Furcifera

And Notre Dame's MA in Classics has been in existence for... what... five years? No slight to their faculty, merely some question marks as to their track record/history. But I don't know by what rubric it would be "easily one of the most respected programs in the country." Maybe if you were studying late (as in Church, really) Latin?

Hi, TakeruK; thanks for the reply. At your prompting and with a couple months to think it over I realized that while I didn't apply to Duke for undergrad, I did in fact attend a get-girls-interested-in-science summer camp (obviously it didn't take. Humanities, what, what!) organized through Duke when I was in middle school. I'm actually a bit impressed they hold onto data that long.

You are the cat's pajamas. Registered.

Okay, so I completed my applications a couple weeks ago. I got an email from Duke this morning to start some sort of status check account, which I did. Then I notice in their "applicant information" section, they have both my "preferred" email address (the one I gave them while applying) and a "home" email address, which was my very first (as in, created at 13 yrs old) email address! How on earth was this populated? I would never have supplied it. Nor am I rocking my first (circa 2001) laptop, more's the pity. Do I now have to check all my applications for embarrassing early teen intrusions?!

I've done this once; worked out fine. In fact, I ended up getting invited to a lot more dinners with her old research buddies than I likely would have otherwise.

Now that the 15th is behind us and the dust has settled, I hope this thread will see some more traffic. That being said, now that I've made my (very difficult) decision, I figured I'd contribute. Accepted: *Kansas (MA- funded), FSU (MA- funded), CU-Boulder (MA- unfunded) Rejected: WUStL (MA), Illinois (MA/PhD), UNC (MA/PhD), Maryland (MA) [assumed. No official word from College Park.] * = attending GRE: 168 V, 156 Q, 5.0 W GPA: 3.79 overall, 3.9+ Classics Degrees: BA in Ancient Studies, Literature, and Creative Writing from Eckerd College (SLAC), MFA in Creative Writing from CU-Boulder. AOI: Latin & Greek historiography, reception studies Languages: Latin from high school up to graduate level, Greek only 1 summer intensive + 3 semesters following. Some German and Hebrew. Professional Stuff: 2 conference papers and some non-Classics publications. Advice: I either contacted or was already known to two out of three of the institutions at which I was accepted. (And none at which I was rejected.) Contacting directors or researchers of interest is usually considered unimportant at the MA-level, but I think it's a boon to both students and programs-- helps you solidify early on in the process whether the school's as good a fit as it seems on paper. Like Petros, I'm coming out of a different department. I had no Greek as an undergraduate. Instead of going the postbacc route, I tried to forge my own while in my MFA and lucked into really supportive departments at CU-Boulder. My only real regret for the process is not having written a new writing sample and instead going with a portion of my undergraduate thesis which, in my case, was a few years out of date in terms of my skills and interests. And if you are in the midst of a shifting path of education, as it were, don't be afraid to 1) use letters from multiple disciplines [i had two classicists and a literature] or 2) mention the benefits of your non-traditional experience [in my case, loads and loads of literary theory]. As one of my very wise letter writers reminded me, those programs which do not assign much value to those experiences will likely also not be a good fit for those skills. Better to lay it all out there in the letter than find out only when you've enrolled in the school that, say, many of the professors dislike the use of modern literary criticism when dealing with classical texts. In summary: (1) Might as well make contact early. (2) Get the language wherever you can. (3) Represent yourself as yourself and the results will be more worthwhile.

Congratulations! Sorry you couldn't join us at the open house! I'm still sitting in Tallahassee, feel free to message me if you want to discuss initial impressions.

This has suddenly become a little more pressing for me. Does anyone have experience in Lawrence, KS or Tallahassee, FL?

Got one this morning while I was in the bath. Good thing I had the presence of mind to grab a towel before I ran to tell my roommate.

On the off-chance any of you MA-seekers applied to Maryland, I bit the bullet and emailed JH; they've made their offers, accepted students visiting campus, etc. Sounds like more offers will be extended if those four students decide on other programs.

When you spam/try to sell stimulants to a department chair over twitter while twitter-hacked. Whoops.

That's me! Prof. Corbeill emailed me this morning. I'm pretty ridiculously excited. Doubly so because it's my first piece of good news this season.

Fantastic! I'm honestly very happy to be wrong. Go get 'em.

Petros-- Seems a lot of programs are early. (I didn't apply to UGA, though. Sorry for no news.) Marcus_Tullius-- According to previous UT-A data on the results search, it does look like they usually accept everyone at once, however this is quite early for them. Don't completely discount yourself before you have direct word from the school one way or another, but in this case no news is probably not good news. .

I think post-bacc would be a stretch in that situation, especially if you're applying for Late Latin. Hopefully not all the adcoms will agree with this POI, but if they do-- did you apply to any masters programs where you might buff up your Greek? And if you didn't, is there a university nearby where you can audit Greek courses? As has been said, though-- a project that intrigues might trump other considerations, and it seems you've already drummed up some interest. Definitely let us know how it goes!