Loric

At first I wanted to console you, saying it's not so bad.. was even going to say the one letter writer who wrote mine didn't write something long... then I pulled it up and his seemingly brief letter was 4 paragraphs and touched on pretty much everything in my life. Well, many programs let you have an extra letter.. so there's that.. if it's already been submitted. Maybe redirect your approach with other writers? And find a spare..? When I asked for my letters, I didn't do the CV/resume thing (as i hadn't gotten mine anywhere near finished and polished yet.) So instead they got a listing under the header "Work I've Done For You" and then "How You'll Probably Remember Who I Am" (this was a bit of a joke, but it mentioned the quirkier stuff I've done working for them - like that time I stood on a bucket of "mice" in storage, fell off, and had a shelf of "mammal pelts" fall on top of me.) I think that worked better than them trying to speak for the rest of my life.. rather, just what they'd know themself but with a little guidance. I also told them what the overall idea I was trying to craft was. The message I wanted my full app to convey and the part I was hoping the would play in it.

Congrats!

If they're not your studies then a complete enough reference in the text that someone could go find it if they wanted is fine. "So-and-so's study of Blah Blah Blah in XYZ.." should be sufficient. You're putting info in context and speaking to peers in a semi-formal manner, it's not a research paper. If it was research work you did, then it's going to show up in your resume/cv/etc.. and need not be explained right then and there.

If you're to last a week, you need to see these people as people, not gods.

At this point i'm rambling but I always feel it's important to mention a reasoning for realism versus naturalism.. It's night in a scene. You don't turn the lights off - people can't see. It's blue. It's a convention, it's accepted by the audience, it means night. They still believe ardently whatever it is you're trying to convey, not viewing it as an affront to logic. You introduce the "magical" and begin seriously toying with that balance.

You could probably also dabble in the notion that magical realism imposes reflective distance and the smoking gallery of Brecht by introducing the norms of the absurb into what is seemingly the direct opposition of the intent of realism - evoking naturalism practically, and the suspension of disbelief. How those tow ideas are at odds and yet often aim for the same goal.

Magical realism in theater would probably be the more compelling subject because it's not as well studied as it seems to be literature and art. Heck, I have a degree in theater design and it didn't immediately strike me an an "-ism" i'd ever aimed to evoke, but obviously it's used and frequently (thanks Google.) I guess I come from always seeing "realism" and its conventions as an opposition to the unsustainability and impracticality of naturalism, rather than having much of anything to do with the real world or mundane. A way things are portrayed (the awful naturalist actually cooks on stage.. realism mimes it) rather than the subject matter of things. So I guess if you could explain what you mean, why it's important, and where you intend to look for answers.. that's what they're looking for?

I have a hard time thinking a higher level academic has such vehemently negative feelings toward marijuana. This coming from a "prude" who never partook. But it's like expecting someone who comes from an all male boarding school to be violently opposed to the concept of mutual masturbation. They're more like "meh" - cuz such is life. I just watched "Another Country" on netflix so i could be coming at this from a completely skewed perspective.. but pot isn't that big of a deal for most people, even those who don't use it themselves.

That's where a phone call comes in. Like i said, people can endlessly ignore emails or put them off. It's a cultural thing.. people do it even with important stuff. You call the office and ask who you'd talk to, talk to that person, and have an answer.

Define "things."

Dear lord, the idea of going unannounced is to get an incognito look at the program, you're not supposed to be forcing yourself on anyone.

What a terrible way to see the world and other people..

I think you should do something like this... http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lkwSqUzgcOQ#t=0 It'll be hilarious and awful.. and hilarious.

Omg he still hasn't written it.... What should I do? Sent another follow up monday, no response. Emailed another professor in the department who wrote a rec for me for advice, he said "keep on him" and "he's terrible about stuff like that, it's not just you." I'm just at a loss. Suggestions?

Most people treat email like it's something they can reply to, if they feel so behooved.. Entire inboxes are full of never-read email. No matter how important. Don't take it personally. You're going to have to make a phone call and be persistent.

You need to think more wholistically in terms of your app. They will have a form or sheet or something with your GPA mere inches away from your SOP. It's not like if you don't tell them, they wont know about it, nor is your GPA low enough that it'd be out of the norm for it to cross their desk. Unless you call attention to it, they probably wont notice much, unless it's a highly competitive school (which in reality most are not.) So if you want to bring it up, you need to frame it positively. Anything that resembles an excuse is out. I'm going to go out on a limb and suggest that you really need to mentally reframe it for yourself before you're going to be able to write about it. What are you explaining? Absolutely under no circumstances that "work made school harder so i got a lower GPA, it couldn't be helped." However, "You'll see that my GPA improved as I moved further into my education and became truly dedicated to my studies" or something of that sort is fine. It's less about what you're saying, and more about what other people are seeing when they read it. This is different than "I suffered a kidney failure and so I had to miss many classes and tanked a semester." Many people who work have amazing GPA's. Trying to set up that arguement to people who spend much of their time looking at people's GPA's and resumes is not going to get you anywhere other than possibly their contempt. I say this because I don't want you to write it because I DO want you to succeed.

Sure, why not? If someone can hit the needed talking points about you, supervised you, knows who the heck you are, and can write a strong letter.. they're good. If you're going into a very distinct field, asking someone from the outside to reccomend you wont be the best course. They're supposed to speak to your abilities.. and they may think you're a great person but if you say.. want to go into underwater basket weaving, and they don't know anything about weaving or being under water.. well.. it's a poor choice. Consider what would make a strong letter that paints you as a strong candidate. Can this person write one? To an extent it is about "can this person do grad level work" but also "do they have requisite skills needed for this particular program." Adcoms know people fudge their resumes and credentials... it's much harder to get a random 3rd party from a university to say you can do something you can't.

You have to make it clear that the circumstances of your life are not "someone else's fault." You earned the lower grades.. which btw is higher than my GPA and i've been to grad school.. so it's not that much of an uphill battle. Your GPA is not a representation of the fact that you worked. You made choices and those were the consequences. You appear to not like your GPA - like i said, it's not actually bad - but you can't blame the circumstance for it. What happened, happened, and you made choices that lead to it happening that way. Was the situation fair? Just? No. Life isn't. Expressing a maturity level that accepts the decisions you made will be what keeps you out of the reject pile if a program views your GPA as subpar for their standards.

If you already think your first prof is going to sound like a buttclown (Who ranks people in rec letters? Who does that?!?) then he will probably sound like a buttclown to the adcomm, no matter how well he even ranks you. Try for the second, settle for the first if needed. Whoever can writer the stronger letter that makes you look better is the right choice. Someone who is willing to say anything negative about you or say you're in any way lesser or inadequate is typically not that person. No one on an adcom is expecting brutal honesty.

And fanboys weird people out.. keep that in mind.

That quant is a little scary for the sciences. Arts, humanities, I'd be like "meh, write a great SOP." I'd suggest focusing on your test taking skills and retake. Seriously, find and learn how to take the test, not on the content. Just need to be able to find the right answer, not actually calculate the right answer.

I am so sorry this happened to you. It'd take everything in my power to not be like.. "Listen lady, because you feel inadequate in your writing ability and status in academia does not give you the right to project your insecurities onto me and sabotage my application by pulling out at the last minute. I seriously hope you consider your newfound and obviously fabricated moral highground before doing anything of the sort to any other students in the future. Curse word curse word curseword. Helping people by screwing them over, aren't you a saint." If you know anyone who knows her and thinks she's nutty, they're a good bet. You can then mention the old bat screwed you last minute, thus the late notice, and they'll probably comiserate. But if it's someone unrelated, just ask and mention you know it's short notice - screw it, fabricate something like her moral opposition.. A school requires one more letter than you expected to need to get, so you need one more to make the deadline. (Wait, that's not a lie.. yay for careful wording!) Worst case scenario, BEFORE THE DEADLINE, find out what the process is to have your app bumped back to the next semester and deadline.

So.. don't..? It's highly focused and your options are slim. Apply to those. 5 is a lot of fees, applications, and nonsense anyways.

A big part of information dumps is how they're presented. I don't like your paragraph format. I want bulletpoints. I do also want that "skill/task - achievement" sort of dynamic. It would help answer the "so what?" questions. And while I appreciate your nod to your fellow faculty and staff, they're not applying. You are. I assume they were skilled or they'd not have jobs nor be in charge of you. Tell me something that makes you a compelling candidate in that space instead. And btw, you put the "where" before the "what" - don't fall into that trap. What you did is always more important than where it happened. What - where - when... how. Mentor. (Surely there was a title that's different though..?) School XYZ They All Look The Same to Me and Most AdComms. 1673-1782. -Teaching and stuff, educating the kiddos. -Developed their proficience and like skills in this and thats. -Like a Boss. See? Total nonsense but it makes it a bit more logical and less "oh god it's a block of text."

And what is the word limit on the app..? Cuz that seems ridiculous..