coyabean

That does, indeed, look awesome. I'm like you. If I could I would get a PhD in Everything. Really, knowing to me is too big for disciplines. I want a little econ, a little cognitive theory, a little public policy, urban studies, education, and sociology and religion and history.

T-shirt. This. On it. Please.

One of the things to remember about these kinds of communities is that they are overwhelmingly populated by super-vigilant, highly qualified seekers. Basically the kinds of people who would get responses from schools. So it can skew your version of reality. If your only exposure to grad school was this board you would think having a 1300 on the GRE and a 3.8 with three conference presentations out of UG is normal yet the statistical averages suggest otherwise. Most people, I'd wager, have not heard anything from a school and do not expect to. I would venture it is more odd to hear something than not, actually. Think of all the many applicants, particularly this year, and the very few people in a position to communicate with them.

It happens during every economic downturn. I am really just banking on career fit at this point. It goes without saying here, of course, but grad apps are a chore. They are so much of a chore that unless you are hyper-focused on the career path and grad school as the means then it seems to me you are less likely to put together as convincing of an application. Sure, there will be high achieving superstars who perhaps would have gone into business and consulting and all of those other euphemisms they create to fast track connected, ivy leaguers but they were never really my competition anyway. They are in a different circle than I am. I am competing against the same hard tackle folks who probably would have always faced this crossroad of middle class crappy job or advanced education. And I can only hope I'm a half step ahead of and better prepared than those folks. Or, this will be the year that the average GRE/GPA will be 1400/3.987 at every graduate school in the country and I will be a loser and I'll be escorted out of this comm. Who knows? I do know, however, that this is what I want to do no matter the economic environment. I'm hoping that commitment shows in my apps.

I think its that season. Plus, you'd have to go to some of the law school boards to put this in context. This is NOTHING like those. Nothing. I mean a predisposed person could slit their wrists after some time on some of them, and that's not hyperbole. I think this is just stress and all of the measuring ourselves and such.

i've heard of both scenarios. for some schools 1200 seems to be the magic number, regardless of how it is weighted while some highly selective english depts, for example, are looking for a certain percentile in verbal and will disregard the quant.

Ok, see, no nightmares (yet?) but I am definitely paranoid. I think EVERYONE is laughing at me -- advisors, mentors, friends, adcomms.

@melusine: Are you kidding me? I'm pretty much exchanging my life for an office! LOL I'm so not ashamed of it, either. One of my mentors has an office that would make you sign up for an online PhD in ESP if it guaranteed one like it. It's a corner space in the second level of a modern theater conservatory. It's large enough for a desk, bookshelves AND a table and chairs for guests. And the windows curve around and are almost floor to ceiling. And she always has tea and just the book you need. It's like...like...nerd girl porn. I love it so.

Why?

I think part of the problem is schools playing the ranking yield game. More applications, lower percentage of accepted applicants = prestige. So while they resent all the work it takes to process your app and take your money - as seen, IMO, in the insane way alot of apps systems are designed to make them difficult -- they also need lots of suckers to apply to seem elite.

OOOOhhh fun. I love imagining even if I'm now learning how woefully bad humans are at doing it. I really think I will like teaching. I've done corporate training and it is still my favorite job, and I've had lots. So my ideal is probably like most people's: a small, quaint, progressive, well-funded, diverse liberal arts school* -- maybe even an all-girls school! -- where I have an office full of blond wood, books and natural light. I teach wonderfully engaged students and when I get tired of that I take a semester for "deep hanging out" so that I can work on my next revolutionary book. More realistically I can imagine being happy in a some kind of public intellectual role, too. Maybe working for a university-based social science research lab with a strong outreach initiative? Maybe as some kind of liason to the public? If all else fails I'll go the dark side: administration or government work. *I am fully aware such a thing does not exist. Do not burst my bubble, please.

LOL! I know. And I'm so proud of myself for figuring it out. I'm notoriously naive about these things. I'm all earnest and crap and think others are, too. Thus my note about realizing that this wasn't a real conversation. It's really something I'm working on. The introduction of emotionally-charged words like "racist" and "racism" and the total refusal to engage in logical discourse -- it all hit me. Bam! Troll. YAY! I got it.

When and where? O_o

I am terrified that you think that considering your discipline. What quantitative data goes into English Lit? But Claude Steele's article is an excellent overview that results from more than a dozen studies he has conducted, that's why I linked it. But for more information please search "Claude Steele", "Stereotype Threat", or see any of the three studies I posted further up. And no one called you a racist but you. I just read an interesting pop psych article yesterday about why is Ann Coulter so angry. There was some interesting stuff about anger as a preemptive protective measurement against challenge often and disproportionately used by those who feel entitled in some way. It was in Psychology Today, I think. And OMG. I just looked back over the progression of this conversation and realized that you aren't serious about engaging in the subject! I have to get better at that or this is going to be a long road. So ignore it all, but I'll leave it for posterity; internet integrity and all.

Well you know you better than I do so I cannot disagree with your assessment, but I do disagree with the lack of support for your findings. If we are all trying to attain advanced degrees I think we have a special responsibility to not use our experiences as the Universal and to consider statistical evidence. The fact remains that there is a wealth of literature to dispute the idea that there is a culture of failure in minority communities. There is more than one longitudinal study that says poor black and brown children (again, I cite a Steele article: http://www.theatlantic.com/politics/race/steele.htm) have a GREATER cultural appreciation for academic achievement than their white counterparts. These types of engagements really reinforce my reasons for going to graduate school. We have here a collection of scientists and humanists that appear ready to easily dismiss the experiences of some people as valid. That is one of many problems I have with higher education. Sure, some people of ALL COLORS do not want to invest in the delayed gratification of learning. That is actually quite American, in my opinion. However, to casually dismiss evidence to the contrary of your personal experience is sloppy scholarship that can be potentially dangerous when you are left relatively unsupervised and omnipotent in a classroom setting with people with life experiences that contradict your "study of one". And this is not directed at one person. I wish it were that easy and that contained. This is systemic and, I think, characteristic of human behavior. We problemitize and marginalize experiences different than our own, and that's when we're progressive and learned! At worse, humans in general and Americans in particular seem inclined to attribute perceived differences as functions of existing frameworks for understanding people -- ethnicity, class, gender, etc. It's easy and lazy. Let me also point out, though, that women are also outperformed by men. Are we prepared to conclude that there is a gendered cultural norm that disadvantages women? Or, are we more comfortable with an ambiguous de-raced group as being more deserving of both the benefit of doubt and validation of proof? And if so, why are we more comfortable with that than the idea that maybe, just maybe, the very unique way in which race has manifested itself and been acted upon in this country could have similar effects? I think that is as an interesting a question as any.

Now we're getting into my area so I apologize, in advance, for going overboard. There is a prevailing school of thought that suggests that all standardized tests privilege those who have the means, opportunity and access to prepare for the skills tested by such tests like the SAT, GRE, LSAT, etc. The most research has been done for the SAT for many reasons. The second most discussed test seems to be the LSAT. But there is some literature about the GRE. One of the issues I have with such conclusions is not a disagreement with the fact that minority students, on average, are outperformed by white students, again, on average but that race is, as usual, being conflated poverty. POOR students and those who are born into poor families in poor communities that then funnel them into poor school districts are severely disadvantaged for a test that does not test one's preparedness for graduate school as it does an accumulation of cultural knowledge that trains students to think in "acceptable" ways that can then be segmented and tested for. For instance, expansive vocabulary and critical thinking skills have been tied to early exposure to high-level language in the home and in school. Well, too often poor kids -- the number of which, for reasons too complicated to maybe discuss with someone who is not American, are too often black and brown -- are underexposed to high-level language. Those same children, the most vulnerable, are then placed in the most overburdened schools where issues of safety and order often trump teaching and learning. When one loses that opportunity to acculturate to sophisticated language processes and critical thinking it is very difficult to "catch up" later in life. Even if a focused, assertive learner from these circumstances does close the gap - and it absolutely happens - poverty comes to visit again when it comes time to prepare for these tests. Children of wealthier parents can afford expensive tutoring and help that is proven to increase competence at these tests. I do not ever want to communicate that black children cannot learn and these tests are specifically designed to filter them out. That is the kind of talk that leads to discussions the like of "The Bell Curve", among others. It is not race but what race has come to mean in terms of access and mobility and wealth in this country that privileges non-minority students. And so, yeah. ETA numbers and studies and all that sexy quant stuff so no one thinks I'm pulling stuff out of my arse: http://eric.ed.gov/ERICWebPortal/custom/portlets/recordDetails/detailmini.jsp?_nfpb=true&_&ERICExtSearch_SearchValue_0=ED135827&ERICExtSearch_SearchType_0=no&accno=ED135827 http://heinonline.org/HOL/LandingPage?collection=journals&handle=hein.journals/ajgsp1&div=10&id=&page= And my favorite by Claude Steele: http://books.google.com/books?hl=en&lr=&id=Ywb7r1oOxJYC&oi=fnd&pg=PA401&dq=graduate+school+testing+race&ots=xnx1P0-ejx&sig=m3zHtv47jCraLE3GjQuBxk65WeE#v=onepage&q=&f=false

! So basically he has my combined GRE score. :/ Nice. I probably won't even be read at most of the schools to which I applied and that hurts.

I agree. I can live with not meeting the bar of a dream school - oh hai Yale -- but I resent, absolutely, being lied to. Here I again compare this to law schools. You can judge, fairly accurately, how you stand in law school admissions based on your GPA and LSAT. It's brutal but it's transparent and honest. This is like when guys swear up and down that they look at "inner beauty". I'd rather you say "I really appreciate models and video dancers with low self-esteem." That is so much more fair.

I love my mother like a kid loves cake, but YES to all of your questions! Even after explaining the odds and how it all works she, a very smart woman in her own right, seems to only hear every other word I say. So, when I say "I am so anxious about getting an acceptance because I'm ready to start my life" she hears "I am getting an acceptance that will ready me for life." No. What i want is ONE person in my life with whom I can commiserate over all of the details and minutiae of this process. I want someone to agree that if I met a school's ridiculous Nov 1st deadline that someone could have made a damn decision by Jan. 8. I want someone to comb the internet with and agree that its almost a lost cause. I want someone to roll around in the muck with me. My mother loves me. She says I am the smartest person she knows. She thinks I can just sashay into a school, pick a program and start next month -- preferably at a school close to home. She doesn't get that I'll probably embark upon one of many moves to anywhere in the country that someone wants me. She also says things like "oh you can get a job at the local State Uni!" like its a bagel shop. Forget they are a research II and have nothing in my field or anything close to my interests.

short people.

Ditto. I hope to pay it all forward.

Awesome! I'm also on the Anth boards but I have several Interdiscp. programs on my list and, ultimately, my research interests cross all kinds of boundaries. I am somewhere at the intersection of higher education, history and sociology of education, complex societies, urban and policy studies, ethnography and critical race studies. My project would employ a mix of ethnography and quantitative analysis to determine how neighborhoods and colleges share space and participate, respectively, in knowledge production both formal and informal. And GAH if I'd had that succinct line four months ago when I sent off my first app I'd be feeling a lot more confident. LOL My UG is in English and Poli. Sci. Anyone here apply to USC's ASE program? I think it would be a dream.

LOL! My first GRE score was something like that. I think in the teens? My verbal was in the 96th for context. My advisors just looked at me and laughed. And Y'all are failing at failure. Let me learn you something: -- there is, no lie, a 12 year gap in my transcript. The last year of the first trip? All NWs and NFs. I'm talking two, if not three -- I can't look anymore -- semesters of straight nothing. When I returned to school the advisor told me it is a miracle of my early 4.0s that my GPA was above a 2.0...if just barely. -- I graduated from a school where you can pass if you showed up for the final and didn't stab the professor, not exactly rigorous. -- Thanks to the NWs and NFs? My attempted hours make me look like an idiot.