Bibica

The stipend is a minimum of $30,250 per year for 5 years. It does say that on my letter on the online app... Not sure about the unionization thing, hadn't heard of it. Probably a good topic to bring up during visiting days.

Ah I see. Guess I'll have to be a little more patient Hopefully they take us out of our collective misery soon.

@ralphwiththeconch Did you call to find out? Or were the joint program decisions just released early? I'm dying to know about Harvard here lol.

LOL, I had forgotten about the Camden Line. Have you considered living near a MARC train station? I know those cities/towns aren't too exciting, but it would be a cheaper alternative.

I think you don't need to pay nearly that much to live in Stanford, but you'll need to keep yourself on a tight budget. First, are they paying for healthcare? If so, the highest cost estimate $38000, should be decreased by about $5,000. Second, you will hopefully get some more money for summer support. Let's say that brings you to $30,000. Next, there's no reason why you should be spending more than $50/week on food for a single person. For 52 weeks, you'll be spending $2,600 for food a year, not $7,760. Even if you want to give yourself a $3,500 food budget, as long as you don't eat out much that is MORE than manageable. Rent is the largest expense. They have you at $16,440 a year (or $1,370 a month) for rent. It might be easier to find a place for less if you are willing to have roommates. Look on craigslist and network with current graduate students to see if you can find a room for $900 to $1200 a month. It won't be easy, but learning how to budget is crucial for life as a graduate student. EDIT: Do keep in mind that your stipend might be taxed. Talk to the financial aid office for information on that. California taxes are crazy high, relative to the rest of the US.

I don't know that it would be easy to live in Baltimore and commute to College Park. The MARC train is pretty accessible but costly. You'd have to live close to/take a bus to Penn Station every day. It would either take you to Union Station or New Carrolton. There is a bus from New Carrolton to UMD but at that point you're looking at quite a long commute. There is also a bus from Baltimore to UMD but it is ~2 hours long. Driving out of Baltimore during rush hour is super annoying. Could you live in the burbs outside DC? It would be MUCH cheaper to buy a house outside of the DC area/near College Park. Also, a lot of the areas you'd want to live in in Baltimore are pricey (at least to buy).

The letter on the website. It included funding, did it not? My first email from ad comm also included details on the funding package. I haven't received anything else about the visiting days but I'm sure it's funded. I did get info about diversity recruitment days (3/26-7) but won't be able to attend. That one offered a $400 travel voucher (they scheduled your travel) and put you with graduate students for that time.

@HermioneWannabe I know someone in AP who was rejected. It could be that no one who uses this site got an offer for AP? I only say that because I've already gotten my official letter and in previous years Yale sent those all out at once. However, visiting days are quite late (April 4-6) so they may have some stuff to sent out still? I'm not sure how likely that is.

@ralphwiththeconch Don't know that hanging in there is the right way to express it lol. My productivity this month has been pathetic! I wish I could say that I knew something about Harvard. Someone in the thread mentioned that decisions would come out early next week, so hopefully that is true for the joint program as well (I only applied to the PhD in Government). If someone wants to email their grad coordinator for information, and post that information on here, that would be a really nice thing to do, and very much appreciated.

@cydxb Thanks for letting me know! My interviewer only said "soon," but couldn't tell me exactly what soon meant lol. I was considering reaching out to him, since flights out of my area are really expensive and, if I wanted to visit, I'd have to book soon. But I don't want to be pushy, so I'll wait until Friday at least.

Congrats on the acceptance! Do you know when visiting days are for ND?

Any updates on ND? I interviewed with them almost 2 weeks ago, thought I would have heard back by now...especially since two people (I think it has been two?) have claimed acceptances.

@bgjoecool27 Yep, mine did as well.

Harvard probably won't be this week, and certainly wouldn't be today (university holiday). UPenn is starting to come out now. Friend just received her acceptance. @international_IR beat me to it, congrats!!!

I'd say no, they've accepted 2 people? From what I can see at least. I'd wait at least a few more days. Maybe by Wednesday or Thursday, if you don't hear back, I'd consider it a rejection.

Haha thanks for the advice, y'all. Don't worry, I don't feast on ramen and stress exclusively. Basically follow an 80/20 diet. Fruit and yogurt for breakfast, salad or a wrap or something for lunch, and usually lean meats, whole grains, and veggies for dinner. Ramen with egg + green onions is an occasional salty treat .

It's the 27th of March.

@GreenEyedTrombonist SAME! I recently changed the topic of my senior thesis (two months before it is due, whoops). I alluded to this fact when I last spoke with my adviser, but I wanted to have chapters 1 and 2 done at least before telling him in plain English. Hopefully he won't be too mad then if I give the appearance of being on track The effect of this, unfortunately, is that I have to stay behind during my school's short February break to work on this stupid paper, and have to watch my SO and friends go out to get tacos while I sit here with my paper and some sad ramen.

@Musick Fair enough, let's agree to disagree. I really like this thread and don't want it getting locked for something that doesn't matter to either of us

@Wongs, I don't know about the program specifically, and it would depend on how their waitlist works and how many people are ahead of you in it, but mid-tiered programs like GWU do tend to have a lot of movement in their waitlist. I do know that they accepted ~30 people this year, and then waitlisted or rejected the rest. I don't know how many of those 30 would have to decline before they moved on to the waitlist.

Nope, just so happens that I follow both of these threads, having commented on them before, and have been receiving more updates than usual today So I got curious as to what all the fuss was about. I did downvote one or two of your posts on the Best Rejections thread, because I thought you were being condescending. Your reaction on the results page was anonymous, so it isn't like you had to go around and find all these instances of it being mentioned and defend yourself. No one needed to know how the rejection affected you, specifically. I don't know about any of the other posts or online debates you've been in, and I'm sincerely sorry if you feel like you're being targeted, because this forum has been a huge source of solace for me, but if you're the common denominator in all this negativity then that should maybe signal something?

I think you're letting the light ribbing of the Best Rejection Reactions thread get to you too much. It doesn't really matter, and no one is telling you how to feel. We just personally think it is silly to badmouth a school that didn't let you in. But if you want to do that you can, just like we can make fun of a public reaction if we want to. Going to every single forum where it is mentioned to defend yourself does make it seem that you care a lot more about it than you led on in the results page. The fact is that you did come across as pretentious to many people. But again, it doesn't matter. Remember that for a lot of people, the school you applied to is their dream school and, especially if they did get in, they probably don't like someone shitting all over the program.

Wow @Bumblebea, how did you refrain from ripping his face off with your old-lady raptor claws? I would flip my lid.

@magicdonhuang and @mstama123 Not claiming the JHU offer, but a professor emailed me on Monday asking if I was still considering the school (so that he could advocate for me @ the adcom meeting). So it could be that they've met since then, and they're doing it earlier this year than previously.

SO got his Michigan offer. So they're coming out now.