Warelin

I'd double-check with the grad school to see if fee waivers are available. Additionally, there are some schools that might be willing to accept an official gre score after acceptance.

Not necessarily. A lot of programs in the humanities wait until after deadlines have passed so they can evaluate applicants at the same time.

I think it's important to remember that any program worth getting into is going to be competitive. I'm not sure if a noncompetitive funded English Ph.D. Program exists. Some programs that come into mind with your interests are: Vanderbilt University (Rachel Teukolsky and Candice Amich) Washington University in St. Louis (Vivian Pollak, Vincent Sherry, Steven Meyer, Rafia Zafar) Emory University (Walter Kalaidjian, Paul Kelleher, Ross Knecht) Northwestern University (John Culter, Mary Kinzie, Harris Feinsod, Reginald Gibbons) Brandeis University (William Flesch, Laura Quinney, John Burt, Dawn Skorczewski)

Small note here: The April 15 resolution applies to accepting a funded offer for the fall semester; it isn't a date whch you have to respond to all grad schools by. There are also some colleges that are not part of the April 15 resolution. Did any of the schools ask for a specific date to respond to them by? The deadline for Spring often varies by the program because very few universities offer spring admission. If you're certain that you aren't going to accept a school's offer, it's best to turn down their offer as soon as you're sure.

This is generally not acceptable at most places and will cause you to burn bridges in a number of scenarios. I'd recommend against it. A deferral is meant to allow you to start at a later date provided everything stays the same. I think the best policy here is to be honest with both schools. Tell them what would make things easier for you to accept their offer but be prepared to accept their offer if they offer what you're looking for.

I think you need to obtain a lot of honors and rewards to remain competitive in Academia. The question then becomes this: How many people who have graduated from Columbia's PHD program in M.E. have graduated since 2012? Before 2012? How many of them are in Academia? How many of them are having their students apply for postdocs at Columbia? It seems that Columbia does hire multiple post docs in M.E. but it's unclear of when they were hired and how long each post doc is for. (Some postdocs last a year; I've heard some last as long as 3.) I have no doubt that your POI could use his connections to ensure that your application is looked at, but postdocs tend to be competitive at a number of schools. Additionally, I think it's important to realize that there's a potential for a personality mismatch between the two of you. If that happens, would he still be willing to vouch for you? It just seems a little bit pre-mature to me. I will admit that Engineering is not my speciality though. Is promising a specific postdoc common in your field?

I'd be extremely leery of any individual that promises they can get you a guaranteed post-doc at any school. Postdocs often are looking for someone specializing in a very specific thing which could change on a year to year basis.

Your score should still be valid if you apply this year. Having a valid score just means that ETS will be able to send a record to the schools though. A university might have a set of different standards of how 'new' they prefer scores to be. These are generally rules set forth by the department or the grad school.They don't often allow for exceptions. Boston University might be the most flexible because of the language they used. In any of the 3 situations, it's best to clarify with each department.

Each school has their own standards for what they consider to be worthy of a fee waiver. NYU just requires that you have received a pell grant during your time as an undergraduate. Harvard will waive your fees if it will cause undue hardship. Some schools will ask for proof via tax returns and the like; others won't. If a certain EFC is required, they generally stick to it since it's graduate school protocol. Private schools generally have a bit more leeway in issuing fee waivers.

I know that WUSTL (phd only) requires 10-25 pages because they want to leave it up to the person to submit what they believe is their strongest piece of writing and don't want people to add any fluff to meet the minimum page count.

I think the important thing to remember is that your university wouldn't have accepted you if they didn't believe you could handle their workload. There are more people applying that are qualified to do the work, but they chose you. They believe in you. You should too!

"Probability theory, a branch of mathematics concerned with the analysis of random phenomena. The outcome of a random event cannot be determined before it occurs, but it may be any one of several possible outcomes. The actual outcome is considered to be determined by chance." Is it fair to use probability theory when the distributions aren't random though? It's a great formula to use when trying to determine things like flipping heads 5x in a row. (1-.5) * (1-.5)* (1-.5)* (1-.5)* (1-.5)=0.03125 or .3.125 percent chance. Each roll is seperate in this case and each has a 50 percent chance of happening. There is no roll in the GRE case though. Numbers are assigned a percentile which already showcases how well you did. This is why I think averages are a better indication of how you did overall if you wanted that number. It weighs things equally and already takes into account how well you did compared to other people in each section.

Using your original formula, someone scoring in the 50th percentile on all 3 sections: (1 - .5) * (1 - .5) * (1-.5) = 0.125 or top 12.5 percentile. or in 30th percentile (1 - .3) * (1 - .3) * (1-.3)=0.343 or top 34.3 percentile. That doesn't make sense either. I think the biggest thing you're forgetting to account for is that the percentiles in each section change depending on how well people in the previous 3 year cycle have done. As such, it already accounts for how well you've compared to other top score getters in each section. I'm not sure if there is a formula that can determine your 'overall' percentile. I'm not sure the GRE was designed to be that way. I think averaging your percentile scores might be a better indication of overall "rank". (69+58+59)/3 = 62 percentile = top 38 percent of test takers.

I don't think subtracting your percentile score makes sense. I think a clearer metric would be: (Percentile score) * (Percentile Score) * (Percentile Score) GRE scores already assign you a percentile score on each section individually. As such, the test already seperates your scores when assigning them. I think multiplying them would give you a percentile score on the overall exam. Using your example: (.69)*(.58)*(.59)=0.236118 or top 23.61%.

I would try not to think of any schools as "back up" since that term doesn't really exist at this level. There are people who were accepted at places which receive more than 200 applicants and were also rejected by schools that receive significantly fewer applications. I would make sure that the schools that you apply to have people that would be a good fit for the type of work you want to do. Graduate School is part of a number game, but "fit" is more important. I'd submit as many applications as you have time to work on, could imagine yourself living in that city and being happy with that school and department's culture, and could afford. SOPs take time and involve a lot of time to get to know the department you're applying to. Programs can tell when they're not being customized specifically to them. I'm confused on this one. Johns Hopkins doesn't have a medievalist in their English department. They have two 'early modernists' but that's a different focus.

If you want to discuss your list, I'd be more than happy to answer any questions you have.

Feel free to do so!

What topics in English currently interest you? Some websites do a great job of listing out requirements. Others leave some things to be fairly opaque. I think it's important to remember that these colleges are making a very heavy investment in you. Some colleges are making hundreds of thousands of dollars of investment of you over 5-6 years. As such, they want to ensure that that person has the potential to succeed and fit in well in their program. One of the easiest ways to do this is to see their commitment to the field if they've earned a Master's degree. Are they aware of current research in the field? Are they aware of what makes their project important and why is it deserving of funding? Have they engaged with others via conferences? Are they a student that we would enjoy spending time with within the field? How close are they to the writing we'd like to see more of? As a result, colleges prefer to make fairly safe bets on who they accept and some colleges will also reject students that they believe would reject them. Safeties are non-existent within the humanities. I think this is largely school-dependent. According to this article, more people at Harvard and Johns Hopkins graduated with honors than graduated without honors. While there are schools known for grade inflation, there are some schools that are widely known for grade deflation. I imagine that those on the admissions committee would be familiar if schools fall on either of those two lists. I also think that the English community's smaller size allows committee members to be more acquainted with how certain professors write their endorsements for potential candidates. Endorsements go beyond grades earned in class and may very well include personal growth, research, and office hour discussions/visits. I think most schools welcome candidates with a variety of interests. Schools with more resources are able to have more professors in different areas but it doesn't mean that they're actively looking to expand each area. Very few schools are really well known for just one field. Notre Dame sticks out for Medieval/Early Modern. I think that about 75-80 percent of their cohort has a specific interest within those time periods. It's not a surprise though considering Notre Dame has put a lot of resources within that concentration. I think your challenge here is that you'll need to convince a panel of professors on why they should admit you over someone who may have more experience within the subject. They need to feel assured that you're devoted to English and that your potential to complete the "marathon" is there. (Besides the dissertation and teaching, you'll also be required to complete comprehensive exams which would test your knowledge on a wide variety of books._

Small note here: Programs in the humanities tend to have considerably fewer Graduate spots than programs in STEM at the majority of universities. Programs in the humanities also tend to place less value on test scores than STEM does and place a significantly higher value on your fit within the program. Columbia, Harvard, and Cornell are all great schools but they have very different things they're known for and it would be a very rare applicant that would find a fit at all of them. Transferring from one program to another is very unlikely at the grad school level. However, you might want to check with your school regarding this. Most programs though will have you apply to their program formally and pool you with all applicants. Most respected PHD programs will not allow you to do their program part-time. It is expected that you treat them like a priority and like it is a full-time job. This isn't meant to be something that you do because you're "dreading graduating" but rather because there is nothing else you want to do for the rest of your life. There are some questions I think would be helpful in answering before pursuing this further: Do you have enough experience to obtain a PHD in English or Comp lit? I think a minimum of 18 credits of English or related credits was something I recall seeing when applying for an English PHD. What are your interests in English/Comp Lit? What theories interest you? What makes the field you're interested in studying so important? I'd carefully consider your letters of recommendation. Programs tend to prefer letters from their field or from someone who understands what it's like to obtain a doctorate's degree in the humanities. A weak letter can hurt your chances of admission. What's your understanding of research in the Humanities? The way we conduct research is very different from the way the sciences does. https://tableau.cornell.edu/views/5yrAdmissionsFactsandFigures_0/AdmissionsbyCitizenship?:embed=y&:showAppBanner=false&:display_count=no&:showVizHome=no As can be seen at the link above: Cornell had 255 applicants for English in Fall 2017. They admitted 9 percent of these applicants (which would be about 23 students that were accepted or waitlisted). Often time, top universities do compete for similiar applicants so yield is never quite 100 percent. Of the 23 students accepted, 11 accepted their offer and enrolled. At one point, Cornell advertised their average GPA to be around a 3.85. Scores are not everything, but Grad Schools would expect you to have more to show if you have a Master's degree in a subject. I think it has to do with the amount of opportunities you've had to professionalize and understand the field better than someone coming straight out of undergrad. In this case, scoring really high on the Literature Subject test might be advantageous to show that you're incredibly interested in the material. I would ensure that you meet the minimum requirements prior to applying anywhere though. If you have any questions, I'd be more than happy to help you answer them. Best of luck!

If you took the test in after July 1, 2016, your scores would be valid until 5 years after your test date. If it was prior to this date in this year, scores expire on June 30, 2021. If you're satisfied with your scores, there would be no reason to retake the exam.

Ahh, that does seem a bit more extreme. I ended up sending a query to a journal today. They responded within a few hours. Sorry to hear that it took them months to reply to you. =(

I think it's important to realize that each journal has a different way of handling submissions. Submissions are often read by several people before it makes its way up to an editor. There's a high possibility that the people on the editorial board are professors or scholars. As professors, they're balancing teaching, advising, recommendation letters, conferences, service to the college, service to the program, service to the city, writing for publications, etc. As a scholar, they're balancing conferences, presentations, social speaking engagements, extended periods of research at various libraries and archives and so-forth. More often than not, journals don't pay for their editors. And trying to find a time where multiple people are free when they have a rotating schedule of events can prove to be an incredibly different challenge. But they edit because they want the field to grow and others to be excited about it.

I've gone ahead and moved this to the Philosophy forum for you. In the future, feel free to message me if you've posted in the wrong forum.

Are these the same professors that are writing your recommendation letters? If so, it might raise a red flag. Were they enthusiastic about writing you a letter? I think PMing is the smartest thing to do here. A Great SOP cannot be plagiarized due to how personal the document is with experiences but it can reveal who you are. I think the important thing to remember is that everyone will have approach and the same approach may or may not work for others. Consider your audience, consider who you are as a writer and person and what you bring to the table. Also, consider what about this school excites you and what that school offers that another could not. Everyone's experience will vary and that will show in the final product. There are often SOP exchanges that are done here. Alternatively, if you found someone whose posts you've found helpful; you could always PM them and ask if they would consider looking over your work. (This usually works best if they're in a similiar field and attend a college you'd be interested in.)

Good luck! I'd heavily consider looking beyond T20 programs. There are a few programs that are stronger in certan concentrations that USNews doesn't account for because they base their opinion off of 11-14 percent of respondents.