boazczoine

Wow, and I thought my past experiences made me the champ of long-distance; you definitely have me beat. Well done and congrats on making it work--I have a small understanding of how rough the time apart can be. Good luck with the admissions process!

Hey, thanks for the link! Its always nice to hear/read other people's thoughts. I feel very lucky to have such an awesomely supportive partner/application proofreader as I try for this path, it'll just take a little extra planning to make sure we find the right situation for us

Agreed! I took all of them while studying, and they were very accurate in predicting my score. I studied off of the Manhattan books and Magoosh.

I have a question for those with families or who are in serious relationships. How is everyone tackling selecting a school while taking in account your partner's needs? Is your partner planning on moving with you no matter what/did you only apply to schools in your current city or are you exploring commuting/splitting time? My husband and I have about eight different contingency plans in place depending on how the admissions process plays out for me--though I did limit my school search to a reasonable range around our home (thank you, Amtrak). We've been fortunate enough to get lots of great advice from couples who have been through similar situations, and I was just wondering if anyone else was going through the same thought processes and discussions.

One of my schools required official transcripts as well--I believe the only place that listed this requirement was on the general grad admission website and not on any of the department materials. One word of caution against sending a screenshot of the status page--the admissions officers know what that says and it could come off whining. I do agree with sending a letter (via email to the graduate school) explaining the situation inclusive of PDFs that confirm your transcripts are being couriered immediately while apologizing sincerely for your misunderstanding. Including anything more, I think, could make it seem like you're claiming that the oversight is somehow their fault. It sucks, but its not on them. Tuesday morning, call the department ASAP and explain to the graduate coordinator the problem. If this helps you clam down, the school that required my official transcripts explained to me that they were only used after a decision has been made to accept a student--and that the graduate school would get in touch at that point (the verification stage), if they were missing.

Got some new hits on my academia profile! ...But they are all from France. I did not apply anywhere in France. Or Europe, for that matter. Tres triste.

The only thing you know for sure is that someone was interested enough in you to investigate further--can't be bad

It makes me feel really old that 6 am - 6:30 am is the middle of the night to you. * Grabs walker, shuffles away *

Six. Stuck to applying to schools that I would be super excited about going to and had a wide range of faculty (along with institutes/established programs) engaged in the type of research I'm interested in. Looking at some of the other posts around here, I'm a bit worried I wasn't specific enough about my interests in my SOP. For every school, I discussed recent books and/or articles by 3-4 senior professors that had informed my own past projects and that related to my future research interests; I also discussed that I thought I would like to be involved in so-and-so center or program because of relevant workshops/symposiums they had recently held.

Nope--its under the "profile" tab at the top. You can see the last five people who have viewed you. I think its pretty common to have one if you're working or in a professional program; I've been out of undergrad for awhile but can't imagine it'd be that common to have one in college. It is helpful if you're in a very network-y sort of industry, but other than that it is really just a nice way to control your public image when potential employers google you (or POIs who are hopefully interested in taking you on).

Oh jeeze, things are picking up! Unfortunately, nothing to report in my inbox from any of my schools, except for a POI looking at my LinkedIn profile last week. But nbd, it didn't send me into a frenzy or anything.

Wanted to voice my support for a date that falls farther out from when the bulk of admissions offers go out. For those of us with jobs where getting time off isn't easy and must work long-distance when away and/or find back-up, its really nice to have a date at least several weeks in advance to help plan (especially if the visitation will be held during the week). I'm not sure what the norm is for graduate departments, but when I was deciding between law schools, several didn't announce the admitted students weekend until two weeks beforehand, making logistics pretty difficult for those with jobs. A February date would probably put a few folks in a difficult spot (recognizing that most admits are undergrads). Definitely can't make the weekend ideal for everyone, but more time to plan will probably help a lot of people out, even if just on a financial level. That said, I'll definitely get to my top choices' events no matter what if I'm lucky enough to get accepted!

Thanks so much for letting us know!! (What about 9-point comic sans? That's always OK, right?)

Ha. Well, I certainly livened up the thread with that tidbit. Its like sending out the bat signal.

Hello! With the Ohio State result popping up yesterday, I am throwing my hat into the anxiety ring. On mid-year grades, I didn't look closely at the instructions on this point because I am not currently a student, but I believe most of my schools explicitly stated that mid-year grades were required to be submitted once available.

I'm set to take the GRE in a little under two weeks, and I am wondering if it would be worth it to bump it two more weeks or so to try and improve my quant score. There are a few open spots later in November. I know these things can be a little tedious, but I am suffering from an attack of nerves. I am focusing on top government departments that have either specific programs on social policy, or are actively producting scholarship on public benefits and health care policy generally. (Princeton, Harvard, the usual suspects.) I have taken 5 practice tests with my verbal scores ranging between 163-168 and my quantitative between 153-156. I don't care a lick about trying to improve on verbal, but am a little worried about the quantitative. I have a strong application package other than the GRE (I think): I really am aiming for the top of the top, which motivates me to want to bump up my quantitative as much as I can--but I know I'm not going to suddenly be scoring over 160, so I'm not sure how much a handful of points will help. I'm fine being told there is no way to tell if it will help, but I figured it doesn't hurt to ask! Thanks in advance for anyone willing to respond!