TheHessianHistorian

Hmm, I don't see a diamond by decision/date...

Well, people who post their results on the results page have to manually type in stats in the Notes field if they want their stats to be visible. But, in addition to the fields for Institution, Program, Decision, Date, and Notes, there are also fields for GPA, GRE V+Q+AW, and other scores. It's just that the data inputted into those stat fields don't display on the results page. The form seems to ask for the stats for no reason. Here is what it looks like:

I think a big problem is that the submission form asks for all the stats, but the results page doesn't display any of them. Don't know where that data goes or what's being done with it, if it's not being displayed to visitors.

Actually, all 3 of my decisions (one Eastern, one Central, one Arizona Time Zone) have arrived in the evening. I got my acceptance call from University of Alabama at 6 pm my time (7 pm their time), I got my waitlist email from Washington University in St. Louis (WashU) at 10 pm, and I got my rejection email from University of Arizona at 11 pm my time (10 pm their time). I think evening decision send-outs might just be a growing trend these days.

Just got a generic form rejection email from University of Arizona for their Master's program. Kind of surprised since there were two POIs there that I really jived with (Plummer and Lotz-Heumann). Feels weird to be wait-listed for WUSTL's PhD program but rejected from Arizona's MA program. Part of me feels like it might have something to do with the fact that one of my recommenders had technical difficulties with submitting his letter, and so he emailed his LOR to the DGS instead of uploading it to the system the normal way. I asked the DGS about this and they said they added it to my file, but the online application never updated to show that my application was complete. I wonder if DGS never followed through on actually adding that last LOR to my file and my application got lost in the pile of "incompletes" that didn't make the first cut?

For which school? Yale or WUSTL? My recommenders and I didn't have any problem with those 2 online applications. The only application websites I've run into trouble with this year are University of Arizona (recommender couldn't get the LOR upload to work and had to email it to the DGS) and Western Michigan University (ETS keeps sending them my GRE score and WMU says they are not receiving it--that's okay because WMU was pick #15 out of my 15 applications and I've already gotten at least one other acceptance).

The logical part of my brain: "Well, they still have to verify applicants' degrees and scores, and decide whom to nominate for fellowships, and it's in their interest to offer admission to their top picks first and then see how many more admission slots are open after the top picks make their decisions, etc." The emotional part of my brain: "These sadists are literally trying to give me an aneurysm."

I'm in the process of preparing an article for publication in an academic journal, but other than that I have not published anything during my undergrad (other than a couple of self-published family history books through Lulu Press). I am heading into (most likely) a Master's program, so I imagine the onus will be on me to publish a couple things in the coming 2 years before I make it into a PhD program. It sounds like you're off to an excellent start! I would say an article and two book chapters is a good place to be at this point.

Congratulations! You ought to be proud! You might have already stated elsewhere, but what is your subfield specialty?

I'm here as someone who lives in the American Midwest, only one or two time zones removed from all of the schools I applied to, and even I am having insomnia due to waiting on application decisions!

And if you can stand living in a very small town and commuting into a larger city, you can find extremely inexpensive living costs. I bought an enormous 2,000 sq. ft. Victorian home here in my little town of population 3,000 for a measly $30,000. (......Wait, what am I doing going to grad school again?)

Keep in mind that the value of a salary is really dependent on the cost of living in an area. $60k in a Dayton or Tuscaloosa might afford a higher standard of living than $90k in a NYC or LA. Careful not to extrapolate your experiences living in metropolitan areas to the rest of the country.

Just the ApplyYourself portal is the only I've seen, and that still says "Ready for Review" for me, so I think you'll probably hear via email before the status changes in the portal.

I just got a wait-list email from WUSTL tonight, so I'm guessing other decisions aren't far behind.

If I hadn't run out of reactions for the day, I would totally like this comment. Sure tenured R1 faculty make $60-90k a year, but tenured R2 faculty make $55-75k and tenured R3 faculty make $50-65. Those are respectable salaries, especially if you're in a job you love so much that you can't believe they actually pay you to do it.

It really is in large part a numbers game. You can be as qualified as they come, but there's dozens of other equally qualified applicants. You've got to submit enough applications to beat the odds, even if it means your POI isn't a 100% dead-on perfect fit.

I was just officially wait-listed for the PhD program at Washington University in St. Louis. Honestly I'm honored I wasn't flat-out rejected from WUSTL, seeing as they are a very rigorous and high quality program. The email I got from DGS was pretty nice about it: "I am writing as Director of Graduate Studies in the Department of History to inform you that you have been named an alternate for admission to the doctoral program in history here at Washington University. I realize that this is likely to produce mixed emotions. Please do take it in a positive sense: we were very impressed with your application and think that you are fully qualified for admission. However, due to tight restrictions on the size of our entering class, we are unable to offer you admission at this time. That may well change between now and April, so I encourage you to keep in touch with us in the coming weeks."

@khigh and @ltr317: I'm 31 and will be 32 by the time I start grad school. My mother was about 40 when she earned her Master's (at Uni of Iowa), and about 50 when she earned her PhD (at Uni of Colorado), and she managed to find a tenure-track faculty position several years ago (in the humanities no less). My grandfather was 40 when he did his Master's degree (at UMN-Twin Cities) and 42 when he finished his PhD (at UMN-Twin Cities)...he worked as a school principal for 4 years, worked as a non-tenured college instructor for 10 years, and got a tenured faculty position at Uni of Wisconsin in 1997 at the age of 56. Granted, people in my family never retire (my great grandmother clerked at a store until she was 99 years old, was diagnosed with cancer and passed away 2 months later), so getting a job in our 50s means probably a 40-year career ahead of us. Point being: you are NEVER too old, as long as you feel like you've got the drive and the energy to go for it. Bust your butt, do ambitious research, fight and claw for those awards, be better than everybody else, meticulously plan how you're going to get from point A to point B, and there will be no age limit to achieving your goal.

Very sorry to hear that! Like commenter above said, it's their loss considering your deep knowledge of and enthusiasm for your subject. Best of luck to you if you apply again next year.

Waiting on ad-coms, trying to figure out what they think about you, overanalyzing every word from your POI... it's all really like being in a bad relationship, isn't it?

Bu keqi

Much appreciated

I had the same thought! Here is the email that I sent to my POI at University of Alabama after I got his voicemail message confirming my acceptance to the UA Master's program: "I just wanted to confirm that I received your voicemail message regarding acceptance to the Master's program. It was a very nice and welcome surprise. Thank you and the admissions committee for extending this offer. I look forward to finding out more about your excellent program as I progress toward making my final decision."

Gotcha. But going from the bottom of the list up and looking for up-to-date information on graduates like David Wheat (graduated 2009, tenured assoc prof at Michigan State), Selena Sandorfer (2009, TT asst prof at Western Kentucky), Larry Rivers (2010, TT asst prof at West Georgia), etc., they're all still there at those institutions as of 2018...

I'm looking up up-to-date information for the TT PhD graduates on Vandy's list, and they all still seem to be in those positions as far as I can tell. Which of the PhD graduates listed on Vandy's webpage as being in tenured/TT positions are no longer in tenured/TT positions as of now? I can't seem to find them.