angel_kaye13

THE ACCEPTANCE THREAD HAS OPENED THIS OFFICIALLY MEANS THAT THERE IS HOPE

May I lead with a gif?
 

 
CONGRATULATIONS!!!

This is my life right now. #IheartFriends??? ;-)

There seem to be a lot of threads asking the same thing popping up lately and I figured it might make sense to make an overall guide thread and then those who feel their answers still haven’t been adequately answered can post below for an idea of what their chances are. Here is a brief rundown of factors affecting your likelihood of getting into top-tier and well respected programs. If you fall below par in any one of these factors you can bump it up by being stellar in one of the others. I'll add to this if others point out other things I've left out.

School requirements:
Your first stop should be the school admissions website – this will tell you what prerequisites you need, give you an idea of GRE and GPA requirements and what work experience is expected (if any)

GPA:
From what I’ve seen/read over the years any GPA over 3.4 and you should be competitive. That’s not to say if your GPA is lower than 3.4 you’ll have no chance, but if you have a GPA above 3.4 you should be in good shape.

GRE score:
GRE scores seem to be most important for schools with demanding quantitative programs and for securing the top financial aid. Most schools will state the average GRE scores for their incoming classes on their website – use these to see how competitive you are. By and large you should be competitive if you score over 650 on verbal and quantitative and over 4.0 on the AWA. For the top schools over 700 seems to be closer to the mark.

Work experience:
For most programs it will be expected that you have at least 1-2 years of relevant experience in your field. This can be lowered a little if you have other pseudo-relevant work experience (management in the for-profit sector etc.) but you should have shown some level of professional interest in the area you hope to study at grad school. Applicants coming straight out of undergrad may find it very hard to get into the programs aimed more at junior/mid-career professionals such as Johns Hopkins SAIS and Princeton’s WWS.

Language skills:
For a lot of programs being able to speak a second language is a must, while for others it is just a very good selling point. If you can show experience working in a foreign language this will show adaptability and will endear schools looking to enrol a diverse group of applicants.

Quantitative requirements:
A lot of schools will want you to show experience in micro/macroeconomics and some maths/statistics courses. You can fullfil these through undergrad classes or by taking courses at a community college/diploma program.

Overseas experience (work, study and teaching):
Work overseas and study abroad are also viewed extremely favourably by admissions committees and if you have taught English abroad, worked in the Peace Corps or otherwise gained experience living in a developing country this will really strengthen your application. It also shows you to be a go-getter, and that you can bring this outside experience to grad school study.

Statement of Purpose:
This is where it all comes together. This is your chance to impress the admission committee and show how your personal 'arc' has brought you to this point - being the perfect addition to their grad school. This more than any other part of your application will determine how admit committees view you as an applicant and it's also one of the only application variables that's completely under your control. Having a cohesive narrative that brings together life experience, past academic history and professional experience is a must. It also gives you a great chance to showcase your writing style - so make sure no grammar/spelling mistakes make it into your final revision.

Great list of SOP pitfalls

If your profile matches at least 3 or 4 of the criteria listed above then you are competitive to apply to an MPA/MPP/IR program.

What is most important about any grad school application is showing fit – that is how your profile matches the speciality of that school and its program. If you can’t articulate compelling reasons why you are a good match for them and vice versa, question whether you should be applying to that program.


A note on applying to top schools:

It is worth noting that nobody here can tell you what your chances of getting into a top program (Harvard, Princeton, Georgetown etc.) because getting into a top program requires a certain amount of luck as well as a great profile. Some people get offers from Harvard with a 2.9 GPA, but also happen to have singlehandedly retaken an allied command post in the Korengal valley. It’s down to who reads your application and what they happen to be looking for with the current application cycle.

Spend time improving the elements of your application that you can (GRE, work experience, languages) and don’t waste time freaking out about the things you can’t change (GPA).

If you’ve read all of the above and really still can’t tell if your application is competitive, post your profile below.

I emailed the administrative assistants from the three departments I was really worried about...problem solved. 
Only one interviews applicants, and the invites are going out next week. All new anxieties now 

Definitely do your research! Be prepared to talk about their research and how it might intersect with yours. Remember that you'll have to have a committee, not just an advisor, so you'll need 2-4 additional faculty members involved. Plus, you'll probably have to take classes (if this is in the USA) with someone other than your advisor. So, it pays to make a good impression with those people.
 
FWIW, it's customary, especially if flying an admitted student in for a visit, for that person to meet with multiple faculty members in 1-on-1 meetings. This helps you get to know the faculty and lets them get to know you. I would think it odd if you were there for a couple of days and only met with your advisor.

Brit. Lit. and my tutorial in Anglo-Saxon overseas: both fostered my love for old and middle english lit, and one gave me the greatest torrid love-affair of my academic life, in the man of John Donne. There can be no better in life. ;-) *^^*

Brit. Lit. and my tutorial in Anglo-Saxon overseas: both fostered my love for old and middle english lit, and one gave me the greatest torrid love-affair of my academic life, in the man of John Donne. There can be no better in life. ;-) *^^*

BUFFY. Enough said.

Seriously, I think the stress of the the application process has sent me into the WORST binge of mindless TV of my entire life. I watched NINE seasons of Grey's Anatomy over Christmas break, and every Gordon Ramsay show I could possibly get my filthy hands on.
 
I moved on to Gossip Girl last night because I'd never seen it before, and ended up watching five consecutive episodes before falling asleep with little Serena van der Woodsens dancing around my head.

Netflix added Friends, so I'm basically in a coma of television right now. I feel you.
 

While I agree that there are major issues in this study-- perceived in field prestige is more important than general perception of the school, after all, and there are huge differences between the hiring numbers between different programs within individual departments. But I'm also glad to see this in this space, because I fear that this is one of those issues where there can be a bit too much optimism. Of course there are exceptions where people from programs with lesser reputations get competitive jobs, but they are indeed exceptions. And with the overall numbers so bad, the power of these tendencies can be strong. It's very frustrating and unfortunate.

This study defines tiers that are too small and problematic to have any reliable conclusion for all of English studies. In fact, I think the statistics should be interpreted more as telling where five schools farm their faculty than anything else. And you wouldn't have to do a study like this to find that out--just visit the program websites.
 
One example: at first I thought this article almost entirely ignored jobs in rhet/comp. Well, then I realized that of the "top six" programs on USNWR, only one has a comp program at all that I know of, and it is rarely (if ever) listed among the "top" programs in the field. In fact, I'd say "top programs" are situated more around the 45-75 mark, so of course we would all be getting jobs of "comparable" prestige when the first "prestigious" schools in rhet/comp appear in Tier 3. So, that supports the article's claim for--what--like a third of all jobs in English? 
 
Also, why is this article only looking at data from 2008-2011? Why aren't schools equally distributed into tiers? Why aren't all schools in each tier considered? Why don't these tiers match up with USNWR? The whole thing just smacks of English self-flagellation propaganda to me. I would take it with a huge grain of salt.

I shared this in another forum and think it will be very relevant to this discussion. 
 
Anxiety and worrying are very normal experiences for most people regarding the application process. You are not alone. As much as we want to act like it's not there, it is. It does have the potential to be unhealthy, but it can be chanelled into other arenas. During this period of waiting, I challenge you to find a hobby, read a few books, hit the gym, set a short term goal, ect. Do something to preoccupy yourself while you wait. The only catch is to have a short term goal attached to it. Set the goal to be met around the time you expect to receive communication from the grad programs. Do your best to meet the goal. Once the goal is met you have something you will be proud of. Regardless of the institutions' decisions you will know that you can achieve what you set your mind to. So if you are denied (I pray you are not) you can look back and say, I was able to meet this goal I can meet another one.  

Focus your energies on whatever you were doing before the application season. You've submitted, it's time to relax! Before you know it you'll be getting interview invites.

Wow.  I really hope my children do not grow up to be as self-centered and entitled as you are coming off here.  Your mother only has a high school education?  Your family doesn't have university educations?  So CLEARLY they have absolutely no idea what you are going through, or what stress means, or how to plan for the future, or any those things.  Your mother has devoted her life to raising you but obviously she has no possible insight into your situation because she's just an uneducated hick from Wyoming.  I sincerely hope your mother and other family members never become aware of your derision for them and their accomplishments.  And FYI, a university education can't teach class, which you've clear demonstrated here.

I got an e-mail from a POI that said "Welcome to the UNCG and SPAHE family!" Not an acceptance, apparently just a really warm and friendly person. I overanalyzed the shit out of that line until she clarified that I won't hear any decision until mid-January. 

Oh gees, I wish I could put Overanalyzing Emails as a hobby on my OKCupid profile. I spend SO MUCH TIME on it. 
 
I emailed one POI (with whom I spent an entire day doing a campus visit) to let her know I'd submitted my app. She replied, "best of luck!" 
 
Wait, what? "best of luck"?! I thought we were a team! I thought you were going to advocate for me in the admissions meetings! BEST OF LUCK?!

I was with you until I read this: 
"I just wanted to get it out there. I'd be really pissed off if I wasn't admitted anywhere. It's not that I feel like I deserve this more than others; it's that I've worked too hard to get denied."
 
The only person you need to be pissed with is yourself if that is the case, I think part of this process is learning that you are the only one that can help or hurt yourself.  Then when you said "its not that I feel I deserve this more than others, its that I've worked too hard to get denied"...I realize that it may be difficult for you to put yourself in another's perspective but my answer to that is....so has a lot of other people.  You aren't the only one.  
There is a bit of your immaturity showing in all of this and maybe it will be good to gain some perspective outside of your own world.  
If you don't get in or struggle this year then fuel that "aggravation and anger/pissed off" into taking the gre again and crushing it so that you don't feel that you are uncertain of your next application cycle.  
Again as many others have noted, there is a lot of time yet.  I don't know your field precisely, physical chem? but I am in the sciences.  There are still plenty of interviews to go out yet, some of your schools may have sent some out and others within the next week or two would be my guess.  Just relax for now, what is done is done.  Game plan for both an interview and a rejection and that is where your energy should be at this time. 

Folks, think about it: what's the very worst thing that can happen? We're rejected from every single school we've applied to -- and even then, we're no worse off than we are now (OK, maybe a few grand poorer -- but everyone in North America is up to their ears in debt anyway…).
 
This is not an evaluation of our value as human beings; even if we get rejected, we will still go on living.
 
Besides, a grad degree doesn't even guarantee us a decent job these days -- from what I've heard from some of my employers, a doctorate can make you a less competitive candidate in some fields. It's definitely not a measure of our brilliance, and never was. We're just stressed out because it's completely out of our control: but so are most things in our lives. Our health, romantic and job prospects, our looks, our wealth and social status, even our personality -- over most of these factors we have limited control at best.
 
This waiting game is really a test of character, of how well do we bear uncertainty -- and we win it not by being accepted, but by realizing that our value as persons is not contingent on external measures of 'success' or 'failure'. 
 
(OK, rant over. I'm going off to get a cookie, and then head out into the -25C winter.)

Any meeting with someone I don't know, at an institution at which I'm trying to make a favorable impression, I would treat as formal. I would dress accordingly, which for me would be a suit and tie.
 
It's hard to know what they will ask. I met informally with a professor at Wisconsin several years ago, before I applied to graduate school. He seemed mostly interested--if you could say he was interested at all, which is debatable--in what my research interests were. Vague answers were not taken well; he challenged every general statement I made, and at the time I thought he was a horse's ass. Certainly, I had interests, but with the benefit of a few years of graduate school, I can see how someone else would have considered them very poorly defined. 
 
In my own questions/dialogue with them, I would try to ascertain two things:
 
First, are there professors in the department who are researching and/or working on projects that coincide with my research interests? It's hard to make generalizations about admissions across programs and universities, but I don't think I'm going too far out on a limb by saying that programs typically want to bring in doctoral students who have interests in the ballpark of some of the faculty's interests; not to say that they are trying to bring in a homogeneous group of people, but if you want to study specialty X, and the faculty excels in W, Y, and Z, it might be hard for them to advise you at the doctoral level.
 
Second, what is the general orientation of the program? Are they focused on the promotion of social justice (although, I think most programs pursue this one way or the other, even if it is not a stated goal)? Do they have psychological underpinnings (e.g., "process-product") that might influence the approach they take towards learning and schooling, perhaps in a way convergent/divergent with your own beliefs? Are they focused primarily on the production of research, or do they work to serve practitioners in their various programs? If you could elicit answers along these lines, it might help to determine whether the program is a "good fit" with your philosophy or ideas on education. Again, it's not that you want to follow something completely in line with your views and be with a bunch of people who are exactly identical, but if you are going to spend 3-5 years studying at a place you don't want to hate the snot out of it because of their take on the world.

FYI....and I'm sorry if this is old news but it tells you on the CSDCAS site what day they are up to for verifying.

One thing I found helpful when I was finishing my undergrad, was to involve my kids in some of the activities that happen on campus over the weekends - there is usually some sort of event that is kid friendly.
 
This way they were able to see where dad was at night, it also encouraged my teenaged (at the time) daughter to go to the same school - she is now in the process of applying to grad schools also.

Thank you!!!  I guess I just needed to hear that I am not alone in this... (meaning there is nothing wrong with me).  It has gotten harder, the older I get, to connect with others.  Hopefully I will have the chance to have some close friendships into late adulthood. 
 
Thank you everyone for your generous input and encouragement.  
 

Yours isn't so uncommon a scenario, Navymom. Which might not be entirely consoling, though at least maybe it'll be comforting to you to know that you're not alone. :-) It's a common cry, especially (I think) among us females, who have the best-friends of grade school, high school, etc.

I don't have any magical answer for it. I'm a social butterfly, of sorts, but I don't really care for the Meetups I've went to, though they're fine enough for what they are. I think it's just a season-of-life thing that we all have to come to terms with: some people will come into our lives forever, some will be for just a moment. I'm still pretty young, so I don't have the "whole picture" view yet. But I have had the bad-breakup with a friend that was like what you described, and only recently came to terms with letting it go. I still have my 2 best girl friends from uni. years, so that gets me through the hard times. But I live in a city that I've yet to make quality friends like I've always been able to before, albeit on a lesser level than my ladies from college. I've heard married life is like that, having less and less personal friends, especially once you have kids (I don't yet), but both my husband and I are rather young and social, so we at least can keep married acquaintances. Though my mother has one or two close friends that's she's made, post-marriage and raising 6 young wild things! ;-)
 
All this rambling to say: if you're looking for a soul-mate girl friend, it's probably going to take some time, and there's the chance that relationships will come and go; things change all the time, unfortunately. But I doubt you'll be friendless forever. I've had friends who graduated and found it difficult to find a peer community like in college, and I've had others who have fit right into their post-graduate years. I myself went overseas and became best friends with a young lady in her 40s, and we're still friends, even though I'm "home" and she's in China. It's probably just one of those "seasons." It sucks, it's not comfortable, and no one likes it. But it happens to us all. You don't strike me as the kind of person that won't be unreceptive to possible new friendships, so I would just try to enjoy the other aspects of your life; relationships will happen. Focusing on the "other" may not be as special or desirous as finding a heart-mate friend. But, then, that kind of friendship wouldn't be so special for the having, if it came too readily or often. I suspect that kind of friend will come around where you least expect it. I certainly never expected to find another best friend overseas! Do try not to be too sad. You're definitely not alone in your longing. I hope you do find that special friend, sooner rather than later. Goodness knows many of us girls just need that good, social outlet! *^^*