LiteratureMajor

Though I can reasonably understand universities' plights to profit from application season (usually 50 USD from, perhaps, 200+ applicants per grad program?), I find it very offensive that many grad programs are not at all forthcoming about their admittance criteria. At most of the programs I have pursued, the departments are quite close-mouthed about cutoff GPA and GRE scores. "We review applicants holistically," they've often said. Yet committees apparently only "holistically" view the applicants that have not gotten the ax for falling below the GPA and GRE cutoffs. As a fair, hardworking adult genuinely committed to my field of study, I am insulted that I may have fallen prey to the holistic-line and could have saved myself valuable time, effort and money by first determining for myself if I met the basic GPA and GRE requirements. This is not to say that I am not a serious student and that my credentials are poor. I am an honors student and will be soon earning a second Masters degree (am therefore pursuing a PhD, as has been my goal even as a high school student), but my GRE scores are average (which I can be grateful for, being that I was ill with the flu and sleep-deprived from being so sick--of course, adcoms will never know this). I don't mean to rant, but this is terribly frustrating. I simply don't appreciate game-playing when my academic and professional future is at stake....

Thank you. I also agree with this logic and hope that it applies to this particular university. I do have some reservations about contacting the department in the event that this is a non-issue in their eyes and prompts them to be a bit annoyed that I am following up to confirm receipt. And of course on the other hand if I don't follow up to be sure my materials reached the proper recepients, I would be plagued with not having contacted someone quickly enough. How should I go about finding a happy medium? Oh, and to clarify, these are the supplemental materials that are in limbo. The actual application and transcripts were previously submitted.

Thank you for your response. I will certainly take your advice and contact the department tomorrow. Because I had initially begun preparing for application season several months ago, it truly upsets me that something like this has happened. The school did not post any special instructions, just a list of deadlines. There was a mix-up with ETS regarding my GRE scores, which then caused me to hold my application materials until the problem could be resolved (as per the university's request that all applicants submit their supplemental materials in ONE packet).

Would someone please offer insight to how this situation will be handled by this university's graduate office? The application deadline was for January 1. I sent my application materials via UPS on 12/30 for Next Day Air delivery on 12/31. Upon tracking the delivery status I found a note from UPS stating that the "receiver is on a holiday and delivery will be attempted when the receiver returns." I am sick to my stomach with worry. Why didn't the university set the deadline for the last open-campus day instead of a time when the entire school was bound to be closed? Is my application null and void because UPS could not deliver due to the university being closed? I've never been faced with this situation before and am very concerned at this point.