Kiyoshi

I plan to quit my job in middle May and take about 10 weeks off until the school starts.Since I guess PhDs don't have long winter or summer holidays LOL.

I have an interesting one. I applied for a school and got a long interview and then was invited to a visiting day, but nothing regarding the decision was mentioned. I felt anxious because I knew some of the people who got invited had been admitted, but I got nothing. I tried to contact the department but they only gave ambiguous answers regarding my application status. So I thought the visit was a on-site interview. Although anxious, I still departured to the airport for the visit day. My flight was supposed to take off at 6:25am, and I received an email informing me I was admitted by that school at 6:06 am, when I was on the airplane. Later I knew they were arranging it as an admitted students visit, no an interview at all...

I am an international student and according to my experience for US PhD application, I wouldn't say it is rare. I have had: Once an advisor promised he could take me and then he said he had no funding 3 months later, which led to my gap year (I trusted him much and only applied for one school) Once an advisor emailed me an unofficial offer letter, and asked me whether I would definitely accept if I got official offer; I asked him whether I can have some time to consider and how long he can give me and he never replied(it's been a week). Once an advisor said he would be glad to take me and hope I will choose his lab (before I submit application), and then I receive no response to email and finally found he admitted 3 new students 4-5 weeks ago. So, I think you may contact your advisor again since it is not impossible that your POI missed the email. But also get ready for attending another school. There are definitely trustworthy POIs, but you cannot tell until you get in. My experience told me never be so sure until you get an official letter.

I am waiting for their PhD in CS. But as they have sent out many acceptances from last month, I won't be surprised if I get a rejection letter recently. UIUC CS is a long shot for me anyway.

Many schools in my area will give the majority of results in March, which I wrongly thought will be in February, so it is not necessary to get anxious from mid January...

I dreamed that I was having an interview with a Professor who was from a school in my top choices. He gave me an exam for the interview and there were three questions on it, all regarding Operating System and Database, which I literally could not solve. Then I woke up... I don't know why I had that dream since my track has nothing to do with either OS or DB...

I submitted in December and now I only have 2 rejections. Getting more and more anxious....

Two rejections: 11 am and 11:30 am. Two interviews: 12:30pm and 7:30pm. All times are local times of those colleges, to make it clear. The 7:30pm one is an email from POI not school committee.

I applied for Northwestern MSCS a couple of years ago and waited until April. At time time I sent emails asking about the decision in February and they told me it was like a rolling based decision, so I think it is possible they are sending out decisions even before the deadline.

I got rejected by the UW Computer Science as expected LOL

Congrats on your admission! Maybe you can ask how you can get prepared before you start your study e.g. your experience and your course selection and so on. Besides, I don't think it is inappropriate to ask about funding unless your funding is clearly specified in your offer letter. I asked every POI I talked with about funding, and most them were happy to answer and gave a clear answer (even I am not admitted yet). For the rest of them, they were being honest with me (I guess) like they can only guarantee 4 years founding and so on. You mentioned you get admitted so I guess you are still waiting for other decisions? Funding is a quite important factor and you may want to confirm it with your advisor or your department!

I guess you are right. I just need to calm down. Thanks!

Yes, if I have publications/patent/awards I will definitely add my advisor's name. The whole thing is just I don't have those accomplishments (which is sad...) Actually his insecurity worries me if he believes every simple stuff must have a story behind it... He also asked why I didn't apply for my Master's University. I didn't know why he supposed like that since I actually applied for my Master's University... These stuffs are really confusing.

I had an interview with a POI this afternoon and it went really weird. After some greetings he asked me who my advisors were, and I gave him the names ( I though maybe he wanted to contact them) and then he asked me directly why I didn't put my advisor's name on my resume. I totally blanked out since I didn't know I was supposed to do so. Then I said I'm sorry I didn't know that, maybe I should have done it. He was obviously unsatisfied with my answer (since we are video chatting and I can see him) and said like it is uncommon you don't put your advisor's name, like everyone who is doing the application know it. If you don't do that, people will guess there are stories behind it. I felt really awkward because the truth is I just don't know. I am doing interview for candidate to our group in our company and I see many people (over half of them) who did not mention their advisor, even those who had a PhD degree on the resume. And I explained that I mentioned my advisors in my RL and masters are course based so there is no assigned advisor and I was only doing RA in the lab. He was still not satisfied, and said like he just want to confirm, the advisors must have been taking much effort and you just omit them in your publication or Resume? I realized what he implies and I said like are you concerned about I don't appreciate my advisor's effort or I am so selfish that I just throw my advisor away when I have accomplishment? he said, YES. I felt that was offensive, but I explained I don't really have any publication during my Masters so there is no where I can write my advisor's name, and besides, the projects are nothing about accomplishment and sometimes we don't have a fixed advisor for a project in our lab, you just follow the senior PhDs. He seemed satisfied, but he said I should pay attention to it in the future. This topic lasted for 20 minutes. I felt really uncomfortable since he was just guessing things. I understand advisor is very important for PhD, but I just did a course based Master and I didn't have many interaction with my advisor. I felt kind of arrogance in him, but I was also wondering whether I really did wrong, not adding my advisors' name to every project in my resume. Actually, I have a couple of interviews and emails with other POIs but none of them mentioned this? I was also wondering if an advisor does put much effort, why would he worried the student may omit him? And what the point it is if some previous students really did so, and he used this to question me? Later this POI told me I was processed to the next step, which is a code test, and then his lab will do a code review to decide whether I can go to the next round...

I guess I plan to quit my job and try to find a PhD position in Europe.