pbspoon

Yeah, three is already a ton of work and stress. Best of luck with your decision! Edited b/c I just saw your signature: I also have a JD! You think that would help.... I do wonder if they see lower JD GPAs and don't understand law school curves, though, since it seems like grad school grades are super inflated.

Thanks! I'm more than a decade out from undergrad and am surprised how much that seemed to affect things. And agreed--very happy that for whatever reason a higher ranked school decided I was a good fit!

My Penn rejection ends this cycle for me. What a bizarre experience--11 schools, only 1 acceptance, and not even a waitlist at any of the others. I'm a nontraditional candidate but was not expecting this...thank goodness for Duke!

Yale rejection for me too. Really disappointed, not sure what would've improved my application. (Another poster mentioned bias against older applicants--I only have my own anecdotal experience, but I'm wondering if that's part of what's going on for me. My stats are excellent and I have solid recs from 3 tenured profs, but I've been out of school for more than a decade. Otoh, who knows, and I'm sure my statement of purpose could've been better as I didn't get edits from any poli sci profs or graduate students.) I'm happy with Duke and it's looking like that's going to be my one admit, but this whole process has felt very defeating.

Yeah, hopefully it was a generous estimate (for them, not us!) and it's actually in the next week or so...

@phduntome This was the last update from the department.

Just got my rejection. Very expected at this point -- was initially disappointing, but honestly I'm glad I don't have to worry about dealing with Bay Area cost of living on a grad student stipend! (At least, that's what I'm telling myself right now.)

@LM2022 I'm a theorist, so JHU is actually slightly higher ranked than Duke. I'd likely choose Duke over JHU even if I got into both (which is looking unlikely!) for a few reasons, but I'd still happily talk to faculty and grad students at JHU. That being said, I take your point, and I think a lot of this for me is just psychological--I want to know where I'm in or not, and I also want to get into more than 1 program (not true yet) so that I at least feel like I have options, even if I already know where I'd rather go. That isn't totally rational, but it's definitely how I'm feeling! (Plus I am very anxious about Yale, which is my true top choice, and feel like getting all these rejections is a bad sign--also not necessarily rational!)

I'm still waiting for JHU and Northwestern. I'm assuming a rejection from Northwestern but not JHU (yet). There have only been 2 JHU posts on the results page, and there are usually more acceptances than that each year (2021 was an exception but that may have been a pandemic thing). So I'm holding out hope they're going by subfield and not all the acceptances are out yet. That may be wishful thinking, though.

QQ: if you're invited to an in-person open house by a school where you're admitted and they don't mention reimbursements for travel costs, do you assume that you're paying for your own travel? (Obviously happy to contact the department but I figured this might be one of those things that other people just know and I don't!)

?

Yep, mine too. It's much prettier now, but still no decision--agree that the timing is weird!

I have a little hope since no one on this thread seems to have heard...on the other hand, in past years there have been only one or two acceptances posted on the Results page, so maybe one this year is it. I'm assuming a rejection and will be happily surprised if it ends up going another way!

Princeton rejection for me as well. It was not a good fit, but I'm still feeling all of these rejections--trying to remind myself it's not a measure of personal worth!

Yeah, seems like a legit JSP acceptance. Best of luck to the rest of us in the next few days!