newms

erratic driving

prehistoric fossil

As someone who is about to have this experience tomorrow, I love this answer:)

ground beef

You could ask if they have a ranked wait-list and how highly your husband's application is on the wait-list. You could also ask how many people typically get accepted off the wait-list. Those answers might give you an idea of how likely it is that he'll get accepted eventually. There are some people who get acceptances who will go elsewhere, so it is entirely possible that people will get accepted off the wait-list. So while it's disheartening, you shouldn't give up hope just yet. Best of luck!

It's generally best to wait until you have all the information you're going to get, since you have until April 15 to accept. If it were me I'd wait until I heard from the other two schools if there was even the smallest chance that I could change my mind - you don't want to accept and then later change your mind. It's also advisable to visit the school first to get a feel of whether you'd be happy at the school and at the city in which it's located. That said, if you're 100% certain about your decision and feel like you won't change your mind even if you got in at your other 2 schools with good funding, then by all means go for it.

It's on the bottom right on the front page where it says 'Online at Once Record'. Now it says 703, where it was in the 680s before if I remember correctly.

fatal attraction

Technically it's not too late, since you can back out of a commitment before April 15. However, you do run the risk of burning bridges, especially if it's a small field. I would ask again about funding at school A, and let them know that you need funding in order to attend. In the mean time, you can hold school B's offer in your back pocket until April 15 or until school A lets you know if and how much they're funding you.

Oh yeah. It may be a way of telling us 'It's time to step away from the computer'

Hey, I just noticed that the record number of online users was broken just a while ago. Congratulations are in order, I guess!

carnivorous plants

I agree that the GRE shouldn't be weighted that much, and at many schools it's not. I say that however, with a caveat, because many schools and programs have cutoffs for what they expect a student's score to be. Once you score above that then they look at the more important parts of your application, like your letters and your statement(s). I've read where schools sometimes look at your GRE scores in determining fellowship awards, but I'm not 100% sure of that. Keep in mind also, that there are a very few programs that don't look at the GRE at all, like MIT in Computer Science.

A POI emailed me for a skype interview tomorrow. Fingers crossed.

Apparently UCLA sent out a lot of results last week. See the results board: http://thegradcafe.com/survey/index.php?q=computer+ucla There have only been 2 results (1 admit and 1 reject) posted for Penn state so far.

I agree it's not usually a good idea to email a POI at this time. You could however, contact the admissions people at the department and ask if all decisions have been made yet.

Yep. They can still break your heart on V Day

electric chair

I know for machine learning, you have Andrew Barto - he's the head of department I believe, but I think he's close to retirement. Sridhar Mahadevan is pretty well regarded and they also have Andrew McCallum and Hanna Wallach, who are well regarded up and coming researchers in the field.

ergonomic mouse

I'm applying to PhD programs and a few Canadian Master's programs. I've been out of undergrad for a few years now, so I'm not a straight out of undergrad applicant.

weak prior

Glad to help. I've been helped so much by the good advice here, so I'm happy to help others too.