[Communicating with professor]

Hello,

I am an international student who appplied to several English Department in the States and got admitted from several programs.

Since I am international who will not be albe to visit the schools and programs, I need some advice.

There is one professor who send letters which explain how well I will fit in that program, introducaing her interest and related research centers and classes they offer. She said she really enjoyed my writing sample and do have interest to study with me, which makes me so happy since her words sound so nice and kind.

(I did not even emention her name in my SOP)

My question is,

Is it usual for professors to send emails to encourage students to accept the admission offer?

I really want to find my "mento" and proper academic advisor!!!

[LoR, waive my right?]

I am an international student who applied for Ph.D in the U.S.

In my online application, I said I would not waive my right to review recommendation letters. Does this seriously weaken the truthfulness of my recommendation? (Ahhhhhhhh!!!!!) Since there was no actual warning or comment that this choice might harm my LoR, I just did not care too much about waiving, which I regret now. (I think it is not fair not to mention the risk you have to take, though.)

Well, there would be a variety of differences between programs, but, based on your experience, please help me...

Is there anybody who got accepted even if they did not waive their right?

Recommendation letters are one of the most important factors to make a decision?

Please, HELP ME!!!!!

[Help me! GRE AWA score]

Thanks, guys. I really appriciate great advices from you. Whether I accept your advices or not, all of them are very helpful.

I will contact the admission offices right now.

[Help me! GRE AWA score]

From the admissions people I talked to I would say that your AWA score would ring some alarms, especially since your major is English lit. But judging by your post it looks like you have a good handle on the English language so you should score better.

Maybe your approach was wrong. How did you study for the AWA? Did you download the ETS software and see their sample essays? Those are very helpful. This might be a ridiculous question, but did you try to memorize some essays your wrote and then try to adapt them to the essay question/issue? I know that sounds silly, but I know some people who would try to approach the test this way and it will always fail.

Make sure you write freely and not try to use any words or sentence structure that you don't feel comfortable with. The essay section was created in part because intl students were getting into programs, but were not ready for college level writing in English. They are just testing to see if you have a good handle of English and can express yourself clearly, not that you're the next James Joyce.The ETS has a list of all of the topics/issues on their website. Try responding to them as practice so that you feel comfortable with writing essays on the fly, then take it again.

Great advice. I also agree that my approach was a little bit wrong. It would not be that bad to take GRE test again since I have time until the deadline. Thnaks!

[Help me! GRE AWA score]

Have you taken the TOEFL yet? If your writing/overall score is high, I think you can get by without retaking the GRE. From my experience, the AW is the least important of the three GRE sections, and a high TOEFL score combined with a well written SOP and writing sample should be enough for the department to see that your English is good.

Thank you for your advice. I took the TOEFL as well and it was 114/120. I got 27/30 in writing section.

[Help me! GRE AWA score]

I am an international student who wants to major English literature in ph.D program in USA.

I took GRE test last month, and got 720(V), 770(Q).

However, I got an awefully low score in AWA, 3.5.

Do you think this(low writing score) affects hugely on admission process?

Besides this, I got almost perfect GPA.

As long as I write great SOP and writing sample, can my application be considered by the committee at least, or be screened out at first because of AWA socre?

This is very important for me because I am considering to take another GRE test next month. Or should I concentrate on my SOP and sample writing?

Please, give me useful advice. As an international student, I do not have a person to ask and get information.