rogue

Love it. I think I will start doing this.

I'm not saying people with chronic afflictions aren't capable of success in academia. I'm just saying that admission of such a condition in an SOP is likely to raise a red flag with ad comms, who are, as I mentioned previously, looking for reasons to reject an applicant. That's all. No offense meant, and I'm certainly not judging anyone's abilities. Also, I read the OP's post as a question about a debilitating illness, for what it's worth. And that, I think, is probably more cause for concern when it comes to deliberating who should be admitted.

My undergrad is in communications. I'm less concerned about this than about my MBA, which can't exactly be passed off as social science, other than the one organizational behavior class I took. Meh.

Trying to find information on some schools' websites has been incredibly frustrating. Yesterday, for example, it took me almost an hour to find the link to check my status on one school's site. You'd think that would be glaringly obvious, in order to stave off phone calls to the grad admin.

Chime. I think it will be harder to tell friends and family than to get the bad news myself. I'm just hoping I get an acceptance or two early, to make the inevitable rejections easier to share.

I've been wondering the same thing, and I kind of hope this is the case. My GRE scores are one of the stronger parts of my application, and it would be lovely if they counted for more this cycle.

At the risk of sounding heartless myself, I have to disagree here. They're probably just being practical in making a very tough decision. Among other things, ad comms are concerned with your potential for achievement post-graduation. They want to admit people who are going to go out and make a name for themselves in their respective fields, because this reflects well on their program. This is why instructions for SOPs typically tell you to describe your career plans. If you say you want to be a homemaker or work at Starbucks, they're not going to admit you, because what's the point? You'd just be wasting their resources in their eyes. Granted, these are extreme and ridiculous examples, but I use them to make a point. If you're not going to research and publish and bring glory to your alma mater, you're just not as valuable to them. And the same thing applies if your career is likely going to be stunted by health problems. Is it fair? No, but life's not fair. Remember, with the huge number of applicants, many ad comms are looking for reasons to reject rather than reasons to admit. Sadly, chronic (and especially potentially fatal) health conditions probably fall into that category, whether anyone wants to admit it or not.

Are you close to Philly? We could always meet up somewhere that you don't have to be 21 to get in.

As an economist--or someone who aims to be, anyway--you should know that you get what you pay for. Inexpensive and "totally top notch" don't exactly go hand in hand. That said, the idea of anyone paying someone to write their SOP makes me cringe. If you can't write, how are you going to succeed in grad school? I'd be leery of using a service, anyway. I'd imagine most of what they crank out is formulaic and boring (and quite possibly recognizable to admissions committees, too).

Me too! I don't know why it took me so long to figure that one out.

Anyone else in Philly? Maybe we could do happy hour one night.

*spent* Sigh. You would think as a professional writer I would proofread everything. This is what happens when I multitask.

I don't feel like my essays are anything like the ones in the book. I certainly didn't use any of the examples as a template. It's just helpful to get an idea of what different types of successful essays look like--and trust me, they were all different. There wasn't a common template, at least not in Asher's book. Other ones, I can't really speak to. I've spend over a decade as a professional writer, writing everything from advertisements to magazine articles to software manuals. Every time I wrote something in a new genre, I studied other examples for ideas of what worked and what didn't. I approached my SOPs in the same way.

Agreed--this book was a huge help.

That blog post actually made me feel a lot better about my SOPs, and it was fun to read, too. Thanks!

I'm in. Who's in Philly?

Congratulations!

I've been getting lots of stuff too, primarily for master's programs. I already have a master's, and I indicated this when filling out the pre-test info. And most of these aren't in my field--or even close to it. Sigh. On the upside, since I work in marketing at a college, at least this flurry of desperate last-minute recruitment emails gives me something fun to share with my colleagues.

It's so hard to brag on myself. I've been avoiding posting on this thread while silently cheering on everyone else's accomplishments. Anyway, I'm sucking it up now, so here's my short list: -Excellent GRE (770/770/5.5) -Decent UG GPA (3.6, and 3.8 in my major) -3 great LORs, including one so good I cried when I read it (prof sent me a copy) -1 publication (not academic, but it is a clinical piece in an edited anthology) -research experience that resulted in acknowledgement in a published paper -teaching experience as a TA, adjunct and corporate trainer Whew. OK, that wasn't so bad.

Several of my schools emailed to tell me my application was complete and under review. Some of these I'd contacted for confirmation, but others just sent an email out of the blue.

Definitely tell them! I'd send an email (probably to the DGS?) with a brief explanation and an updated CV attached.

One of my schools required two copies of each transcript--which for me meant ten total, since I went to five schools between undergrad, master's and "just for fun" classes. They ended up with nine at the deadline, as one of the copies from one of my UG schools apparently got lost. And even though they already had one official transcript from that school, I still had to get another official copy to them post haste for them to consider my app. Luckily, the grad admissions assistant was incredibly helpful through the whole process, so even though that one transcript copy was late, I wasn't disqualified.

Oh, that's a good idea. I just shoved everything in an envelope and, like JerryLandis, assumed they'd know what to do with it. It seems to have worked for the most part; most of my apps are verified as complete. But if I had to do this again, I'd copy your cover letter format. Nice work.

Um, yeah... it's definitely a need! I've gone from idly clicking through to obsessively checking, and it's still a month before I expect to hear anything.

Ha ha... I love that you were so excited about nail clippers that you woke up!