Monody
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Posts posted by Monody
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4 hours ago, swanblack said:
Has anyone ever faced a dilemma where one had to meet the deadline while his/her statement of purpose was not ready or had typos? Or may be one applied but in a day or two after the deadline, one got a better version of SOP. My suspicion is that Universities don't accept revised SOPs/CVs/Writing samples etc post the deadlines. But what if one has to send one and make sure it reaches the admission committee as well. Is there anyway one can do that or simply the answer is no, and not worth the effort?
I realized that a word was missing in one of my statements and that was before the deadline, but I don't think that they accept revisions especially after the deadline simply because they initiate the process of preparing all the files for the committee and it may be somewhat unfair to all other applicants if they were to allow you to revise it again.
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I would also add that one of my writers directly told me that he writes the letters when they are due and as long as the person is sufficiently trustworthy to actually do this I wouldn't worry about it. Especially because late letters do not seem to be an actual issue for most schools.
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23 minutes ago, dagnabbit said:
All of the programs I applied to require that applicants send official scores as soon as they've completed the test, but they will begin reviewing one's application with the unofficial scores if the official ones have not arrived yet. I have never heard of a situation in which a school did not require official GRE scores until after admission, though this is common with transcripts.
The thing that really bothered (and annoyed) me about the transcripts was that Stanford requires you to send them two physical copies of your transcripts which didn't only cost me 15€ to send but also took away 2 of the three official transcripts I received from my exam office.
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2 hours ago, correlatesoftheory said:
Literally all of my apps except one asked for unofficial GRE scores.
Where did you apply? All of mine asked for official scores. :/
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1 hour ago, CarefreeWritingsontheWall said:
As an international student, I lose 14% of my fellowship to taxes. I have it set up that it's automatically deducted so that I won't have to pay when I file at the end of the year, though income earned as an RA/wages is exempt due to a tax treaty between my home country and the US. https://smartasset.com/taxes/income-taxes is a great website that can give you a sense of how much you will lose depending on where you attend. http://www.phdstipends.com/results can also give you a sense of how livable stipends are, and if there is variation in the packages offered from a given program (some do, some don't offer different things to different people).
re: committees meeting to review: I suspect those on committees will start reading applications after the deadline, but most won't formally meet until January, or later depending on when the fall term formally ends for them. Most have just finished meeting to determine job offers for the hiring cycle.
Thanks a lot. I hoped that it would be something in this range, even though I am personally somewhat perplexed that stipends are being taxed in the US since this is not usually the case in Germany.
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20 minutes ago, amripley said:
Can't speak to the US, but in Canada, any portion of the stipend that comes from regular wages (TA ships, etc) will be taxed (albeit at a very low rate), while fellowships/scholarships/bursaries are not taxed. For holders of really big awards, this is a huge boon. A $20,000+ SSHRC award would put most people up a tax bracket or two, so not having that count toward your total is definitely nice. Either way, the fact that tuition, ancillary fees, and textbooks are all (partially) tax deductible means that most graduate students will be getting their payroll tax back -- and then some.
Alright. Thanks.
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Something Ive recently been interested - and maybe some of those who are currently in grad school can shine some light on it - is the taxable status of the stipends. What is the average range of tax in percentages you pay on your stipend and how much do you pay if are an international student since there are some tax treaties which apparently have to be considered. Thanks.
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5 minutes ago, Yanaka said:
It's funny how all these lists go from reassuring to dream killing
I'm also an "international" applicant @Monody (US citizen graduating from a French BA), and many points are impossible for me to evaluate, such as the grad-level courses to excel at and the independent studies. Let's stay calm. haha!
Caaaaaalm...
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3 minutes ago, dagnabbit said:
@PoliticalOrder - This is a good post, but my point in responding to Yanaka was to encourage them not to freak out over their applications. I don't think that providing such a list on December 1st is going to do more than further stress out qualified applicants like @Monody, as it's a bit late to change most parts of our applications.
I was stressed out already. Doesn't change my status.
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41 minutes ago, PoliticalOrder said:
Listen, there is a myth on this board (and other venues) that stats are an incredibly important measure of success. Yet, one just has to look at the evidence to say that is not the case.
1) Go through past year's results and you will see plenty of applicants who got in to top programs with 'average' stats.
2) There are some universities that have average GPA/GRE scores available (especially public ones) and what you will see is the average GRE Q score (something that is heavily emphasized on this board) is somewhere from 158-163 for even the best programs. That means that half of the applicants getting accepted have scores worse than that or at least very close.
3) Stats are noisy, ESPECIALLY the GPA. No one knows what GPA really means across institutions, and there isn't much of a discernible difference between a 3.6 or a 3.7 or a 3.8 in the grand scheme of things. Furthermore, there isn't really that much of a difference between a 161 Q vs. a 159 Q; it is a matter of getting a couple of more questions right and people who sit on committees know this.
4) Once you meet certain cutoffs, stats become essentially meaningless.
With that being said, they do matter sure. But they won't get you accepted. Ideally you want a 3.6+ GPA, and a 160/160+ GRE (or close to these cutoffs) and you'll be fine wherever you apply.
What is going to get you actually accepted to a program? Many things (no particular order):
1) (to address ResDQ) letters are important. Letters from people committee members know are likely to be read more closely. But you need strong letters...and by strong letters that means you have to establish relationships early and deeply with professors. Working 1 on 1 in some capacity with professors is a must for every letter you submit.
2) Overall trajectory...applying straight from undergrad is fine, but those who have a masters and show clear progress are likely to be perceived as lower risk. For undergrads, taking advanced courses and/or graduate courses and excelling in them matters. Taking independent studies matters. Doing theses matters. Attending conferences matters.
3) Research experience. If you have multiple months of RA experience, you definitely have a leg up compared to those who don't (and this will also show in your letters).
4) Quant background. You aren't expected to have double majors/math minors or anything. But having an intro to probability and stats as well as differential and integral calculus gives you a leg up; even more if you do things like linear algebra and real analysis, ect. Bonus points for somehow getting a grad quant sequence under your belt.
5) SOP. Matters a lot. Be professional, show that you know what you are doing. Clear proposal that is different from established literature and has interesting questions. Show that you have multiple of people to work with and they aren't just people you read off the faculty list.
6) Writing sample. Matters as well. This shows that you are actually capable of doing graduate level work, making a puzzle, and surveying the literature; something a lot of undergrads have trouble doing well.
Those 6 things get you accepted to programs. Lots of people have perfectly fine or stellar stats...getting this is not challenging. Showing committees that you can excel as a graduate student in political science and knowing what you are doing is done by extremely careful attention to those latter 6 things.
Thanks. Will look for more Master programs now. Every time, I read these lists that are probably rather accurate of what's going on I feel ever more screwed considering that point
1) (much more loose connection to professors, no actual office hours to get to know them, no research or teaching assistantship, little knowledge of the system in the US and the letter requirements, no recognition on the other side of the pond),
2) (usually no option to take advanced courses, courses in other areas or independent study),
3)(see 1)), and
4)(see 2, OLS, ML, factor analysis but nothing beyond that; currently doing an exchange semester where I sneakily asked myself into the econ department and am now doing econometrics 1 and 2, econometric policy analysis, and analysis of panel data, but nothing of that will be completed before the applications are being reviewed)
are quite difficult to handle as an international student. Further, I had probability, calculus, and linear algebra courses in school in Germany, but I doubt that this is considered.
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1 minute ago, angel_kaye13 said:
Try not to worry too much. This is the most stressful thing, I know, but...in retrospect, you'll do well, or you'll find something better. I am sure you are doing your best, and what more could you do? Best wishes for your success!!
I know I shouldn't. Everything is going fine, the writers submitted the letters yesterday, and neither the SoP nor the writing sample is terrible and the grades/GRE and such are great. I just continue to realize all the possible improvement I could have made to increase the admittance change by a few decimal points. I recently changed the SoP and writing sample for Columbia and will do the the same for Princeton and MIT on the weekend. Maybe I should rather look forward until mid-January when I really can't change anything anymore.
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I am uncertain. I thought about thanking them before the results, so rather soonish as a gesture that I value their help irregardless of the outcome. On the other hand, this may come across as weird. I will probably wait until Ive got a response and then thank them with a small gift or whatever also irregardless of the outcome.
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Well, I just submitted a safety application to the MACIS program at the ETH Zurich which probably doesn't improve the whole situation as I am now also worrying about the possible failure of an additional application. February/March really can't come soon enough.
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The thing is that the writing sample isn't the article I am trying to get published, but I see your point. I am probably much too nervous about all this and am also constantly reevaluating the writing sample I submitted as well as the SOPs that I can't change anymore. :/
Anyway, for the universities where I can still swap out documents I just added the article under "Working papers" with a link to my Google Drive and mentioned it in the SOP.
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Indeed. Sorry. Do you think that it is worthwhile and understandable to bother them with this?
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6 minutes ago, CarefreeWritingsontheWall said:
Oh yeah. As soon as submissions are made, people on the admissions committee can start reviewing materials (same goes with job applications in academia). It likely means that someone opened your file but I wouldn't read too much into it. The under review status tends to pop up rather quickly and for most schools will stay that way until they issue their decisions in February/March. It could also be an automated thing (so I wouldn't stress).
When it comes to notifying people, I wouldn't. It's unclear who is on an admissions committee in a given year (as professors rotate off and on). The most relevant person to contact is either the school's DGS or the graduate program coordinator if you wanted to edit something, or add something but they're busy people (some applications specify who you should contact if you need to correct something). My understanding is that they prefer to only add things to files if it's a grave mistake, or something crucial was missing (like an entire page from a document) as well. Trust that your application will be reviewed well and that your writing sample will speak for itself.
You've put a lot of work into this.
I meant the journal submission actually.
It jumped from awaiting editor decision to the phrase mentioned above, so I overcame the possible desk rejection (yeah!). I didn't mention it on four of the seven application and it may give them a boost. I thought about contacting the secretary who is responsible for the administrative stuff of the submission and sending her directly an updated copy of my CV.
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1 minute ago, GradNYC said:
Hey everyone--- any advice for older applicants applying without a traditional academic writing sample. Is it ok to submit a public policy report i written for work?
This is certainly not the best answer you will get, but I think that it is less applicable as long as it has not clear research-oriented component and remains wholly descriptive. In this case, an older paper in which you actually "do research" would probably be better.
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On 11/5/2016 at 5:41 AM, CarefreeWritingsontheWall said:
My CV was 1 and 3/4 pages. I modeled it after academic CVs published by professors, though I added details for a number of my positions and experiences since they weren't clear (I was held multiple RAships at once during my MA, doing different things etc.)
Also - when it comes to journal submissions, I honestly wouldn't include it. It would be false to say it's under review unless you're notified that you've made it to that stage - and notifications that you've gotten past the desk-reject stage can take 3-6 months for some political science journals. Even if it's under review, it can still be rejected, or you could enter the R&R stage. Saying something is under review implies it's been accepted. Personally, I wouldn't list it as more than a working paper until it's been accepted and is formally under review for publication purposes and you've received the green light. I think this is absolutely fair -- most academics have a works in progress section on their CV and/or website. If you intend to try and publish something you've written, but are still working on, having this kind of section really doesn't hurt so long as its brief and your titles offer detail as to the contents.
So, Ive just checked the status of my submission now says "Awaiting reviewer scores". I would wildly suppose that this indicates that it is indeed under review, doesn't it?
edit: And on a related note: Does it make any sense to contact the admission offices regarding the "under review" publication as it isnt reflected in any of the documents I sent to Stanford, Duke, NYU or Penn, because I can't change the submitted documents anymore.
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Same situation?
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With the first deadline approaching (2nd of December), one of my LoR writers hasn't started yet. I am currently doing in an exchange year and she hasn't responded to my emails in the last two months, even though she said that she would write the LoRs in the next few weeks after I had have sent her all the material nine weeks ago. Should I send her an additional email asking if everything is alright with the letters or should I wait maybe until next Monday? I already contacted her secretary asking whether the letter writer is sick or something similar but she hasn't responded either.
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I applied to Princeton, Columbia, PennState, MIT, Duke, Stanford and NYU and I obviously would take any offer as long as it is coupled with funding. I also applied to the MACIS program at the ETH Zurich just in case and will then apply again in two years if I am unsuccessful this time with my PhD applications.
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What about posting our profiles to jointly feel miserable about our different weaknesses?
Welcome to the 2016-17 cycle!
in Political Science Forum
Posted
I can second this. While I am anxious about February, Ive so much work to do that it only creeps into my conscious rather rarely, like twice a day. I am preparing for exams in January (that I don't need) and Ive two papers I am working on and am currently trying to figure out which of the underlying files changed so that Ive now 15000 observations less than in the original run. Recently, I also decided to get my Math up to speed again and am working through an undergraduate calculus textbook when I can't read anymore as I find it rather relaxing to do some exercises. And of course, for the evenings there is always Wooldrige 2010.