TC3

I'll get the cliche over with: every place is different. Whew. Okay. Cliche out of the way. I asked about my visiting weekend, and was told that business casual (including nice blue jeans) was the standard.

This may seem like a silly question, but I figured that I would get some group feedback. The visiting day is approaching, and this is my first graduate program visiting day ever. What is the standard attire (if any)?

I also just withdrew my name (not part of the 5 offers, but part of the top 12).

I just withdrew my name at UC Riverside. A wait list spot should be opening up as a result.

I agree. It's safe to say that all funded admission offers have been sent and all unfunded acceptances have been updated on the GAMES site. Nebraska doesn't stagger acceptances. However, I have no idea how the wait list works there, and it is common to dip into the wait list as top candidates accept offers from other institutions.

It's *almost* universal in that it's the mandated earliest deadline by the Council of Graduate Schools. Very few programs do not abide by this standard.

I'll be at the open house!

I'd recommend not taking unfunded offers, especially for the PhD. It's true that there are one-year renewable TA-ships for which unfunded PhD students can apply after the first year, but these are totally variable based on the leftovers of year-to-year funding. I know of someone who was really jerked around by that process; he was awarded a package that was later rescinded due to budgetary nonsense. More importantly, it's difficult to network with faculty (and other students, for that matter) when one is unfunded. This is in no way a denigration of Nebraska's program, but a fair assessment of the realities of unfunded graduate study. My Masters was unfunded, and while I learned a lot and grew intellectually, I often didn't feel like a part of the department. Plus, the loans add up quickly, even at public institutions. After that Masters and three doctoral application cycles, I've found that the most important factor is that a program *wants* you to be there. I'd say that it's fair that if by the end of the week we haven't heard about a funded offer, we probably didn't get one. I'm also leaning more towards accepting that those of us whose GAMES has not yet updated were not even accepted *without* funding.

I have no idea. It could be that those still "Under Review" were not accepted at all. It could be that those "Under Review" still have a shot, for some weird reason. Only one funded admit has come out of the woodwork.

My GAMES page still reads "Under Review." To clarify funding: if you received notification directly from the DGS or a POI via email or phone call, s/he would have detailed the funding package. Otherwise, if the only notification is the auto-email from Sue Hart directing you to an updated GAMES status, you're not one of the first-round funding offers.

Creative writing wise, I think that only one or two people per year are accepted. It seems to be a really small program.

Funded admits are notified by an email from the DGS. Unfunded admits are notified first via the GAMES website and then through snail mail.

It does seem strange. Next week would be the latest that funded admits ever have been notified by the program, judging by the history on the results board. Last year, funded admits were notified the last week of February. At some point, it will be difficult to compete with offers that have been on the table for a month or longer.

Hah. I suppose that my cat drinking absinthe picture could go either way. Your first instinct, rightly or wrongly, was correct. And big congrats on the acceptances at Mich, UCLA, and UCSC. You must have had a stellar application!

It does seem to be taking a while, but it's possible (though not that likely) that everyone admitted to CU doesn't use GradCafe. I understand that CU has a small entering cohort, maybe 6-8, and I guess that they may not have let anyone else know about their good news. Or, the more likely possibility is that CU is just dragging its feet.

Looks like a Loyola Masters acceptance was notified two days ago. I wonder if this is one of the two spots left.

I'm sure that you'll get a flood of conflicting answers to this thread, but my two cents say that your GRE scores, while not freakishly high (i.e. 700+ verbal / 6.0 AW) like the scores of some who are accepted into super elite programs, shouldn't detract from an application if your other materials are strong and if you are a good fit for the program. You're getting rejections simply because regardless of scores, it's an incredibly competitive time to be applying to graduate study in English. Some programs are accepting/funding 5 or less people out of the hundreds who applied. It obviously helps to have higher scores, but a more productive use of time would be in tailoring your application to specific programs and to revising your writing sample, statement of intent, and CV. My scores are 670 V, 5.5 AW, and 650 Subject. I didn't get into Harvard, but I did get into some strong programs; after speaking to faculty at these programs, it has become quite clear that I went from the short list to the list of actual offers because I was a good fit for the department and faculty, not because of my scores. Some programs prefer applicants not to have an MA, whiles others prefer the opposite. Most programs accept a mix of BA-only and MA-already applicants. Penn State, for example, offers only 1 or 2 spots per year to applicants who already have an MA; the rest of the 12-18 spots go to BA-only applicants.

I'm doubtful about the post. I don't see how someone could have "multiple publications" after just a BA.

I was updated today by Dr. Caughie, the graduate director. Apparently, 3 offers were made last week, and 2 more will be made after Loyola's spring break. She also indicated that because top candidates often receive offers from other programs, it's common to dip into the wait list to fill out the 5 spots. Because Loyola admits so few students, a concerted effort is made to distribute those admissions equally across subfields. This may be why it is taking so long to make offers. They don't want to get more than one person per subfield, I'm assuming. And I'm also assuming that subfield is fairly broad in this case, i.e. maybe 1 rhet/comp, 1 20th century, 1 18th/19th century, 1 early modern, 1 medieval, or something like that.

Early on (September, I think), I contacted Iowa's graduate director because I literally would be unable to provide the original draft with instructor comments (it was years ago, and most likely lost in a move). The director was ambiguous about whether or not that would be viewed unfavorably by the admissions committee. I just sent the revised version with an explanation on the cover sheet. I mean, when I've revised the paper into a now-published article, I'm going to send my best work.

TAMU is a legitimate PhD in English with creative dissertation.

Did anyone else think that the writing sample stipulations were weird? Ideally, they wanted us to submit the *original* first draft from a seminar *with* the original professor's comments. For me, this would have meant that I would have been evaluated based on my writing skills from 2007, and not my current skills.

Loyola certainly seems to be sitting on the top 12 candidates. I wonder when the actual cohort of 5 will be notified.

There always are outliers, but this is ridiculous. For prestigious programs like Iowa, there always is at least a sizable chunk of the accepted cohort that uses GradCafe. More than one person, that's for sure!

This is just strange isn't it? The one, lone website acceptance posted *a month ago* and *nothing* since then?