AsymptoticallyUnbiased

PROFILE: Type of Undergrad Institution: Large, high-rank R1 State school Major(s)/Minor(s): Political Science major, statistics minor Undergrad GPA: 3.74 Type of Grad: N/A Grad GPA: N/A GRE: V168 Q162 AWA 4.5 Any Special Courses: One PhD-level course in survey/questionnaire design, two courses in the first year graduate student statistics sequence, plus Calc 2 and Calc 3 (the C in the former is the biggest mark on what was otherwise a good transcript) Letters of Recommendation: Four Tenured or TT Poli Sci faculty, three of which I served as research assistants for at some point, each worked in different subfields (CP, IR, and AP). One is the DGS for my school. Alternated between sending the CP letter and a different AP professor who I didn't do research for but was personally close to and who I often talked about research with, always sent the letter of the DGS and my thesis advisor. Research Experience: RA'd for four different professors, first projects involved literature review work for two of them, one of which was a big name but rarely got to talk to or get close to and because the work I did was relatively insignificant and because we fell out of touch never asked for a LOR. Third project involved a lot of tracking down of replication data files and R coding for visualizing dozens of results. Fourth project involved interviewing a couple dozen subjects, ended up writing a portion of the final paper and receiving a co-authorship on a conference paper we presented at MPSA 2016, we weren't able to get it published but was able to put a (Under Review) paper on my CV during application process. Did a senior thesis on MTurk survey data that I presented at a poster session at PolMeth 2016. Worked as an editor for an undergraduate research journal. Teaching Experience: TA'd for one of the professors that I RA'd for. Subfield/Research Interests: AP (public opinion, information effects, machine learning) Other: Did an internship during 2016 summer at a news organization that had some "cool" factor RESULTS: Acceptances ($$ or no $$): UC Berkeley ($$), Chicago ($$), Yale ($$) Waitlists: Princeton Rejections: Michigan, Stanford, Stanford GSB, Harvard Pending: N/A Going to: Not sure yet, going to come down to campus visits because having chemistry with my advisors and cohort is the highest priority for me, I definitely draw a lot of motivational energy from other passionate and energetic people. LESSONS LEARNED: - I wish I had polished my thesis/writing sample far more than I had. It makes sense for it to be not fully polished during the first months of my senior year during application season, but what I submitted was essentially a first draft and it certainly wasn't my best work, I just felt like it was better to send a research article-like piece of writing rather than what would have been a more polished piece of writing but what would've just been an obvious term paper. I don't think I was wrong in that assumption, but I definitely could've spent less time procrastinating by formatting and reformatting my CV and polishing my writing sample. - I also think I spent far too much time in my SOP covering my qualifications rather than talking about what I wanted to research, why, and how. I do think I avoided most if not all of the "Kisses of Death" so often referenced, but I think I should've let my CV do the talking as far as qualifications go, and used my SOP to talk more about motivations and ideas. I'll admit that while I sought advice from my letter writers about writing my SOP, I never had them read it before I submitted my applications, which I think was a mistake. - Others have talked about this in the main admissions thread, but I found it interesting to notice how my preferences changed as admissions results rolled in. While I was applying I always had a mental tier list of where I most wanted to go, but that tier list changed quite a bit as the cycle went along, with one of the schools I considered to be dead last on my preference list currently being my favorite among the places I was accepted. - I was very fortunate to get early success during the cycle (Berkeley and Chicago were among the first to send out decisions) which made the rest of the cycle go easier, but despite that, it's still emotionally exhausting to get denied from a place you'd spent so many months fantasizing about attending (Stanford GSB and Harvard were my two top choices and I definitely spent an embarrassing amount of time stalking the faculty pages/websites of my fantasy advisors during the cycle) SOP: Rather not share my SOP because there's definitely some things that could easily identify me with a modicum of effort even if I redacted the names of people/institutions. 1st ¶: Stated my name, intended program and subfield, and my specific research interests. 2nd and 3rd ¶: Told a brief story about the juxtaposition between my experience at my media internship and presenting my research, how it motivated me to pursue grad school. 4th ¶: Summarized how my grad-level and quantitative coursework has prepared me for graduate study 5th and 6th¶: Talked about my RA experience. 7th ¶: Described my thesis research. 8th ¶: Described my TAing experience and my experience editing for an undergraduate research journal 9th ¶: Talked about the department and why I thought I was a good fit. On advice of my DGS letter writer I made sure that professors were not noted in alphabetical order to avoid appearance of simply scanning the faculty list. Each letter ended up being about 1100 words. Happy to answer any questions, would also love to get in contact with anyone visiting my accepted schools.

I could be wrong, I got the 26 number from PSR, hardly the most reputable source.

Last year's was 26. That pretty much exactly the matches the 4.4% drop in slots based on the GSAS funding decrease.

Oakeshott reported getting a form letter for his waitlist. Did your SO get one as well or a personal POI email? Wondering whether I should give up hope if I haven't heard anything.

Wow. I feel like it's almost a blessing that I discovered that page this late in the cycle. I'm positive that I'd be a 10x larger ball of anxiety if I knew about it earlier.

I've seen this kind of exchange a lot on this thread this cycle. Claim what Harvard acceptances? And who's trolling? Is there another site that people are checking for admission rumors?

EH was, JH was not. Gerber and Huber were other POIs for me, though I haven't heard from them (doubt I will, every other school has had the AdComm chair and one POI send emails)

Got accepted to Yale for AP. Visiting weekend is April 4-6. Heard from EH and JH.

I've heard this too but have know idea if it's just PSR being PSR. No idea where to get honest answers on this though.

Well, after thinking I got rejected from Yale due to the long silence after first confirmations, looks like I got accepted after all! Got an e-mail from my POI this evening. AP subfield. So there may be hope yet for those with procrastinating POIs

In the last 24 hours I've received rejections from Stanford, Stanford GSB, and Michigan and no acceptance from Yale with credible claims in the thread. Needless to say, my ego is well-bruised. Thank god it's the weekend. Only waiting on Harvard now. Not feeling optimistic given recent rejections so I'm pretty much calling this cycle a wrap for me. Overall I hoped and expected I would do better this cycle but I have offers in hand that I'm happy with so it's hard to feel too down in the dumps. Subfield: American Politics (Public Opinion) Stats: 162Q/168V 4.5 AWA, 3.74 GPA (Poli Sci major, Stats minor), co-authored paper under review Accepted: Berkeley (TBA), Chicago ($25k for 5 years) Wait-listed: Princeton Rejected: Stanford, Stanford GSB, Michigan, Yale Pending: Harvard

RSVPing for Berkeley today. Hope to see you there! Is there any etiquette for meeting other Grad Cafers? Would love to meet some of you all but not sure if people tend to prefer anonymity re: their account name.

+1, got a waitlist e-mail from them this afternoon. +1, just got an e-mail acceptance as well! Congrats to both of us! E-mail was phrased "chair of the admissions committee" [emphasis mine], looked at his faculty page and he isn't the DGS. In my case he is a POI but I get the impression from the wording that he chairs the committee that reviewed all applications. 1/8. 1/8. 0/8. so far! (using oakesott's signature notation, which I really like)