justinmcummings

Have you looked away from the school and tried seeing where you might like to live more? And yes it could be worse...I think I would have taken rejection at this point rather than admittance with funding to be determined :-/ only because I don't have 200k laying around

So much regret this, also I think I should have replaced the nearly unattainable schools with more realistic choices

its better than not having one at all

after you apply you need to email the program director and tell them that you have external funding, if your stats are good they should accept you almost right away. I went to a conference with some of the top graduate recruiters and they said that I after I apply I get a company or fellowship or whatever source of money after I have applied to contact the program and let it be known...they want your money.

I wouldn't worry about your GPA too much, it sounds like you trended upwards and that's good. However, having said that, you must find a way to get a min of 3 letters of recommendation. For my program at least, an application was considered incomplete if you did not have at least 3. Incomplete meaning they would not even look at it. I think some ways you can make it easier for the LOR writers is to send along your resume, paragraph about your goals and interests in school and after you graduate with xyz degree, and if they are not familiar with you possibly some unofficial transcripts? What year/semester are you apply for? If it's not till Fall of 2015 you have a decent amount of time to keep asking and figuring out how to get those LORs. Best of luck to you!

great point, ~20k in Washington would be difficult to live comfortably on

PS i don't think you realize how jealous I am about U Washington

My money would be on University of Washington, its in an amazing town, it has the prestige, I've seen employers state Umich, Uwashington in job postings in before. Uwisc sounds great! I have been accepted to the PhD program there also just the communications/signals program. They are rubbing me the wrong way so far though...wasn't invited to a visit day...no contact from a professor...and still no word on funding...and all since being accepted in January. I visited Ames Iowa last year for TBP honor society conference. The campus is beautiful, the engineering building was less than impressive but I wasn't allowed to see inside any of the labs. The town is extremely small and from the locals its a bar / football type of town. Personally if you are getting those kind of offers for just a masters, you might want to consider doing your masters at a well known school where you will get even more exposure and I'm betting you can get offers for PhD from the top programs in the nation if/when you reapply for PhD. Just my opinion

In regards to #2, it depends if you are declaring yourself as a dependent or independent. Typically you will get more financial aid as an independent because you won't have as much of an income.

So I just received an email back from MSU, they are waiting for faculty members to offer RA positions. I guess they cannot officially admit a student without guaranteed funding. More hoping and waiting in my future!

I can't speak to that program specifically, but I had some low GRE scores and was accepted to 2 programs without interviews. For some engineering disciplines interviews aren't needed. I can also say that Northwestern is taking their time with admissions. I emailed yesterday and they say that acceptances can come all the way up till the April 15th deadline (for my department, I'd assume all engineering is similar?)...I'm hoping for that school also. I say keep positive, I feel as long as your not instantly rejected you still have a chance! I'm keeping hopeful about my 5 other schools and funding. Good luck!

Trying to bring this dead post back to life, now that some time has past. Has anyone been offered funding for UWisc for EE PhD??

I'd be interested in hearing some advice also, when I applied my advisers told me that I would 100% be funded for my PhD...but I came from a small school and I think my advisers were out of the loop. I have been accepted to a PhD program with funding still to be determined. The department said only about 10% of incoming PhD's are funded. I was also accepted to a MS program unfunded (I applied PhD but got offered MS). Should I be begging people in the department to hire me or should I spend more time applying for places like Best Buy and live off that and loans?

Emailed Northwestern yesterday and the responded today with: "Applications for Fall 2014 PhD applicants are still being reviewed and decisions being made, and will continue through the end of this month. Some final decisions may be made as late as our April 15 deadline" Side Note/Mini Rant: If all the schools are going to require us to accepted by April 15th, they need to inform us with enough time to be able to tour the schools to make the most informed decision.

I just saw a ucla acceptance come through the results search

My parents keep hinting at the fact that by the time I get out I will be almost 30 and still have not started life in the real world...let alone have a serious relationship. I guess its impossible to date in graduate school? Funny they would know this because neither of them went to college :/

I'm a firm believe that no news is better than instant rejection, I think at this point it wouldn't hurt to send a friendly non-pestering email.

I figure I should post these in here and not just in the results page: Cornell: I emailed the department for my application status and my response was ... A decision on your application has not be made yet, you will be emailed when one is. There is no current time frame for when this will happen. U of Washington: Emailed today to find out my status my response was...It would be best to consider your other offers at this point in time as we will not be able to admit more students unless others decline enrollment. Official rejection letters will be emailed mid April.

Some of my favorites are: "Engineers don't get high degrees..." "So you wanna teach then, cause that's all you can do with a PhD" "Have you seen how cold it is at XYZ University" --- probably because I'm from California "Why don't you just invent something and get rich instead?"

This is my first time applying also, but I think that it is generally acceptable to start inquiring starting this week if not next week. For most of my programs I have to accept or decline admission by April 15th, So I have started emailing all the programs I haven't heard from. On a side note I went to NAU also, I graduated with a BS in Electrical Engineering last December!!