k0909

You could always ask how their waitlist process works. For example, how do you determine who gets pulled from the waitlist? Is it one general list or does each professor have a list? You could also ask the professor to explain the waitlist process. 
Instead of saying this school is your only option I would say something along the lines of this is my top choice program and I’m very interested in attending. I mentioned that to a program director and he said it was helpful to know I was very interested in their program. I’m on a waitlist right now and I check in with the program coordinator every two weeks or so to ask for an update. With a lot of universities moving to online classes acceptances may be put on the back burner while courses make the transition so I think it is helpful to check in so they know I’m still interested 

The waiting is killing me. I am an alternate, and I'm wondering as more and more time goes by, are my chances decreasing as well? The school didn't elaborate on high/med/low alternate, so I'm not sure where I place. 

I just got placed on my first waitlist post-interview and I am worried about my mindset a bit... I don't want to take this as a rejection and get too down about it, but I also don't want to be too optimistic, especially as this school/POI has been my top choice since I started the process. I am also only waiting to hear back from one other school at this point, which makes things feel a little more dire. I'm trying to manage my expectations, but it's hard. All of my other rejections and assumed rejections have been softened by the thought that I still had my top choice on the docket, as it was my last interview. So now I feel sort of at a loss... I feel like I should be regrouping and thinking about next steps to strengthen my application next year, but I don't really want to at this point. I think I inadvertently got too attached to the idea of this program and POI being the perfect match for me, so now I'm trying to avoid clinging to the hope afforded by still being on the waitlist so I don't get wrecked when it doesn't happen... But it also could happen! So I keep going back and forth...
There's really no point to this post, I just wanted to get my feelings out to some people who might understand. But any advice about getting into a good mindset about this all would be appreciated!

Anyone else get their soul crushed when a potential PI talks about how they are SURE you have SO many offers and that they think you have an amazing career ahead of you...but then reject you? I know it's them trying to be nice, but when the reality is that I have no firm offers, it just adds insult to injury when they are asking me to contact them when I "decide where I'm going". 

Lol, well optimism is always good.
 
I wouldn't stress the Ivy thing, there's really no ranking system at PhD programs. It's more about fit and making sure you're productive in the ways that will suit your ultimate goals. 

I'm really starting to get worried overall. I have one interview weekend coming up but got rejected from my top choice school that seemed like a very promising acceptance due to all the interviews and communications I had with PI/faculty/students so hopes aren't too high. This is my second time applying, though the most serious as now I will be graduating with an MA in May, and I'm scared this isn't the right decision.
I have such a deep passion for my area of study but these rolling rejections and a negative direct supervisor of my thesis have been haunting me. It's hard for me to write my thesis/do the remaining school work to graduate/teach my class I'm TA-ing for/and even begin to prep for the interview that I do have coming up since I'm starting to feel like someone else more deserving should be in that spot instead of me.
Unsure how to boost up my work ethic again. Is this what burnout really is?! I've never truly experienced it.

As week three of post interview waiting nears an end.. I am almost numb to the waiting, I am searching for answers but also backup jobs, I am slowly drifting off to sea. I shall write back when I befriend a whale... 
But seriously, I am wondering how long it can take to hear back? Waiting until April sounds awful at this point. Trying to distract myself with all the cookies! 

What I've done is familiarized myself with the methods the mentor seems to use frequently and the types of measures they typically use (survey, psychophys, interview, fMRI, cognitive tasks, etc) and come up with a couple of ideas synthesizing my research interests with those methods. I'd air on the side of thinking about a couple of broad study ideas and being willing to think on the fly or riff on ideas your PI might bring up. Most probably won't expect you to have all your measures sorted out, but you should probably have somewhat of an idea what you could use if they ask. For example, if you wanted to look at anxiety symptoms, would you want those assessed via interview, self-report, by gathering physiological measures like heart rate, or some other way? If self-reported, would you want to look at EMA or retrospective report? As long as you have a baseline knowledge of what you're talking about and are familiar with their research style (which you should have already if you made it to an interview!) you should be fine after a little bit of prep. Some people don't ask this question at all! But if they do, I've found it helpful to have a couple loosely fleshed-out questions prepared and to be willing to be creative in the moment. 

Hi! Most of the times I've been asked that question, it seems like they want an example of a specific research question that takes into account what opportunities the program/lab offers. For example, I would not propose a research question using an adolescent sample if the program does not have any faculty that have experience with that population. I would also have an idea of what you would expect to find in the results (based off of a few background readings). Overall, I think most people use this question to see if you are able to generate research questions and think a bit about their feasibility in a graduate program. 
I've also heard of some professors asking for a bunch of specifics regarding study design, but I never experienced it. Does not hurt to be prepared, but also if you don't know the answer, it's better to be honest! I think the majority don't expect you don't have a full study proposal ready to go since that's part of graduate school training anyways. 

At my recent interview, here are a couple research-related questions I asked:
1. I noticed in this paper, you chose to utilize "x" measure over "y" measure, despite utilizing "x" in your other papers. Why is that? (Basically, I showed that I noticed a pattern in my POI's methods and noticed they deviated from this pattern in a particular paper. These 2 measures are very similar so I was curious as to why he chose one over the other)
2. I noticed you collected "this data" while examining "this research topic". Have you considered examining "this data" in relation to "this research topic"? (showing that their research inspired you to ask questions shows that you care about their line of research and have ideas of your own to contribute. For example, a faculty member I interviewed with collected racial-ethnic data while examining her topic of interest. I asked her if she considered seeing if race/ethnicity moderated the relationship between "x" and "y." I think she was impressed by this question)
Also, I skimmed most of these papers for the main ideas and went back to whatever I especially found interesting. I didn't spend a crazy amount of time reading every little detail (although it was tempting at times lol). Hope this helps!

I’d risk corona virus for an interview at Northwestern

i think this generally happens after offers for PhD have been extended. schools that do this will also usually wait until all the masters applications are in so they can review everyone at once, so it might be relevant if you can see online when masters applications are due or if they have a timeline for the masters program process posted anywhere!
for reference though, boston university (who i applied to last round) also offers you the chance to be considered for the masters. i checked my email and last year i got my rejection notification + invite to masters for them on February 25th, but I didn't need to decide if i wanted to be considered until May 1st.

hasn't happened to me, but when I was telling the grad students i work with that I thought I was out for a certain school because interview invites had already gone out, they named like 3 people off the top of their head at the program where I work that currently attend grad school there but weren't invited to interview day. they got in because the PI just didn't click with their initial invitees and reached out off their shortlist.  i wouldn't say there is a strong chance (just to be a realist), but it does happen! 

As far as I understand, it is important for some programs to be able to collaborate with other faculties. Because sometimes as a requirement you should in a different lab at least for a semester to gain experience. I would name a professor if I were you.
Good luck!

I had the same dilemma when I was asked if I wanted to meet any other faculty besides my POI. I didn't know if it looked like I wasn't that interested in my POI if I mentioned others and if it looked I was unprepared if I didn't mention anyone else. Fortunately, there were other faculty  whose work interested me. Can you find few whose work you atleast find interesting? Then you can write something like, 'If possible, besides <your POI>, I would love to meet with other faculty whose work on <topics you find interesting> intrigue me: Prof. X, Prof. Y....'

hi guys!  a school i am interviewing for has explicitly asked us if there are any other faculty members (aside from our PI) that we are specifically interested in interviewing with. do you think it looks bad (or maybe not bad but perhaps underprepared) if I don't indicate any preference? there isn't much overlap between my interests and that of the other faculty so I'm not fully sure on what basis to pick other faculty I'd like to interview with but I don't want to sound like I don't care what happens.  definitely overthinking this haha but just wondering what others have done :~)

Are there any faculty that provide stats consultation to grad students? Other faculty could be the DCT or other faculty that your PI collaborates with. 
 
I always indicated additional faculty when asked to but I don’t know if it’s viewed as “underprepared” if you don’t. 

I FEEL THIS. Literally all my mentors and psych friends were like, "Obviously you're going to get in this year, don't be dumb" and then I started believing them and now I'm like........................ oh

Me, trying to remind myself that I’m not complete trash after dealing with this stress the last few weeks: 

1st time applicant here in the same boat--just one interview! It's stressful knowing that everything pretty much rides on this one school's decision, but I keep having to tell myself that they invited me because they DO want me, and this interview is really just a personality check.
I think what is most embarrassing, for me, is having all of my mentors & friends tell me that I was going to get so many interviews...and then this happens lol. I'm mortified just thinking about having to go back to my letter writers in April to tell them that I didn't get in anywhere and ask them to submit their letters again in December ?

Me thinking about the schools I applied to

School: University of Denver
Type: Clinical Child PhD
Date of invite: 1/14/2020
Type of invite: email from POI, had a prelim phone interview in december
Interview date(s): 2/21 or 2/24
i wasn't one of the posters on the results page but feel free to DM for POI! 

Anyone else already looking at apartments on Zillow in the cities of schools that invited you to interview? ?

I don't know if it's because I'm having kind of a blah day or what, but I'm starting to second-guess my decision to apply to programs this year. There are days when I feel somewhat confident in my ability to succeed in grad school and other days like today when I think, "Am I even ready for this? Can I even do it? Why would anyone even want me in their program?" Anyone else feeling this way lol? 

Anyone else want to get their rejections so they can move on with their life? ?