portnut2014

Lol didn't mean to sound that whiny, just venting. I know I'll survive, it's just an insanely annoying process that is indeed full of disappointment, for now. Thanks for the input!

I feel the same way It's extremely difficult not knowing whether or not I need to pack up and move in a couple of months. I've told as many people as I could think of who would be affected by me moving that I'm incredibly sorry that grad schools string applicants along on wait lists for a ridiculous amount of time, making it so that they cannot tell their landlords, bosses, volunteer directors, etc. whether or not they'll leave in two months or stick around for another year. I'm also really not looking forward to possibly telling the professors who wrote my letters of recommendations that, "hey, sorry I wasted your time, I didn't get accepted anywhere, and I'll probably bug you again about this next year too!" What an embarrassing conversation that will be. It's also extremely frustrating when I'm struggling for money right now, knowing that I could have an extra thousand dollars or so lying around if I hadn't applied this year. But hopefully we can avoid all of these frustrating things all together and just get accepted to a gosh darn school, right?!?!

Thank you for this update! When I looked at the past years on the results page, and this year, I got really scared that they just wait list everyone who isn't accepted. Oh the agony of waiting...

I got another rejection today. I guess all we can do is sit back and remember we're awesome. *sends hugs through interwebs*

Yes! I'm so glad this thread is happening! I had to listen to a classmate stress about which school to pick today, meanwhile I'm wondering if I get to go to grad school this year. Jealousy is ugly so I'll stop now, but yes, I'm excited we can make each other feel not so alone

Ahh thank you for the help! Yea, all the schools I applied to are out of state. My residency is actually Indiana, even though my profile says Maine. All the schools in Indiana are more competitive (IU, Purdue, etc) than what is realistic for me because my own stats are just barely competitive that I didn't even try for them lol. I didn't apply to LSUHSC either but still wondered hopefully I won't have to go through this anxiety again next year

I'm learning so many things about the application process AFTER I applied to schools this year, which is making me cringe every five minutes, but anyway, when you say it was a long shot because you are an out of state resident--does that mean schools often always accept in state students? I was told it was the opposite, like schools may want more out of state students. I'm so confused about everything , please don't think I'm stupid I'm really not! Lol

I hate that you're in this situation, but know you're not alone! I only applied to five schools. I got rejected from my top choice (UW), then waitlisted to my second choice (PSU). Now one of the other schools I applied to is sending out acceptances and I haven't received one, leading me to believe I didn't get into that one, either. It's really a bummer that after this month, it's possible that an entire year of my life will be wasted probably moseying around until I can try applying again next year since SLPAs are uncommon in my area. Ughughgughsiggsdngos

Many of the students in my program had to take a physics or chemistry class this past year because they took geology, and the geology class ended up not counting as the science requirement for ASHA. Thankfully, my school offered a physics class called "Physics of Music" that was basically like an easier version of the acoustics class that I'm assuming all CSD students had to take. Maybe see if your school or local community college offers a class like that over the summer!

I need your positivity through this process! The jar of Nutella I ate after being rejected to my top choice would agree with me also.

Woot woot!

Waitlisted here, too. After a rejection, it honestly felt really good. I don't think I would have responded as positively to it if it were my first response from any of my schools But yea, I'm really hoping that doesn't mean that they waitlist everyone who is not initially accepted. I think at some point, I'd rather be rejected than told I'm waitlisted if my waitlist rank is unrealistic.

Oh that's good, most likely being rejected next week will give me a little time to recover from being rejected from my top choice last night. So calling and checking with the committee or the department chair is a thing? I kept wondering the last few months if that was something very taboo or if it was okay to ask when their decisions would be made. Thanks everyone for the input!

I saw on the results page that two people have heard back from Portland State University (both accepted). Has anyone else heard from PSU? Since I haven't, my anxiety is of course telling me I'm rejected, and honestly, I'm not sure if I can take ANOTHER rejection from a grad school this week. Thanks to anyone who can offer some help!

Reading this thread is so scary because I'm already have a huge chunk of debt because of my bachelors degree :(

I'm not in grad school (yet--as long as I'm accepted this year *fingers crossed*) but I can tell you that the people I've met that are in grad school right now don't hate their lives. I'm the kind of person that feels stagnant and full of negativity when I'm not enjoying what I'm spending my time doing, so honestly, I asked tons of people a variant of "do you hate your life right now?" And the answer is always no. Yes, it's very tough but when you're challenged by a field you're passionate for, it doesn't feel quite as bad. Also, I think everyone is guilty of over exaggerating the difficulty of situations to people who are below us (like grad students to undergrad students) Even now, when I hear students a year below me talk about classes I had to take last year or the year before, my classmates and I have the natural instinct to say "just wait until *insert name of higher level course*!" I'm not trying to say that everyone is over exaggerating by saying it's hard. I just think that everyone deals with the difficulty of situations differently, so you won't really know how hard it is until you get there.

Aw thank you!!

So, I am in the agitated pool of applicants who will not hear back from any of my graduate schools that I applied to until mid March and have a question regarding how applicants are selected for admission. Today, I heard one of my professors say that my undergraduate program has a "really solid reputation for producing well prepared students." Is that something that admissions officers look at, or was that simply an opinion? Also, is there a place to look online for that sort of thing (a program's reputation)? I'm really curious now and would love to know how undergrad programs rank!

I know exactly what you mean! From people outside the speech pathology field, I often get comments like "oh, I know someone who got into grad school with a 2.1 gpa for history" or "they'll probably just accept you anyway to get your money" NOPE THATS NOT HOW IT WORKS! Now that it's March 4th and none of my schools have yet to reply to students, my anxiety level is immeasurable. Every time I check my email for anything (not even grad school related emails) I feel like throwing up all over the computer until the site loads. Fun. This part's fun.

I feel like this has to be the case. If not, barely competitive people like myself who are always too scared to comment on these forums because of my average stats would probably never get into graduate school. Congratulations to all of those who have already received acceptances! None of my schools have sent out letters yet and the wait is making me check these forums/results pages obsessively

I have no idea who to ask this question to, so I figured I'd try posting it here and getting someone's input I'm applying for speech-language pathology graduate programs for Fall 2014 and all my applications have been sent in already. Today, a professor informed me of some research I could do over the summer to gain some experience. Since I've already sent in all my applications to my desired schools, is it worth informing the schools about this opportunity since research looks good on applications or should I just let it go and hope everything else within my app gets me accepted somewhere? If I do contact them, how should I go about doing this? I feel like emailing the head of the departments about my new research experience could seem pretentious . Thanks for any feedback that can be offered!

This thread is really nice to see. I've been trying to find people that are similar to me (don't have 4.0 GPAs, 155+ GRE scores or tons of impressive research experience). I'm applying to Eastern Michigan University, Illinois State University, Saint Xavier University, Portland State and University of Washington. I tried to pick places that seemed less competitive. PSU and UW are probably completely out of the question, but I figured I'd at least *try* My overall GPA is 3.52 which seems like a really forgettable number. In my eyes, it's impressive. I know that I've worked my butt off through college, but my advisors aren't as encouraging. I keep being told that it's not very competitive and that I really need to have a backup plan. Waiting to hear back from schools has caused me so much anxiety! It's so stressful not knowing whether or not I'm going to be moving in seven months! But this thread has definitely made me feel a little bit better tonight knowing that the applicant pool isn't only full of people with 4.0 GPAs, wonderfully high GRE scores and an insane amount of lab or research experience.