ColorlessGreen

*Cough* I still have one more application to go too *cough*. The deadline's March 1st, it's my alma mater, and it's almost done. With my statement of purpose and one LOR, it would be complete, but I just can't seem to do it. I already paid the application fee, so I really ought to just send off the rest of my materials and get it done with.

You saw that on the SPIRE webapp page, right? I haven't heard anything either way yet. It still just says "applied." They don't seem to have sent me an e-mail, either, so I guess there will be a few more rounds of decisions to come. I'm sorry to find that you were one of the people on the results page who didn't get in; it's depressing when it's one of our own. I hope things go much better for you with McGill!

Don't know about other Big 10 schools, but Iowa's got a tuition surcharge this year for sure, and probably next as well. Mostly that's because they're still rebuilding from the last flood, though.

Yikes, I'm sorry. I really didn't mean to offend you - I may have come off as more inflammatory than I meant to. I definitely didn't mean to imply that middle-class white people shouldn't have opinions. Heck, I am a middle-class white person with strong opinions! And I absolutely agree with you that socioeconomic status should be taken into consideration in admissions, job recruitment, etc. I just think that there are other things as well that should have some influence on the process. Pamphilia, red_crayons, spozik - thank you for your posts. You've all made some really good points about the nature of privilege and diversity. There's a lot to think about in this thread.

I think we can all agree that minorities should be better represented in higher education, yes? Can anyone really argue that this is a bad thing? I doubt it. So in fact it seems as thought there are two main arguments being brought against AA - 1) the worthy poor white boy and 2) a perception of AA as discrimination in and of itself. 1) is an interesting anecdote that often seems to be brought up primarily by the middle or upper classes: "What if it came down to a privileged black woman and a poor white boy?" Now, this could theoretically become more of a problem in hiring,when only one person can fill the position in question, but I find it to be an extremely odd thing to bring up in admissions, when usually at least 10 students are being admitted. Everyone I've talked to about AA assumes that the privileged black woman would be taking the spot away from the poor white boy. What about the 8 privileged white men and women who would presumably be admitted as well? Why should the choice be to let in all 8 of them, but just one of the "less desirable" candidates? An admissions committee could reject one of the other candidates instead, but we assume that those other 8 are fully qualified and that the two in question are simply not. Admitting them is seen as a magnanimous concession - a gift, rather than something that is earned. I think that this is proof that there is racism in this country, and sexism, and discrimination against people of lower socioeconomic status. These are precisely the things that AA, when implemented properly, should be attempting to remedy. The reason we need AA, the reason that individual conscientiousness is insufficient to change these prejudices, is that those of us who are privileged, white, male, or anything else especially favored do not realize that we have privilege. Our prejudices are ingrained and unexamined. That is what leads people to believe myth 2), that AA creates discrimination where there was none before. AA is intended to correct discrimination - it says that, all else being equal, a minority should be favored over a white candidate in order to correct a bias already at work. It is true that sometimes all else is not equal. Sometimes the white candidate may have marginally better scores, or grades, or SOPs, or LORs, and yet is still rejected because of something beyond their control. But that is true of any decision. Life isn't fair. It's not fair that my dad is comfortably employed at a job he enjoys when my friend's dad works at Walmart, despite having once been a successful accountant, due to a language barrier he can't break through. Life isn't fair. But AA isn't intended to contribute to that unfairness - it's meant to level the playing field in some small part. It won't make everything totally equal, but it might remove a large rock barring my neighbor's way. And I think that's a good thing.

Thank you for the mention! (And you're right, by the way, that I'm female.) I absolutely agree with everything in this thread - The GradCafe has been a joy to be a part of during these crazy months. It's full of so many supportive and genuinely helpful people. I'd like to say thanks to fuzzylogician in particular, who makes me proud to be a fellow linguist; to rising_star, who is a bastion of common sense and clear good thinking; and to jacib, for keeping even the most heated discussions friendly. Folks, you are all fantastic.

Welcome to the forum, and congratulations on your acceptance! So, what's your linguistic specialty?

Hooray! Congratulations!

One of my schools has a history of doing phone interviews the first week of February, and one has a history of accepting top applicants the second week. I will have a constant churning in my stomach until then.

Y'all must have seriously intellectual cohorts. I know only one guy who's applying to grad school this year, and he doesn't do Facebook. Admittedly, two of my friends might do some kind of advanced degree in the future, but neither is interested in anything even remotely related to what I'm doing (one's an accountant, one wants to teach Japanese). There's no question of my hurting anyone's feelings if I post to Facebook (which I probably will, whether I get in or not, for each school I applied to).

I didn't get to use fuzzylogician's idea after all. The sneaky inquirer asked "What language are you specializing in?" instead. I told him that I wasn't specializing in any language and then began a short lecture on the subfields of linguistic study. Scared him off right quick.

This EXACT SAME THING happened to me with the ApplyYourself system. I think the second account was created when I clicked on the Update Profile button at the top of the screen and changed my contact preferences - maybe that happened to you, too? Luckily, I found out well before the deadline, and got it fixed by asking my recommender to re-submit her LOR. I think this kind of problem is far from unheard of - I got a very polite form letter back from the IT support team when I was frantically trying to figure out what was wrong. Hopefully everything will work out fine in your case as well.

Love this. I am going to use this the next time someone asks me this question. Will report back on results.

Don't let your friends acquire too much linguistic knowledge, or they may become dangerous - one of my friends now introduces me to people by telling them that I can do a bilabial trill. Which, although true, is not necessarily the best way to impress folks.

I think this thread has gotten a bit off-topic, and I'm sorry to have contributed to that. We started out trying to help the OP determine their options, considering their scores and interests, but now the conversation has turned to a very general discussion of whether or not applicants should have good grades. There are other threads that would be suited to that conversation, but on this one, it's more or less irrelevant to the OP's concerns. We should probably let this discussion end, unless the OP comes back at some point to elaborate.

Seems to me that, although law school and med school may be more of a numbers game, most other fields are a lot less willing to impose strict cut-offs. I don't know what your field is, but mine and most other social sciences I know of go quite a bit out of their way to assure applicants that a low GPA or GRE will not sink their chances at grad school. The OP never did get around to saying what it was s/he was hoping to study, but if it was a research program then I think that the low GPA will not hurt as much as it might in a vocational program. As to "top-ranked schools" and "better job opportunities".... well, I can't speak for the rest of the forum, but I'm definitely not in it for the money. If I were, I'd be in for a heck of a lot of disappointment.

I'm ashamed to say I used to write like this in high school. It took me years to train myself to be concise - I used to imagine Hemingway was my editor, and then I would cut out the most baroque passages. Maybe the author of the page linked could try the same technique?

Well, it was winter break, after all. I'm sure she had a lot to do. The fact that she's gotten back to you expressing interest now suggests that she thinks you'd be a good fit, so I'd say you should take advantage of her offer to talk to you! Contact a few grad students saying that she suggested you speak to them, too - word might get back to her, and she'll be pleased to know you're willing to take advice. Plus, grad students, or ex-students, can be a really good source of advice, especially on mundane things like housing and transport. You shouldn't take this contact as a sign that you're sure to get in, but I think it sounds like a step in the right direction. At least it tells you that the school and the department care about prospective students - that you're more than just a $70 application fee.

I applied last year for Intermediate Arabic study in Jordan - didn't get it. I think my application failed because Arabic was so popular that year, and because, more importantly, I didn't intend to use my language skills in any long-term, career-related way - my interest was more scholarly. Neither of these problems should hamper you, since you're not studying Arabic and you intend to go into something related to International Security. Best of luck to you on your application!

Now there's a new one to add, thanks to Avatar: "Like the guy who created Na'vi?" Apparently we're going to actually do something with Na'vi in one of my linguistics classes this semester, though, so at least I'll be able to indulge these fans by discussing alien phonology. I just know this is going to end by someone becoming convinced I'm a Xenolinguist in the tradition of Lt. Uhura...

This author appears to be confused about how the GRE scores. There are a few different definitions of "percentile" floating around, but ETS clearly defines scoring in the X percentile as scoring above X percent of the test-takers. On a different note, although his advice may very well be helpful to applicants to English programs, I find this author rather snooty and judgmental.

I don't know whether to be amused or saddened by the second response.

I'd forgotten about this thread. Time to revive it, I think! Personally, I've given up on explaining linguistics to most people. Seems to me most of them don't really want to know - they'd rather go off on a tangent about their own or their children's language-learning experiences than actually learn what it is I'm studying. Sad, but true. In my rich fantasy world, I imagine explaining the field of linguistics and my own interests in painstakingly sharp detail - in Japanese.

"Oh, you're a linguist? My son/daughter/cousin/nephew/niece is studying Japanese/French/German/Swahili/Dutch! You know, you can make better money in the army than as a TESL teacher." "I always wished I had studied Spanish in school..." And the moderately more well-informed - "Like the guy who created Klingon?"

You must realize, though, that not everyone can be in the upper percentiles, due to the very nature of the GRE. That doesn't mean they're not qualified for grad school, it just means that there are people out there who have done better on a test that is, as you mentioned, quite generic, and ultimately unrelated to success in one's own field.