APGradApplicant

This is another thread that I thought would make sense to start. I know that very few of us have made a firm, 100% decision to accept an offer. However, I imagine that a few of our members here have. If you have chosen to do so, then by all means, post it here. It might be helpful to let us know what you've decided to study, what kind of funding you'll be getting, whether you'll be a TA/RA/not sure, etc. However, let's try to limit the postings to just announcing acceptance of an offer. That way we can use this thread to track where everyone we've gotten to know on the boards ultimately decided to go in an easy, reference-book type way rather than having to navigate our way through a bunch of clutter to figure it out. Thus, I won't be posting on this board myself for quite awhile. Just wanted to get it up and running!

With initial decisions now winding down, I thought it would make sense to start this thread so that people can share their thoughts about where they're planning to visit. I've decided to accept travel offers to four of the programs to which I was admitted. My schedule for the next month is as follows: UC-Davis WashU FSU UT-Austin So yeah, in addition to racking up a fair share of frequent flyer miles, I'm hoping that I'll get the chance to meet some professors in person, get an overall "feel" for these departments as well as the cities in which they are located, and most importantly, get a chance to talk to some grad students who haven't been selected by professors to "sell" the programs but instead will be willing to speak honestly and frankly "off the cuff" about their experiences. I think that all of this, particularly the latter, are valuable things to figure out and can only be done to their fullest with an in-person visit. I'd be interested to know where other folks here are visiting as well as how people have narrowed their choices. Post away!

Just finished sending out e-mails to withdraw my acceptances at the places listed in my signature. I hate that part of the process, as I had some very good conversations with people at those places. In the end, however, I knew it was more important to be fair to anxious borderline/wait list applicants than to be "nice". Good to get that done. Now on to the visits!

Me three!

Shoot me an e-mail with your e-mail address and I'd be happy to talk about it. I know that the moment I say anything positive about Marco Rubio or Tom Coburn people here are going to get into a frenzy, so I'd rather talk to you about it off-site.

Professor Christina Wolbrecht, Director of Graduate Studies.

Add to me to the Minnesota rejects Can't say it isn't disappointing, but at the same time I have very little standing to complain. I have some great options in front of me currently. I plan to visit UC-Davis, Rice, UT-Austin and WashU. In addition, I'm on the wait list at a great program with University of Rochester. Right now, I'm probably leaning towards WashU, but of course getting off the wait list at Roch would no doubt be a game-changer. We shall see, but at this point in time I feel very lucky to have the choices that I do . Finally, a sincere congratulations to those who were accepted today! I can't say how relieved I am that this part of the process, for better or worse, is finally finished.

Anybody wanting to claim UMN wait list? Haha, nevermind, blankets' post went up same time as mine. Congrats on that!

Sounds like we line up pretty similarly!

And the wait on UMN continues...sometime today let's hope it ends!

I think Minnesota is a definite for tomorrow. JHU will, I imagine, be some time early this week, but obviously I don't have any knowledge whether it's tomorrow or not...Good luck to everyone who has applied to those schools and any others that have yet to notify!

No problem. Glad to be of help and yes, let's definitely hope for good news for all of us on Monday! I don't want to stray from the admissions results topic, but hopefully I'll see you Wednesday evening/Thursday morning at UC-Davis?

Is it very typical for students enrolled in a terminal MA program to receive funding?

Unclear at this point about JHU. My understanding with Minnesota is that only a few individual applicants, all of whom were accepted, were notified for various reasons, either because they were offered a special fellowship or currenty attend the university as an undergraduate and thus have friendly relationships with professors on the admissions committee. These notifications were all either earlier this week or before. The two posted for yesterday remain unclaimed and appear to me to be likely trolls just trying to mess with UMN applicants' heads. If you scroll back through posts from the last few days, it seems that UMN faculty/staff, along with some at other universities, are aware of the way that any decision (good or bad) has a very good chance of being posted on GradCafe and thus my theory is that, similar to UCSD and UT-Austin, UMN is going to send all of its decisions out on Monday, whether people are accepted, rejected or wait listed. We shall see, but I'm pretty sure that will be the case, as we know that everyone will be notified by Monday.

No worries, I'm a guy.

Right. Haha, all I'll say is I guess three's a crowd

That's me. Check page 129 for details.

Awesome! This can serve as a lesson for all of us (but ESPECIALLY me!) that patience is a big key to this game...

Minnesota acceptance- anybody?- going once, twice...

Congrats! As I said above, I'm was an undergrad poli sci major there and graduated in 2008, so feel free to shoot me a PM if you have any questions I might be able to help with.

Nope. Just individual it appears.

Also, does anybody want to claim the UMN acceptance listed in the results database? Please don't let yesterday's incident make you think that you're going to get it rescinded or something if you claim it on GradCafe. It would just be helpful to those of us who applied to know whether the admits have already been sent out and if we thus shouldn't have to worry this weekend... If you are nervous about posting it publicly, however, then feel free to PM me. I'd just be interested to know whether it was a mass e-mail or individual and what your subfield is. Thanks!

Just received a wait list notification from them approximately 10 minutes ago. From the DGS: I'm writing to let you know that you are currently on the (very short) waiting list for the PhD program in the Department of Political Science at the University of Notre Dame. We regret that we are unable to make you an admissions offer right now. We received more than 200 applications this year, and our applicant pool is extremely competitive. Our policy is to only admit Ph.D. students with funding (full tuition and a $17,000 annual stipend for at least five years), and budget constraints have limited the number of admissions we can make this year. We will let you know as soon as possible whether or not we can offer you a place in our program this year. Would you please let me know by return e-mail whether you are still interested in graduate study at Notre Dame? We very much hope you are still interested, but if you are not it would help us to know soon so that we can consider other candidates if a place in our program becomes available. Thank you for your interest in our graduate program. I look forward to hearing from you. End of e-mail, now shifting into my commentary: I am likely going to e-mail them on Monday letting them know I do not wish to remain on the wait list. However, I don't want to make any decisions like that until I consult with my undergraduate adviser on Monday, after Minnesota sends me a decision. Thus, for those of you also on the wait list, this should be good news.

Thank you, Jud M, for accepting my apology. I think I speak for most people on this board when I say that I have no doubt that it's not easy on your side of the process either, and that's something I'll definitely be more mindful of in the future. Also, thank you to Shere Kahn and itsgonnabeme for your kind words. I've enjoyed hearing your insights/progress during this ordeal as well, and I hope that all of us who've been on here for a good while will be able to check in every now and then once we're toughing it out as students somewhere next year

Haha! Good idea!