rheya19

I'm so sorry to hear that.

Taylor Swift. Can anyone explain her popularity to me? (That's a rhetorical question, by the way. By no means should you engage a conversation with me about Taylor Swift.)

Recipe book

Crushing my old high score in Tetris!!

Spider Man

But the score distribution here on thegradcafe.com would only include whoever uses this website. And since I don't think there's any data showing if the users here represent all kinds of applicants in their actual proportions, it's still not likely to be a fair distribution. I agree with you though, that students should contact programs directly with their questions. Every school is a little bit different.

Spilling T

Sigh.

Did you apply to CJA?

I haven't gotten one for Xty and Judaism in Antiquity, but that just might mean they've already tossed my application out. Which area are you waiting for?

Vanishing act

One year a long time ago, there were penguins who didn't wear hats when swimming. This made their mothers livid. "Unacceptable!" Frightened, they screamed, "Bears!" Nobody seemed convinced so instead of going swimming they tried juggling. Their mothers tried everything they thought would teach her a skill. However, she couldn't even make oatmeal without disastrous results. So, the penguins gathered money (obviously) trying to purchase a bear. Towering over them, a grizzly beast danced, devouring all bears with such ferocity that even God enjoyed it. Afterwards, God congratulated the penguins and applauded them. "You did it!" Suddenly, the grizzly beast started dancing vigorously. There was an acromantula nearby. It challenged the preconception that magical mushrooms were magical. Sparkling, the magical mushrooms were spreading throughout town. Nobody with pyromania thought grilled cheese would spontaneously erupt into nine identical squirrels! Nevertheless, the penguins elucidated the benefits of sparkling water from Iceland. Suddenly, Iceland exclaimed, "Enough!!! No more penguins. Kill all of the arcades on Monday because King Arthur suffered from sphenisciphobia." Tragically, everyone forgot lasers cure bug madness, meaning none of them stripped the violet beast of his powerful jaw bones. So while some arms spouted Kool-aid, others chopped nuts. This phenomenon halted commerce. Together twenty-five yellow dragons danced sporadically inebriating all anger gods, while academics drank champagne profusely. Who

Now I'm going to be checking this schedule against the time 40 times a day.

Also remember that the professors you're talking to are human beings, too. They know you're nervous and under a lot of pressure. They've probably had friends in their lives who have had similar problems. Any decent professor won't hold that against you (why would they?). They're going to just consider your research interests and how they fit into the program.

Try to get a sense of the departments' culture, too. Talk to current students there. Is funding ever a problem? How competitive is it amongst students or faculty? Do people there collaborate well? Do people have lives and interests outside of school? Remember, you're going to be working closely with the people at one of those two schools for several years. Make sure you'll be happy there, or at least not overly miserable (after all, grad school isn't a walk in the park.)

My husband is a military chaplain. He said that in the military they require two years of "experience," but not CPE specifically. What kind of chaplaincy are you considering?

The negatives are giving people another thing to obsess over, when they are already stressed out as it is. And although you only see verbal scores between 163-170 on this site, it seems like people with lower scores would be less likely to be posting them, so what you're seeing isn't a fair distribution. PLUS there are many, many applicants who probably never visit this website, so there's no way of knowing if posting scores here would give you a clear outlook on the applicant pool as a whole. Only more to compare yourself to and feel nervous about. IMHO

My husband is staying in Illinois for another year to finish his PhD while I start my first year of my PhD. (We pretty much knew when he started that I would do mine when he was done with his.) Then he has a year-long internship. We're hoping he can find an internship near me, but if not, then that will be another year apart. I'm not worried about the first year (9 months, really) apart, but if we're apart for two years (two very important, busy years,) I worry that we could grow apart. But, as friends have reminded me, at least we're cognizant of the complications and stressors involved. I think since we're very committed to our relationship and supportive of one another's goals, we can do this. It will take extra work communicating and finding quality time (weekends, face time, etc) to stay connected. And to be honest, the happiest, longest lasting couples I've known have allowed one another to have their own lives too. Your relationship can't be everything. It's not fair for either of you. Anyway, I might be rambling now. It seems like a lot of people here are saying you can do it and succeed. I'm hopeful.

I applied to 10 schools, and I've heard back from 0. 0. 0. Ze-ro. On the outside, I look very placid, but on the inside I'm rage screaming about 18 out of the 24 hours of the day. I'm afraid of rejection emails. I'm afraid of interview emails (new anxiety!!). I know some people don't even hear back until late March, early April. I don't think I can go that long. Thank God for thegradcafe. None of my friends are in the middle of this, so they try to be understanding but don't really get it. Most of graduate school, from application to prelims, is just a long, long hazing process.

I've also been terrified thinking about interviews, but then I remembered the advice a friend gave me when writing my SoPs. I think it could serve useful when interviewing, too. How to apply.tiff

Ugh, I have a a self-deprecating sense of humor that in emails doesn't always come across and just makes me look bad. As a result I have to ok certain emails with my friends or husband before sending, because I would do the exact same thing.

One thing I'm seeing as I read through the forum, is how much easier this process is at my age than it would have been in my early to mid 20s. Yes, I'm stressed out about the process, but I also have enough life experience to know that this PhD thing isn't me, it's something I want to do. When I see how some other applicants are personally invested in "being an academic," it makes me want to give them a hug and tell them to work a few years and come back when they've learned a little bit more about what makes them happy. I hear what people say about starting a career path in your 40s. That it can be detrimental to your career (maybe.) But locking yourself into a career path by mean of a PhD when you haven't had a chance to experience much else can be detrimental to your sense of self. I'm not trying to be patronizing, but I'm wondering if other people in this thread get what I'm trying to say.

Early Christian art! I applied to some religious studies programs, and a couple art history ones, but all the programs I applied to are highly interdisciplinary.

YAY!! Congratulations! That's a great school!

I have one other cringe-worthy story. In my application to IUB, at one point in the statement I called it the "University of Indiana." I was concurrently working on the University of Iowa's and University of Texas-Austin's applications, so I got mixed up. Hopefully they won't transfer my application directly to the trash.