Eman2

Yeah the response that everybody quotes as saying we would hear today actually says decisions will be finalized by today...That makes it seem like they definitely won't be sent out today since I'm sure they need a day to process everything at least

Or it said "won't be able to make additional awards this year".. and that its been a rough spring for their sponsoring agencies. Unsure whether that means they awarded some this year already or not.

Got an email saying they won't be handing out fellowships this year. VERY Lame of them

Why do we think it will come on Friday? I think I missed the comment about that.

LOL at least with you they know it will be a long term investment

I had first author and also not recommended. You have to realize that there are people out there who just have incredible resumes (like 4 pubs by end of undergrad incredible).

I didn't get it either or even honorable mention. Feels kinda crappy. I told myself that it was a long shot to not get my hopes up but I'm surprisingly disappointed. There are some existential doubts about my abilities that I'm feeling like what yayareaforever commented. In hindsight I sort of rushed the application but idk I thought it was pretty good. Hopefully the feed back from the reviewers will be constructive at least. On a positive note I applied for two more fellowships that I haven't heard back from yet and one is an even bigger award than the NSF!

I'm pretty sure the bar is just high enough that reviewers expect publications from even undergrads. Also, I think the personal statement prompt asks people to explain any break in their studies? Maybe they expected you to discuss you work experience more in depth. I want to point out that it is not up for speculation whether they segment the applicants- undergrads are compared with undergrads grad students are compared with grad students. I'm pretty sure Science Geek is right about 1st and second years being in separate categories too but I can't find that stated explicitly online. Until you enter grad school (even if in a gap year), you compete at the undergraduate level (https://www.nsf.gov/pubs/2017/nsf17123/nsf17123.jsp#q3). if they didn't do this no undergrads would get any fellowships lol! if you read example proposals from different levels they get MUCH better as you go up each level imo.

I'm going to start at uiuc in the fall. I find this comment surprising because just looking a craigslist it seems there are many 1 bedroom apartments available for less that 700 and even 600 dollars. They may not include utilities but if you have a 1 bedroom apartment for 600 that still leaves 100 for paying your own utilities. These apartments I have seen are closer to downtown urbana or champaign but I figured thats where I would want to be as a grad student. am I missing something?

So I have had the fortunate problem of being accepted with funding offers to multiple schools for a PhD. There are some differences between them but these schools are all of a similar caliber (at least for the subject I'm interested in) which makes it hard to choose. Here are my options: School A: research in a fundamental area that my background prepared me well for and that I find interesting. Uni is in a medium-large city (plus for me) but the department is sort of small and there are probably only 2 profs whose research I'm interested in. School B: research in basically same area as above school, in smallish town/city, department is well known/regarded in my field and quite large. School C: the research option here is more applied and supported by an important industry sponsor, but it is in a field of application that I find very interesting. Their work is interesting but I don't think I would like working so closely with industry (who then owns the results of the research). There may be another research option here that is more fundamental in nature but funding for that option is not certain. The location here is likely the worst of the three My issues are: I'm leaning towards the more fundamental research area but am worried that it would be difficult to get a job in industry afterwards. I haven't decided whether I should try for an academic career yet, but I don't want to exclude the option to get an industry job after graduation. Between School A and B, School B is definitely the "better" school reputation wise but i would rather live in city of school A. On top of this, I would rather go to school D, my first choice school which hasn't responded to my application yet (I think they haven't sent out decisions yet). I also feel bad delaying my decision because I know these professors need to build there teams. I'm visiting these schools soon so maybe that will provide some clarity How can I choose between these schools?