rising_star

I think it depends on when your current semester ends. In my MA program, the semester ended in early December so I actually did send transcripts with the fall semester's grades on them to schools with Jan 1 or later deadlines.

Honestly, if it's an acceptance, you're most likely to get it by email before you get it by mail. I'd use your college address.

Get an official transcript from your school. Open it. Scan it (all pages, all sides). Upload the scanned document to the applications.

Does the Senior Lecturer not have a PhD? It's unclear to me from what you've written.

I don't think it's worth it. Save the money and use it to visit once you've been admitted. Alternately, can you attend a conference that many of the professors you want to work with will also attend (possibly AGU in December)?

This is my fifth year in grad school. I've dated off and on and had two different relationships. There is time to date and be in a relationship if you want there to be time for that. You have to make time to relax in grad school, or you'll burn out and drop out. For me, I watch football, go to bars with my friends, and hang out with my partner to relax.

Deven, nothing you've said changes my point. I changed disciplines (from humanities to social sciences) between undergrad and grad. I did not waste space in my SOP explaining why I had all this literature coursework and very little social science coursework. Instead, I used that space to explain what it was I wanted to study as a graduate student. Now, YMMV, but I was very successful with this strategy both times I applied (the second time was to switch schools for my PhD and I changed my focus area within the discipline dramatically). You really don't have to justify what you took (or didn't take) in the past provided you have a solid research trajectory for the future.

I did mine this way: ------------------------Full Name page 1 ------------------------Full Name page 2 The already know the name of the university if they are reading your application. They probably also know it's a statement of purpose.

Think about it this way: You want to cover the important things in your SOP that cannot realistically be covered elsewhere and that tell everyone what it is you want to study, why you want to study that, and why you want to do it there. Your coursework? That's covered on your transcript already. If you really wanted to give full titles, you could put them on your CV in a section labeled "Relevant Coursework" or something like that. Honestly, people don't care so much about the history of how you arrived at your specific research interests. What matters more to many (including folks like my advisor) is what your ideas are and what you want to do with them. That is your purpose for pursuing a PhD so that should be the focus of your SOP.

I think you may be going about this in a way that makes things more difficult for you. You don't need to spend a lot of time justifying your coursework, especially if it's not related to your degree. Your focus really needs to be on what you want to research and why, with just a bit to indicate that you're prepared to pursue such research mostly independently at the graduate level. The section about NYCEP shouldn't just be about why you like it, it should tell the adcom what you have to offer the program and why the program fits your needs as a graduate student. If you're going to sacrifice something for the 500 word statements, sacrifice all the stuff about what led you to your field. It almost doesn't matter anyway, as long as you have compelling research interests within the field. FWIW, my PhD statements (in a related field) say nothing about how I got interested in the discipline or even my subfield. I just launched right into what I want to study.

Why are you only interested in doing a 1 year MA program? There are many downsides to doing a 1 year program, particularly in terms of giving you the opportunity to develop a strong thesis, to further your language training, and to demonstrate your performance in graduate seminars prior to (re)applying to PhD programs. If you're at all serious about wanting to do a MA before a PhD, you should give serious consideration to 2 year MA programs in comp lit, area studies, and/or a national language and its literature.

You might want to consider that there could be other people that the prof is writing LORs for applying to some of the same schools you are. Obviously, the actual deadlines would be the same so it might seem weird if you gave them deadlines that were earlier than the actual deadline. Plus, there are plenty of profs that have written letters for that program before and thus are familiar with the deadlines.

You might want to take a look at Colorado State's program.

I don't put much stock in them since almost all of the faculty that I work with were hired during or after the survey was initially done. These results have been delayed for years, which diminishes their utility in many ways.

My SOPs dove straight into research interests, starting with a brief discussion of my general interests then showing how I used these in my master's thesis, then connecting those same interests to what I want(ed) to research as a PhD student. Make sure you talk about your past research, your future research, and how the program can help you achieve your goals. There's no need to talk about how you fell in love with the discipline or your specific research area. As anthropologygeek has said, the SOP is one of the most important parts of your application. If you're having trouble writing it, just start wherever you can.

Before doing this, check with faculty in your department. While publishing from the MA thesis is standard in some disciplines/sub-fields, it's a horrible idea in others. And, if you do publish from a thesis, make sure the publication goes in a quality journal that you won't be embarrassed to list on your CV ten years from now. I actually disagree with this advice. Applying for grants, essay prizes, fellowships, etc takes a *lot* of time, particularly if you want to put together a quality application. It also requires effort from your faculty to write supporting letters of recommendation. Yes, there's a hierarchy where people who have gotten funding in the past tend to get funding, but that doesn't mean you should apply for every little thing out there. (Note: by little, I'm not referring to the amount of money winners receive. I have gotten numerous travel grants for $200 or $500. But, while competitive, those weren't that difficult to obtain, which is why I applied for them.) Essay prizes are even worse sometimes, because you may have to write an entirely new research paper to have something to submit. If writing that paper doesn't further your research interests or goals, it's probably not worth applying, even if you are eligible. In lit programs, they probably are wanting an applicant with at least some teaching experience, mainly because they're going to through you into teaching freshman comp in your first semester at most PhD programs. But, that doesn't mean you should go out of your way to teach as a volunteer or something. Getting a paid TAship is great, as would any other assistantship in a library/research setting. Teaching is also important to do as a MA student because it can help you decide whether or not teaching is what you want to do as a career, and lead to accompanying changes in PhD program selection.

No one will care, except you.

I would say no, just because a traditional resume will have a bunch of things on it that an admissions committee doesn't care about. But, you could list related work under a heading like "Work Experience". And by related, I mean that you're applying for a master's in social work and you used to work with children with disabilities, or something like that.

Most people don't put any bullet points on their CV...

I would just list that you're a RA in Lab X, Sept 2010 - May 2011 or whatever on your CV. You don't actually have to explain what you've done or will do on your CV. In fact, I rarely see CVs that offer project descriptions.

I don't understand why any interim transcript you would send would be unofficial. Get an official transcript sent from your uni to Rockefeller this semester. It should list your past grades and the courses you are currently enrolled in. You can optionally choose to send them another transcript after the term ends that lists your grades from the current term but this isn't necessary.

Given how frequently the curriculum can change, asking someone that graduated a few years ago about it is not a good idea, imo. Instead, you should ask the Director of Graduate Studies. Or, and this is how I think about it, don't really pay attention to the curriculum other than to note what is absolutely required.

If you mean a master's degree program where you complete coursework, in addition to a long paper/thesis at the end, that's pretty much any MA program in the social sciences and humanities in the US.

patent leather

As a non-PhD holder that teaches, I go by my first name in the classroom. For email, students address me either by my first name or as Mr./Ms. LastName...