OhMySocks

My boyfriend and I (of 4 years) are both applying to Ph.D programs this year. It kind of annoys me that more often than not the first question out of people's mouths when they find out I'm applying is along the lines of "So, are you and (boyfriend) trying to go to the same school?". I understand the question, but the fact that I get it before "What are you going to grad school for?" or "Where are you applying?" bothers me. It bothers me more that he told me he never gets asked that. 

My boyfriend and I (of 4 years) are both applying to Ph.D programs this year. It kind of annoys me that more often than not the first question out of people's mouths when they find out I'm applying is along the lines of "So, are you and (boyfriend) trying to go to the same school?". I understand the question, but the fact that I get it before "What are you going to grad school for?" or "Where are you applying?" bothers me. It bothers me more that he told me he never gets asked that. 

You have a moral obligation to attend School B since you've already accepted, but it's still possible for you to back out of the deal. Just explain the situation, and they should let you off the hook, especially if it's early. Whoever is on the waitlist for School B will be ecstatic too.

Still waiting on UCSD, but I've definitely assumed the worst. High performance computing and theory. Looks like last year their rejections came out march 26th-april 1st, so its not like they're behind at this point.

Still waiting on UCSD, but I've definitely assumed the worst. High performance computing and theory. Looks like last year their rejections came out march 26th-april 1st, so its not like they're behind at this point.

I wish I had your "problems"

Is anybody else starting to get somewhat pissed off? There are the schools where its obvious that I was rejected since they had interview weekends and such and I wasn't invited, and I haven't heard from then which is fine. But there are two schools, one of which I had several interviews and a visit at (over a month ago) and I'm getting complete silence (and as far as I know so is everyone else) and one school which apparently hasn't sent anything out to anyone. Its nearing the end of March. Ugh.

That reminds me of back during undergrad when I had started an application for a school (a fairly selective top-30 UG), not turned in an essay, recommendations, not paid the fee and not submitted he application, and I not only got an acceptance, I received a 20k per year scholarship. I had already gotten into my top choice, so I didn't actually get to find out what would happen if I accepted it. 

That reminds me of back during undergrad when I had started an application for a school (a fairly selective top-30 UG), not turned in an essay, recommendations, not paid the fee and not submitted he application, and I not only got an acceptance, I received a 20k per year scholarship. I had already gotten into my top choice, so I didn't actually get to find out what would happen if I accepted it. 

Nope, if you read the article it says: 
 
 
 

i wish i had your problems.

It also might have been that the department made decisions and sent it now for the graduate school to review. 

I think that sets up a false dilemma where your choices are are either go with no funding or don't go at all. There's always the third choice of waiting a year or two, doing something to improve your application and applying again. 
 
And I think its going to vary vastly from field to field, I know that I could get a job right now making at least 70k at an entry level, so if I went to an unfunded Ph.D. program (and say I was paying 30k in tuition), that would be a difference in 100k per year (not even taking into account promotions). And if I decide to stay in an academia I will undoubtedly be making less than I would have been in an industry job at that point. Even if I go back to industry, I doubt the modest salary increase would make up for the half million difference during my 5 years in a Ph.D. program. 

I have the whole priority inbox thing going for Gmail, and I'm now convinced that gmail is sentient and trying to protect my feelings. I've gotten 4 decisions so far and one interview so far and it has filed the 2 acceptances and interview as important and the 2 rejections as not important. 

I thought this was amusing:
On Wednesday morning, I received an email from the department at school A with an invite to their admitted students visit weekend.
On Wednesday evening, I received an email from the department congratulating me on being accepted by the grad school and having funding info.
On Thursday, I received one of those generic "Your application status has changed emails" and pointing me to the web site, which had an acceptance letter.
Today, I received an email saying that the graduate school has made a decision and that the decision would be available in the next few days on the website.
 
So yeah, they've got the whole thing completely backwards. 

I think that sets up a false dilemma where your choices are are either go with no funding or don't go at all. There's always the third choice of waiting a year or two, doing something to improve your application and applying again. 
 
And I think its going to vary vastly from field to field, I know that I could get a job right now making at least 70k at an entry level, so if I went to an unfunded Ph.D. program (and say I was paying 30k in tuition), that would be a difference in 100k per year (not even taking into account promotions). And if I decide to stay in an academia I will undoubtedly be making less than I would have been in an industry job at that point. Even if I go back to industry, I doubt the modest salary increase would make up for the half million difference during my 5 years in a Ph.D. program. 

I wish I had your "problems"

Its a very innefficient process because all parties only have partial information and everybody's decisions are tightly interconnected. The grad schools are holding out making decisions on everyone because they're waiting on a a few students who are waitng on other grad schools who are waiting on other students and so on. In the perfect world every student would submit their school preferences and every grad school would submit their student preferences to a giant computer which would calculate pairings that make the maximum amount of people happy.

I thought this was amusing:
On Wednesday morning, I received an email from the department at school A with an invite to their admitted students visit weekend.
On Wednesday evening, I received an email from the department congratulating me on being accepted by the grad school and having funding info.
On Thursday, I received one of those generic "Your application status has changed emails" and pointing me to the web site, which had an acceptance letter.
Today, I received an email saying that the graduate school has made a decision and that the decision would be available in the next few days on the website.
 
So yeah, they've got the whole thing completely backwards. 

I thought this was amusing:
On Wednesday morning, I received an email from the department at school A with an invite to their admitted students visit weekend.
On Wednesday evening, I received an email from the department congratulating me on being accepted by the grad school and having funding info.
On Thursday, I received one of those generic "Your application status has changed emails" and pointing me to the web site, which had an acceptance letter.
Today, I received an email saying that the graduate school has made a decision and that the decision would be available in the next few days on the website.
 
So yeah, they've got the whole thing completely backwards. 

I have the whole priority inbox thing going for Gmail, and I'm now convinced that gmail is sentient and trying to protect my feelings. I've gotten 4 decisions so far and one interview so far and it has filed the 2 acceptances and interview as important and the 2 rejections as not important. 

I have the whole priority inbox thing going for Gmail, and I'm now convinced that gmail is sentient and trying to protect my feelings. I've gotten 4 decisions so far and one interview so far and it has filed the 2 acceptances and interview as important and the 2 rejections as not important. 

I have the whole priority inbox thing going for Gmail, and I'm now convinced that gmail is sentient and trying to protect my feelings. I've gotten 4 decisions so far and one interview so far and it has filed the 2 acceptances and interview as important and the 2 rejections as not important. 

Yeah...I get that one a lot. Particularly in Computer Science because industry jobs are plentiful. I finished my undergrad last year, and took a job as a research assistant at a university, turning down 3 industry jobs in the process (one of which offered 35k per year more than what I'm making now). Honestly, I have absolutely no regrets about this decision. I LOVE my job now. But people find it so difficult to understand why I would ever turn down a high paying job at a good company, and then take even more of a paycut to go to graduate school. 

The one thing I did prefer with the old one was that it gave you the option to choose several options, instead of having radio buttons. I sit in a weird middle ground between a few of the listed fields so anything that I chose wouldn't really be accurate.