Language Lover <3

It's all across the board. I received G/G and F/F, and both reviewers wrote such nasty comments it actually made me cry. My approach in the proposal was mainly ethnographic, and they both made clear that they docked me for not have more laboratory methodology, even though that's not compatible with the research. For my stats, I have 3 pubs, 1 forthcoming, and 3 more in review; 10 conference presentations (3 international and 3 major national); undergrad GPA 3.78, grad GPA 3.85 at a top tier school; GRE is average (1230, 5.0); over a year as research assistant on an NSF funded project; 2 additional years as a grad research assistant; 3+ years volunteer teaching children from different backgrounds; and four invited guest lectures on my research. Yet, the second reviewer said my research background was "adequate" and both didn't give me any comments on anything other than my research proposal. This year not one award went to anyone in my subfield, so I don't know that the reviewers this year even really understood the project... 1st time applying, 2nd year in grad school... so looks like I'm done...

Wow, just viewed my rating sheets, and I am beyond frustrated. The only thing that my reviewers commented on was the IM/BI of the proposal itself, with no acknowledgement of having even looked at my other essays. They even commented on how I didn't discuss how I'm prepared to do that topic, even though my research background essay specifically addresses my four previous years, three publications, and four national and international conferences on that exact topic. ~FUMING~

I feel exactly the same way. And I did put a lot of work into mine. Since there were only 10 awards given in my field, I Googled the recipients, and they're all from the same two concentrations... my concentration received zero.

Congrats to the winners! I didn't get one (alas, my field went up to a total of 10 awards, but again all to predictably the same schools as usual). I'm interested to see what the rating sheets say, though

With all of the anticipation/trying not to get my hopes up, I now have a RAGING headache! An award sure would help relieve that pain, though, I bet I'm only going to be able to follow this for a few more hours tonight, though, since I have to T.A. early in the morning and pretend to get some sleep tonight.

I never did figure out how they know who your advisor is, other than you saying "My advisor, ..." In my program it's really not that clear cut. We get assigned to a person as your "advisor," but it's only on paper to approve course choices and give you general program info when you start the program. The advisor who you work with on your research is usually someone different in the department who you switch to on paper later when you begin the dissertation process, and in my case I have two, one for each part of my research (the fieldwork and the laboratory). So, in my application, I mentioned them as the "professors with whom I most directly work," and then I elaborated on how exactly I work with them. Those who have previous experience in this, do you know if this will sit ok with NSF, and do you know exactly how they find out who your advisor/s are?

I think so many other things must matter in addition to the GRE scores, just as they do in admissions considerations. I attend a first tier grad school, it's one of the top in my field, and my GRE scores were quite low (combined 1230 V and Q, 5.0 analytical). However, due to my research experience, publications, conferences, overall academic record, and letters of rec, I was admitted into one of the top two awarded positions in my department and concentration. I also received quite nice offers from several other first tier schools. So, like admissions decisions, I really think that while GRE scores may be important to some GRFP reviewers, they may be just as equally unimportant to other reviewers if you have a strong record overall.

I'm driving myself so crazy waiting that I've taken to new workout routines to burn the nervous energy. A couple of hours of dancing, running, and aerobics each evening/night is working pretty well!

I don't really think anyone would mess around with anything as serious as this. At least I would hope not.

OMG! Now I am officially freaking out.

These last few days of March are dragging by soooo slowly...

Yeah, last year my category only had 7, and they were all in the concentration I don't work in. Normally there are only 4 for my discipline. I keep wavering between feeling like my application is strong and feeling like I don't really have a chance because of my concentration and other smaller things... We'll see, I suppose! The announcement can't get here soon enough!

Who wants to make a guess about announcements? This coming week or next? I'm going to guess it'll be next.

Hmm, I had 7 (after I had to take a couple out in editing). The ones I saw had 6-10. Two were winners, and one was close.

I'm sorry Krypton... I don't quite think I'm following what you mean.

How many references did each person include in their proposal? Also, does anyone know how many references past winners had?

I also have a couple of pretty horrible typos that I've been obsessing over completely distraught: left out a hyphen once when it was present in the other instances of the word and missed a letter in one very important word (and neither my spellchecker nor advisor caught it... I saw it a couple weeks after I submitted). I also had to remove 3 references (they were extra but helpful support) because there just wasn't any space left... We'll see what happens I suppose...

Does anyone know how adding an international component to the application affects your chances of getting an award? If part of your work is in another country, does this increase or decrease your chances?

This is also my first year applying, and I'm a second year PhD student. I found out about this fellowship right after the deadline passed last year, so this is my one shot at it! I wish everyone the best! And I'm going to say April 12th (but I really hope it's April 2nd)!

Does anyone know the dates and times when the awards were announced the past few years? One thing I've learned about DC is that the agencies usually have certain days when they try to announce, hire, hold press conferences, etc, while the rest are work days. So my guess would be that NSF also has its preference, and we may be able to figure out a good guess at the day of the week and time they'll announce. Passes the time while we wait at least...

12, due to the peak in posts as it edges closer and people find out more

With the increase of awards, does anyone know if they will be increasing both hard science and social science awards? I know there was talk earlier on by Congress about starting to phase out social science awards. Hope this doesn't end up being true! >.<