bosie_dearest

@radredhead As far as I understand it, Bard will give you so many more opportunities and connections than Irvine. When I told my undergrad advisor last year that I was considering going the curatorial track in grad school, she said: "Go to Bard. It's by far the best program in the country." You'll only be in NY or Irvine for two years -- even if the location totally sucks (the Hudson Valley is so beautiful and will totally not suck ), it's only temporary. If you hate living in isolation from New York City, know that upon graduation you'll be able to live wherever the hell you want because you graduated with an extremely valuable degree; if you love living in Irvine, cherish it, because you might not be so lucky as to choose your next place of residence.

@unanachronism and @radredhead this ^^ is such good advice, and it doesn't just extend to "well, I know I like contemporary feminist art" or whatever your AOI is -- it means that you're familiar with how your research interests fit into the larger field of art history, what critical and theoretical approaches you want to take (including their common flaws and how to defend/ameliorate them), and who in the field is best suited to help you with your project. Moreover, I personally would caution against going into a PhD program without absolute certainty that that's what you want to be doing and that's the degree you need. A PhD program is going to be, realistically, around seven years of extremely difficult work, between four and five of which will be basically self-directed. If you're not totally self-motivated and driven to complete your degree (especially if the career you want to pursue only requires an MA), the vantage point from year three to the end of a 200-page dissertation at year five or seven might look challenging -- not to mention unpleasant. Besides, you'll have to hang out with jerks like me who've drunk the academia kool-aid and want nothing more than to aggressively slog through seven years of a PhD program!

As far as the "switcheroo" goes, I've talked to a few people who've done it, and they said not only did they basically have to start from scratch at their new institution, but they do not have good relationships with the places they came from. All of them were basically forced to transfer because of advisor issues (moving, retiring, etc), so I've never known anyone to basically take two years at a program just to have to do them again at another program voluntarily. Essentially, getting an MA only takes a few credits off your PhD course load, as far as I've heard, so it's definitely not the most efficient choice and would be VERY hard to pull off without burning bridges... If you're being accepted into a program to complete a PhD, you're expected to complete the PhD -- few programs will offer you a terminal masters at the end of your second year to discourage this very thing. I can't imagine getting letters of rec would be easy, either, because if I were a professor I'd feel very slighted and taken advantage of if one of my students was using my program as a stepping-stone to a "better" one. But again, maybe I've just happened to meet all the people who think this is a terrible idea and none of the ones who've pulled it off successfully.

Guys, seriously, is it that hard to post civilly about, of all things, an acceptance? This sort of tone makes us all look like assholes

@Mirrorical_Return I'm surprised you downvoted me, as I think we're saying the same thing! I wanted to explain the specifics of financing at the IFA, as I know when I was considering applying for MA programs and people said the phrase "cash cow", I wasn't sure what they meant. Also, just as I said, if you're independently wealthy, the IFA is obviously amazing and nothing should stop you from attending! There are a few ways to mitigate debt from an MA, but not everyone will be so lucky as to work for a non-profit, etc., and not everyone wants a terminal MA. I agree, as far as job connections go, the IFA is tops, but if you're getting an MA to prep you for a PhD, there's no reason not to take a funded offer at a place like Stonybrook or Austin over going into an insurmountable amount of debt from attending the IFA. I certainly didn't mean to offend you or minimize your (or anyone's) accomplishment in being accepted into or attending the program, and I'm sorry if it came across that way. I just wanted to contribute what I've learned so far about the program so those still on the fence can make an informed decision.

For those of you curious about the MA program at the IFA: as a PhD admit who is totally enamored of the IFA, I've heard less-than-stellar things about their MA program. It's biggest (only?) problem, obviously, is that it's a cash cow for the PhD, so they'll admit as many MA students as they need in order to fund the PhDs. In fact, if you look at the numbers, there are around 10 PhD students per cohort, and about 50 MAs. Each PhD student receives about half a million dollars over the course of their 6 years (in the form of stipend, tuition, healthcare, fees, etc), meaning a cohort of 10 is equivalent to an investment of about $5 million over 6 years on the part of the IFA. A cohort of 50 MA students paying ~$50,000/year will generate $5 million for the IFA by the time they graduate -- or, exactly enough to fund one PhD cohort. So, basically, if you're in the MA program, not only do you know that you're basically paying the PhD student sitting next to you in lecture, but you're competing against 49 other MAs to get a limited number of places in seminars/letters of rec from profs/internships at museums/etc etc, many of which are effectively reserved for PhD students already. I hate to speak ill of my own soon-to-be institution, but I know that there are lots of other, more selective MA programs (UT Austin, Tufts, Williams, SUNY Stonybrook) who take care to fund their students, whether partially or fully, and which are better respected in academia overall. That said, if you have the means to fund yourself and won't spiral into horrible debt trying to live in New York, you'll absolutely get a world-class education at the IFA and potentially make lots of important connections -- I just wouldn't go into debt to make that happen.

I think the most inappropriate thing about @northeastregional sharing things about "his wife's" experience is that less than a month ago he(/she?) apparently had a male partner...? Get your stories straight before you troll, dude.

@northeastregional have you ever heard the phrase: "If everyone you encounter is an asshole, maybe you're the asshole?" You're married, you're not in academia, and, god willing, you have at least one hobby or interest that's not trolling people on the internet. So, as many of us have requested of you before: please, just leave us be.

Of course all schools say "it's just a competitive program," but of course any rejection has *something* to do with one's application, which makes me think you might be asking the wrong question here. The two main reasons applicants get rejected, as far as I understand, is 1) being unqualified, and 2) not being a good fit for the program/POI. In terms of the former, lack of qualification can be anything from not having enough experience in the discipline (e.g. never having taken an art history course before), not displaying a clear understanding of the field (e.g. not understanding how your research fits into what's already been done; understanding what type of research proposal is expected for the PhD level), not displaying any/enough knowledge of the program (e.g. "I want to go to Harvard because it's in Boston!" vs. "Harvard would be the best place for my research because xyz professor's work on blah blah blah compliments my work on blah blah blah..."). Also just generally having a low GPA/GRE combined with unremarkable letters can do you in. As far as the latter goes, professors know that you're going to be working with them for, like, SEVEN YEARS. They only want to bring you aboard if they think that they'll be able to be a good mentor and advisor to you. For example, I applied to work with Hal Foster at Princeton, but was rejected because a lot of my work is an outright rejection of the October School (of which he is a part) -- however, I was accepted to work with two profs at two equally competitive programs who are, like me, very anti-October. Even the strongest application in the world can't make up for an ideological difference between candidate and professor, which is, in a sense, a good thing, because it leads to diversity in the field and better fits overall. If you're considering applying again next year, feel free to PM me and I can try to offer more specific help!

I tried calling them today to get an update on my application before I commit elsewhere, and they hung up on me. Thinking it was a mistake, I called again.... and they hung up on me, again.

@futurestandysgrad Yeah, it's definitely frustrating... I'm in the same boat with Penn and I'm dying for transparency! I don't know anything about UVA, but NYU sent out unofficial offers on Friday and official offers yesterday. NYU doesn't accept any applicants they didn't interview, if that helps clarify things.

Michigan's visit weekend is this coming weekend, so all shortlisted candidates have been interviewed and invited already. The rejections that went out last week, as far as I understand, did not go to anyone on the shortlist. If you still haven't heard anything, this probably means that you're on the "second" rejection list -- some programs, instead of waitlisting applicants, hold them on a late rejection list in case a significant number of their shortlisted candidates don't accept their offers. Michigan in particular is very keen on having a high retention rate (only giving offers to those who plan to accept). Hope that helps.

I think it's acceptable to contact those programs as long as you have other offers that you're considering -- e.g. "Hi York, I have an offer from xyz University and I'm hoping to give them an answer soon; are you able to give me an update on my application status?"

Fellow Stanford admit, PM me!

I think a better question for @northeastregional is why they would bring that type of attitude to a thread full of people trying to commiserate about the stress of pursuing their passion/dreams. C'mon, man.