AnonymousMonad

Rejected from B. Ha! I've accepted C! The dilemma clearly turned out not to matter.

Rejected from A. That does make decision-making easier, right?

Got a rejection from UCSD's waitlist.

Good points! Another friend of mine who is in graduate school drew attention to the bit about student loans. I hadn't thought about that. Yes, I do have some loans and it was pointed out to me that I could pay off those loans at B and perhaps take a good bite out of them at C—whereas that would be impossible at A. I don't think program C would be bad for mentorship. The profs I'm interested in working with are older and are purportedly a bit out of touch with the job market. They also have big reputations as far as publishing good philosophy (that's probably why the school has higher rankings)—but I've heard no independent praise about how they are as teachers and mentors. Whereas I've heard independent praise about the mentorship of the people I'd be working with at programs A and B, especially A. I think B will be my top choice, unless A makes a competitive offer rather than the projected one. It's worth pointing out that I'd be happy to go to any of these places. It's important to bear that in mind on this intense day.

I'm only holding on to one offer right now. But I can imagine a scenario in which someone might have good reason to hold on to multiple offers. For example, if School A is trying to match or beat School B's offer, and School A's success would be decisive. I don't know if that happens this late. But it happens.

Wouldn't "prior to April 15" strictly speaking mean "April 14th or earlier"?

Might be worth telling the west coast school that you have an offer you have to accept by 4ET/1PT? Maybe tell them in the guise of asking what they would advise you to do. But I've no experience with this. Just making up stuff as I go. I know one of the places I'm waitlisted at gave their prospectives with offers until 4:30 ET. Which is great for me. The one offer I'm holding on to gave me no such deadline, but just as soon as I know, before the end of the day.

I'm waitlisted at two schools, schools A & B—both of which I think would be better fits for me. Facultywise, A would be potentially fantastic for me, and I've been told that the department is very functional and people are very happy there—though, unfortunately I wasn't able to visit A. I've an offer at a really good school (C) in a pretty inexpensive midwestish city, with fantastic funding. Rankingwise C is a top 10, but I get the sense that the mentorship wouldn't be as good as either of the other two, which are top 30 but not top 15; I take these with a grain of salt. I've visited too and I like the city. If I get an offer from B, I'm likely to take it over C. Not sure about A though. All financial things being equal, I'd probably (??? not clearly though ) choose A. I got a preview of what A's & B's offers would likely look like if I get an offer off the waitlist today. I'm not yet sure what I'd do if I get an offer from A. It seems like a great fit, but the living stipend is a little over 20% less than C and 33% less than B. That in itself isn't a deal breaker for me, it's that in conjunction with the fact that A is in California which is much much more expensive than the other two. But I'm wondering if this shouldn't even be a deciding factor for me if I thought that school A would be the better fit—should financial considerations for fully funded programs only be a consideration as a tie breaker? I've no attachments or family to support or significant others to visit. What has been your approach to choosing? Have you tried to turn a blind eye to the finances?

So what're the late visit days that'll be finished today? For some reason my impression was that Harvard, Stanford, and UCSD had late visit days, I think through today? Is that right? Are there others?

I'm wondering, is this sort of offer common as time is running out? I'm holding on to just one of my offers while I am wait listed at two schools, both of which I'd prefer to the school where I have an offer—all other things (i.e. funding) being roughly equal. But all other things (i.e. funding) being equal, I'd prefer one of those schools at which I'm wait listed over the other... but I'm not sure what I'd do if I got this sort of offer from the school I prefer less. so, all things being roughly equal: 1st choice (waitlisted), 2nd choice (waitlisted), 3rd choice (offer) What to do if I get a "here is an offer if you're in the position to accept" from 2nd choice before hearing anything from 1st choice? ? Here's to hoping that doesn't happen. Though at the end of the day it's important to bear in mind that I'd be glad to go to any of the three places.

Pittsburgh's philosophy department probably does. But her spouse is in sociology not philosophy. I think the move from Duke to Pittsburgh would be a significant move down for him, as Duke is quite good and far superior to Pitt for sociology. Even if Pitt is better than UNC for philosophy (contestable), it's not that better. Of course, there might be other factors (e.g. perhaps he is a trailing spouse, or they really like Pittsburgh, etc...).

I find it unlikely that she'd go given that her partner is a professor at Duke which is quite close to UNC.

Kant mainly, but also Leibniz and German Idealism more broadly. Kant / Kierkegaard at Cornell.

After a few days of tough deliberation, I just declined UC-Irvine and OSU. That means I've declined all my actual offers except for Pittsburgh. However, I am still waitlisted at UCSD and Cornell and I will wait those out before accepting Pitts' offer. That means that if I do turn down Pitt, it's likely that it won't be until very close to April 15. But I've done my best to make a decision on the options I do have in a timely manner. Best of luck, everyone!

I took three semesters of German as an undergraduate. Still can't read philosophy in German (haven't done any German in a year) but I have the basic foundation to build off of. I'm planning on working through April Wilson's German Quickly book this summer. I'm pretty poor with languages though (my work ethic could be better in this area too); I know some philosophers who have taught themselves German. But I think that, in general, the language learning infrastructure (in America) is terrible. We are required generally to take a few semesters of language classes in college and high school. But why so late? Isn't the best time to learn languages when we are in elementary school? And, when we do take language classes in college they are 4 days a week for an hour a day. Obviously that's not the most efficient way to learn a language. Seems like the best way to learn a language would be to live immersed in it for a few weeks—I imagine 8 weeks of German immersion (where you can't use English) in the summer would be more beneficial than 3 semesters of German classes. The problem, of course, is that the immersion style programs are so rare and expensive. I got accepted into Middlebury's language school for the summer (by the way, they have other languages as well), with a grant that covers half the tuition, but I still don't have quite enough to go. But that does seem to be the most efficient way to learn. Would be interested in hearing others' experiences. Edit: One other thing. They say, in philosophy only reading knowledge is important. It's true that reading knowledge in German, for example, is a must if you're doing Kant. I'm skeptical that it's all that helpful to divorce language-for-reading from language-for-living. So yeah, I bet there are a lot of philosophers that can read, say, Kant in his original language, but couldn't speak or live in a German environment. But I'm just skeptical that their reading of German is really authentic when it's divorced from knowledge of living in German. But maybe I'm making a lot of unwarranted language assumptions. Would be interested in hearing others' views on this.

Hi, I'm hoping someone can help me get a picture of the cost of living in Irvine. I'm trying to compare it to Pittsburgh, PA and Columbus, OH. On the numbers, UCI is my best offer. But I don't know if it's that good relative to the cost of living. I'm trying to compare my funding from UCI to these other two schools. I've been consulting those 'cost of living' calculators (e.g. http://www.bestplaces.net/cost-of-living/ ) and I enter in a figure for my stipend in Columbus and enter in Irvine as the comparison city, and then the site calculates to see what a comparable salary would be based on the cost of living. I noticed that what's really jacking up the price is the housing (682% increase apparently) — but I'll have graduate housing at UCI... (I can live alone for I think $1100/mo or with roommates for $650/mo at UCI; by contrast, in Columbus I can live alone for $650/mo, or with roommates for $400/mo) so the housing won't be as big of a factor in my case... Maybe I can communicate what I'm curious about more directly. On average, over 5 years, my UCI stipend is 49% more than OSU and 17% more than Pitt. Do you think the cost of living significantly offsets the larger living stipend? (Also, if I went to Irvine, I'd like to get a car. I wouldn't get a car in Columbus or Pittsburgh.)

Not having visited anywhere, Cornell would probably be my top choice but, restricted to my actual offers, my top choice would probably be Pittsburgh. But my view might change after my visits which is why I'm not going to eliminate any more choices until after I visit (before the end of March!).

Declined Simon Fraser and Loyola Chicago. Removed myself from Notre Dame's and Johns Hopkins' wait lists. Will decline 2 of the following by the end up the month after I've visited: UC-Irvine, OSU, and Pittsburgh. Trying to keep things moving for those of us on wait lists. I'm waitlisted at UCSD and Cornell and will wait to hear back from them. My main AOI is Kant's theoretical philosophy and Leibniz. Best of luck to everyone!

I know at least one person who is on the WL at Pitt and is still visiting.