MathCat

Keep your GPA up, form good relationships with your professors, and try to get research experience. But also realize that you may very well change your goals between now and graduating. Only one person I know is graduating with the degree that they had planned on when they first started. All the rest changed majors around 2nd or 3rd year as they were exposed to new things. I'm not saying you will definitely change your mind, but keep an open mind to the possibility.

Thank you! I am definitely keeping an open mind about other fields of study. I have taken coursework in political science, philosophy, and mathematics in the fall. During the spring I will be doing more coursework in political science and biological sciences. I am trying to make sure I give as many fields as possible a chance, and with my institution's flexible liberal arts curriculum that is possible. I appreciate your feedback. 

I would think your background motivates your decision to do that research at that school, and thus should be included. It is (at least for me), exactly the 'why' they ask for in this prompt. I would have submitted the same SOP for both prompts, with some edits to reflect my reasons for each program.

I did this too. I like it better than a gift card, because it lasts longer and it also doesn't have an immediately obvious dollar value on it.

The day I submitted my last application I dreamt that I had dreamt that I finished the processes and actually hadn't started the application process at all and repeated all the stressful steps during the dream. What an exhausting nightmare 

Well... it is still the holidays. He may not be in contact with anyone.

It started to feel real for me when I checked my bank account balance after submitting 10 applications

For both, I would wonder: 1) Will they still be there next year, and the year after that? Both positions are of a temporary nature so I don't know that you can count on it. Postdocs in the humanities, in particular, tend to be quite short. Lecturer positions can be more permanent, but can also be to replace someone on sabbatical or temporary leave. 2) Can they advise students? Often lecturers and postdocs are not allowed to supervise students, at least not alone. Even if you could make it work technically, you'd be asking them to invest their time in something that they might not be paid to do. Not everyone is that generous with their time, and it would put you quite low on the priorities list: the extra thing they signed on to do after they are done with their formal obligations.
 
I would worry about only listing temporary POIs as faculty of interest. If there is no one else with a good fit, this school might not be for you. What would you do two years from now if you had a write a thesis, and one or both of them are gone and/or can't advise you? The chances of that happening are not insignificant. 

Not to be brutal, but I would put forward the idea that if he cannot deal with you choosing what is best for you and does not encourage you to pursue the course you love, but instead pressures you towards a different course, he is not your soul mate.

Thanks for the replies! MathCat's story is interesting and something I wondered about. I did get an admit before all my LORs were in for one school, so more proof that they're "going to do what they want" I guess.
 
Another obvious reason NOT to procrastinate like me is that any technical difficulties will presumably get you a lot less sympathy if brought up in a panic at the last minute.

I have never asked for a "strong" letter of recommendation. Ever. I ask if people are willing/interested in writing a letter for X, Y, or Z, and leave it at that. My assumption has always been that if the letter won't be favorable, they'd tell me. But, I also wouldn't ask someone that wouldn't write a favorable one. At this point, jujubea, I wouldn't ask the recommender anything at all unless it's to make sure the letters were submitted. Don't ask about the content. Don't fish around to try to ascertain the content. Just let it go. They're in and there's literally nothing you can do about the letter right now. 

Well I would stay away from having multiple excuses. In my opinion, having a few different reasons all together makes it start to sounds like you are making excuses.
 
If I were in that position, I think I would focus on the major reason: that you worked full time. You downplay this but actually a huge deal and most students work 10-20 hours a week AT MOST. Since you also say that you have an upward trend in grades, then I would work that into your reason as well. So I would say that you worked full time and had a hard time juggling everything at first but improved at this with time, as can be seen with the upward trend in grades.
 
I would not linger over all of this stuff though. If asked then I would give your reason, point out that you improved at this with time, and then move onto talking about accomplishments. This school is ovbiously interested in you or else they would not be interviewing. They are probably worried though that you will not be able to maintain the min gpa for the program (usually 3.0) so you will have to make sure they leave their intereview with you thinking that you have overcome whatever caused the bad grades and that it wont be a problem again.

Part of bring an adult in a job is that occasionally you have to do stuff you would rather not, at times you consider inconvenient but are without your contracted hours.
Unless your career plan is to become a hobo under a bridge.
Starting work at 8.30am for one quiet tutorial near the end of term is not a violation of your basic human rights. 
If you don't have a genuine excuse then there is no way you'll get out of this without sounding whiney, lazy and unprofessional. 
Just bring your laptop, spend an hour doing work/playing games then go back to bed if you wish once it's done. 

When I first read OP's post, I thought he was complaining about something unimportant, but reading his replies, I see what he's saying.
 
The application fee is supposed to be the fee for having the application reviewed. So if he pays the fee, but doesn't have his application reviewed, what is he paying for? He's essentially just paying for having his online application sent to the UWM servers, and never looked at. It's like paying a professional editor to look at your manuscript, and never receiving anything in return. I agree that's not fair. I think UWM is within their rights to not review an application if slots fill up from domestic students, but if they don't actually look at an application, those students should get a refund. Of course, UWM probably would never do that, but I think that would be fair.

Each has its pros and cons! I've had some wonderful roommates and yes, it was very nice to always have someone to talk to, watch tv together, etc. Mostly, it was great to have someone I could count on if I needed help, assurance, or a hug. BUT - it's really hard to find roommates with whom you mesh that well. Unless you sort of already know someone you could live with (maybe other first years, maybe a friend who lives in the new town), it would be difficult to find someone that you believe would be a great fit. If you do choose to go this route, please be careful with craigslist - I've had some wonderful roommates, but I also had some... less than great experiences.
 
I should add, though, that even living with amazing roommates has its limitations. I missed having me-time (I think I need more me time than most people). Silly things slightly annoyed me - like every inch of space in the fridge being occupied, or waking up early because they were up earlier than me (not their fault at all - they were fairly quiet, but the apartment was small and I'm a light sleeper). 
 
So when I moved to a PhD program I decided to live on my own. I told myself - if it gets too expensive, or if I get too lonely, I can always change my mind and get a roommate next year.
 
I LOVE living on my own. I spend so much time on campus, in the office, hanging out with my cohort, that when I get home I don't feel lonely at all. What I feel is extremely grateful to have my own little place, where I can do all the things I want to do, and feel completely at home. I do have a cat - which is also great, and I'm sure contributes immensely to this general sense of happiness. 
 
My main piece of advice is: you can change your mind. Whatever you choose, after that 6 month or 1 year contract is done, you are free to change things up.

Thanks for all the advice guys! 
 
I have submitted this application, removing that paragraph from my SOP and not mentioning it at all. I've used the "Additional materials" section to mention it and I've removed all the blaming language, AND the bit about integrity and Dr. Nice Guy etc. Hopefully I've done it in a way that doesn't come off as blaming anyone for anything. 

I do not think you should put this in your SOP at all, and you should definitely not badger one of your other letter writers to mention it in their LOR. I think pushing it any further with your new letter writer will damage that relationship too! This is an issue between you and your former advisor; don't drag your new letter writer into it. 
 
Instead, almost every school will have a final page on the application form that asks "Anything else you would like to include" or something like that, with a big blank text box. I would simply write one sentence in this space, something like:
 
"My MA thesis supervisor, <<Dr. Supervisor>>, retired from <<Crappy Bad School>>, while I was writing my MA thesis and is unfortunately unavailable to write a letter of reference for my application."
 
Definitely do not convey any negative thoughts at all about your MA school no matter how much you want to. It's too bad that your MA supervisor isn't around to write your letter, and that is all you need to say. Anything additional negative thing you try to convey will just reflect more badly on you than on the MA school. 
 
Also, there may be very good reasons why the professor is not willing to spend any more time writing your LOR. Although I agree that writing LORs is one important part of being a professor, they might have very personal reasons to retire abruptly and cut off all ties with their old job! Your very long statement in your first post seems to imply that your supervisor has no integrity and that is a very serious accusation which you do not back up in that statement. Perhaps it is true that your supervisor has no integrity and perhaps you can back this up in a much longer statement, but your application is not the right place to make a case against your supervisor's integrity, whether it is well founded or not.
 
Instead, you just need to focus on the single aspect that is relevant to your application, which is the fact that your supervisor is now retired and you cannot get a LOR from them. Without that single sentence, it would be a "red flag" to <<Dr. Nice Guy>> because it would look like your supervisor refused to write you a letter, instead of the just being unavailable.

Do the schools you are applying to allow for another place to include this information? If so, put it there. If not, I think it is highly relevant to how your application will be viewed, so unless one of your other letter writers could explain it for you, I don't see what choice you have. Can your new supervisor explain the situation in his letter?
 
Only one program I applied to had any second essay - if I needed to include such information, the SOP or a LOR would be the only places that I could. If you must include it in your SOP, I would probably shorten it, and definitely soften the language as museum_geek suggested. If it's just a few sentences, it will have less of a derailing effect on your narrative.

This isn't too bad, especially since the SOP is for a POI you've spoken with a few times and who presumably has some background information on this whole situation.  There are a couple things that I would change to make it seem less "shit-talky" while still imparting how badly you got screwed over.
 
"My thesis supervisor retired as I was in the final stages of writing, leaving mid-term and refusing to stay on the committees of any of his graduate students."  
I would change this to: "My thesis supervisor retired as I was in the final stages of writing, leaving mid-term and declining to stay on the committees of any of his graduate students."
 
"I reached out to my former supervisor many times, hoping to secure a more insightful letter, but all of my attempts at communication went unanswered."
I might go with: "Multiple attempts to reach out and secure a more insightful letter from my former supervisor were unsuccessful."  
 
Just my two cents.  I think you can soften the verbiage a bit and still leave the impression that this guy sucks and you got screwed, without coming right out and saying it.  I really like how your last couple sentences turn this shitty situation into a positive for the future, though.  If anything I think that part will really shine through.  Good luck!

Pro tip: do not look at app materials after you have submitted them, ever.

This past May I was submitting some requests for information to a couple departments, and I pasted my generic inquiry paragraph into the form then submitted it without changing the name of the last school I had sent it to. 
 
The graduate program admin responded back with a link to the other program's website, and nothing else.  Oops

I would say it only felt like something that is really going to happen when I got an early acceptance. Now I'm actually thinking about moving across the country (or potentially to another country!), rather than putting it off as something to think about if they accept me. It's kind of scary, but also exciting.

I was just wondering if it were possible to put your consciousness is another brain what would happen ? Like If a person with a brain disorder put their mind in someone else's brain that didnt have a brain disorder would that person also not have a brain disorder ?

^^Sounds like you are the one with the attitude, I already stated they were my opinions so its funny you are being so defensive, just because I said "you" doesn't mean I'm telling others what they don't need. I am not worried about what others do with their time that is their choice, I am not forcing my beliefs on anyone but I know there are others in grad school who have the same thinking as me. It is just my belief that people who are more willing to make sacrifices will ultimately be more successful, this doesn't just apply to grad school or a PhD program so why does it matter whether I am currently in school or not? You are just upset that others don't share your opinions.

Hi there,
 
I am in your shoes too, but I moved in 2012. The short answer is that yes, you can bring all of that stuff without worrying about being taxed because of NAFTA. There is a lot of fine print but generally the items that belong to you for more than 1 year and are for your own personal use only (i.e. not importing products to resell in USA) are okay under NAFTA. You technically do have to declare them all on the itemized list but they will rarely check unless you are bringing something major down.
 
For example, when we moved in 2012, we had a U-Haul pod full of stuff. We had to submit an itemized list--we probably went a bit more detailed than necessary (better safe than sorry was our thinking, especially since we were not traveling with the pod). So we had a 13 page itemized list, with things like "203 books" and "21 forks" etc. You can be pretty general (i.e. no need to list all the DVD titles, just the number of DVDs -- and we probalby could have said "102 pieces of kitchen utensils" instead of breaking it down into forks/spoons/knives).
 
We moved almost everything we owned this way. But like you, we came back and brought random other pieces of things we owned later on. For example, just last month, we went home and my spouse's mom gave us her own sewing machine. We took it down to the States without any problem -- we did declare it at the US Customs though (although we almost forgot, they had to ask us what was in our checked baggage). But we didn't write it down on a form or anything, just verbally said it. In 2013, I also brought my guitar down in this way -- just verbal declaration at Customs when they ask "anything to declare?"
 
No, we do not get more than $800 max exemption. So, if you are bringing back stuff from the States that will remain in Canada, then you need to make sure the total amount is less than $800 in value. However, again NAFTA is important because it allows for certain things to not count towards this $800 limit. For example, some items made in Canada, United States or Mexico do not count. If you are bringing into something that you purchased in the USA but will take back with you to the USA (e.g. a laptop you bought down here and just want to bring so that you can use it in Canada), it does not count since you are not leaving it there. It sounds like you have already done this, but definitely look carefully at the Canadian Border Agency website for official information -- I'm not qualified in any way
 
So, if you are just going back to visit Canada, the only thing you really have to worry about exceeding the limit are gifts for your Canadian friends/family. Remember that the limit is 60 CAD per item and the total limit is 800 CAD. Last month, we bought back about $300 worth of gifts (no item exceeding $60 though) and that was fine. If you are worried about bringing new Canadian items back to the US, the limit is about the same, I believe (your old Canadian items are covered by NAFTA as mentioned above).
 
Eventually, if you do move back to Canada for good, you don't have to worry about the $800 max exemption because, again, under NAFTA, you can move all your personal belongings across the border without having to pay taxes.
 
Hope that is helpful