Eigen

I'll chime in for PI's personality and fit with your working style to be more important than the project. In general, you have a chance to branch your research out post-PhD from where you started, so the exact project doesn't matter as much. Especially in the sciences, you're pretty much expected to branch away from your doctoral research to "distance yourself" from your advisor and show that you're an independent researcher. Accordingly, finding a project that you can learn a lot from, with a PI you fit with and can learn a lot from is hugely important. For the lab sciences, I'd also weigh how well you get along with the lab group highly as well- while you need to be able to work with your PI, you'll be working closely with, and ideally learning a lot from the senior graduate students and post-docs in the lab. If you can't get along with them, they're bitter, etc. then you will have a really hard time fitting into the group even if you like the PI. Also, as mentioned, there's nothing wrong with not getting along with a PI. You're not saying they're bad or wrong, just that you don't work well with them, or the personalities not mesh. I have some PI's that I really like, that I'd say I'm friends with, but our work styles do not mesh at all. I have friends in their research groups who fit with them very well, and probably would have a hard time working with my boss, who I love.

I'm not really sure what this has to do with an 18 month old thread, that really doesn't address the discussion at hand. That said, PIs (not to be conflated with academic advisors, which are a different thing altogether) are not counselors. They're not "advisors". They're CEO's of a small company, of which the students are employees, with according seniority. Most departments also have people with some training as advisors- either academic advisors, which may or may not be faculty, or the departments graduate coordinator/graduate advisor. That said, while it sucks, having a range of people who you can and can't work with isn't any different in any other segment of the workforce. Some managers/bosses/PIs/supervisors are antisocial/sociopathic, but you still have to learn how to either learn to deal with them, or learn how to avoid them. At least, unlike most of the workforce, as a graduate student you get to *choose* your advisor. And you can *choose* to drop them and find another one. Sadly, many graduate students make bad choices about who to work for, and continue to work for them far longer than is productive.

I'm trying to think of a good reason not to mark this as spam.... And having a hard time.

So you're stating absolute facts about people you don't know based on your vast years of experience (23) and aren't open to, you know, discussing things on a discussion board? Then why are you posting in a thread you have no interest in discussing? Seems like you just want to judge people based on your limited world view, and then defend it to the end without listening to anything anyone else has to say. Also, based on your posts, you do seem to need a lecture on relationships. Especially since you seem to want to "lecture" other people on their relationships. Turnabout is fair play, no?

I will mention that HR Block will tell you the wrong thing. They don't seem to differentiate undergraduate scholarships and graduate fellowships/assistant ships. The IRS has a whole publication devoted to them, however.

For the US, both stipend pay and scholarship lay are taxed at the same rate as any other income. There are lots of previous threads on this, I'd suggest searching.

"Ivies" are widely varied. Princeton, Harvard and Yale are good schools, although only one makes top10 in my field. The rest of the Ivies really aren't top notch research institues. Good, but not top.

It doesn't actually say 7 years from undergrad to post-doc. It says 7 years from starting your graduate degree to post-doc, and that's actually not too atypical. It's to keep newly graduated students from competing with PhD's moving from industry, etc. for post-doctoral positions.

The thing that I think would be the most important is getting your letter writers (ideally, new advisor and committee) to comment on your long MA time, and address factors outside of your control (personal issues, advising issues, change of advisor, etc.). I'm, granted, not in your field, but I don't think my department's admission committee would be too put off by a long MA, given extenuating personal circumstances. I think they'd be more interested in the breadth of the scholarship during that period. It's not like you spent 4 years, and then had a very weak and unpublishable thesis.

Honestly, what's the aversion to getting a PhD? The pay's not great, but it's not horrible. You'll learn a ton, you have freedom for research that you may or may not have that 5 years moving up the ladder the slow way, and the flexibility of grad school can be a huge benefit. Choose your school well, choose your advisor well, and take it as a great 5-6 years instead of a bad 5-6 years.

Biochemistry, but I didn't apply to an Ivy, I didn't really have any interest in going to one.

An apology never hurts. And while morally, I believe that you should only apologize if you actually think you were in the wrong.... Practically, I also support apologizing if someone else felt you were, and it doesn't hurt you to do so. If nothing else, you can consider it validating their feelings, and phrase your apology carefully, in accordance. You're apologizing for the fact that they were upset/put off by your actions, not because you believe they should have been.

I don't think it's the research that's lacking, I think it's the attitude. You may have great research, but you have several major deficiencies in your application that you don't seem to want to put effort into resolving, and that makes it seem like you don't have the right attitude for graduate school (i.e., doing what you need to do even when you don't want to). I went to a small regional state school with only two faculty in my field of research. You know what? I branched out, and made strong relationships with faculty in other research areas. And had multiple strong letters because of it. Having only two letters is a pretty bad sign to most committees. Not taking the GRE (on principle) is a bit strange, but OK, the school you want doesn't require it, so I'm not sure why you brought it up. Low GPA is bad. A 3.2 major GPA is bad. A 3.2 general GPA with a higher major GPA would be workable, but still bad. I would strongly suggest a MA to try to get a better GPA, and get other people who will write you letters. And unless the book is a research-based manuscript within your field, it probably won't matter that much. But as has been said, if you have close ties to world class scholars, they are who you should be asking, not us. They're the ones that can get you into graduate programs.

That's why I advised her to go back to the people who's feathers were apparently rustled and smooth things over. To explain to them that jumping over them wasn't intentional, and she wasn't slighting their knowledge/ability/etc, but that she was just worried about the lack of supervision at the site and felt she had a short time to remedy the situation. It's amazing how much even a rather weak apology and explanation can do to smooth things over, and worry/stress/anxiety is always a good back for such an apology, in my experience. Being as the OP hasn't posted or logged into the site since the first night, I'm assuming they're gone and the discussion here is more general for others to use as a reference in the future.

The one thing I'd say that stands out to me is punctuation/capitalization errors. I know people get used to writing improperly, but it makes the essay look much worse. You also have some structural issues (i.e., "foul playing") and I would say your points of support are amorphous (History has witnessed) without more detailed attributions. I think your arguments in general could be less general, more specific, and accordingly, stronger- but I would say the most important thing is correct structure (not using apostrophe's for contractions, incorrect tense, not capitalizing the first words in sentences) as those are easy to fix and also make the writing look a lot worse than it would otherwise be considered. I would say, by and large, for the issue prompt it's much easier to argue for or against rather than to take the midline approach- I think a for or against essay can be a lot stronger, whereas midline (in this case) comes out a bit hit-or-miss.

I still don't see how waiting more than one day (say, give it a week) or taking a "benefit of the doubt" approach in dealing with graduate staff differs in a two year program vs a 4 year vs a 6-8 year program. Sure, you might lose a little bit of time at a good practical site. But if the tradeoff is earning yourself a bad name with the very people with whom it's beneficial to network (and it's beneficial to network with everyone), then you're probably losing more than you're gaining. Taking a proactive approach can help, but alienating the people that you need to work with and learn from will not. And judging by the OP, that seems to have been the result of her self-advocacy. None of us can tell if it was when, what, or how they were proactive, but I'm just cautioning some patience and caution to future students who might find themselves in a similar situation. Also, I wouldn't assume that just because I'm in a PhD program, I'm only familiar with PhD programs. I've sat on our Universities committee on graduate and professional programs for several years (certification, evaluation) and I've also been in the position of coordinating and advocating for all of the graduate and professional programs (including MSW) to the administration for the last few years. It's not my primary area of expertise, but I do understand the importance of field placements, as well as the difference between terminal professional masters programs and full length PhD programs, or non-terminal masters programs.

You do tend to judge a lot. I have friends who are happily dating 19/20 year old girls, so I wouldn't say there's anything off about it. Some have even stayed together for quite some time.

The last few posters have said it more elegantly than my original late night posting, but that was the point I was trying to get across. Advocating for yourself is great, but you need to be careful exactly how you go about it. Additionally, things at every school are highly disorganized the first week, let alone the first day, of the semester. I wouldn't recommend asking to get out of something assigned to you before your first day, or even after one day, of almost anything. It's possible that the placement was due a social worker that might have come in the next week. Many staff at graduate programs are quite sensitive, especially towards an attitude of "I'm paying XX tuition, therefore you owe me" with respect to anything. Tread carefully with that logic, or it's quite possible to get burned.

If they list that you can submit supplemental materials, then that's fine. In general, anything that's truly pertinent should be highlighted both in your personal statement and letters of experience. A CV or listing of prior experience will also show quite a bit.

From the materials they ask for in your application.

I would strongly encourage not submitting material past what the application requests. If those experiences are particularly important, they should be worked into your personal statement/CV. At best, it probably won't help. At worst, it will frustrate the administrators and faculty looking over your application, and make it seem like you can't follow directions or be succinct.

Early applications are great. Back when I applied in the dark ages of many years ago, almost every school did rolling admissions. It was kinda the best of both worlds- you could prioritize your schools, and all my applications were in by mid-September, with decisions back mid-September to early October. I did my school visits over winter break, and had plenty of time to decide. As for early decision, no. The schools I had ranked 1, 2 and 3 based on websites, publications, etc. Turned out to be 3, 2 and 1 respectively post-visit.

You could use Endnote, with the Endnote app.

I'm really not sure what most of that has to do with the topic at hand. I'm sorry your field site didn't work out, but you obviously did upset someone to get a response like that. You felt railroaded, but it's a week into classes. Patience is something that can help a lot in situations like these. As for not caring that you put the field coordinator off, well, you asked for advice on salvaging the year, and that was my best suggestion. Also, heavy sarcasm and annoyance does not generally, in my mind, translate to incredibly rude. Perhaps you're used to something different in interactions than they are? Generally, I would personally be very skeptical of paying a lot of money to a school who's educational quality I didn't trust, especially in a field that is not known for high salaries on graduation. If you do not trust the faculty at your school in the first week, you have two options. One would be to give them the benefit of the doubt, and the other would be to withdraw, wait until next application cycle, and apply to schools you feel you would trust more.

Ok, so you're paying a lot of money for a non world class education? I still can't see why you would question it's validity on the first day, without really giving it a chance, the benefit of the doubt, or asking, politely, your advisor how you can get the most out of your field placement. Now you've put yourself in the position of already having spent a lot of money, and at the same time put off the people who you are working with/learning from, or at least some of them. Standing up for yourself is good. Standing up for yourself when you can achieve similar results without being demanding, or coming across as a consumer instead of a student is not as good. Personally, I would try to smooth things over with the people who's feathers you've rustled by implying that you know better how to structure your education than they do. Explain you're just worried, and didn't feel comfortable at the placement without a social worker to learn from.