week if they need more time. I don't know what that means for notices, but that's what I know.

We finally have news from a credible source that notices are being sent out I didn't apply to UIUC, but congrats to all of those who are waking up to good news. Thanks for the update tidefan.

As an update to the previous post, Bentley offered my fiancé an extension on the deposit until April 15th, so it certainly doesn't hurt to ask and hopefully have some of the decision pressure postponed.

My fiancé and I are both applying to programs, so I know a bit about what you're going through. I know many people have mentioned that you get until April 15th to decide, but unfortunately that isn't true for all programs/schools, so I recommend doing your research to see if it applies to you and your boyfriend's programs. For example, my fiancé was recently admitted with a nice scholarship to a master's program at Bentley who require a deposit by February 15th. Since I applied to PhD programs (where the April 15th notification is consistently applied), we don't anticipate being ready to make a decision by February 15th. He is requesting additional time before giving a deposit, but we haven't heard back whether it will be granted. As for the broader question of how to manage the two-body problem, we identified cities that had strong programs where I wanted to apply to PhD programs and then searched for good master's programs for him in the same cities. When it comes time to make a decision on where to go, I suspect that we will prioritize living together, academic opportunity, and professional opportunities (especially since his master's will be over in a year or two and I'll still be in school). The results could be that we are both in school or one of us in school and one working, but that remains to be seeing. We have the unusual flexibility that we are not both committed to graduate school and will assess the options once we know what they are - we are trying to remain very open-minded to whatever options we are given.

Here we are - the last full week of January. I'm optimistic that this week will be the beginning of (hopefully good) news. Based on last year's notifications it looks like OSU, Wisc., and Stanford all started notifying at the end of this week. Best of luck to everyone!