ungerdrag

DHumeDominates is spot on. Your writing sample is far more important than any gold star on your CV—it's probably the most important part of your application. (Today I thanked one of my recommenders, who has plenty of adcomm experience, for writing such a helpful letter. His response: "All the letter can do is to get them to look at your paper.") FWIW, I haven't published a damn thing, and I'm doing just fine. So logos0516, if you get shut out, I'd recommend against trying to get published. Just write another sample and retake the GRE. Those are the only two important parts of your application you can still improve.

Glad to hear it! That should be fine, then.

There's nothing wrong with getting in touch if you do it right, but two days after initial admissions? Emailing several people? How could you possibly think that that's the thing to do? It's not going to get you in anywhere, and if your emails sound impatient or impolite, you might just bump yourself down a few notches on the waitlist. If I really felt the need to reach out, I would wait another week and email the director of admissions—and no one else.

Hang in there, Vineyard.

I started with a little solo study from Graham Priest's An Introduction to Non-Classical Logic. (It's impossible to learn logic without doing it, so if you go this route, be sure to do the exercises!) Next was an intro to logic class that used Dan Bonevac's Deduction, which is a better book to start with than Priest's. After that, I took a grad-level semantics class. It wasn't too hard; it helped that I knew some logic and philosophy of language (e.g., I knew what presupposition was). But it's possible to flourish in a semantics class even without this background—especially if the textbook is Heim and Kratzer's, which one could probably work through alone. Now I'm taking semantics 2 on discourse representation theory. So here's my advice: if you're going to study alone, pick the right book (can't go wrong with Bonevac's or H&K's). And no matter what, try to find people to work with or teach to. There's no better way to learn something than to teach it. As for my writing sample, I wrote about moral non-naturalism and Hume's arguments that reason is the "slave of the passions." (My view: Hume's arguments miss their mark.) This was really a stroke of luck, since it allowed me to show off what I know best: ethics, action, metaphysics, and mind. It started as a paper for a class that went 3x over the word limit, and it ended up getting me into my dream schools. I can't say that there was an easy trick I used, though. That paper was the product of years of serious study, not a one-off project. The best I can do is: write what you know. But the knowing is the hard part.

Thanks for the flattering words, Vineyard! Here's what gave me the edge up on other applicants—or at least this is my best guess: (i) I got serious about philosophy early on as an undergrad; (ii) I spent hours and hours talking to people around the department during my free time—walking into people's offices, introducing myself, and asking about their work; (iii) I go to talks and conferences; (iv) I took grad classes; (v) I spent time studying what I knew the least about (viz., logic, semantics, and history); (vi) I'm fairly good at both analytic and creative thinking. So part of it's just dumb luck: I'm just a friendly person who talks to everyone. That helped me to learn a lot about the discipline—and a lot about the grad school application process—well in advance. The rest of the story is that I was a reasonably bright student who got help from some wonderful professors. (My school is PGR ranked around 20, so there are plenty of excellent faculty around.) Hope that helps. If you have any more questions, or just want to network (since we're both going into philosophy!), just let me know!

I spent all day checking my phone/email waiting to hear from Harvard. Crickets. Then I get a "Welcome to Harvard" email way late at night. Moral of this story: just because you didn't get the first call, that doesn't mean you won't get in. Stay (cautiously) hopeful!

I was admitted to Michigan; at least one of the posts was real, and more acceptances are coming.

I should add: the former chair I talked to didn't have an enormous sample, so take what I said with a grain of salt.

I've talked to a former department chair of a top 20 program about this. He found that high GREs correlated with grad school success and believed that this was the reason. Now, if you didn't do as well as you'd have liked on the GRE, but are pretty sure that you're able to motivate yourself to study, then you can rest easy knowing that your score doesn't really reflect your strength as a student. But suppose you didn't do well on the GRE, and you didn't even study for it. That's maybe a sign that academia isn't for you—at least not until you improve your study habits! If you neither studied for nor aced the GRE, you may want to read some psychology articles and try out some productivity techniques. (Example: make a vow that you'll write a paragraph a day, or else you'll donate $50 to an organization you loathe.)

A pattern I've noticed: the people who think the GRE is a good indicator of success seem to be exactly those people who did well on the GRE. FWIW, I can at least say that a high GRE score can improve you chances of getting extra money after you've gotten in, since the grad schools themselves do care a lot about stats, and they're the ones with their hands on the faucets.

My institution was barely in the top 20 PGR, but not even in the top 50 US News.

Fun fact: I only got into my undergrad school, ranked around 20, off the waitlist. Now I'm choosing between Yale, Michigan, and MIT. It's not all about where you get your degree from.

Happy to respond! I'll say as much as I can without losing anonymity. My department is ranked around 20—so not even in the top 15. My letter writers did a fantastic job, from what I've heard, but not because they're rock stars. They're well-respected full professors who knew my work and had good things to say. I took a grad seminar with one, and we met about twice a week to discuss my term paper. One I took a class with last semester; my final paper for this class got full marks and ending up as my writing sample. (I later spent 6-8 hours a day for a week beefing it up.) And my third letter writer and I have been doing independent projects together for over a year. So I'm not at an elite school, but because I'm pretty outgoing, I've become close friends with some excellent professors and gotten tons of support. (That said, I did go to a super-super-elite private school from grades 6-12. So at least some of my success is just due to that privilege.) My GREs were strong: 170V 168Q 4.0AW. My recommenders said good things about my writing, and my sample was fairly polished, so I don't think I was hurt at all by the weak AW score. I also am working on a second major in a related field (in which I've taken two grad seminars). That's all the relevant stuff I can think of off the top of my head. I'd be happy to answer any other questions. (And congrats to everyone who's getting good news! Hope you get off the waitlist, zizeksucks!)

UM has a new director of admissions.

Congrats, DHD!!!!

My Michigan admit was real, and I can confirm that first round picks aren't done yet. (Which I didn't know when I posted to TGC!) So far I'm 4/4: Yale, UNC, Michigan, and MIT, but I'll likely be declining my UNC offer tomorrow so that someone else will get to visit.

So many good vibes in this thread. Thanks for the congratulations, and to everyone who's still waiting to hear back from their dream school: hang in there!

Got into MIT. Hell yes.

People have made it to the top with degrees from lower-ranked schools—take John Hawthorne and Ted Sider, for instance. But they're not the norm. They rise through the ranks by writing extremely influential stuff. Unless you're one of the top two or three philosophers of your generation, you're not going to have much of a shot at a top school unless you go to one, but even then there's no guarantee. In general, you're going to end up teaching somewhere ranked way lower than the school where you get your PhD. You might rise up later, but that's going to depend on your work, not your pedigree.

Out of curiosity, what did you get on the GRE?

I should add that this is the norm for contacting POIs. While it may give you brownie points if you mention them in your personal statement, it's not a good idea to contact them before or during admissions. In fact, most departments discourage you from doing so, since it might give your application an unfair advantage. (This is why you're only supposed to visit after you've gotten in.)

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Awesome thread! Thought I might throw in a few things: (1) Michigan has probably accepted other people besides the ones who posted. One was me (phone call, fellowship offer). Apparently there was a list of people to be called, so there was at least one other acceptance besides my phone acceptance and the email posted here. (2) I was given a sweet deal by UNC Chapel Hill. I intend to make up my mind by April 3 or so (at the *very* latest), so either UNC or UM (or both) will have an extra offer sometime around then—and maybe some money, too. (3) A top 20 program (maybe top 10, maybe not) that's not on the east coast will be deciding whom to admit a week from this Friday. I haven't checked to see if Grad Cafe allows for PMs, but if so, I'd say who in private. (Don't want to be de-anonymized.) Best of luck to everyone who's waiting to hear back, and congrats to those who've gotten in!