cokitty

ok i'm sorry 

yea, leggings are probably bad idea. if you want guys like me to take you seriously, definitely dress conservatively. otherwise, we'll be like "oh hi there.. how ar- beeewwwwbs"

all i saw was "busty"
 

This is my tattoo and my cat.... love them both

I've heard tales of people (in this field) being accepted at the last minute because the department didn't get the applicant(s) it wanted at first. I guess some schools don't really notify you that you're on the wait list.
I don't know if that falls under the "hold on to hope" category, but strength and honor nonetheless! My advice: get ready to make up your mind in a hurry, should any of the schools contact you. They're not likely to woo you much if it's late in the game.

So it's now the beginning of March and I have yet to hear from 4 programs (UCLA, UIUC, U Southern California, and Northwestern).  Is it game over or should I still hold on to hope?  I'm feeling pretty hopeless right now like I'm being shut out this cycle.  Allegedly UCLA has sent out admissions (not confirmed but allegedly) and Northwestern has 1 result on the gradcafe results page but no results posted from UIUC, UCLA, or USC.

The sites are probably not updated realtime, so it isn't worth the effort and added stress to check them more than twice per day. That said, I still look several times a day.

I love this and I feel this! I just got rejected from UOregon's Anthro program. That's 2/6 rejections so far (rest are pending). I supposedly had the strongest apps for the two schools I've gotten the No from, so I think, unfortunately and realistically, that I won't get in anywhere else. I'm definitely bummed, but I'm trying to look on the bright side: I can have a puppy now, do yoga, plant a garden, read for FUN-- who knows! A 9-5 job for a while might be just what I need right now. I feel really burnt out as I start this final semester of college. I think this is a blessing in disguise. The hardest part might be telling my Rec letter writers that I didn't get in (anywhere..). It's embarrassing! How are you all coping with this? What are your plans? I'd like lastly to note that I will be moving to Oregon and looking for jobs there..just because I can. Young, childless, degree-holding, and with a positive attitude: things could be worse?

Yale, Harvard, Columbia, Berkeley. Sounds like I may be out of luck on Berkeley, though.Their program certainly did strike me as the most difficult to get into.
 
But yeah, I have no idea how many applications these programs get, nor do I have any sense of what it takes to get in. It's difficult information to find for either specific programs, or even the field of Slavic studies in general.

We are in the same boat, then. My program (Anthro) is 'supposed' to have a feb/march notification window, but I've received swift rejections. Definitely sharing the same concern about interview invites right now :/

Hi! I just heard back from the first two of 6 programs I applied to...rejected to both! I have the same concern as you... if I haven't heard back from other schools- is that a rejection too? I heard some people got interview invites to Berkeley today.. :/ 

You always know what's up, Fuzzy.  Thanks for all of your contributions to the forums here.  

These UC diversity statements are there to identify students who might qualify for special scholarships; it's not even entirely clear that they are read by the departments. At least when I was looking into this, the programs I was applying to said it wasn't an important component in the decision. I can't promise you that that's also true in your case, but I do think it's safe to think that this is one of the less important documents, so don't stress about it too much (but of course you should still aim to write a good statement, just don't worry about your entire future resting on this, because it really doesn't). 

Try giving it to a trusted professor to read. If that's not possible, give it to a friend or two. There is always a danger that tone doesn't come across as you hope when it's in writing, and you don't want to alienate people because of that. For the same reason, I always advise against having jokes in your statements. They are rarely as successful as you might think. I would personally tone it down, or at least pay very close attention to what your readers are telling you about how successful the language is. If anyone expresses any doubt, take that as a reason to be careful. 

Masking race/gender addresses some issues of unconscious bias by the evaluator. Some schools go with this route, at least for the initial screening of applications. This works well at the graduate school level, however, it won't really work as well later on (e.g. postdoc and faculty hires). Most of these positions require detailed information about your research that will reveal your identity.
Also, masking these factors at the time of application doesn't change the fact that one person's lived experience is different than another based on their race, gender, socioeconomic class etc. One example: you have two students and a standard application form that asks for a few stats. Student A has a 3.7 GPA and volunteered in a lab for 10 hours per week during their senior year. Student B has a 3.7 GPA but no research experience. With this information only, you might want to choose Student A over Student B. However, if you ask for more information, you may find out that Student A was get some scholarships from their private high school to fund their university education and had the time and money to volunteer in the lab. Student B, however, needed to work during university to pay for tuition so they didn't have time to volunteer in the lab. They also showed that they applied for undergrad research grants (so they could be a paid researcher) but were not successful, demonstrating they were interested in this pathway. Now, how would you evaluate them? I think it would be unfair to not also consider the background of each student and recognizing that some people have more opportunities than others. 
In my opinion, grad schools shouldn't (and I know that many do not) simply evaluate students on how large their list of achievements are. Instead, schools are looking for certain areas of excellence in academic achievement, research experience, and character traits. This is why it's important to ask applicants for more information and to get the full picture. 
Finally, it is not impossible to suppress implicit bias. In fact, discussing that these biases exist and bringing them to the forefront along with strategies that remove ambiguity in the definition of a "qualification" can reduce the negative effects (e.g. [1], [2]). In my single experience on a hiring/search committee (for a Graduate Dean, not a faculty position), we spent the first 2 meetings with an HR person defining exactly what criteria we will use to evaluate candidates and which factors we will consider before even looking at a single application. I think this helped us a lot.

This has been my experience as well. My department has an almost weekly happy hour frequented by grad students and faculty. Some people talk about random things (sports, news, etc.), others talk about teaching, others about research. I've found that in some of these small conversations I've gotten great ideas or insights into my research that I hadn't gotten otherwise. Sometimes just being asked to give the 30 second version of your research can force you into thinking about it in a different way or allow someone else to say something you hadn't thought of. Without those conversations, my work would definitely suffer.
 
And yea, I'm one of those people who can't work all the time. Back when I did my comprehensive exams (which were multiple questions over like 10 days), I remember people in my department (mostly those not yet at the exams stage) being surprised that I was still attending the class I was TAing (I was mostly grading but went to every single lecture), working out, and even watching an episode or two of a TV show online. But you know what? You can't work for 16 hours a day for the 10 days without a break. And really, since I was limited to like 25 pages double-spaced per answer, I would've ended up writing way more than I needed if I'd worked that long. Instead, I rode my bike to the gym, worked out with friends (including some who had PhDs and thus totally understood what comps were and why you might need a break), cooked myself real food, etc. It's about knowing what you need to work efficiently and be productive and taking the time to do whatever that is.
 
Back to the original question though:
- Be open and willing to learn.
- If you're in the humanities or social sciences, take the time to just browse the library shelves in your general field and in your intended research area to get an idea of what's been published and what research resources are available to you. (Even better, meet with a librarian early on to make sure you know what your school has and the support s/he can give you.)
- Skim through recent journal issues in your field to get a sense of what topics are current and which are becoming dated. Pay attention to book reviews if there are any and use those to help you find relevant books for your discipline and research area.
- Learn to use reference management software (EndNote, Zotero, Mendeley, etc.) and start keeping track of your references that way.
- Figure out an easy to use system for staying abreast of current/new research in both books and journals that may be of interest.
- Read your graduate handbook (and TA handbook if needed) so you know what is expected of you. Ask questions if expectations are unclear.
- Start figuring out what, if any, courses outside the department you might want to take, how often they're offered, how difficult they are, etc.
- If you're going to need research methods training, figure out how to get that ASAP. In the social sciences, this often means taking courses in qualitative methods, statistics, and/or GIS and seats in those classes can fill because they're attracting students from an array of disciplines. Getting your methods coursework done means you can start collecting data sooner.
- Get to know whomever helps oversee grant apps (NIH, NSF, SSRC, Fulbright, IAF, etc.) at your institution and ask them what you can do beginning now to prepare to apply in the future, when you should be applying, what you'll need to be competitive, etc. And, while you're there, get them to help you set up some alerts for grant announcements.
 
There's probably more you could do, especially related to conferences and networking, but I don't want to overload anyone with suggestions.

Oh I do hope you do not intend to pursue an academic career. Life gets significantly more difficult after you graduate. There are fewer jobs than PhD graduates so getting that postdoc won't be easy, not to mention that first TT job. And once you're on the TT, it's publish or perish (and teaching and service) for 7 years until you're up for tenure. Maybe then you could start having a life, assuming you're not particularly rushed to get that Full Professor rank?  Assuming you're one of the truly lucky ones who gets the perfect job straight out of school and can fast-track the TT, we're looking at a minimum of 10 years of everything on hold. If you're one of us mere mortals, you're probably looking at closer to 15 years of school-postdoc-TT job celibacy. I don't know about you, but I value the rest of my life just as much as my career. Being successful but completely alone for over a decade does not sound appealing at all. You need to start learning how to have a full and balanced life now, because it will not get easier later. 

Indiana seems to have been bolstering the translation side of their program in the last few years.