KevinJHa

So many of us are applying to the same schools! I keep on seeing University of Chicago / University of Pennsylvania / Indiana Bloomington / UWM (of course). I'll be frank with you guys. I am NOT a fan of y'all having better quant scores than I do. 
It really is the luck of the draw though. We'll see. I feel like my application is a particularly mixed bag. 

Hmm well I know Harvard and the CUNY Graduate Center are expected around 400 applications this year...

Same here, buddy. I'm constantly refreshing my e-mail waiting for that notification or a phone call.
Whichever works for the adcomms. HAHAHAHAHA

That my friend, is fascinating haha. 
Side note, I check my application pages every single morning around 10AM and I'm tired of seeing the green 'Submitted' status. I have to stop doing this.

I got a VPN service exclusively for the waiting period and have been marathoning Euro crime dramas on Channel 4 UK and SBS (Australia) On Demand sites. They are reasonably complex and entertaining, and reading subtitles also leaves less brain space for worrying.

You’re welcome @qeta! Hoping that we all share news from the adcomms as it comes in ... it’s internet karma right?
@2733amh interesting group of schools! Are you applying for sociology at all of them, and is Georgetown a JD?

@abenz I am hoping that we will both get good news from our common departments (Berkeley, Brown, Wisconsin)! It would be fun to meet face-to-face during prospective student visits, although I remain unconvinced that I'll make the cut this year. Your profile sounds incredibly strong, so I'm sure you have very good news coming your way.

Thank you @qeta that is very sweet of you to say! However I think we all have the same insecurities and none of us really know what they’re looking for, so I am holding out for good news for you too!

This is why I've been taking nyquil or melatonin every night to sleep 

Well now that most applications are submitted and the waiting game is officially starting, I figure it would be good to figure out ways to occupy headspace while we wait for our lives to be determined by a committee of strangers. It's funny because most people who apply to graduate school are neurotic and anxious people in general.
Things I've been doing:
(1) I've been using this time to start saving money, considering i'd probably be broke in graduate school
(2) Going to the gym and trying to get the body I want
(3) Activism 
(4) Video games
(5) Checking the application pages for each school I applied to every morning 
 
What are you all doing to keep busy?

I worked until last week for the research team of an NGO, based in country. Hoping for something similar!

I am starting a masters program in Sociology in just a few weeks. Once I receive my MA degree, I would like to go into the data analysis/statistics field. 
I have been looking for data analysis positions to view the requirements and what the jobs entails. I have noticed most positions require several years experience. I am new to this field and do not have any experience. Would submitting a cover letter with my skills and abilities be enough to become employed without experience? I would like to work in the field now while completing my degree so that I can gain experience, but it seems impossible being able to gain experience without having any to start with. 
Im somewhat worried that I wont be able to get a data analyst job once I receive my degree because I dont have the required experience. 
Please help!! Im worried....

I'm lucky enough to have a full-time too (as you can probably surmise I'm on grad cafe at said job now) haha.
That's great, definitely good to keep doing research in the meantime!

What sucks the most is that some of my applications changed the status from submitted to forwarded to department within a matter of days of submitting them. What's worst? the results page supposedly predicts when we'll get contacted and two programs I applied to should have reached anyone by e-mail this week of limbo between Christmas and the New Year. FML.

Same - going mostly crazy, at my 40/hr computer based job where I check GradCafe 2-5 times a day. I try to stay off of the school application pages (one of them changed statuses today and I almost fainted - all it says is it has been forwarded to the committee for review). 
I'm definitely working out more, trying to save money to relocate for grad school, trying to work on my hobbies a little - but mostly failing. I spend a lot of time just fantasizing about the future. 
I have been trying to formulate a Plan B lately, but I want to believe that that is a waste of mental energy. It is going to be a tough 25 days.

I think we're all on the same boat! I'm at work right now. checking this. HAHAHAHA. 
I've been refreshing my phone for my personal e-mail. Hence, nothing yet.
I get so OCD that I start so many projects to distract myself only to find me checking e-mails and application portals again and again.

Haha damn man you gotta find a way to keep yourself busy!!
Random tidbit my mother told me that make me feel better: 'You want this so bad, and you've been working hard to make your application perfect. If you don't get accepted, who will?'. It really made me less anxious about the upcoming decisions and if you want this as bad as I think you do, I'm sure this applies to you as well

I feel ya! I have melatonin at home, but it stopped working because I had a period where my anxiety/depression kept me so much I kept taking it! Lol. And i'm so close to throwing my phone way because I keep checking/refreshing it as if it'll magically appear out of nowhere! 

This is why I've been taking nyquil or melatonin every night to sleep 

Holy shit I just submit my last application. Holy shit! It's all in... 

SUBMITTED ALL MY GOD DAMN APPS.
Can't wait to start hearing the good news yall. We worked hard for this and FINALLY the application phase is pretty much wrapped up.
You guys are awesome and I'm hoping for successful admits from all of you!
Stay tuned~~

SUBMITTED ALL MY GOD DAMN APPS.
Can't wait to start hearing the good news yall. We worked hard for this and FINALLY the application phase is pretty much wrapped up.
You guys are awesome and I'm hoping for successful admits from all of you!
Stay tuned~~

My god I totally understand y'all. Here I am checking the application sites on a daily basis, thinking, 'hey, maybe im just SO GOOD they'll admit me even more the application deadline.'
Here's to 3-4 months of anxiety and uncertainty .
Also I totally had that same realization a few weeks ago and added some 'safety' schools to my list haha.

@syza
 
Thanks, you too!
Sure I'd be happy to!  I'm feeling confident in my SoP because I've watched it grow for numerous drafts, gaining greater specificity every pass. My first draft, though I was proud of it, didn't work to my strengths. I was merely telling admissions committees what I've accomplished and what my goals were rather than showing- much like my pros and cons list. For example, in my first draft I mentioned that I had done research on X and Y but didn't bother to explain these projects in the fine, calculated detail that's expected nor why it was important to sociology. I believe they want to know the whys, the hows, its implications for the (sub)field, and what you're going to do with it in graduate school.
I also realized I used concepts ambiguously. For example, my introductory paragraph used the word globalization but didn't explicate what I meant or connect it at all to my research interests or goals for graduate school. I took those out and aimed to be entirely relevant from the start.
I also feel I played to my strengths. For example my first draft buried the most qualifying component of my application in the middle - my research experience. With a professor's advice, I immediately hit them up front with this information in a way that demonstrated the research experience rather than just name dropping. Then I connected what this experience taught me to how I was going to use it for future research in graduate school. I also mentioned funding very briefly, I heard this gives adcomms confidence in your understanding of the logistics of research. 
Another thing I've done recently is download the course catalogs for every school and made lists of what faculty teaches what topics. This helped me because I'm tailoring my SoP to every school and I don't mean by just replacing block paragraphs. A piece of advice I got was to demonstrate how YOU would benefit from attending institution X and make it less about how great you are. So from start to finish I talk about faculty, what each one could teach me to become a better scholar.
Lastly, I've sent it to multiple professors and friends and critically engaged with every bit of criticism I've received. It really helped me feel confident in my final draft. I just want highlight how important it was for me to ask other graduate students and faculty to review it for me. I couldn't have refined it this much if it weren't for their advice and suggestions.
These are just somethings I've done recently and I am very happy with my statement. If you want me to give you some critiques on yours, feel free to PM me!