music

Really depends on your home country. For me, J1 was a better choice because I get the option to stay longer after graduating if I find work (3 years on J1 vs 1 year on F1) without being subject to a home residency requirement. It also keeps the option of having a financially stable dependent open. I'm not married right now, but who knows what might happen by the time I graduate. Can you contact the international office at your university for guidance?

It's free, thanks to the NHS. In fact, all healthcare (including mental health) is free. You may have to wait longer than you'd like if your case isn't considered urgent. Register with your local GP as soon as possible, since any referral to a specialist will be initiated by your GP. You might, for example, wait 10 days for a GP appointment, then 6 weeks for a specialist assessment, then 4 weeks for regular therapy, so you see why it's worth getting into the system ASAP. On the other hand, if it's urgent you can get seen by a specialist within hours. To use a personal example, I had anorexia a few years back, and because of the severity I was referred to begin a 16-week therapy plan with a specialist the next week. But after discharge from that, the follow-up stuff with my local non-specialist mental health provider required an 8 week wait. You should also investigate your university's own provision. I believe all universities in the UK have free counselling services, again with various waiting times, and varying levels of specialisation. You'd do well to get in touch now and request that you see someone as soon as you get here, so you're in their system. It might be a good option while you're waiting for NHS referral, or at least to be known to the university counselling team in case you needed more urgent help. Good luck! I hope you'll find the healthcare system here to be pretty great, particularly given that it's completely free (ETA: prescriptions aren't free, so if you're medicated it's about £7 each time, unless you qualify for the help with health costs service which you can apply for through some government thingy...but it's pretty damn hard to qualify for that.)

Could you mention any particularly good or bad companies? I've been pointed towards MAC by my department's student affairs people.

Happy April 15 everyone! And congrats on surviving application season. Kccur - any news?

Accepted my place this morning Kind of cool to learn that international students can get a J1 visa, I was expecting to have to get an F1.

Decision made. Feels right

Kccur, give that I'm working on Israeli hip hop and theorisations of blackness in the M.E., Chicago has the perfect faculty. I have concerns about both schools, and yet either would undoubtedly be a fantastic choice, and I would have been thrilled just to get one offer this application season. I do want to work interdisciplinarily both within the music dept and outside, and both schools would facilitate that, although I think it would be *necessary* at Penn to get what I need, and a nice bonus at Chicago since the dept has strengths in my research areas. I think I'm going to finalise my decision tomorrow, having had the chance today to talk to more people Hopefully someone will get a waitlist place out of it! Kccur, where are you waitlisted? That must be very frustrating right now, fingers crossed that you have some good news in the next few days.

I still can't decide between Chicago and Penn. Help!

The grad students I spoke with all lived in West Philly or Centre City. It sounds like West Philly is a really good place to get cheap rent, be very close to campus and have enough local stuff going on so as not to feel tied to university life. Centre City seems kind of cheap too, for a city centre... like I have seen beautiful 1-bed modern apartments for $1350 inc bills. The bike lanes are good, and the city is pretty small, so I could imagine walking/biking that commute every day. I got the impression that if you live on campus, it could be easy to get stuck in that bubble and not need to ever venture out into the big wide world. Personally that's not how I want to do things, especially while I'm in coursework and will be in the department for class 5 days per week, so I'm thinking that living a little way out might be beneficial for building my own life and enforcing home/work boundries. But like I said, I don't know

I visited Penn earlier in the week and I'm very seriously considering it. I've got a generous stipend offer about $2350/month after tax, and am now trying to work out how to budget. Seems like prices for 1 beds vary a ton - I've seen as low as $700 for something reasonable looking, is that likely to be legit? I was going to cap rent+utilities+commuting at $1350 to allow $1000/month for food+books+clothes+leisure. Is that do-able in Philly?

I'm off to do campus visits this week, and then again in 2 weeks time. Still very much undecided between UPenn, NYU and UChicago. It's kind of bizarre that, had I accepted a UK MA offer, I'd be looking at £25k of debt for a 1 year course, and instead I've got 3 schools flying me across the Atlantic just in case I happen to decide to take up their offer, and then paying me to study for 5+ years. Well done USA. Anyone made any final decisions yet?

I am at a complete no-name school right now doing my undergrad, and it doesn't appear to have affected my PhD applications. If anything, say there are two equally strong applicants, one from a famous school and one from a no-name, I'd favour the one from the no-name because it suggests their achievements are more self-led, and indicates strong personal motivation to work hard and become academically accomplished regardless of their environment or background.

Do you think that really matters much? All my references were from my (current) undergrad conservatory professors, only one of whom has a musicology PhD, and it doesn't appear to have been a problem for my application. If you want to study for its own sake and to continue working on your English/writing skills, I think that's great, especially if you can get funded and view it as a 'job'. But in and of itself, having more degrees and contacts is not going to get anyone into a PhD program...only the work you produce will do that.

Would it be ridiculous to commute to NYU from New Jersey? Would the rent savings be cancelled out by the cost of commuting? Any recommendations for areas worth considering commuting from in order to save on rent?

Both great options. Is there anything pushing you towards one or the other? Me, I'm not decided yet but I am so thankful to be in this fortuitous position. I have to factor in whether I could support my partner if needs be, which is pushing me towards Chicago, who have the leading prof in my field, and away from NYU, which was initially my first choice. Penn don't have a specialist in my geographic area and I'm still waiting on their financial package, but they *are* awesome in every other way, and the weather would suck less than in Chi-town (yes, it matters). If Brown made an offer, I'd definitely consider them a contender too for their faculty, location, relatively low cost of living and interdisciplinary ethos. I assumed I'd get 5/5 rejections, so I didn't even begin to think about my preferences til now, and also only applied to my top 5 schools where I knew I'd accept a place without a second thought. Can't really make a bad decision as a result, but also makes this process tough.

Tutupack, great job on all the acceptances! Any ideas where you'll go? Also, is anyone else going to the Chicago or Penn campus visit days?

I'll be starting in September too, PhD Ethnomusicology on a $26k stipend. I'll be attending the department's prospective student day next month where hopefully there will be a chance to get more info about the practicalities of living in Chicago. From what I gather, you can rent a decent 1 bed in Hyde Park for $1000/month which is about the same as grad housing. I'm going to budget on that kind of scale and look for off-campus housing.

I heard from UPenn today, just to let y'all know. It was an email from the department, but sounds as if it's already been confirmed by the graduate school. Come on Brown...

Same. They said to me it will take a minimum of 2 weeks though. I guess maybe they don't release until it's all approved by the graduate school or something, rather than sending out unofficial departmental acceptances.

Fingers crossed for everyone that we get some more acceptances trickle through this week

That's useful info. Very different to my current budget (£11/month for an iPhone contract over here...and max £20/month on travel). Looks fairly dire, and since I don't know anyone in NY it would almost certainly be grad student housing as the best option. Which would be fine, except it looks as if NYU expect grad student to SHARE a studio, and I can't find prices for that anyway :/ I thought London was expensive...

Contemplating, but concerned about the finances. The faculty have been lovely with offering to Skype to chat about my options and so on, but there doesn't appear to be a visiting day, unfortunately. Perhaps because my department is pretty tiny. It's either NYU or UChicago - I feel like NYU would offer a marginally better fit, but I'm not super keen on commuting and sharing a house and not being able to afford flights home to London, and those factors might make for a less than enjoyable 5 years.

I'm trying to budget for UChicago (where I'll likely take up my place over NYU based on living costs vs stipend). I'm planning to allow $1200 for rent and utilities, leaving me $967/month for everything else, or $850/month if I fly home twice a year. Does that seem reasonable? Am I right to think I'll find a nice one-bed apartment for that much, in Hyde Park? I am used to London living costs and from what I've heard, it sounds like Chicago will be somewhat cheaper If anyone in Chicago has a personal budget they could share, I'd be really grateful.

I just got accepted to NYU on a $26k stipend. I would like to be able to live by myself - seems I'm looking at about $1100+ per month for a 1 bedroom place in Brooklyn, is that about right? Will I be able to exist on the remaining $1000/month for everything else (food, commuting, leisure, utilities if they're not included, etc), including the odd flight home to London? I assume living costs are fairly comparable to what I'm dealing with in London right now. Finances in NY are pretty critical to whether I opt for NYU or UChicago, since Chi-town is so much cheaper and offering a slightly higher stipend...

Also got into NYU whoa. My top 2 schools... this is the best dilemma ever. Gosh. Wow. I never thought anywhere would accept me...