pi515

Thank you for your advice, ts!

Hey everyone, I've noticed that many of you have already published and/or presented papers at conferences. Since this application round isn't going so well for me, I thought it'd be wise for me to focus on strengthening my application in the coming year. And so I'd greatly appreciate any advice on publishing and/or presenting. For example, how did you decide which journals to submit your paper to? What kind of paper was it (research-based, book review, etc)? How likely it is for non-doctoral students to have their papers accepted? Similarly, with presenting at conferences: are there some conferences that you'd particularly recommend? Any tips for successful submissions? As a side note, since I'm out of school right now, do you have to be affiliated with a university or a research institution in order to submit papers for publication/presentation (in academic journals/conferences)? Thank you in advance for any tips and advice!

And hang in there @HopefulSocPhD I can very much relate. I'm also a teacher and an older applicant. In fact, at 40, I'm more of an outlier. Although I have some research experience from undergrad and grad studies, none of it is directly related to the type of research I'd like to pursue in a sociology phd program (my recommenders were anthropology and poli sci professors). I'm also transgender and my proposed project relates to the emergence of the transgender rights movement so my research agenda isn't a "great fit" with too many departments out there. In other words, I'm not an easy sell. But even though this application round has been soul-crushing thus far, I'm not giving up. As per the helpful advice of many of you, I'll look for research positions for the coming year, revise my writing sample, start contacting professors whose work interests me, and maybe even try to publish a paper or two (though first I have to write something of publishable quality!) Hugs to all my fellow applicants who have seen nothing but rejections thus far. We'll be ok!

Thank you for all your tips and advice, everyone. I've applied to five programs this year but it already looks like I've been rejected by three of them so I'm mentally preparing for the possibility that I might not get in anywhere. Those of you who have mentioned contacting departments you receive rejections from to ask about the basis for that decision, who in the department would you contact? The department chair, the department administrative assistant? Any advice would be greatly appreciated it.

Status1 Key: A: American; U: International, with US degree; I: International, without US degree; O: Other; ?: Unknown.

I feel your pain @nowayjose. I have applied to five schools and haven't heard from any of them yet. Keeping fingers crossed for all of us!

Do you think that's it for Harvard? Or is there any chance they might be contacting more people with acceptances tomorrow? It seems that in previous years all acceptances came on the same day (just judging from the results page here). Congrats to all those admitted!

Thank you for the info @goofylemon I did a master's at Yale, though not in Sociology, and met several PhD Sociology students there, all of whom were doing ethnographic research for their dissertations so it does seem Yale is a great place to do qualitative research (same for Poli Sci).

@goofylemon you mentioned that some departments have reputations for being on the qualitative side and some as heavily quantitative. Would you mind sharing which are which? I'm applying to a few programs this year and I can kind of gauge where most of the department is by looking at faculty interests but it'd be great to know more. I've been lurking on this forum for the past week or so. I was cool as a cucumber about the whole application process... until I discovered the grad cafe. I'm now checking the fora and the results page several times a day anxiously awaiting results, yikes. Good luck everyone!