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To be honest, I don't know where I would find out how prestigious any of these programs are without making several annoying posts asking 'how prestigious is the University of X?'. Where I got my information was from the National Research Council's most recent survey of graduate programs, and that was back in... 2012, I think.

I am fairly sure I'm not shy. Somewhat introverted, yes, but not shy. They're two different things. I am moderately sure that my research interests are very near the top of the list of reasons as to why there might be a problem. I probably come off the way I do because lately, the only reason I've been posting is because I'm upset and very confused about what's going on. 'Entitled' is one thing, but I don't feel entitled to a degree so much as completely unsure as to why I'm being dinged so badly and concerned that it's for really crappy reasons, and consequently, I am in fact fairly angry.

Maybe. I have difficulties with being terribly effusive. It seems like there's a fine line between 'this person's communicating sheer passion and drive' and 'this person is a wacko'.

Here's what baffles me: If this was a problem, they would have tossed my CV out the window without even inviting me for an interview. Yet three places did. I'm confused. Regarding why I finished at 26 after an abortive first try, those years off were spent earning money at shit jobs to pay for college again. Perhaps I should have explained this on my app. We're not all privileged. Regarding research, I was under the very mistaken impression until about sophomore year of college, and I'm STILL very angry at the person who misinformed me about this, that you couldn't DO research as anything earlier than a junior in college, and I still don't quite understand how anyone without an upper-level class or two under their belt gets into a lab. In theory, freshmen and sophomores don't even have any real lab skills yet. I don't think I actually learned any useful lab skills until I started taking a graduate-level molecular methods class, actually, despite the fact that I compared lab syllabi from my undergrad institution and other more highly-ranked, household-name ones and they were pretty much identical.

And from literally EVERYBODY I asked, faculty who were and were not on the adcoms, I couldn't extract an answer from them as to what, and I have no idea what it could have possibly been. If that was the problem, nobody's being honest with me. I certainly wasn't the yob at my Florida interview who got so drunk that he wandered into the woods outside town, passed out, and got mugged the next morning. (Yes, that happened to some guy at the interview. Very weird to hear about.) I have gone around asking virtually everybody I know who knows me well enough that it wouldn't be awkward if I do in fact have a problem with how I come off, and I get a 'no, you're fine, why are you so concerned?' answer. Consistently. I would be perfectly happy if someone gave me a blunt answer that maybe made me sad a bit but that I could act on rather than telling me a lie. And I don't know if the people I'm talking to about this are being honest with me anymore.

Pretty much just lost it. I have been rejected for the second year in a row.

I didn't get in the second year in a row. Fuck American science. I'm going to Europe. EDIT: Am I just getting downvotes because you lot think I got rejected for being an idiot? Here's my stats: I have a 3.69 GPA with honors, 167V/163Q/4.0A GREs, a second-author pub, about three semesters' worth of research experience including at two prominent research stations, two and a half years spent at community college, one first abortive try at college when I was younger before the second time went through, and I'm not sure anymore what my letter writers think of me. I may not have taken enough credits each semester as I was going through undergrad. My interests are a little niche, probably (evolutionary developmental biology with a focus on neuroscience). Evo-devo bio has only just now set up a professional society in the United States. I don't THINK I'm socially awkward, and everybody I've asked has said I have no problems, but I'm beginning to be doubtful. I'm twenty pounds overweight, if that makes much of a difference, which according to peer-reviewed research it might. I'm just a little introverted. Not shy. Just more easily exhaustible than average when it comes to social shit. I got three interviews each year, so the adcom clearly knew all this going in and invited me and then fucked me over. My undergrad school was somewhere in, like, the top 250. Third-tier shit. Public institution. Yes, this matters: http://www.nytimes.com/2014/08/03/education/edlife/why-you-cant-catch-up.html?_r=0

No, I'm just asking them to make them in enough time so those of us still waiting can get offered the position, if that's the school's modus operandi.

How is it at their expense if they've already got it? Wanting something at the expense of others is realizing that the process is competitive and someone will get screwed in the end no matter what you do. Maybe they won't get screwed next time. Or maybe you didn't get burnt enough.

We all want in grad school and we want to save our own hide first. Is that such a bad thing?

And I did. I got some nebulous shit about fit, even when I thought I did my best to make it clear that I believed I would fit with a variety of labs.

Thank you. This has been a message from the Still Worried Grad Applicants.

Shut out of Ivies? Oh please, I don't feel sorry for you.

eteshoe, at least turn down SOME of those acceptances. It's not polite to hold onto so many when others might want in.

I graduated from a top 200 university (... lol), got a 3.69 at graduation, honors in the major, 167V/163Q/4.0A GREs, a second-author publication in an excellent journal, supposedly good LORs, three semesters of research, am taking some graduate courses in the meantime, and... I'M PROBABLY NOT GETTING IN A SECOND TIME EITHER! ... It's so bad I'm seeing a therapist. Seriously.