coffeelyf

Hi! These are all great questions that I wish I asked before starting my MA in English in the US. Hope these would be helpful to you: 1) How formal and frequent should the relationship with your Graduate advisor be? If it is before you decide on your thesis and have a thesis advisor, your advisor may be another professor (in my case, our DGS was the advisor for all first-year MAs) and our relationship was limited to one meeting a semester before registering for classes just to catch up and talk about my plans, etc. It was not very close but certainly quite comfortable - though this of course depends on the personalities and dynamics involved and in the department as a whole. I would agree that you should build stronger relationships with your course instructor, who could later advise you on your thesis project, be on your committee, or just be a mentor for you. 2) How should you prepare for graduate seminars? Do the readings, annotate, and make sure that you have a question or two to raise about the text as a whole. The question(s) should come from something that you noticed or a close-reading that you did with the text. Graduate seminar readings usually combine primary texts with theoretical ones, so an easy way to raise questions is to connect the theoretical ideas with the novel/poem to see how they align or don't align, and why. 3) How can you improve your academic writing? I find that this kind of naturally develops as you read and write more in an academic mode. As you read - especially the academic/theoretical readings, note the styles and wording and thought patterns that appeal to you, that you think make sense in presenting an idea. This has helped me improve my way of using words and stating my points. Of course, diversify your vocab, use strong verbs, lessen use of crazy long-winded nominalization, etc. 4) Who should you contact for summer job and internship opportunities? Your professors could be a good resource, especially those that work in the realms related to public humanities or writing pedagogy. Some may help you connect to their former students. Your university's career resource center. Your upperclassmen, who could also connect you with alums (I know people from my program who even found full-time jobs through this kind of "recommendation process"). For international students, as CPT and OPT are complicated processes, I recommend that you work for a program in your university over the summer if that is available and possible, as you wouldn't have to deal with CPT that way. 5) How exactly does writing center consulting works? Each Writing Center has a different philosophy, but my sense is that many writing centers in the US are moving towards a non-directive approach, meaning the writing tutor would assist the student by reading through the assignment, asking questions, explaining and working through their ideas and issues with them, rather than just editing their essay as the student sits there. This was how it was at my undergrad (where I worked as a tutor) and also at the university of my MA (where I visited the writing center as a student and the tutor was one of my MA classmates). The sessions can take half an hour or an hour. I enjoyed working as a writing center tutor and it really helped me with my own writing as well as teaching skills. Before you start work at the writing center, they should provide some training, which would help you know somewhat about the work, but it is also something you get better at with experience and reflection. So don't worry; if you have been accepted and offered the job, they believe that you could do it. Good luck!

I think somewhere between 7 and 12 is good - not so big that you get lost in the crowd (not to mention a large cohort is unethical in this day and age) but not so small that you have no one to get along with. A friend of mine who's in her first year at a top program has a cohort of 9, and she says she enjoys that size because they all have such different personalities that if there were only, say, 4 of them, it would be difficult for her to make a friend in the cohort.

After several great, slightly patchy virtual conversations, I've accepted my offer from NYU. This is literally everything I dream of in a program (complete with a small cohort size), so it's unbelievable to me that it happened. This means I will give up my other offers and my waitlist spots. Best of luck to everyone making a decision!

Just need to vent re: visit days. I'm an international student and thought I had all of my visits figured out perfectly: I was sponsored to go to a conference in the US, got my visa, and planned my visits for right after the conference. Booked my flights to the cities and everything (non-refundable ones). And now the conference was just cancelled, and all my plans went out the window with it, including seeing Salman Rushdie speak at my MA school. At least JHU is going to make things virtual anyway, but I have no idea about NYU, or if they would be willing to reimburse my ticket. GOD. The US needs to get a hold of this situation right now. Update: NYU just emailed to say that they will reimburse, so bless them for that.

Agreed with many points above re: the SoP. I'd also say put more weight on the WS. I always thought the SoP was the most important thing, but as it turns out, the WS is often what my AdCom and PoIs remember best about my application. It makes sense because people would latch onto things that resonate with their own work and that have concrete arguments and analyses. The WS is also where you prove that you are capable of doing the level of thinking and writing that you discuss in the SoP. I used my MA thesis, which was a good piece of work. I found it extremely difficult to cut it to the required length, because I wanted to include my introduction, which is long but includes a lot of theoretical and historical research that frames my argument. After seeking advice from a friend from my MA, who was very successful during their app cycle last year, I decided to forgo the introduction and used 2 chapters which analyzed 2 different texts instead. It was an agonizing decision but it worked out for me, as the WS ended up showing my ability to analyze different literary forms using different theories, while still containing some outside research. So my advice if anyone finds themselves in a similar dilemma, is to choose the writing sample that has more "close reading" than historical/theoretical framing. As I used an excerpt from a longer work, I put notes in the beginning of the WS to explain how it fits into my larger argument in the thesis. Also, regarding prestige and whether to apply to Ivies: I wouldn't say anyone should not apply to Ivies simply because they are a nontraditional applicant or didn't come from a prestigious undergrad institution. If a school has multiple faculty working on the things you have done/hope to be doing, is in a location you want to live in, etc. and which is an Ivy, you should apply, as you never know what may happen. But I would also not apply to an Ivy school just because of their prestige. For certain fields/subfields, they simply may not be it (anymore). For example, my main field is postcolonial studies, and 2 of my recommenders went to Columbia and were students of Spivak. Both of them told me that I could consider Columbia but it's no longer particularly strong in PoCo, which I confirmed by scanning the graduate students' profiles besides the faculty's. Other top-ranked programs that are known for my field are UCLA, UPenn, and UT Austin, but the time periods that their faculty work on are different from mine. When I found NYU, however, it was a perfect match - strong in PoCo with a contemporary, Global South bend, and Robert Young is still there as the theoretical powerhouse. So really digging deep, knowing the state of the field, and looking at faculty's recent research, are very important for picking the right programs for your 1. theoretical frameworks and 2. time period. Finally, apply to at least 8 programs! It is ultimately a numbers' game.

Turned down McGill's offer the other day. Hope this helps someone out there!

@jm6394 The DGS is Robert Young. You can find his email address on his NYU page (all the way at the bottom of the Faculty list).

Between that Princeton rejection and silence on Rutgers' side, I think I will be capping the cycle at 4a/4r/1w. My decision falls to JHU vs. NYU, and I will be visiting both before making the choice. It's crazy how the acceptances did turn out to be my best fits/top choices, and JHU wasn't even put off by my terrible GRE subject test score taken in 2016 (for anyone applying in the future, don't worry too much about the subject test!). I was shut out last year while finishing my MA, including from NYU. Taking another year to polish my materials (a WS from my completed thesis, which is 100x better than last year's WS), knowing how best to articulate my ideas in the SoP, and getting better letters from my professors changed everything. With a job, I am also more financially prepared to make the move, and know for sure that a PhD is what I want to do. So to anyone who is applying right out of undergrad or MA and not getting the results you want, it may really be worth it to take a gap year, as you would be more prepared and knowledgeable about the process. If anyone has any knowledge about the programs at JHU or NYU, I would love to hear them! Thanks everyone for your advice and commiseration, and best of luck to those still waiting!

@meghan_sparkle Congrats on the Princeton acceptance! Just wanted to come here to ask you - were you called/emailed by a PoI or was it a mass email from the dept? Still on the edge of my seat for that school alone....

My vote is for taking the terminal MA with funding anytime. I was in a similar boat as yours, graduating from a small liberal arts college with a pretty average GPA (I did 2 majors, and my other major besides English was crap, while my English major GPA ended up around almost A-minus range because I had no experience studying literature in English as an international student). I also applied to both PhD and MA programs my first round and was accepted into 2 low-tier PhD programs (with pretty low stipends) and a top-20 university MA program with full funding. This was an incredible stroke of luck, by the way; somehow I was awarded a rare graduate assistantship that paid my tuition and included a living wage. My MA was a tough time as I had to balance coursework and working 20 hours a week, and I sometimes questioned if I had been wrong in choosing it over the PhD offers. However, I was also not certain at that point that I was ready to commit 5-6 years to a PhD program, having done little independent research in undergrad. I was glad that I took the MA to figure out my own scholarship a bit more, understand more about my field, and get to know younger, more active scholars (most of my profs in undergrad were older and removed from research because the school was teaching-oriented). I think a lot of people in my cohort used the MA to understand themselves better as well - most of us came in wanting to pursue PhDs, and after the program, only a few applied, while the rest found jobs in teaching, publishing, consulting, etc. I think you could also go through your MA with an open mind towards other career options. Like you said, at the very least you'd end up with another degree and no debt! Realistically speaking: I think you can go from a middle-ranked university for the MA to a higher-ranked PhD program. Perhaps not Duke, but UC Irvine is not too impossible. The MA is a great opportunity to get a great writing sample focused on your intended subfields, gain more research/conference experiences, speak more knowledgeably about yourself and your work, and get letters of recommendation that represent you well as a mature baby-scholar prepared for PhD work. Of course, this is all dependent upon the dynamics in your mA department and whether the faculty is approachable and personable towards you, so that you can do your best research and writing and get good letters from them. For what it's worth, I'm standing at 4a/1w/2r/2p this cycle. 2 of my acceptances are from Johns Hopkins and NYU, schools that I couldn't have dreamt of getting in right out of undergrad (with generous funding). After everything, I still think that my undergrad GPA is the weakest part of my application, but with a good writing sample and rec letters and good MA records, it becomes much less important. The DGSs and PoIs I've talked to seemed to focus the most on the writing sample and what it communicates about my scholarly abilities. I hope this helps, and good luck!

Oops, posted on the wrong thread. Oh god I'm so anxious about Princeton, which makes no sense because I've already gotten into some of my top choices. Just had to get that out. What are they sitting on their results for?

Thank you! I hope to visit in March

Johns Hopkins acceptance and Emory rejection came within a span of 10 minutes. JHU is fantastic and a completely different kind of department (because of their small small cohort size), and I'm so thrilled. In other news, Princeton is really dragging it til next week, huh.

The Johns Hopkins acceptance letter was the most well-written among the personal acceptances I received. Holy shit.

First Emory acceptee on the board said they only have 5 spots. Can anyone claim that acceptance and did anyone else hear from Emory? I was rejected by Cornell as well, which I kind of expected because it was the worst fit out of my 9 programs.