isostheneia

I know a few people who did this. From what I remember, they stated (plausible) fit-related reasons for transferring in their statements of purpose. E.g. they became interested in moral psychology while in the program, and there was nobody there sufficiently knowledgeable in that area to supervise them adequately.

My two cents: I applied with a WS on Hegel, and I applied to analytic schools (though exclusively ones with at least a few people working on Kant and German idealism). Glasperlenspieler is right in saying that it matters for history writing samples that they engage with the contemporary literature; I was navigating a dispute between two major interpreters, and my bibliography was filled with people at the places to which I applied. And while I think Xia1 is right to say that making negative points is easier than good positive proposals, I'm not sure that means it's more beneficial to go for the former, since adcoms are aware of this. For what it's worth, I argued that the two interpretations on offer were compatible (primarily negative), and that the reading that held both theses is a correct reading of the text (primarily positive). My biggest piece of advice is to make your WS look as close to the best papers you're reading as possible. If everyone cites Professor S when talking about a certain issue, then cite Professor S. Even more aesthetic things: if everyone writing on topic x fills the majority of the first page with a list of 75 citations in which they explicitly attribute the target view to everyone who ever held it, then you should do the same. The professors reading your WS know what good work in your area looks like (unless your WS is on a really rare topic, perhaps), so it's helpful to make your paper look like the good papers you're reading and citing. (It's of course also helpful to make your arguments as good as those in the good papers you're reading and citing, but this is almost always an unachievable goal for people just applying to graduate school. Making one's paper look professional in non-argumentative ways is, on the other hand, achievable.)

Topic seemed relevant for where I got in as well. My main AOS was in Kant and German Idealism, and my writing sample was on Hegel. I applied to twelve places, and the four I got into were the four that seem to have the biggest emphasis on history of philosophy, especially Kant and related figures (Johns Hopkins, UCSD, Georgetown, Pitt). The eight from which I was rejected all have at least one or two people who work on this stuff, but all seem to place less of an emphasis on it. I wrote on a pretty well known thing in Hegel (the self-consciousness chapter in the Phenomenology), and argued that two positions in the recent literature are compatible. I don't think it was a terribly original thesis, although it was one that hadn't yet put forward in print - I think what was really useful was showing that I was good at both doing close reading of a historical text and engaging in a pretty detailed way with secondary literature. The latter especially is, I think, a really helpful skill to demonstrate in the writing sample regardless of topic.

For what it's worth, I've heard (in conversation) from a few professors who regularly sit on search committees that they actively count mid-tier publications against applicants. One example given was that they would think better of an applicant with one publication in Nous than an applicant with one publication in Nous and one in a mid-range specialty journal. Granted, these comments have mainly been from professors in top 10 departments - it's entirely possible that there's a significant difference in hiring strategy between such departments and others. But it's at least some direct testimonial evidence that mid-tier publications can be harmful. (Just to be clear, I don't mean to endorse their comments as reflective of good hiring practices.)

I think I just disagree on the numbers here. At DePaul, 4 of 17 faculty come from ranked programs. At Penn State, it's 6 of 17. At Boston College, it's 10 of 25. Of course, this is in no way to deny that it's an ultra-competitive job market, regardless of where you go. I just think that there's less of a correlation (though not none) between a school's ranking, or its being ranked at all, and its placement record than some people think.

I think it depends partially on what you want to do. I think that your professor's advice is good if you want a research job, and work in analytic philosophy. But there are a number of schools that primarily do continental philosophy, aren't ranked terribly highly (at least by the PGR), and have good placement at research jobs at other continental schools. And there are also some schools that aren't ranked very highly but have extremely good placement records at teaching schools -- Georgetown, e.g.

FYI, Carolyn Dicey Jennings has been collecting a bunch of updated placement records (including breakdown by R1 vs any permanent position) from 2011-2016 and releasing them on her twitter over the past few days (https://twitter.com/cdj140). It's info that's probably relevant to those of you who need to make a decision in the next few weeks.

Foreign language shouldn't be a problem - I applied with a big emphasis on German Idealism, without knowing any German whatsoever, and even then no school that I applied to had a problem with that. And plenty (most, at this point?) of departments don't have a language requirement anymore. Regarding other factors: 1) GPA 3.6-4.0 sounds about right. 2) The writing sample is almost certainly most important. Make sure to read lots of contemporary papers on whatever topic you're writing on, cite/respond to them (showing how your paper is a worthwhile contribution to the literature), and make your paper look and read like them. Following the stylistic norms (e.g. how to motivate main issues, how to raise and respond to objections, what papers it's important to cite and respond to, etc.) of a sub-field is an important way of showing off philosophical skill. 3) Great LORs are probably second-most important, I think. Eric Schwitzgebel's blog has more. 4) I don't think presenting at undergrad conferences makes much of a difference directly, although indirectly it may help the quality of your thinking and writing. Finally, two more things. With the GRE, it's probably good to aim for a total score of 315 or higher. Many profs on admissions committees don't care much about GRE, but some do, and you have no way of knowing who will read your application. So it's good to get each component as high quality as possible. And second, statement of purpose/evidence of fit is important. Departments want students who are excited to be there and have interests that are well served by the department. So choosing schools where you would fit well, based on your interests, and demonstrating that fit in your statement of purpose can definitely help.

Yeah that makes sense. Seems plausible enough on second thought. That makes sense, good points. Makes me realize how lucky I've been. And thanks as well for the kind words, I really appreciate it.

Sorry to hear that the waitlist didn't work out. Will you be submitting more apps next year? (edit - sorry, didn't see your other post where you say you probably won't be.) Also, are you sure that the bolded claim is true? From what I remember of the survey results from last year, the majority of applicants got in somewhere (although this might include both PhD and MA, and you seem to be only talking about MA). Feel free to correct me on this.

AMAZING. Congratulations. This is so fantastic for you.

Thanks! Full funding, just under $28,000 per year, with 6 years guaranteed and 3 years of fellowship.

Oh my goodness. I just got off the waitlist at Pitt. I'm total disbelief, but I'm absolutely thrilled.

I've just declined my offer from UCSD. I don't think this helps anyone, since I don't think they use a waitlist. I'll either be going to Pittsburgh (if I get off their waitlist), or Georgetown. Very stressful times, but it'll be settled in roughly 24 hours.

I'll add myself to the list - feel free to PM me to connect on facebook.

One example: "I love your program, and it's an excellent fit for my interests. However, it's on the other side of the country from my family, so visiting them would be much more costly than at some of the other programs I'm considering. Accordingly, if there's any flexibility with the stipend at your program, a larger stipend would make it easier for me to accept your offer of admission."

I just got back from visits at Pittsburgh, Johns Hopkins, Georgetown, and UC San Diego. I'll try and say a bit about what I thought of each. Pittsburgh: It's more or less my dream school, so I was really happy to be there. I had heard some rumors of climate issues there, but I was really happy with what I could tell of the environment. (Which isn't to say that climate issues definitely don't exist.) I got along well with many grad students, and I'm really hoping to get in off the waitlist. I got a great impression from all the faculty I talked to, and asking some of their advisees about working relationships, I was surprised by the amount of energy the faculty put into advising. So overall it seemed great. Pittsburgh is also a surprisingly nice city. Johns Hopkins: This was my only visit that wasn't during official visiting days, so perhaps it's a bit unfair to hold it to the same standards. But I didn't love it. The grad students didn't seem tremendously happy to be there, and apparently there's some animosity between students with different interests (a factor which is very important to me). For instance, there have apparently been cases of students yelling at each other during colloquia. On the other hand, the faculty seemed amazing. But given how important the grad community is, I turned down this offer today. Also, I don't want to live in Baltimore, even though the cost of living is quite low. Georgetown: I loved the department, including both faculty and grad students. They seem very supportive, interested in others' work even if it isn't directly connected with their own, and like everyone enjoys hanging out with each other regularly outside of scheduled activities. One downside is that there aren't a huge amount of grad students working on my primary areas of interests, but there are many people who work on directly related areas. Supporting grad students during their program (financially and otherwise) and afterwards on the market seems like a primary emphasis of the program, which I think is a great sign. Very high level of morale, from what I could tell. UC San Diego: I don't think there's a school with a better climate, meteorologically speaking. One thing that I loved is that there's a really big community of grad students working on German Idealism, all of whom seem like really cool people. I also got along really well with the faculty I talked to. One downside is that it seemed to be a fairly male-heavy department, especially in terms of grad students and prospectives. On the other hand, they're doing really cool work with the UCSD summer program for women. The funding is a bit lower here, but students said that they get by just fine. There's also a general cogsci/empirical focus throughout the department, and while I think that's totally fine, it's generally not my sort of approach to the things I work on. Basically, I'm trying to figure out where to accept if I don't get into Pitt. Pro Georgetown, there's a really nice emphasis on Sellarsian/Pittsburgh school style work in a lot of areas. Pro San Diego, there's a large German Idealism community. Making this sort of decision is a good problem to have, though definitely still a problem.

As far as I know, many programs are actually not allowed to review any more work you send them once they've reviewed your app one time around. So I wouldn't do that. What you can do is send them a gracious email thanking them for putting you on the waitlist, and assuring them that you're interested in the program.

Off the top of my head, I think the person's AOIs are pretty broad, including things like early modern and modern, philosophy of language, metaphysics, and early analytic.

The relevant question seems to me not whether Pollan is a philosopher, but whether he's the best person to use as a primary source in an undergraduate thesis. You could certainly engage with many of the topics he discusses by investigating arguments made by people specifically within the discipline. Here's a page on the philosophy of food which might help. Discussing people who are in published conversation with other philosophers will probably make your project much easier in the long run, I would think, regardless of the question of whether Pollan is a philosopher. You could always cite him in passing or in footnotes, while engaging other people's arguments as well.

Congrats, I'm really pulling for you. Hope it turns out well.

They offered $20,000, which is $2,000 less than last year, according to the funding survey. I could certainly make it work, but it would be tighter financially than my other offers. (Maybe Georgetown would be somewhat similar, since housing prices are even worse in Georgetown/DC than in San Diego.) Not sure if this helps, but I know someone who's already turned down an offer from Penn. It's conceivable that there's a delay of a few days between someone turning down their offer and them contacting the next person on the waitlist, assuming that they start admitting people from the waitlist after each declined offer.

Thanks! I truly have no idea. First I thought I was leaning toward UCSD, then Georgetown, and now maybe JHU (contra what I said earlier in this thread). Basically, the visits are going to be incredibly important in figuring out my second choice in case Pitt doesn't work out. With UCSD, one of my primary concerns is the funding situation - it's not very much money, in a relatively expensive place, with teaching duties every year. Plus the UCs in general are pretty broke, so the ability to get conference funding and fellowships later on might be limited (something to ask about). With Georgetown, I'm somewhat torn. I love the character of the department, and there are some great people there for me to work with, but it's also an enormous department, which has pros and cons. And given the amount of faculty specializing in German philosophy, there aren't a ton of grad students specializing in it. As for JHU, Baltimore sucks (in my opinion) but they're clearly committed to German philosophy, both in faculty and grad students, and the funding is fantastic. Plus they've got some cool interdisciplinary stuff going on with the Humanities Center, which has some folks I'd be interested in working with. Anyway, this is all to say that it's way too close for me to have any idea what my second option is without visiting and actually meeting the people I'd be working with.

I hadn't heard this rule of thumb before. I'd be interested to know if you (or anyone else) have any more thoughts as to how true it is. Pitt is definitely my top choice, so any insight into my chances would be welcome.

I agree with everyone else here than writing a thesis is a good option. I also think it could be a red flag that most students at Program X don't write a thesis. I would talk to profs and students there to try to find out exactly why that's the case. One potential benefit of Program X is that if you do write a thesis, you might be able to stand out in the program and get some great letters of rec. Of course, if there are legitimate issues with the thesis track there (not enough faculty support, it would hurt your grades, etc), then it would seem to be a bad idea.