reluctanthuman

I am so so SO confused about writing an e-mail to Michigan. In my mind, I am either thinking “getting off of the waitlist will happen whether you do something or not if the list moves, so let it be” or “are you stupid, of course you should do whatever you can?!?!?”
Why every single step of this process has to be so full of anxiety?

U-W Madison for me as well!

Just got an email that I got the tuition waiver + the stipend at Villanova! Will be confirming my acceptance of the offer tonight!

My family is pretty anti-intellectual so it's been fun seeing their "that's not a real doctor/you're a cog in the liberal indoctrination machine" instincts clash with their very real pride and excitement for me ?

@tacocat211 that's awesome news!  It's going to go great!
 
On another note, anyone else struck by how funny it is that this one thing has been so all-consuming for you for so long, but no one else in your life (or maybe mostly no one else) really gets exactly what the hell you're on about?  Listening to my parents try to tell people what I'll be studying is always a hilarious reality check.

I plan to officially turn down Brown's offer and accept Michigan's by the end of the day tomorrow, at the latest. The people at both places were really unequivocally lovely, and I hope this early-ish decision on my part helps encourage some pre-April 15 waitlist movement at the former. 

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

GOT INTO THE VILLANOVA MA! Funding pending, but I am OVER THE MOON! 

Okay, I heard back from the grad program coordinator at Davis! He was very friendly and helpful, and even gave me a few direct quotes from the Adcomm. Ultimately, there wasn’t much to work on—he said that my app was highly rated by all 3 profs,  the comments were almost entirely positive, and that they thought my WS was “very competently written” and “strong,” but not as interesting as some other applicants, and that they think I would probably benefit from getting my MA. The transparency and clarity of his email makes me feel better about the denial letter, and encourages me that the Adcomm had positive feelings about my app as a whole! Might look to get this kind of feedback from other schools. 

Declined UCSB and Duke.

In off the waitlist at Loyola

Turned down WashU and Western University.

I feel that way about all of you ❤️

On a related note, thoughts on Brown vs. Michigan? Haven't visited either yet, but I'm completely and utterly torn. Would love any specific insight or general decision-making advice!

caveat, i'm in coursework, so this might not apply to later stages, but...
depends so, so much on where you are. and who you are. and how you handle school. and what you're trying to get out of any given experience.
for example, grades in grad school are meaningless. I know a lot of people who came out of undergrad and had a really hard time adjusting to a world without grades. how do I know if my stuff is good? the answer really is that you'll never finish the idea -- the feedback will always be more things to think about, more ideas to hone. you're never going to get a paper back that says "great, perfect." if you do, you've been let down.
so this question for me is really about how you find value in your work and what you're after. there's no way to measure yourself that's objective and "real," so you have to set up some definitions you can live by. this semester, I have two seminar papers. I want to use one to explore a new interest. I want to use the other to improve my skills in clarity and analysis. if I do both of those things, this semester will have been a good one. and I'll use the comments I get to set goals for next semester.
my program is dope because we aren't trying to outdo each. sure, it can be a spectacular bummer when you get passed up for a position and someone else gets it, but I always keep in mind that seven years is a long time. there's gonna be more stuff. 
---
there was also a question about time.
i think honestly it's more helpful to tell you what I did this week. everyone does stuff at their own pace.
1. worked on a paper for a conference that's in a few weeks. I had hit a wall. I think I've spent three hours this week re-orienting the focus of the paper and making a revision plan that I plan on doing in small chunks each day. 
2. graded papers for my students (this semester, that's fifteen of em)
3. had a fifteen-minute meeting with each student about their next paper. had some pretty good ones.
4. read four articles (~20 pages each) for one class
5. read one book (~250 pages) for another class -- this class has a pretty high reading load
6. planned three lessons to teach next week
7. spent three hours teaching
8. spent five hours in class 
9. couple of meetings here and there. 
10. random writing/email time/notes revision*
11. half an hour each day preparing for my language exam. ugh.
let's assume thirty minutes per student paper (a slow pace, but one that I intentionally choose) and twenty pages of reading per hour... i'd say that's about 48 hours. give or take. my math is probably wrong too
*notes revision, where I write down the greatest hits from my reading in the hour before class, is something I recommend to everyone. it's great having one sheet of organized notes to refer to when discussion is going real quick. plus it helps you remember complicated stuff you might have read six days ago.

In at yale, oh my god

My puppy will just be getting to the age of not being a total menace when I start my program in the fall. Thank goodness!!!!!!!
Here she is asleep on a carrot....

I’m in at Rutgers!

Speaking from a bunch of years down the line: all the MORE reason to celebrate! (And maybe this is your point, in which case I don't mean to belabor the obvious.) This is one of the things about the academic life cycle: it's never over. You wait to get into grad school, you wait to pass your QEs, you wait to "advance to candidacy," you wait to pass a prospectus, you wait to get a fellowship, you wait to publish your first article, you wait to get a job interview, you wait to get a campus visit, you wait to get a job, you wait to get a book contract, you wait for the book to come out, you wait for book reviews, you wait to get tenure, you wait to get a fellowship, you wait for your graduate student to get hired, you wait to get a second book, you wait to get promoted ...
I'm listing all of this not to be demoralizing, but to say that one of the best things you can do for yourself and your career is to create time for rest and celebration and rejuvenation. It will make you better at your job. Have a time every night when you stop working. Have a "sabbath" of some sort: a 24-hour period each week when you don't work. There will be weeks when it's impossible (as at any job), but don't make that the norm.
Academic life can be the best gig out there, because you can work on something you love; you can have constant intellectual challenge; you can have tremendous flexibility in your schedule; you can work with brilliant people. It can be the worst gig out there if you drive something you love into the ground; you never feel satisfied with having met challenges; you never give yourself a break; and you never feel like you measure up to your brilliant colleagues. Choose the happier version. At least most of the time. 
[End soapbox rant.]
I hope this comes across as encouraging and not patronizing! I only say all of this so urgently because it's hard-fought knowledge that I don't always remember. But when I do, I work better and I am more content.
 
 

I second all of this. There’s also the strange thing where it can become really difficult to give yourself boundaries, and consequently end up feeling like you should be working all the time, because there’s always something you could be doing. When I’m working nonstop, I feel guilty for neglecting my life (not spending enough time with friends/partner/working out/etc)— and then I feel guilty when I am doing those things instead of working. I don’t have the answer, but just putting it out there that you should be aware of this as soon as you can, and try to figure out how to mange this.
The work/life struggle really adds to what @jrockford27 is saying: it’s so easy to get into a hole where work becomes everything. And then, if that’s the place you’re at, it doesn’t take a lot to topple emotionally... if you aren’t doing anything besides working, and your work isn’t going perfectly, then what do you have?
Re: imposter syndrome… I think one thing that’s important to keep in mind is that, if you’re in an English PhD program, you’re there because you’ve been one of the best at doing this thing in the past (i.e. in undergrad, you were probably one of the best students in your English classes). In other words, the way you’ve learned to tell that you’re good at this is, in part, by comparison. In a PhD program, that won’t really work. Everyone is good at this! The best thing to do is to learn to find value in what you do that doesn’t come from comparison. If you think about this as a competition, you’ll feel awful all of the time (there’s always going to be someone that seems like they’re doing better than you, in some way).
All that being said, by and large, I’ve had a great time so far. Sometimes it’s crazy to think that my “work” is sitting around and talking about exciting ideas and books, and writing papers (all things I love— there is something to the parts we all idealize, really). I find a lot of joy and reward in watching myself grow as a thinker/writer/scholar. Despite all the bad things, there’s a lot of exciting parts, too.

GradCafe measures out its life with coffee spoons

real random - why are all the usernames tea-related?  is everyone obsessed with tea?  i like tea too but wtf lmao

Accepted at University of Washington!  My first acceptance and I am STOKED. 

I had a short email exchange with a professor I was interested in working with over the summer (asking questions about research in my field etc), but that's the extent of my contact with Penn! 
Thank you!! Fingers crossed for you guys!

GUYS, I'M IN AT UPENN?!?!?!?!??!?!!