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Don't worry, I understand where you're coming from. I attended Penn on a full ride pretty much due to coming from a low-income background, being first-generational, etc. And, of course, who can't fight the allure of HAAHHVAAAD? I do think for PhD programs it's more important to pick the right fit (all other things being equal), but it may be more important for you Masters (which is 1-2 years) to pick also the best program and something with a name. Having gone to Penn, I can tell you that students do usually get annoyed when people mistake Penn for Penn State, or something else. Some people, especially the ones that matter, do know about Penn, and especially Wharton (the business school, since it's tied for #1 with Harvard and Stanford). So Harvard may have better name recognition for you, and especially initially as you talk about your background in interviews. But as you get older and have more experience, there's less school bragging to do. I guess the one thing you might be able to rely on is the alumni networks. Either way, hoping for the best for you and that you get to visit both and talk to the students and get a better sense of the programs.

I had a friend that turned down Harvard for Duke because she felt the program fit better and the atmosphere was more cordial and collaborative, and more inline with her ideal research. I also went to Penn as an undergrad, so I didn't want to apply for graduate school there due to intellectual incest and just wanting to explore other parts. Since Penn and Harvard are already Tier 1 schools (and most likely the same situation for your grad programs), picking Harvard over Penn would simply be a choice someone would make because they have people to please, their own ego to stroke, etc. Because, seriously, at that tier, your success is based on you and not the program. And if you'd only pick Harvard to let your parents brag to their friends about where their kid is, then I don't know what to say to you. I would think that people would have grown up by the time they apply to graduate school, but I guess I could be wrong.

Rockefeller rejection finally came in. Yay. Moving on. So not looking forward to finally getting the other rejections at the end of the game, just to have them open up a wound.

Finally. Got it and happy. Still have MIT BSC anyway. It's really hard to call anything a reach school especially based on looking at people's stats and invites here. But, on the bright side, you get to concentrate on your other schools now!

Make a new topic / search the forum. There are a few topics already. Also http://videocast.nih.gov/summary.asp?Live=9809&bhcp=1 Damn, looks like you got all your interview acceptances. Nice! Grats. And they use snail mail? I'm just waiting from my rejection letter from them. *Yawn*

Of course I appreciate your comments from your experience. I'll re-emphasize my points which I think were missed. 1. I don't know how you get a "are not considered OK" vibe unless explicitly told so. I think this more has to do with people just not wanting to do it anyway. My point was simply if you don't have a pair of suit pants or khakis, etc, don't kill yourself over it. If you can afford it (try a thrift store if your budget is tight), go ahead and get fancier pants and relieve yourself of worries. There is no reason why you can't bring a pair of jeans for the non-interview days. And if that's all you have, and especially it's cold and snowing outside, a nice pair of jeans (according to my Northeast school program admins) will be fine. But, obviously, if you can't wear them well (with a nice pair of shoes and shirt, maybe sweater), or you don't feel comfortable doing so, then don't bother. 2. I'm not against your point but I think you misunderstood mine. As I emphasized in point 1, look clean. So obviously no profanity, stupid t-shirts with tribal tattoos. I'm not here to baby people, but people are asking really ridiculous questions. It's as if they didn't get 4 years of college to at least practice and learn what presentable attire looks like. My point about not being judged for what you wear is at the level of having passed a decent level of attire for an interview. In other words, if you're looking clean and presentable, and someone is looking down on you for not having heels or a full suit, etc., it's not the place you wanna go. I'm not talking about people feeling entitled while wearing ripped jeans, dirty sneakers, and a tank top. It's not very hard to look professional and clean, but clearly people's anxiety over this suggests otherwise. 3. Agreed about the obscenity, which, like point 2, I had implied. Two of my schools (that gave us the itinerary and rooms already) stated that we can leave our things in the department office during interviews since interviews will all be in one spot (not moving outside the building). Even if you are moving, don't worry about which tote or backpack you will bring. And, as you said, you might just get swag to carry it all in anyway. What's the problem here? There isn't one. Just ask. It's next week. If they're reimbursing you or they have a cap on how much they will pay, they will want to get it to you ASAP. They should have given you an idea about whether they expect you to buy it, or if they will coordinate it. Either way, just e-mail them asking about flight info (like if it had gone out or if you're supposed to buy it).

Back on the topic of graduate school interview attire and fashion. I wanted to make a few points to all the fleshy bags of anxiety out there, and to use some more examples for the guys since the girls have been dominating. 1. Wear what makes you feel comfortable and clean. Clean being the operative word here. I was told by two program directors to not worry about wearing hiking/snow boots or jeans (as long as they aren't grungy or have holes in them). This emphasizes my point that as long as you look put together, it doesn't matter if you're wearing jeans. Here's a nice example (minus the glasses) of a somewhat business casual look that's office appropriate with jeans and would be fine at an interview. The basic point here is that you look good. Sneakers or a backwards cap would not look good with that ensemble. So just be mindful of the overall appearance. This goes for girls as well. 2. If you're being judged for what you wear, the program isn't right for you. You're not applying for beauty school. Nobody is interested in your being edgy either. But would you really want to spend the next 5-7 years with grad students and professors that will judge you by your choice of attire? Obviously, this is an extreme case but it should put your anxiety into perspective. Professors and graduate students also don't know where you're coming from. For all they know, you could have been homeless up until college where you received a full ride but didn't have enough money to buy a suit. They are not expecting you to wear a suit. But at the same time, decent people will understand that you are trying to make an effort. This goes back to my first point: looking clean and comfortable will make you look great and will bolster your confidence. 3. Nobody cares what purse or bag you carry with you. Most places will even have a closet or a place to store your bags before interviews since you don't really need pens or paper, or a C.V., etc. I'm bringing my computer to write down notes after interviews and fill out my all-encompassing spreadsheet that I'll use to rank and compare schools, but not during interviews. Either way, if you need to carry stuff, it doesn't matter what it's carried in since you can also just put it on the floor or behind your chair. 4. If you're going somewhere cold, bring the winter gear. Nobody wants to put up with people shivering from the cold walks outside, You have been warned (especially for girls that want tights/leggings/skirts in lieu of pants). You're also only going for about 2-3 days, so you don't need to bring your whole wardrobe. A few versatile accessories being recycled between days is fine. If you're like me and will only be bringing your carry-ons, I'm just going to use my peacoat in lieu of a suit jacket and just wear that on the plane anyway as I don't have extract space in my carry-on luggage. A puffy winter jacket would be fine as well. And, as I alluded to in the first point, hiking/snow boots are completely fine to wear with slacks/khakis etc. As for what I'm packing: Travel clothes: Jeans (Clean/neat), Winter jacket, button down, sneakers (the nice Nice 5.0s that actually go with everything). Interview clothes: Oxfords, Khakis and Banana Republic Chinos. Button down and a cardigan or sweater. Bringing a blazer just in case for dinner night, but not expecting to use it and my winter jacket can suffice. Grad school student party/outing: Depending on the vibe (whether it's at somebody's house or at a bar), either the jeans or Chinos again (and matching shoes). Would probably still wear a button down. Hope that helps!

Depends on two factors. 1. Your department. If you look at most program handbooks, the average amount of vacation time you get a year as a grad student is about 10 days. I'm not sure if sick days run into that. 2. Depending on your PI, you could possibly ask for more time off. Since they're pretty much paying for you at that point, it's up to them. They probably won't say anything as long as you make work up or they're just that understanding of your situation. And it might be even easier if you take unpaid leave, even though that's pretty much impossible in grad school since you're not actually getting paid since you're on a stipend. Hence the makeup work arrangement.

I called once to ask when they would be released (last Friday), I'm not calling again to double check. I'm moving on; I have interviews at 7 great schools to prepare for. Mind you, Stanford was one of my top choices going into the application season, but as I applied that all changed and I'm more interested in seeing the places I am interviewing at then being stuck on the idea of Stanford. There's always chances for postdoc opportunities. The same should be emphasized to anyone that is upset about not getting an invite or waiting for that invite to their "dream" school.

I believe so. As did I. But, then again, I knew each class only had about 5 spots and they'd only interview 10, so I'm not upset, and wishing the best to the people that get accepted.

Every school appears to be different. Some tell you they will give it to you X units of time ahead of the interview. Others specifically and explicitly state you will get it at check-in. Either way, I recommend keeping an excel spreadsheet with the professors you ranked for the interviews (if you had a choice to choose either after being invited, or when you originally applied), and make like a quick summary of what their research specialty is, and maybe an abstract of a recent paper.

Probably reading too much into this. If I remember correctly, they once sent out an e-mail to all applicants of all programs about upcoming deadlines, and their deadline was supposedly in February, then they e-mailed and said that was a typo and was still due in December. So possibly it wasn't a typo, but it was misleading and confusing, so they decided to either extend it, or keep it the original date which wasn't December 1st.

Phds.org It has sub divisions and aggregates data from a bunch of different places, allowing you to filter by what you find most important. It goes, however, have an overall score, and statistics so ranks are placed in context.

THIS. And, as a general reiteration: how you act now while you wait for interviews and your general outlook towards interviews will reflect heavily on your future success. Are you being neurotic, and anxious to the point of toxicity spilling over onto here and in real life? Take a step back and BREATHE. B.R.E.A.T.H.E. A little bit of learning how to deal with this stuff now will give you big divdends in the future. After all, I'm hoping for all of your successes. At the same time, I'd like my future colleagues and peers to be more grounded and to be people I can drink with without constantly having to allude to all the problems going on in their lives or experiments, lol.

Unfortunately not all programs are automated or use mail-merge, so the some poor program admins have to do it manually.

Congratulations!

I mean I have 7 places so far to interview. They're all back to back. I get 2-3 days in between them. And I won't know who I'll be interviewing with until about a week to two days until the interview, or in some cases not until the day of the interview! Therefore, my main task is to simply put down my experiences into vivid, detailed memory; to succinctly explain what I want to research at X school and why; and to know a brief description of my POI's work so that the interview is about me asking more questions and them doing most of the talking.

Haha, what's your study technique? One abstract per PI?

Well in your situation it will look poor because you asked for the alternate, and are now switching not because you originally had a conflict, but because now you do have a conflict with a new school. They might realize this, but they might be okay with changing it up as long as all the spots in that original interview date aren't filled. Either way, trying to change it at this point won't harm you as much as it may make the admins handling the stuff a bit more busy. ----- An update about Stanford Biosciences: I called up to the main office and they said that most departments are finalizing their reviews this week so if you don't get anything this week from your department, it's not unlikely that they will send out invites next week, too.

Congrats! I just looked at my application status and it still says it is incomplete (That they didn't get my official GRE scores, even though I have a receipt from ETS sending it). But apparently reviewers can review apps without that anyway. Oh well, might be a bittersweet but happy thing to get rejected from Stanford since living there would be a stretch on the stipend, lol.

Just a reminder for people to stop spamming and posting in succession. Just edit your previous post and use multiquote. No need to bump up your post count nor add more pages of text for people to read.

I just talked to a program admin for a top NE school and they said that they fully encourage people to wear comfortable clothes for their interview, and to bring warm clothes. As such, while ripped jeans aren't good, they said clean nice jeans or khakis, and a t-shirt, would be absolutely fine. I mean, just think about it. Even most professors and grad students don't dress up in business clothes or even business casual. Wear something clean, neat and comfortable, and you'll be fine.

Well, with the end of the New Year break:

Congratulations! I got my invite more than a week ago, so I guess that's reassuring for people still waiting to hear back from such programs, that even they do invites in waves.