Cornell07

I thought that they were being FedEx-ed last Friday if you got in. Surely someone here would have heard some good news by this point if they actually mailed on Friday.

"I regret that I cannot attend _____ University and have instead chosen to attend ____ University. I wish I could take [x] from your school and merge it with [y] from _____ University, but reality denies me this ideal world. Ultimately, [z] has proven to be the deciding factor that has pushed my hand in this challenging decision. Thank you again for all of your assistance and guidance through this process. While I cannot accept your offer, I suggest you speak to Cornell07. I can attest without reservation that he is a worthy, distinguished, and highly qualified candidate, who would be a perfect match with you and your department. In light of his impressive tangbile and intangible qualifications as a scholar and assured future as a luminary in his field, I am honored that you ultimately extended your offer to me. Even though you may have originally passed over his application, I am sure that he would gladly look past this unfortunate oversight. Kindest Regards, redwine"

Well, I already have my UNC rejection via snail mail.

Huzzah! UVA has a very pretty campus and it is infinately cheaper to live there than in the NYC area. Much nicer for the grad student budget.

True! I've also seen that program and contacted the MAGIC director about a week ago. He said he couldn't squeeze me in this year, but encouraged me to apply for the next semester. It looks verrrry interesting. As my 9th grade math teacher frequently said, "Life is full of choices!"

I am definitely considering parring down my statement to sound much less controversial when I apply to an MA program. I think I should only be expressing such interests once I have more credentials to lean on. Modern US history is well studied, just not so often in the way that I suggest. Plenty of books have been written on Kissinger, McNamara, RFK, and a few on Reagan. History is so exciting in part because there will always be new things to write about! And if there comes a point when there is nothing new to write about, I doubt we will be around to worry about such things :wink:

It has not. The deadline is April 1. I've already alerted my recs about a week ago about this program and they are starting to put their heads together to see what they can do: boost/co-ordinate recs, pull strings, etc... I'm doing everything else I think I should do: revising my personal statement and writing sample, contacting profs at programs where I was rejected for insight etc... Because I work in Midtown Manhattan, I may take a trip up to Columbia one day during my lunch break and (with prior warning) chat with profs at Columbia.

Rejected via postal by UNC and BU. That seals the deal for whether or not I will get into a PhD program this year. I have one left, Columbia, but dimes-to-dollars say that probably won't work out judging by my track record. That being said, time to go through the necessary post-mort steps. One thing at a time. One thing at a time.

Well... down to one reach and one safety... (assuming that UNC is a rejection as a bunch of UNCers have been notified of their acceptances). Now I'm really gunning for that last ditch MA program that I need to apply to before the end of the month. EDIT: Down to one reach. Didn't get into BU but ultimately get into Columbia? Yeah right.

Does anyone know if the UNC-CH email was a mass email or individualized? Did any US/International historians hear back? EDIT: Called the UNC office and they said "No. Not all decisions have been made. Some may take until April 1." I read into this "Some people may be on the wait list... a secret waitlist(?)"

So... if I am away from home this weekend and don't receive a rejection email, it would be a good thing? Sweet.

Well, if I don't get into one of my last programs, I may need to write a new SOP and apply to a masters program at one of my schools.

I applied to US history, not American Civilization (aka American Studies)

Aww... I seem to remember enjoying Guns, Germs, and Steel when I read it ages ago. Perhaps I wasn't a seasoned historian back then?

Oh I was never saying that one shouldn't read a Marxist history; sometimes batty writings are the most influential and thus important writings. It is impossible to understand how Stalin or many other Soviets conducted foreign policy without first understanding Marx's instance on historical determinism regarding the eventual, ultimate failure of capitalism and the coming of the proletarian revolution.

Right oh! Well, in my field of modern American foreign policy... ... a particularly good introductory overview of the Cold War is "The Cold War: A New History" written by John Gaddis in 2006. He has written more detailed histories, but this one touches on the major themes and trends amongst the American and Soviet leadership in a very concise manner. "Thinking in Time: The Uses of History for Decision Makers" by Ernest May is a book more concerned with thinking about, analyzing, and utilizing history rather than being a history of anything in particular if you need a good book on a particular historical theory or methodology. "1943: The Victory that Never Was" probably was the first book to get me thinking about military leaders as personalities rather than purely rational, calculating actors. A better example of this perspective is "Strange Victory" also by May. I'll never forget the image of Hitler refusing to put a carpet down on marble hallway leading to his office just so he could watch foreign dignitaries slip and fall. And Marxist historians were just plain batty, but that's me.

My research interests are generally defined as a study of the policy making process, usually, but not always, in the lens of late 20th century US history. If you are familiar with Ernest May at Harvard, I'd say that my interests most closely align with his. Though he typically focuses on American military history, such as the Cuban Missile Crisis, May has written a number of books on non-American conflicts such as "Strange Defeat" about the intelligence failures of the Allied forces leading up to the German invasion of France in 1940. In particular, I'd cite his "Thinking In Time : The Uses Of History For Decision Makers" co-authored with the now-deceased Richard Neustadt, as the most influential book I've ever read. May argues that by utilizing the historical method in policy making situations, in the ways that he outlines, one can achieve sometimes marginal but always valuable improvements. For example, strategists love to make historical analogies, but often the analogies only work because of a superficial similarity between the two. I don't remember why I didn't apply to NYU, but I am sure I had a good reason...

Uhhhh... an intro, overview book for US history? Umm... even as a US historian, I can say that I haven't even looked at one since high school. Sorry! I could help if you narrowed down the field just a bit: legal, military, scientific, educational etc...

Got my Harvard rejection letter today! Wooooo.....? Aw. Long shot.

Well, I just found a wonderful MA program that just started and will be extending its application deadline until April 1! So, I get to see if I've learned anything by going through the app process once and really hit it out of the park this time around.

The JET applications were due back in December FYI. I've had a couple of friends go through the program. Some loved it; others hated it. I think the big factor was the will not to be frustrated by the language barrier; at least in most of Europe and the Americas everything is written in Roman script, so, even if you cannot understand everything, you can pronounce mostly everything.

BC08, I am very much in that boat. I really wish right now that I had applie to Masters programs. My best hopes right now are probably UNC (as a technical in-state student thought I don't live there presently) or BU (not an overly difficult program to get into it seems). Harvard would be sweet as my best faculty match is there, but, judging my track record, it is probably not going to happen right now. Well, it looks like it will time soon enough to start boning up for the GREs again, probably writing a new sample essay or significantly overhauling my current one, and finding masters programs that accept for the Spring 2009 semester. Oh, and apply for a new job in the meantime, because this one isn't really helping me get into g-school. Bleh.

Well, I loved my alma mater Cornell's History Dept is definitely a department in transition with a number of exciting young faculty. Lots of our really big names have either just retired like Walter LaFeber or are getting on in years like Michael Kammen, Richard Polenberg, and Steven Kaplan. A number of my profs have either retired, transfered, or were simply guest professors. Out of the professors that are still involved with the dept, I can tell you about Hull (Germany), Hyams (Old England), Kaplan (France, Food), Koschmann (Japan), Polenberg (US Legal), and Weiss (WWII, Humanitarianism). PM for details. I was very impressed with every professor with whom I took a course, except for two whose courses I promptly dropped after a couple lectures (one whose class I dropped after a couple weeks out of boredom and another with a reasonably famous historian with a huge ego). What area of history will you be studying? Check out this article on Wikipedia for a little more background on our dept... http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cornell_University_Department_of_History

Well, I'm going to keep plugging away at my job and apply to jobs more relevant to my field of study and then apply to an MA program in the Fall. I've got a few more schools left to hear from..