illcounsel

How long before there is just some kind of grad school Tinder where you super like all your fave schools and they laugh with their friends at you as they swipe a hard left?

I have basically been devolving into nothing more than a semi-functioning ball of anxiety since you posted this, as I'm on the waitlist as an early modernist, and was told I was high on the waitlist. 
Just call me pleaaaaassseeee.  Or send an email.  Hey, I'll even take a snapchat at this point.  

Just got accepted into villanova!!!!!! 

Took myself off waitlist at BU and will decline Loyola later today.

Dallas bound y’all!

Just sent an email to accept the offer from the University of Mississippi's MA program!

Just sent an email to accept the offer from the University of Mississippi's MA program!

Just sent an email to Loyola asking about negotiating funding, and let me tell you after years, honestly, of begging the gods to get into a program it felt INCREDIBLY awkward to essentially say thanks so much but you can you give me some more, please? I hope he responds quickly so I don't have too much time to re-read the email and sweat about it.

Just sent an email to accept the offer from the University of Mississippi's MA program!

Just sent an email to accept the offer from the University of Mississippi's MA program!

Just sent an email to accept the offer from the University of Mississippi's MA program!

Just returned from the visit to a school I had booked before I was accepted to my top choice MA. It ended up being a really wonderful experience! I was nervous having conversations with POI's knowing that I would probably not accept the offer. However, I reframed these conversations to be less about asking specific program questions and more about their current research interests and what is exciting them at the moment. This led to fun and informative talks, a lowkey kind of networking. I post this just in case anyone is a similar situation to me. 

Just returned from the visit to a school I had booked before I was accepted to my top choice MA. It ended up being a really wonderful experience! I was nervous having conversations with POI's knowing that I would probably not accept the offer. However, I reframed these conversations to be less about asking specific program questions and more about their current research interests and what is exciting them at the moment. This led to fun and informative talks, a lowkey kind of networking. I post this just in case anyone is a similar situation to me. 

Just sent an email to accept the offer from the University of Mississippi's MA program!

Just sent an email to accept the offer from the University of Mississippi's MA program!

Just sent an email to accept the offer from the University of Mississippi's MA program!

Just returned from the visit to a school I had booked before I was accepted to my top choice MA. It ended up being a really wonderful experience! I was nervous having conversations with POI's knowing that I would probably not accept the offer. However, I reframed these conversations to be less about asking specific program questions and more about their current research interests and what is exciting them at the moment. This led to fun and informative talks, a lowkey kind of networking. I post this just in case anyone is a similar situation to me. 

Just returned from the visit to a school I had booked before I was accepted to my top choice MA. It ended up being a really wonderful experience! I was nervous having conversations with POI's knowing that I would probably not accept the offer. However, I reframed these conversations to be less about asking specific program questions and more about their current research interests and what is exciting them at the moment. This led to fun and informative talks, a lowkey kind of networking. I post this just in case anyone is a similar situation to me. 

Rice's visit program was spectacular. The way they run their program is super sharp and very attentive toward the needs of 2019's job market. A big takeaway for me is that they dedicate a lot of attention to training grad students in styles/genres of academic writing other than criticism: conference proposals, book reviews, etc. But the biggest takeaway is that EVERYONE WAS SO SUPPORTIVE OF ONE ANOTHER. If you had told me that a graduate program could be so tight-knit, I would not have believed you.
Some takeaways for you all:
Really ask what a department's professionalization philosophy is. What is the theory behind their "Intro to graduate studies" course, if they have one? And if they don't, why not?? How do they intend to make sure graduate students aren't teaching themselves how to apply to conferences in the fourth and fifth years, when it's too late? Think about the distinction between "guaranteed teaching" and "required teaching" — what is the quality of the teaching experience you'll get, not just the quantity? i.e. does the department view teaching as an opportunity for you, or a way for them to make sure all of the discussion sections get taught? Ask about the relationship between mentors and advisees: Do the department's most well-known (and/or most ego-driven) professors allow students to latch remora-like onto them and produce methodologically identical work? (Spoiler: this kind of mentorship model often does not yield exciting job applicants) Try to have dinner/drinks with groups of graduate students and see how they interact with one another. Is this an environment where you feel at home? I'm not gonna lie, Rice really blew me away on all of these fronts and more. I'm going to enjoy asking Yale to compete with them next week.

Off CUNY's waitlist :') 

I'll also chime in and say that I think this is spot on in my experience. I'm a student that took five years in between undergraduate and graduate for mostly financial and health related reasons. When I applied for graduate school, I contacted the one faculty member who I thought might remember me (he was my advisor) at the very beginning of the process. I ended up getting in contact with two other faculty and sending them copies of papers that I had written for them as an undergrad. I was able to mention that I was already being mentored by my former advisor (and that he had signed off on my decision to apply). So, yes, it was more difficult to build these relationships back up when they had lapsed, but it wasn't impossible.
While applying, it didn't offer me any significant disadvantage. I would come home from work and work for a few hours on my applications at the end of every day, sending drafts to my advisor as I finished them. I mentioned vaguely in a subordinate clause of my SOP that I had researched and studied during the gap (I didn't give specifics). No-one asked me why I had taken the time off; no-one cared.  I got the sense that as long as I acknowledged it like a banal fact and didn't make a big deal about it, that others would take my cue. I did exactly zero publishing and conferences during this time. I certainly didn't put non-academic work on my CV. I stuck to things I had done during undergrad, leaving all my gap year stuff off. So there was no opportunity for anyone to judge me for working in catering. It simply didn't come up. I think only Boston University asked specifically for a work resume, so that's the only exception.
In grad school the gap has only been an advantage. As others have said, it gives me perspective; I've cultivated friendships and relationships outside of the academy and that helps tether me during times of stress or self-doubt. I have a better sense of how to prioritize my responsibilities and make time for my health and well-being. I also had a generally looser point of view on what I wanted to achieve in grad school rather than being tied to an undergraduate thesis project (which I saw sometimes happen with straight from undergrad people). That's only benefited me.
This is just my own two-cents, but I think that sometimes because we know that the process is grueling and rigorous we want to impose rigor onto all aspects of it, even to aspects that the institution itself isn't rigorous about. There's no indication (in my experience) that anyone has to worry about the gap year.
 

i want to push back on this, that a gap year isn't "universally harmful." i feel like this is very strong wording against advice i feel like is pretty universally given, universally belabored on, and universally true. every single person i've talked about applying to PhD programs with has 1) advised me to take a gap year, if i was already in academia at the time, or 2) made sure i had taken at least one year off, if i was out of academia. it is also one of the most given pieces of advice to what seems like everyone in this particular tiny section of GC; it feels like all of us have heard this piece of advice at least once. why would all of our most-loved and most-favorite professors continue to give this piece of advice over years and years if it weren't true? 
honestly, just living life outside of academia makes you a stronger candidate. developing relationships with coworkers, learning how to be professional as an employee rather than a student, understanding ways of navigating work hierarchies... also just spending time being a person while not in school can really be an awakening process. nearly everyone i've ever encountered who took a gap year (or years) has said that they've done some growing that they felt made them a stronger candidate. 
if anything, perhaps a conversation about if taking a large gap is detrimental would be productive. at what point do gap years become a barrier to communicating fit? does that point even exist?
why would you even need to address your gap year? this feels like you're equating a bad GPA or GRE scores to taking a gap year and that it needs to be explained away. however, most people don't encourage the discussion of weaker parts of an application. rather, you should spend time emphasizing what makes you a strong candidate. if the job you took during your gap year doesn't strengthen your application, then it remains a line on your CV, and that's okay.
publications and presentations aren't necessarily markers of a great candidate, either. some students get into top programs without either, but most certainly without the former. however, going through the motions of these professional experiences are definitely good, as it replicates other submission processes that are important to academic life, such as applying for fellowships, applying for grants, and (of course) submitting your work to conferences, journals, and (eventually) publishers. so it doesn't actually matter if it "happens" because a lot of things you apply for as an academic don't always "happen." rejection follows you everywhere, and learning from that is also a good experience.
email, phones, and skype exist. i understand the fear that perhaps a professor may not remember you or may not write as good of a letter if you're a year (or few) out of the program/institution, but professors do remember their students. if you did something that made you stand out in the first place, the professor will likely remember it. i say this anecdotally, of course, but i wouldn't be surprised if other students and teachers feel this way as well. moreover, if you create a habit of checking in with professors you'd like to ultimately write you letters during your gap year, then this won't be a problem at all. the additional bonus is that this would mirror similar processes after you complete your PhD of keeping in touch with your mentors from different institutions.
a lot of students, even for their dissertations, may move away and still have a great working relationships with their committee members, who will be providing feedback via email and skype. real world mirrors the real world, and you can't control for people always being in one place. sure, you may move, but maybe you don't move and one of your letter writers moves instead. we've moved into a time where a lot of connecting does happen through email and the written word. whether it's the "same" or not doesn't necessarily matter. it's similar and i'd argue that neither gives you more leg-up on your application than the other.
 
i apologize; this was long. however, i've taken a lot of gap years, and i've never once felt like it put me at a disadvantage. in fact, i feel like it's prepared me more for graduate study, so the idea that it would be discouraged is bizarre to me.

Helpful information:
1) UCSB, Michigan, and Northwestern all have a policy not to offer feedback (citing volume of apps received)
2) UCSB's adcomm chair told me that this year they had around 200 applicants for 6-8 positions.
3) Michigan's director of graduate studies said that admission is very competitive, and "historically only 8-10% of applicants are offered admission"
4) Aaron Barstow from UC Davis said they had 156 applicants this year; didn't say how many offers were made. 
Hope this is helpful in getting a sense of the lay of the land!

This. 
And while we're on the subject, I'm going to have to drop in to do a little PSA about adjuncting. Please don't adjunct unless it's a matter of survival. When you adjunct, you basically eliminate your future line of employment. Moreover, you deserve better than adjuncting--we all do. We all deserve a job with benefits that pays a living wage, even if it's outside academia. I know that there are people out there who HAVE to adjunct ... but again, that's why those of us who have some sort of choice in the matter (i.e. other, better prospects) should not do it. (I could never have afforded to adjunct for an actual living anyway--it just doesn't pay enough where I live to support a single person unless you're willing to live with five roommates in a bad part of town. As @frenchphdpoints out, those who need to be self-supporting usually can't do it.)
Just say no to MAPH and just say no to adjuncting. 
 
On paying for master's degrees--so many people here have already made excellent points, so I won't belabor the matter. I will say, however, that I had a friend who did MAPSS, which is the "social science" equivalent of MAPH. She originally applied for PhD programs in anthropology and applied only to top-flight schools. She did not have a BA from a prestigious university, which I think is what set her back in the admissions process. For that reason, she was also very impressed with the Chicago name and really wanted a Chicago degree. She dropped a ton of money on MAPSS with the intent reapplying to PhD programs with a stronger and more elite background ... but when she was finished, she realized it wasn't feasible. She just had so much debt. She's been working a "soul-sucking" job (her words, not mine) ever since, struggling to pay off this ginormous Chicago debt. Her proposed anthropology projects were fascinating, and I feel that she should skipped MAPSS and reapplied, maybe to less-prestigious schools or maybe to the same schools but with an improved application. But in any case, she's not only not an anthropologist; she's not-an-anthropologist with debt and a job she really did not ever intend to take. 

*Clicks on hand held recorder*
Day 472 - still no word from UVA. All is silent here. Not sure how much longer I can go on.