Argon

People are logging on here https://ndseg.asee.org/award and it shows them. Your application page should also update I've been told.

Thanks! Yeah, looks like that may be it for me too... ah well...

My girlfriend was able to login to the award site and it said she won. I guess it's real! Not April Fools

Facebook page also just says later today.

Chiming with a "nope, can't log in" from me as well. Although, I think my chances of winning NDSEG are not the highest. We're approaching the end of the work day on the east coast. If we don't hear back soon I guess that means tomorrow it is!

In case anyone's curious, last year they notified applicants via email at 4:13 PM on Wednesday, April 1st. Make of that what you will.

Yes, that's indeed true. You can take a look at the past winners on the NDSEG website to see which branch supports each fellow. Keep in mind the the DoD branches are not just looking at military applications. They care a lot about fundamental science as well. If you go on each of the DoD lab webpages, you'll likely find that to be the case.

They send out an email with the decision. Also, in prior years there have been applicants that have been waitlisted in addition to the standard acceptance/rejection.

It seems to be about a 7% acceptance rate, although the website says approximately 10%. If you look at this PDF from 2013, the author says about 200 awards for 3000 applicants. NDSEG on Facebook said today that there were over 3000 applicants this year. Contrastingly, NSF typically gives out 2000 awards. I don't know what the number of applicants was this year, but it was 14000 in 2014 for an acceptance rate of just over 14%. These numbers are just ballparks. Generally though, NSF has a slightly higher acceptance rate overall. Both are of course very competitive. That all being said, the two fellowships favor different types of applicants. For instance, GPA, GRE, and publications/presentations have significantly more weight in NDSEG than for NSF.

Yeah, it would be really annoying to wait that long. The NDSEG representative was super nice though and said that if for some reason we don't hear back this week that we would be updated about the timeframe.

I just called and was told that we'd be hearing back later this week! Combining that with the "first week in April" message from the Facebook page would suggest an April 1st release date, which is the same as last year. Good luck!

Hello applicants for the 2017 NSF GRFP! You get to read our collective freak-outs that are recorded on the interwebs for your viewing pleasure. Enjoy! (Also, last year the emails were sent out just a few minutes after the end of the maintenance period).

For the record, the UChicago IME stipend is probably so high because the program is only a few years old and they are trying to attract strong students. Money can sometimes do that (as evidenced by you asking the question). Just food for thought.

Just for the record, the ones I posted were from 2016.

I don't think I could provide any better advice than information you'd gain by visiting, but the the current Top 20 based on US News and World Report are shown below. Also, it's worth checking out http://phds.org/rankings/chemical-engineering as another ranking option, although realize that the individual department statistics are about 6 years outdated. 1) MIT 2) UC Berkeley 3) Caltech 4) Stanford 5) Minnesota - Twin Cities 6) UT Austin 6) UW - Madison 8) Princeton 9) Georgia Tech 9) UCSB 9) Delaware 12) UIUC 12) Michigan - Ann Arbor 14) Carnegie Mellon 14) Purdue 16) Cornell 16) Northwestern 16) Colorado - Boulder 16) UPenn 20) Johns Hopkins

The information on phds.org is probably not something to believe at face-value, in my opinion. Firstly, the data is quite old. It's from 2010. That's 6 years ago. A lot can change in the span of 6 years at a university. However, the data itself is legitimate (even if it's out-dated now) and is collected directly from the institution by a non-profit organization. Equally important, while some statistics on phds.org are very insightful, some are less informative. You said you're interested in the placement statistics. However, phds.org doesn't tell you how many people got what they wanted. For instance, in the link you sent, 65% of the people in the program went in R&D. However, did only 65% of the people want to go into R&D? If so, that's a 100% success rate. The success rate is not present on phds.org though. So I don't think those kinds of outcome statistics are very relevant. This is especially true because it varies much more on a lab-by-lab basis than a university basis. As others have suggested, you should check out the "People" or "Alumni" page of group websites. Sometimes you will see where they ended up. If a page doesn't have this (or even if it does), it is worth speaking with the professors you're interested in working with and inquiring about where their students are placed. That is likely your best bet.

Sorta! I'll be there on 2/27! I visited last year so I really only need to chat with a few professors. Hope to meet some of you there.

With regards to UW-Madison: No, not yet. I'm getting kind of impatient

For those admitted to UW-Madison, did anyone get financial information yet?

From my understanding, everybody accepted to Northwestern's PhD program in Chemical Engineering gets the university fellowship offer. I got it last year when I applied and again this year. It seems like a pretty standard part of the application package (unlike fellowships offered at some other institutions).

Just head from Minnesota via phone! Seems like they're starting to send out some offer letters.

My best guess is that there are some more Stanford admits to come. Look at previous years. There is always more than 1-2 admit on Gradcafe. I wouldn't worry about that yet. Many congratulations to the person that was admitted. I'm sure it was much deserved!

Hey @akcc2319. Don't worry too much about it right now. It's still super early on in the admissions cycle, and they have a lot more admits to send out. I re-applied this year, but when I applied last year, I was certain I didn't get because a full wave of applicants got in, and the first visiting weekend was fast approaching. But lo and behold, I (very fortunately) ended up getting in. So, it's not over until it's over. Best of luck!

Thank you! Yeah, process controls and optimization seems huge at Wisconsin! It is pretty impressive, although I don't think that'd really be my cup of tea. I'm most interested in molecular-scale modeling (e.g., MD simulations, ab initio methods, kinetic modeling) for pretty much any physical (eg., reaction kinetics, transport properties, thermo, material properties, almost anything not bio) related applications. I'm looking at some of the computational catalysis work at Wisconsin; I think computational catalysis may be an ideal research focus for me. As for UC Berkeley, their chemistry department has a ton of computational work I'd be interested in that is on the border between ChemE and chemistry. And I had a great visit at UIUC last year and there were some professors I could see myself working with, so I am very happy with the options I have so far and look forward to hearing back from the rest. Since I've already been through this process once, I have a pretty clear idea of what I'm looking for, so I'm feeling confident that this year will be better. I hope your first semester has gone well and that you're enjoying your new grad school life and school! What area of research are you working on/most interested in?

Thanks for posting! As for me, I'm hesitant to get into too much detail on a public forum just out of principle. But I will say I was part of the MIT CSE program (PhD version of CDO you applied to), and I was accepted joint with the Nuclear department. The "CSE" part is very minimal, and for a number of reasons I'm looking to bring my computational skills back to ChemE. No idea where I'm headed yet, but I feel incredibly fortunate to have such options. I'm pretty excited! Hindsight is 20/20!