needanoffersobad

Great advice! Thanks! May I ask if you wanna share how is the interaction with faculty and your cohort? Do u find it sufficient? As I am taking a gap year (deferment), I am concerning whether we will have “normal” conversations with professors. Cuz I currently work as RA and talk with people on zoom. I find conversation on zoom is extremely short. Many thanks!

Advice from a faculty member at Stanford: mentioning 3-5 faculty members and briefly addressing their work and your interests at the end of your SOP. To him, it is a must when he reads applicants' SOP. btw, he also told me if you cannot list out 3, it probably means this school does not fit you well. dont just put one or two. As posts above said, we are not sure if they still take students or not. So 3-5 is much safer (its extremely unlucky if none of them takes more students)

To me, its not a question on whether you should, its a question whether adcom will have a chance to read your SoP. I was told by previous PhDs in top 6 that PhDs or other staff do the first round screening based on GRE, GPA. So if 154 is not a safe score to pass the threshold, your SoP and other application materials may not be passed for the second round by professors.

it is true international students may not get a high score as native english speaking students. But just among international students, many apply with at least 158 (I am talking among my peers in East Asia). the common score among us are 160-162. So I suggest do it one more time

sorry but I have to give my strong opposition to this response. (which I normally dont say it out publicly) No one can deny the academia is getting harder than ever. limited faculty positions, funding being cut down, extremely high competition...... And Covid-19 is making things even worse. But which industry can escape all these? How many people get laid off in 2020. We are experiencing difficulties. It doesnt mean thats the end and we shouldnt think of doing a PhD at all. For PhD application, it is totally normal to wait a few years until you can get into a suitable program. No one should rush for it. No one ever say you should get it in 2020!

No you are not. GRE may not be that important if you read one person's application only. But if you put it in a pool with 200-300 students whose score averagely are V155-170, you will know how important it is. I have a professor who worked as a student helper in PhD admission in a Top6 school, (you know which 6 ). She told me facing hundreds of applications, student helpers are firstly asked to narrow the pool to less than 100 , or even 50. They look at GPA and GRE mainly. Finally people who entering the smaller pool almost all have a nearly perfect GPA and GRE. (both V and Q are over 160). So it's not GRE per se is important. It is important that everyone else has a very good GRE score. That is what makes us all have to work super hard to get it as high as possible. (Again, I took it 4 times.) If it is only your first time, dont be afraid and frustrated. You got plenty of people like me who failed many times before the last shot. Good Luck!

No u don’t have to. U fill in a new DS 160. And then use the update profile function on the left hand size

no. I am applying from Hong Kong, where no new cases for more than 2 weeks. I am not sure they will open country by country or all together

I am really sorry to hear that. I am in the same boat as well. May I know what makes you think that no new visa will be issued throughout 2020? Cuz i am thinking of deferment if I still cant get a visa before 2021 spring. thanks!

Hi I think we r In the same situation except for our locations. Tuition waived with no stipend. One thing I really don’t know: will they resume visa service within 2020? I seriously doubt it

I think if you are aiming to work in organisations instead of academia, then your working/intern experience is more important than the reputation of your school. So Getting an internship or contract based work in the UN is much much easier if you study at Graduate Institute. Plus, if I remember it correctly, internship is even part of their program. science Po is famous indeed. I have never studied there but I have professors talking about it with negative comments. Like they are not updating their courses. They recruit just too many students. I also have a couple of friends studying there. They said the courses are too general for a master degree program. It’s hard for them to look for a job or internship Maybe also think about what major you want to choose Friends who got UN working experience told me they should have chosen a more professional degree instead of something like “international public policy, international security, international organizations. ” UN recruits people for their needs, such as data analysis, consulting.... so also check out their course syllabus instead of school reputation

@Paulcg87 I dont know how to further extend my gratitude. I would say this is a must read for everyone. Thank you! "being on a large campus right now in a world without a vaccine" this is almost everything in my mind, as a new student in the US without a car. As @Artifex_Archer , i dont want to begin my phd by sitting in front of my screen. But I know there will be lots of difficulties for me to travel to the US and settle down now. So while I am praying for more flexibility from my school, I am thinking questions like "will online learning better than nothing"? "Do I have an equally good plan to fulfil my gap year?" "Will I enjoy the year away from school just as the year studying remotely?" At the end, there is a question that I, or no one, can avoid. Will it be online for the whole year? I bet no one knows the answer. Choosing online means I need to be prepared for studying like this for a whole year. Deferring means freezing myself for a year and welcoming a rather "normal" start a year later. So far I still dont have the answer yet. But thanks again for all your comments to make me be able to re-phrase my question better and think more.

I agree with you the decision should be made between the cost of deferring and the cost of doing (one semester at least) online. thanks for pointing it out!

Thank you very much! I appreciate that you suggest thinking about how much time I can save to do something else. online things suck but I am really happy to see more scholars are still utilising online opportunities to arrange presentations and other things. Thats a great inspiration!

1. don’t go to Science Po. It’s just a name. (Welcome any further discussions) 2. Graduate institute in Geneva is perfect if you want to work in UN. It’s just right next to UN. I have two friends studying there and they all got UN internship. One of them even stay there for a full time job. But don’t dream too big about UN. They don’t pay lower ranking staff much. And living in Geneva is very expensive.