threnagyn
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Posts posted by threnagyn
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Honestly, if that was an April fools prank, thats pretty irresponsible. Lets hope it comes back soon.
- Monochrome Spring and threnagyn
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I second this. Enlighten us please, even if it will only further my paranoia.
This isn't news. NSF already mentioned that the stipend amount was increasing from $30,000 to $32,000, hence the 2k difference between $42,000 and $44,000 (the other $12,000 foes to other things like your tuition, $32,000 is what you get to take home for yourself)
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At this point in time, many of us are waiting for a message like this to come up on Fastlane: '03/28/13 - GRFP/FastLane will be unavailable from 11:00 PM ET Thursday March 28th - 5:00 AM ET Friday, March 29th for scheduled maintenance. We apologize for any inconvenience'
For the past few years, this was posted on a Monday (for Tues announcement) or Thursday (for Fri announcement). The message usually appears the day before, but the time of day can vary. In 2012, the first time that someone saw it and reported it on grad cafe was 9:09am. Last year, it was much later - at 8:59pm, just a few hours before it was supposed to go down. Last year, it did not take until 5:00 AM ET for the awards to be posted - there is a post saying 'they're up' at 3:44 AM ET. Emails are sent out shortly afterwards.
Just to add to this - if you look at last year's forum, up until the announcement (which was end of March), people were asking NSF when the results would be and they kept saying 1st week of April.
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I get where you're coming from, and we've all been there, but I enjoin you to consider that your opinion is rooted in ignorance.
What is, pray, "useful"? Is it something that we can make a product out of? Is it merely something that can be sold? Does it have to be useful now, or is it still useful if it becomes useful many years later? I ask because the notion "'useful" derives its meaning from 1) the contrast to "useless", and 2) the contextual parameters in which you define it.
I can't deconstruct your argument until you answer these questions, but I can give a couple pointers re its founding assumptions.
Your first point. You are perhaps implying that 'Abraham Lincoln studies' and 'Socrates Interpretation' are too esoteric or too historically removed to be "useful". However, is everything esoteric and removed necessarily "useless"? HEP is pretty esoteric and pretty removed, given that it's founded on a theory invented 200 years ago, which might be wrong anyway. Academic geometry is pretty esoteric, since it is very needed by those same high-energy physicists but more or less by nobody else. My own degree is in economics, and oh man, I can tell you, unless you're doing quant finance, whatever you're doing is some high-octane bullshit. But your own degree, engineering. I know an engineer who's building these little flying things out of spy movies that are super cool, but otherwise the only use they have so far is inspiring a very detailed model of the mechanics of insect flight. I imagine in engineering, as in other professional fields, the hivemind is closer to yours, but in general academia, I have yet to encounter an academic who has a gripe with study being useless, as long as it is original and elucidatory.
To your second point, the market will decide us. However, a caveat: the market system operates by consumer demand, which reflects consumer preference, not usefulness of the good traded. Of course, sometimes we want things because they are useful in general, like food or oxygen, but other times - indeed, most times in developed economies - we want things for other reasons, ie because they are useful to us. Perhaps that will clear up your confusion as to why this humanities bullshit is being funded. Further, I would like to remind you that, in recent history, the sciences have been privileged for a lot of good reasons, and a lot of bad reasons too. One reason for privileging STEM in the states, and pretty much the main reason for the higher education complex and the ridiculous salaries professors get, is the Cold War arms race. I mean, yeah, building nuclear bombs and putting Neil on the moon is really cool - but is it, by your definition, "useful"? There is a rhetoric in the United States that if you pour money into the sciences, they will eventually come up with a way to cure cancer or invent Atlantis because scientific inquiry is incremental and accidental - at least, this rhetoric has been explicit in my K-12. But it is, nonetheless, a rhetoric. There is no essential reason why the sciences must receive more (or all, according to you) funding than other fields. Indeed, in many countries, the sciences do not receive such funding, or they do not receive funding at all. That's why for so many people grad school in the states is such a good deal.
Lastly, it seems to me that you know very little of what people in the humanities actually do. The R1 researchers are cultural theorists of some sort. It sounds corny and a little communist, but bear with me: they contextualize social movements within the dominant social belief system, so that we may understand what is going on in the world. Of course, that's just the couple hundred researchers at the very top of the hierarchy. The rest pretty much teach. That's basically the "crisis" in humanities hiring in a nutshell.
I thoroughly read your post, and I generally like it - but there are some things I disagree with. I don't agree that the technological arms race (man on the moon, nuclear bomb development, etc) is necessarily useless. Aside from the other applications of these technologies, the use of these technologies in their current forms has dramatically altered the balance of power in this world, influencing the lives of everyone thats part of the global economy. We don't need to get into whether its for better or for worse (i.e. vs. what it would be like under USSR control). Either way, these things have resulted in the self-preservation of western societies and is why we live in a westernized world. I also never stated that the sciences should receive all the funding and I don't think this should be the case. I just don't think they should be funded equally. I know they are not funded equally on the graduate level and above level, but they are on an undergraduate level.
We give money to public universities for a reason - its an investment we make on ourselves (mostly an economic benefit). Given this, wouldn't we want to give more funding to studies that translate into jobs that offer society a better return on its investment? A person goes to a school and has to pay a certain amount of tuition, with the other expenses being paid by the gov., equally no matter whether its science, business, engineering, history, art, etc. If anything, engineering tuition is higher because of the associated technology fees. If we gave a little more (not too much more) to degrees that had a higher rate of return, it would encourage more people to go into these demanding fields and our economy would do better as a result.
While you may not agree with what I am saying and would argue about the importance of preserving the humanities, I don't see why you would say a statement like mine is born out of ignorance - Seems kind of strange as its not an outlandish idea to have.
To Mocha - In general, I wouldn't be super supportive of someone studying the mating rituals of jellyfish either. At my school, a top 10 in engineering and science, I have yet to meet anyone studying the mating rituals of anything. Most people I meet are doing quality research relating to water quality, air quality, bioremediation, health care studies, climate change, etc.
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At this point in time, many of us are waiting for a message like this to come up on Fastlane: '03/28/13 - GRFP/FastLane will be unavailable from 11:00 PM ET Thursday March 28th - 5:00 AM ET Friday, March 29th for scheduled maintenance. We apologize for any inconvenience'
For the past few years, this was posted on a Monday (for Tues announcement) or Thursday (for Fri announcement). The message usually appears the day before, but the time of day can vary. In 2012, the first time that someone saw it and reported it on grad cafe was 9:09am. Last year, it was much later - at 8:59pm, just a few hours before it was supposed to go down. Last year, it did not take until 5:00 AM ET for the awards to be posted - there is a post saying 'they're up' at 3:44 AM ET. Emails are sent out shortly afterwards.
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Not trying to be a jerk here - just taking advantage of the open forum. As someone who's migrated from the Science (BS) to Engineering (PhD), it really suprises me the number of people who go on and get a PhD in the humanities. I do love what I do, but the other half is knowing that my work is useful in a world that becomes more overcrowded and 'complex' by the day. I'm sure there are topics in the humanities which are useful, but when these PhD students usually talk to me, its usually about 'Abraham Lincoln studies' or 'Socrates Interpretation'. It boggles my mind that funding even exists for these topics in a time when the EPA can barely afford to give out their already low-paying fellowship awards. Sorry, I know this is harsh to some. It just seems like there are way too many going this route, and that the 'job prospects' agree with me.
- gr8pumpkin, Kleene and BrisketSpud
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Source?
Follow the link and download the presentation. If you combine 2,000 awards with the ~17% acceptance, those figures make sense.
Edit: They also flat out say 12,000 at the end of the presentation.
- fe3lg0odhit, threnagyn and baron23
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Don't ever... ever ever ever feel pressured to stay somewhere that you are not interested in, even if the PI is like a father/mother to you. Never feel pressured to continue doing the same thing since you have prior experience in it. A ton of people make these mistakes and end up in an unhappy situation. Follow your dreams
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Do you mean under "applicant data"
Application Year: 2014
Application Status: Received Final Status: So if I were DQ'ed, it would say so there?
Probably. But if it said DQ there you should have received an email as well. Just don't worry about it - its out of your hands and too close to the announcement to try and guess about the DQ possibility. My guess is that your the only one who noticed.
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I formally accepted an offer for a PhD program a week ago. After visiting the school and meeting with my advisor, I was very happy with the decision. I had reached out to the schools I had not yet received an admissions decision from and had not heard back from them. Yesterday, however, I received an offer at a higher-ranked program for a fully funded (for 5 years) PhD.
In all honesty, I am not sure it is a better fit. However, I am interested in learning more about this new offer/program. Is it possible to retract an acceptance before April 15? How binding is a decision? What is the process to do so?
It is definitely still okay to retract acceptance. Its just best to let them know as soon as you change your mind (i.e. don't accept the other offer and wait until June to tell University 1). I would just send an email the the advisor and some official contact person within the dept you applied to.
Did the first school not offer you funding? How much different are the two schools rated? Is it like one is top 10 and the other isn't in top 100? Or is it like one if 9th and the other is 13th - because these small differences don't matter much.
If you had a 'good feeling' about the first University and advisor, thats definitely not something to ignore... but if University 1 is lower rank and does not offer funding and University 2 is much better and does offer funding, then the decision is obvious. Funding vs. no funding makes the difference of $150,00-$300,000 over 5 years.
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Not being snarky, serious question - what do you want to do with a PhD in Philosophy? Your answer is relevent to any advice we can give you.
I ask this because my guess is that places are rejecting you because you they weren't satisfied with what you provided to them as a 'forward direction'.
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Hello Everybody;
I got admission for Master of Chemical Engineering at Illinois Institute of Technology in Fall 2014.
I have the following inquiries and am sure you will help me;
1- How is the quality of teaching at iit?
2- How is the reputation of the school?
And any other advice that you may have about iit.
thanks in advance.
In between my BS and PhD, I took a few classes at Illinois Institute of Technology.
1. Its hard to give you a good answer since I only took 2 classes, but I felt like they were done well and challenging (in a good way). The other students in the class are good at asking questions and good discussions result from this. I felt that my peers were thoroughly engaged with the lecture, as was I. Im saying this as someone who is from a top 10 engineering school (UIUC) and is getting a PhD at a top 10 engineering school (GaTech).
2. The reputation isn't bad. Its ~107th for schools overall and higher for engineering. Depending on major, it may be in the top 50. It definitely isn't know for research, so I would do a Masters, but not a PhD. Its a good school if you want to stay in Chicago and get a job in Chicago, but engineering firms from other cities probably won't have heard of it. You will also be competing for jobs with UIUC kids (which is much more prestigious). Its also on the expensive side (because its private). Finally, the area around there isn't that great. A lot of your peers are going to be rich foreign kids that wanted to do school in the USA around Chicago and couldn't get into UIUC.
One other thing, there is another bullcrap school in the area called ITT Technical institute. This is one of those private schools with a TON of commercials. 90% of people you talk to about IIT will confuse it with ITT Tech. I had like 4-5 people say, 'Oh, is that really a good school? They have all the commercials..." and I had to correct them and this was from just attending one semester and two classes.
UIUC is hard to get into, but what about attending GaTech in Atlanta? Its moderately easy to get into, its cheap, and its a fantastic school. Your job prospects would be much higher.
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So I am curious if any other current graduate students feel the same way I do. I so anxious about the NSF GRFP because I feel like if I don't at least get an honor mention is will be embarrassing. I am not sure why I think this but I just dread not getting at least an honorable mention and then having to tell my PI and all the people that help and encouraged me to apply that I got nothing. I know that rejection is a huge part of science funding but I guess I am just worried since it is my first time.
Honestly, a lot of people (about ~25-30%) get HM or an award now that they've raised the # of awards to 2,000 from 1,000 a few years ago. Last year they issued 2,000 awards and 1,700 HMs.
But think about it, what goes into a funded application? A lot of it is related to hard work, but its not so straightforward. A lot of people have parents willing to dish out $3,000 for a 'humanitarian/volunteer trip to Africa' every other year that maybe you and I couldn't afford. There's so many people that get to do this 2-3 times because someone else paid. They go there for a week or two, do a minimal amount of 'group labor', and cite it as some moving leadership experience that reviewers gawk over. Similarly, many students don't need to get a part time job during the school year because their parents are paying most/all of their tuition. Not having to work makes pulling a 3.5+/4.0 that much more obtainable. Anyone can pull off a 3.5+ if they are willing to 'work' at least 20 hrs a week. It also makes getting into undergraduate research labs easier since you have more time on your hands. Some people have an awesome proposal because their advisors wrote it for them almost entirely. Many applicants are dishonest in their applications. Reviewers are also WILDLY inconsistent. I'm not saying that people who get the awards fall into these categories, I'm just saying that any one of these things can upset the 'fairness' of the award. Just ask yourself - Have you been working hard towards something great, or have you been sitting at home watching TV 8 hrs a day and just stop by the lab for a few hours a day? If you can answer that to yourself honestly, you'll know how to feel regardless of whether or not you get the award.
We will all have a lot of chances to prove ourselves during our PhD program and afterwards. This NSF GRFP award seems important now, but its really just a drop in the bucket - unless you don't have an RA or TA alternative. In which case, you haven't been looking in the right places. RAs and TAs are so so so easy to get now. They are available to almost everyone willing to take one who is at least mildly competitive (3.0 gpa, some work/research experience at some point in their lives). At least, this is the way it is in the hard sciences and engineering.
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No, he's right, this is a common maintenance message and the GRF message is a different time. You can look in last years thread for the specific wording that they've used for the last 2 years, but this is most certainly NOT the announcement.
ic ic. DO you happen to have an quote from that specific wording that they've used before? I was around last year, but don't remember exactly what is was.
Also - has anyone here ever gotten an honorable mention for multiple years, or gotten an honorable mention one year and then got nothing the following year?
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Yeah, probably just a coincidence. Someone said this earlier, but scheduled maintenance happens all the time. And for GRFP it is usually something like 12AM-5AM, not 12AM-8AM.
Wait no... scheduled maintenance does not happen like this all the time. This is exactly what it said the last two years when the awards were announced, just a slightly different time and day of the week. For now, I would assume that this is the announcement, or this is some preparatory procedure to test the website to make sure the actual announcement will go smoothly.
Great, now I'm going to be up from 12-8AM on Sunday.
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http://news.sciencemag.org/education/2014/03/nsf-plans-changes-graduate-fellowships-traineeships
While the stipend is increasing, there will NOT be any additional slots compared to last year, leaving only 2,000 slots available. Stakes went up, chances went down.
Thats pretty discouraging news. Our chances of getting the award just decreased by 20% in the case of 2,500 awards, or by 26% in the case of 2,700 awards (as originally suggested). So they don't want to give out more fellowships, but they want to increase the stipend amount from $32,000 to $34,000? That seems like an odd tradeoff... $32,000 is already a lot of money compared to what students typically recieve as research assistants and/or teaching assistants.
Perhaps they went through most of the applications by now and are thinking that there just aren't 2,700 (or 2,500) quality applications and that they would rather just give more money to the more qualified students. I guess this kind of makes sense... The award rate at 2,000 awards was around 17%, 2,700 awards would push it around a 23% award rate. Kind of seems too high...
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Just throwing this out there for those that don't know - For the last few years, the night before the NSF GRFP results were announced, the fastlane website went under some strange maintenance ordeal that made the impending announcement obvious. The forums are always 'wide awake' those nights and the results arrived between 3-5AM. I am anticipating something similar this year. If you look at last year's forums, there were around 100+ posts in that 10 hour period leading up to the announcement.
Its usually last week of March or first week of April, and I think the announcement usually happens on a Friday (maybe so rejected students can cool down over the weekend?). Therefor, I would peg it on March 28th, April 4th, or April 11th at the latest. Again, we usually know the day before or so because of a maintenance announcement.
When FastLane comes back online, you can check your results on the website immediately, or you can wait for them to email you later on in the morning. They will also send an email to your advisor.
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These are my thoughts - Last year, I received honorably mention. Since then, my application has improved (publications, STEM outreach, refined proposal, etc) and the number of awards has gone from 2,000 to 2,700 for 2014. I don't think my odds can possibly be worse than they were last year, so I'm at least expecting another honorable mention. I did not receive a request for more info, so I don't think it means I've already been 'hosed'.
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To all those who applied - I think this year is going to be the easiest year in the history of NSF GRFP to recieve a fellowship, especially if you are a 2nd year grad student.
A few years ago, the number of awards jumped from 1,000 to 2,000. Even though this attracted more applicants, the number of applicantions did not double - thus, the success rate went up. The award rate has been around 15-20%. Also, There is a cumulative effect with each passing year if you are applying at later stages (1st or 2nd year grad). This is because your competition is worse than it would be if there were less awards in previous years. Confusing? Let me explain. More competive applicants win the award at earlier stages (senior year of undergrad, 1st year grad) and are 'removed from the running' at subsequent stages. Somebody who won during their senior year can't apply later on obviously. If more people win at these earlier stages, then less competitive people will be applying next year at the next stage. Also, the award rate at each stage is proportional to the number of applicants that applied at that stage - In simpler words, if 35% of all applicants are 2nd year grad students, 35% of the awards will go to second year grad students. This means that if you are applying as a second year grad student, you are really only competing with those that applied in previous years and failed (even with the high success rate) and those that are applying for the first time as a 2nd year PhD student.
But wait, it gets better! The number of awards is expected to increase from 2,000 to 2,700 this year because NSF wants to stimulate STEM fields!
tl;dr version: If you applied as a 1st or 2nd year PhD student, you probably have the best chances of winning the award than at any other point in time because your competition is worse and because award/application ratio will probably be higher than its ever been.
Good Luck. I don't think you'll need it.
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Honorable Mention....
Good luck everyone and stay positive.
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Sucks to think, 10-15% of us are going to have a good day tomorrow. The other 85-90% are going to be depressed as all hell.
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I thought the odds were similar for all fields since they hand them out based on the number of applicants per field, or something like that, right?
I definitely saw a figure that showed award rate by major and engineering was higher than the others. Not by a ton, but by a few percentage points.
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Looked through my application and found 3 typos in the 2 page proposal section.
awesome.
NSF GRFP 2013-14
in The Bank
Posted
I saw it.