alizeh55

What a lovely note at the end of your comment. I feel the exact same way. It takes a lot of guts to apply and push through the anxious never-ending weeks up until decisions are announced in ANY year, and the fact that we persisted during this year specifically speaks volumes about our patience and persistence. Wow ... four spots for all subfields. That’s insane. I’m so sorry about that, but very happy to see everyone looking on the brighter side. Just think of it like this—Yale just lost their chance to claim all of you future groundbreaking researchers as their own .

Yes, I completely agree. Maybe I was naive and just excited when I submitted my application but I genuinely did not know there would be less slots for candidates. I assumed that if a program is accepting, that means nothing has probably changed since the previous cycle, since so many programs had closed their applications for all. In my defense, the programs did not even hint such a change, probably so they could get more application money lol. I guess we can just hope and see what happens for the best. Not much we can do anymore, besides go down in history as the people who actually applied during a pandemic, haha. Good luck to everyone. Xx

I see that as well. Does anyone ever wonder if applying this year was really a crap shoot ... maybe even useless? Considering they have less spots in an already selective process... might just be my late night imposter syndrome

So glad to hear that at least some schools are more organized. Exactly, I don’t understand what they lose, even if the target date is a little vague!

I genuinely wish programs could let us know when they expect to release admission decisions on the portal. I understand it's a process for them too, but at least knowing a date range for each cycle would really help ease the anxiety! Thank god for GradCafe results page. Informing applicants of estimated decision time every cycle is one thing I would recommend to committees if I ever become a professor one day...

It’s good to hear that there can be exceptions. Thanks for letting us know!

So I only applied to Harvard this cycle, and based off of the results on gradcafe (where accepted applicants stated they got emails or calls) it seems that’s the case for CSR. I also asked a current student in the program who confirmed that that is how they were informed. I wonder if there are exceptions, but I’m not sure. Also CSR does not do interviews so maybe that’s why the admission itself is formal. not sure about other programs but I would definitely ask a current student (if you are in contact with any) or look into the results page if there are any notes mentioning a personal email from a POI! You never know, there could be exceptions even if that’s the case.

Thank you! At this point I’m just checking my missed calls every afternoon to make sure I didn’t miss “the call.” What I’m dreading is getting an email saying “your portal has been updated” or something of that sort with no POI email or phone call prior. Hoping to hear back soon so the anxiety can end!

Sending a PM!

So I’ve heard mixed things after getting into contact with 4 current students. What I’ve learned is that it has its pros and cons, which also depends on your field of study. Major pros I’ve heard of is funding. what personally attracted me was the interdisciplinary nature of it. Knowing I can take courses all around is precisely what I need for my research interests, and it’s also the exact format my master’s program had as well. There’s also really only two academics I’ve grown up reading, who have impacted my research interests deeply, of which one was my advisor for my MA, and the other I’ve personally gotten into contact with at Harvard. So that was a huge plus point for me. You know what they say — you apply to work with faculty more than you apply to an actual school. I do think the quality of the department matters because we’re spending ~5+ years with the same administration and faculty. At the end of the day, I’m just an applicant who has heard from a few students. I wonder if anyone else has any experiences or insight to add.

No, not saying that. Just saying that the committee is most likely meeting today. You have to look at what date the second Monday of February was in the past two years to see that as well, which I did. I guess that the actual process of informing applicants could be anytime after that - maybe this week or next. No clue, let’s see

After a lot of [unhealthy] stalking, I learned that Harvard CSR will be meeting tomorrow to discuss applicants. you might be able to see this for your school too. if you go to the calendar section of the program website, sometimes they have their internal meetings on public. So every year CSR has this “committee meeting” flagged under grad school on the second Monday of February. It also aligns with all the results posted on Gradcafe. I hope this helps whoever is anxious like me about when we will hear back!

Definitely starting to get anxious. Also, to make things worse, I've gotten random spam calls from the area codes of schools I applied to everyday this week, so that doesn't help haha. Not sure if this will help anybody, but I spoke to my department chair at Columbia (for master's admissions) and they told me that the committee will be meeting "in a few weeks" to finalize admissions. So I would assume COVID hasn't affected the timeline much. With most of the committees working from home, it may even speed things up--who knows! That doesn't make you any less of a scholar, just human.

Hi, I started a thread called Fall 2021 Religion PhD applicants. Check that out, there are about 6,000 views so people will def respond there!

Hi there, I'm currently enrolled in the Islamic Studies program at Columbia (graduating this May.) Feel free to message me privately if you have any questions!

I wanted to share some excerpts from an article I was reading which I hope will bring some positivity to everyone who comes across this: "Do not — I repeat — DO NOT try to put yourself in the minds of the admission’s committees. You won’t be able to figure out exactly what they’re looking for and you won’t know who will be looking at your application. I guarantee that you are much harder on yourself than anyone else will be on you. You don’t have to be perfect." "You have to trust the process, because, like I said earlier: grad school is too hard to be in a program that is not right for you. Applying to grad school should be a mutual process, as applying to a job should be. I can guarantee you that you do not want to go to a grad program where you aren’t a good fit — even if it’s at [X school.] Because once you’re there, you’re just one of the crowd. You stop feeling so special. And if you hate it here, you could hate your life or end up dropping out. Or both. I’d say that’s a lose-lose." ^That is such a good point. Maybe what we see as our top choice would actually be a horrible experience. Great to keep this in mind. "We can all get great educations, we can all find amazing careers, and we can all change the world — if those are things that we want."

Can’t speak for phd’s because this is my first round applying, but for my master’s admissions, I was notified really late (in April). I assume no rejection email means they might be considering your application still (no news is good news), so I wouldn’t draw conclusions until you get the email!

So I’ve never actually called a department/school before admissions to ask when results will come out. I was always scared that by doing so, they would get annoyed by me, and somehow it would affect whether I get in or not (I overthink A LOT). However I would really like to know when to expect something from Harvard and I would hope that this year, calling is justified in that COVID has changed a lot, so relying on previous results and dates here on grad cafe back when things were “normal” can be misleading. What are your thoughts on calling programs to ask? Is it generally frowned upon? Should I just do it?

Congrats! Please do keep us updated if/when you hear from Harvard CSR.

From what I know Harvard doesn’t do interviews (if you applied to CSR, phd in religion, that is.)

Hi all, I’m so glad to see the thread is getting responses. When I started it I didn’t expect any responses considering how small our field is in comparison to others on this platform, so this feels great to see! I just wanted to share something that has helped me stay calm and avoid anxiety. I was listening to a podcast that basically said that whenever we really really want something to a point where we can’t imagine life without it, we are often ruining our chances of getting it. This is a manifestation technique, by the way, and I’m not fully into manifesting but I felt that I had a handful of personal examples to go with it. anyway, the point is, one needs to accept that whatever the outcome, things will be okay. At the end of the day we will each end up wherever we belong — whether that’s at a certain school or a completely different career path. We have put in the hours and work into these applications, and that is the most we could do. Now we wait, but practicing this idea of being okay with whatever outcome might be the best thing that we can do for ourselves! ive been occupying my time by working out a lot and watching movies. I wish each and every person good luck, but also hope that this entire process doesn’t take a toll on your mental health. Grad school is tough, guys, let’s try to alleviate some of the anxiety while we still can.

That's awesome--please do share if/when you heard from CSR at Harvard. According to older stats, it seems like we should hear by end of February, but this year is a COVID year and I assume all the professors are home-based so maybe that will speed the process up? Not sure. Waiting is definitely the worst, and also knowing that we are the first COVID applicant cohort is even harder, because everyone you ask who is already in the program will explain that things have drastically changed due to COVID. SIGH.

Yep! I wonder though if PhD decisions work similarly to MA. Do they have an internal wait list sort of thing? Meaning that if their first choices reject the offer, they accept their second choices? If so, I'd imagine the decision would come out later.

Harvard doesn't do any interviews, have you checked if your schools do?

Hi guys, if you are applying to a PhD in Religion for the 2021 cycle or have experience from last year you'd like to share, please do post in this new thread. Thank you!