PHNutr

Ah!! This is such great news! Huge congrats - so happy for you!

I have been seriously stressing about how to make a final decision, so I ended up making an Excel sheet with all the factors that matter to me (falling into the categories of research opportunities, program offerings, and geographic location). The ones that I weighted the heaviest were: research opportunities with primary advisor, rigor of methodological training in the social sciences, balance between public health approach and food/nutrition topics, and funding package. I still have not made a final decision, but having it all mapped out on one page has been very helpful in narrowing down my options. My suggestion would be to think carefully about the criteria that matter most to you, and then compare how your options stack up along those lines.

No, I am also still waiting! I actually have three schools (including Columbia) that have not released their decisions yet, and the ones I have heard back from are being slow to release funding information. It is going to be so stressful to have just a couple weeks to make a decision after all of this.

It was not really a standard interview, so do not worry about not getting contacted. She said that they did not do formal interviews this year, but she was contacting me (as well as a couple other students) who did not have clear mentors identified (due to joint appointment confusion or simply not listing them) to get a better idea of how our research and career goals fit with the program/department.

I am waiting on a decision from Health Behavior and Society at Hopkins as well. A faculty member called me last Tuesday to talk about my application and research interests since the POI I listed (and spoke with throughout the admissions process) cannot actually be my primary mentor since he only has a joint appointment in the department. The professor I spoke with said that decisions should be issued in the next two weeks (so this week or next), but to not quote her on that as they have been deliberating intently over the applications this year. So, I am definitely not expecting a favorable decision, but it would still be really nice to know the definitive outcome.

Hm. That makes a little more sense, I suppose. But it is still an odd email to send out, especially so close to March 1. Why not send out acceptances to their top candidates, and then if they are that torn over some of the applications either waitlist/reject them, but pose the MPH as a possibility?

I got a strange email from Columbia Mailman last evening... "Thank you for submitting your application to the Columbia University Mailman School of Public Health doctoral program. Your application is in the final stages of review. Since our doctoral programs are highly competitive we wanted to reach out to you to ask if you are not accepted into the doctoral program would you be willing to be considered for our masters program?" Did anyone else who applied to the Sociomedical Sciences PhD program receive something like this? Considering other people were accepted/rejected yesterday, this almost seems like they are trying to solicit me into paying for a (second) master's rather than make a decision on my application. Any thoughts?

I am new to this forum and cannot claim one of those actual posts, but I did get an unofficial acceptance to the same program at UCLA via email on Feb 16. And then that was followed up with the official acceptance/funding letter via email on Feb 23. They did not mention whether they are done extending offers, so there may still be hope for you. I wish you the best of luck!

Yeah, unfortunately, I think you are probably right. Congratulations on your acceptance to the Epi track!

I am pretty late to this thread, but... 1. To all those accepted into Harvard's PHS program, congratulations! It seems like it was especially competitive this year. 2. To fellow members of the HSPH PHS waitlist, does anyone know if the only way to be offered a slot is for someone who was accepted to our specific track to decline their offer? For example, I was waitlisted for the program after applying for the Public Health Nutrition (PHN) track and was told during my interviews that the Nutrition department only gets 5 students (of the 40 total) and only 2 of these are PHN (versus Nutrition Epi). So, am I waiting for 1/2 spots? Or, 1/40? I plan to contact admissions after I get my letter in the mail, but thought I would try the hive mind first. Best of luck, everyone!