coho

I think it's bad . . . ass. :mrgreen: As long as it's obvious that you're not grad school drop out material. I know nothing about mechanical engineering, but I'd be willing to look over it as well (I'm done with my apps).

first of all, shout out to Phedre, whose posts from last year I've appreciated (I've gone through much the same predicament re. languages this year). I read this essay about the importance of a city's "vibe" awhile ago. It made me want to switch cities. :http://www.paulgraham.com/cities.html Another thing you might consider investigating, however, is how easy it would be to convince your new favorite program that you want to go there after all because its "in the city." Do schools play lovers' revenge when you re-apply if you don't pick them the first time round? I've heard one story that seemed to indicate this to be true.

But not by raising the price of applications. In fact, they really ought to lower it. 60 dollars per application is a lot, but some schools have a whopping $90 fee. Plus $20 for "additional" score reports. To pay that much just to lower the chances of one's being rejected from 100% (not applying) to ~90%. sheesh. Back to 10 dollars, I say!

the charms of a small town are indeed more subtle that, say, having the Met in your backyard . . .

interesting 1966 Times article: http://www.time.com/time/magazine/artic ... -1,00.html if you're feelin' down about the application process, just remember--at least we don't get shipped off to 'Nam if we don't get in! :shock:

butcha still don't talk about it! :wink:

Interesting. That thread has quite the variety of opinions. I'm going to go with my instinct and leave that question blank. It's exactly like asking someone who asked you to the prom if you were the first person they asked or not. It's just not polite. The only time I can see bringing up that sort of information when jockeying for funding after having been accept to schools Y and Z. But until the point where there are actually a few schools in direct competition for me (in my dreams, of course!) rather than an amorphous cloud of 10 schools of to which I'm applying, there's no reason they need to know. An adcom who thinks that an applicant who leaves the question blank is only applying to their school . . . well they'd have to be pretty naive imo.

ooh! that brings me to another question . . . I'm hesitant to ask for fear of jinxing myself, but . . . I'm a US citizen, but I live abroad. I know grad schools often pay travel costs for prospective students to visit the school. Is this just a state-side perk? It would be SO amazing to get a free flight.

I live abroad, and I ran into a similar problem. I think the safest thing to do would be to print out the form, sign it, and scan it to your letter writer. But since most of your letters have already been sent, you ought to contact the schools and explain the situation. You definitely want them to know that you waived your rights, but my guess is that you can let them know that electronically as well as by on that slip of paper. You sort of de facto waived your rights by absenting yourself from the country when the letter was being written, so I doubt they'll make a big fuss about it! Anyhow, that's my take on it.

why do all my grad. applications tell me to "list all the graduate schools to which I am applying"? Do they go behind our backs and make deals like, "I'll let you have Jill if you let me have Bill" or what?! So far I've been leaving this section of the application blank because I feel like it's not their business.

awesome!

I had a difficult time deciding between choosing to study English or French literature as a graduate student. One of the biggest drawbacks (in my eyes) to earning a PhD in French was the fear of being stuck teaching Intro to French Grammar classes for years (should I be lucky enough to land a teaching position at all) rather than much more pleasant sounding courses such as "Intro to American Lit." Language acquisition holds no interest for me, but at my school even full professors teach grammar courses. Is this normal? and *why* is the English department a "literature" department wheras the rest of the languages are grouped as "languages"?

yes, some of the profs involved in my app. process have warned me that state schools may be in an especially precarious position, student funding-wise . . .

one of my prof.s (who, nevertheless, turned the lor he wrote for me in on time) told me that schools tacitly accept that LORs may come in later than the deadline (he gave the possibly random figure of 2 weeks). But this doesn't go for the rest of the application material...

just remember, even if your SOP does prove to the adcom. that you're a comp. lit. girl at heart, that doesn't change the funding and grant prospects. . . . but I wonder if you can do a lot of cross-departmental-pollinating even if you apply to the French dept.? as for me, I ended up deciding that, given my profile, to send in only 2 comp. lit apps; the rest are for the French department. But my dilemma was different than yours . . . Good luck picking a department--I know the deadlines are fast approaching!! (I haven't sent in mine yet either . . . )

warning: You asked for advice from current grad students; I am not am not a current grad student (I'm in the application process). However, I've been advised (and i think it's good advice) that it's a good idea to be able to read and talk about theory intellegently (cuz it's a whole nuther language . . . ) even if it's not really your thing. How much you emphasize it in your own work, however, is up to you. As far as "being behind," however, I really doubt that you are. It's pretty unusual for sophomores to take hardcore theory classes, and I'd say pretty much unheard of for freshmen! As for the "canon," in my undergrad experience, English classes are less about introducing you to all the works you'll need to be familiar with a grad student than they are about teaching you how to think about literature. You can only cover so many books in a semester. Like you, the vast majority of what I've read of the "classics," I did on my own time, outside of class. My guess is that that's normal, too. I think you can find MA "reading lists" from various grad programs online. You might take a look at one of those sites and click on the subject area that you think you're particularly weak in, and bone up by picking some titles from the list to read. (just don't take the lists as a minimum knowledge threshold. it's more like a full compendium of highly specialized literary interests) For example: http://www.columbia.edu/cu/english/grad_orals.htm

Thanks for the feedback, FSIA and mims3382!

In contrast to the "1000 word limit" for SOPs, I have found that writing sample length limits read something along the lines of "maximum of 15/20/30 pages." Which raises two questions: 1. double spaced or single? 2. is there a cushion for how far over the limit one can go? Any ideas? . . . my personal guess is 1. double spaced 2. don't go over the limit. But I'd like to have your opinion.