Bschaefer

I won't lie, @phyanth. The funding situation is bad, and half of us commenting this year are back from not getting in last year. Shit happens. The stats are unpleasant. My best advice, don't think about it and try as hard as you can to get in. That's all you can do. If you don't get in, it might have nothing to do with you. Just don't lose hope and don't stop trying. We only lose when we give up.

Haha yeah, I just submitted my first application today and naturally I am ‘patiently’ waiting a response 

For sure - good luck @Archaeodan!
Final letter writer just submitted - all applications are complete! Now the real worry begins.... 

I'm one hour away from my 2nd deadline of today and I'm looking up pictures of how old Avril Lavigne has gotten. 

All December applications submitted! And I got my Brown fee waived because I'm with AmeriCorps! That was a really nice present. Thanks for recognizing how sad my pay is, Brown

For me, it solidified my interest in earning the PhD after the MA. Overall, the MA program allowed me to manage a stable isotope lab and conduct research in biogeochemistry (A field I never thought I would be working in) in Mesoamerica, the Andes, and in Medieval Europe; Hone and refine my research interests and questions through writing a thesis on Human Sacrifice; and gave me time to develop my own professional persona within Anthro from networking at conferences and in the field to learning how to conduct myself in academic settings more properly. Additionally, through my collaborative research through my lab and other experiences, I have been able to present research at various conferences and have my name on quite a few publications. This is an added bonus expecially at the MA level since it is seen as atypical. Of course, my experiences are idiosyncratic, but it is about how you make it your own during the program. 

I will send you a PM!

Wooo! Back for round 2! Kinda feel like not getting in last year was for the best. Did a lot with this year, have a much better statement written, and I'm actually slightly excited to get back into the saddle of this grad school application madness. Applying to 4 this year (maybe more), all with December 1st deadlines, and I'm moving for a new job on Nov 23rd. I'm running on caffeine and luck and I'm pumped.

@Bschaefer that is all wonderfully useful,  I will definitely keep that in mind when prepping! Also, thank you for letting me know about multiple professors, I hadn’t even thought about that. 
And bingo! 

Totally anecdotal, but I have a friend who is doing African Historical Archaeology at William and Mary and they love the program so far!

@phyanth that’s great news! I’ve had poi’s respond within a few hours to a week or so due to them being busy/in the field.
for the phone call/Skype interview - treat this as an interview for the program even if it is only with 1 poi. Last year I had a Skype “chat” with 1 poi that turned into a group interview with every archaeologists and bioanth on faculty (to my surprise), other Skype chats were with just my poi. Basically, just be on your game and be yourself regardless of who/how many people may be there. But congrats!-that’s awesome and shows their interest in working with you! 

@Bschaefer Oh man, that's great to know! I'll definitely treat it like an interview, but didn't even think that there might be more than one person. What sort of stuff did POIs ask you? I'm not sure what to expect. 
On an unrelated sidenote, I think you know a girl I went to school with, you and her were in the same grad program! (not to be creepy or anything, haha)

@museum_geek, that is good to know! I wasn't sure what the policies were. I actually received some more responses today, so that's encouraging! Also, one of the professors wants to skype with me to talk more about my project, so I figure that has to be a good sign right?! I'm about to pass out over here, haha. I get really nervous talking with people I've never met. Especially in this kind of situation.

I wouldn't worry too much about not hearing back from professors - it's a busy time of year, plus some have policies of not speaking with potential students until after they've had a chance to read applications (something I didn't find out until after I applied).  Last year, only about half of the POIs I contacted responded to me, and of those that did only about half were meaningful responses beyond "Interesting project, I encourage you to apply, good luck, etc."  As for timeframe, four business days is certainly reasonable, but I did have some faculty respond to me weeks after my initial email, explaining that they were on leave or in the field.  The important thing here is that you've heard back from your top three choices - way to go!

San Antonio. Graduate school has an early deadline for the scholarships. Luckily I've written a proposal over the summer so I had most o the content for my letter, but I've heard they only have a handful of scholarships for everybody that applied for this deadline. Without it whatever you get from the department only covers your tuition. I'm kinda letting go of the naive hope that I've had so far  

Hey @timetobegin
it looks like you want to go the bioarchaeology route so it can get a little complicated on how to situate this. I’m a bioarch myself. 
I would be very specific in how you structure your research interests given the interdisciplinary of the research. For your example, I would say something along the lines of “I’m interested in studying the effects of vitamin deficiencies, such as B12, D, and etc.., among infants in rural Chinese communities during the X time period to understand the transitional health through political whatever” or something to that effect. That gives it depth and it shows that you thought about the topic beyond then “disease are cool”. 
You should check out my colleague Christina Lee who does bioarch work in Mongolia and all over Asia/Egypt. She’s at Cal State in LA and I think they have an MA program? - I’m not sure about PhD

If you don't mind, let me just direct you to this other post on this subject I wrote: 
 
This idea seems quite specific to anthropology (my field of comparison includes sociology, linguistics, and many humanities: other disciplines I can't say)—that your SOP should be a mini dissertation proposal. I think this idea is a) pernicious and b ) incorrect. I suspect it's fed mostly by the fact that the best/only anthropology sample SOPs available on the internet are the ones from Duke, which shared only essays from applicants with master's degrees. Those essays are really good! It's great that Duke made them available! But that they're only from applicants with master's seems to distort how other applicants picture what they should be aiming for. Your interests as listed above are somewhat too broad, yes; you'll want to make them more specific for your SOP, as I'm sure you know. 'Miniature dissertation proposal' is, however, not the correct standard. (It's not even the correct standard for the NSF GRFP research statement, which asks for a longer and more detailed attempt at defining your research project than do regular applications; there are a lot of winners who acknowledge uncertainty about their projects, even while they propose a compelling, narrow-ish set of questions to investigate.)

That's a pretty good list of schools you're applying to, but I'd advise you to drop Johns Hopkins - their PhD program focuses solely on sociocultural anthropology.  You also might want to check out Stony Brook and Penn State, which are both known for having strong physical and biological anthropology programs.

Hi everyone! I'm reapplying this year too. I have a [kinda final] draft of my SoP if anyone is willing to edit -- and I'll of course edit anyone's as well! I'm feeling really positive about this year. Good luck to all of us  

My MA is in applied anthro. What do you want to know?

@Islamahmed I am applying to PhD only. I just got my MA in Applied Anthropology, so there's no reason for me to apply to do an MA again. On the Comm side, I'm not necessarily opposed to entering at the MA level, but might as well try for the PhD.
@EvelynD Doing better than me! Writing is pretty much on the wall that I'm much more likely to get into a Comm program given my interests. x] Regarding the submittal of your thesis, I would reach out to friends to see if they'd be willing to edit a chapter or section for grammar. Does the content suck because of the findings, the quality of the methods, or something else? Some of these can probably be corrected for before submitting it with your app. 
Still need to edit my SoP, but I have an article due today (not academic/journal, just for work) so I'm procrastinating...
 

Wow that was not correct English —“was. Emy. Lose” translates to “was very close” in extremely tired graduate student lingo haha
 
sidenote: do people still use the word lingo?—asking for a friend...

I think I heard my grandma say it once..;)
Just kidding, I don't know, I'm not even a native speaker.

Wow that was not correct English —“was. Emy. Lose” translates to “was very close” in extremely tired graduate student lingo haha
 
sidenote: do people still use the word lingo?—asking for a friend...

@Bschaefer I have no doubt you'll get in this cycle, especially after how close you came last year with only a couple apps sent out!