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Wow I'm in the same boat! Except swap out University of Illinois for a different school. AU offered me partial funding and a graduate assistantship. Definitely an attractive program, so I get your dilemma. I'm also from the northern VA area outside of DC, and I can attest to how expensive housing is here (even split b/w housemates). Like others have said, accruing debt in the humanities is not at all ideal. Especially in today's unstable job market and struggling academia. Full funding for a MA is also a rarity, so if presented with that opportunity and at a program you equally like, Illinois seems like a great choice. I would definitely work out on paper what kind of resources are offered versus cost-of-living estimates for both programs. I'd also ask yourself what your quality of life would *potentially* look like in both cities. Especially if one requires a more demanding commute and higher living expenses Four Factors to consider: 1) Funding: If offered full tuition remission, is it guaranteed for 2 years? Is there a stipend/assistantship attached? Does the program struggle to support its MAs? 2) Professor/faculty match: Do our research interests align? Is there a potential for a good relationship dynamic? Are there multiple faculty members you can see yourself working with *in the event one is unavailable*? Do I like the departmental culture? 3) Can I imagine myself living there? Do I like the atmosphere of the city and what it offers? What would my life look like outside the program? Cost of living? Any resources, institutions, and opportunities in the area relevant to my goals? Congratulations on your choices, and good luck!

Combination of their faculty (one in particular I saw as a potentially strong advisor fit), university resources in southern history (plus shared resources with Duke), and the appealing location. The lack of funding is still a bummer, but I grow increasingly hopeful w/ VCU's full ride & will make my decision soon!

Yeah that is sound advice, thanks ? I found two potential advisors at VCU, still in the process of meeting and gauging our compatibility. Sadly even after trying to negotiate, Chapel Hill made it clear MAs are just out of luck this round (COVID, budget cuts, etc.), and that funding is going more to PhDs.

I received full funding from Virginia Commonwealth University's (VCU) MA in Art History/Museum Studies program (graduate assistantship too). But my first choice UNC-Chapel Hill isn't offering anything, RIP. Anyone want to vouch for either programs?

Yeah, sadly the funding pool shrunk even more with COVID. Congrats on the AU offer! & in my excitement I didn't read the GWU letter carefully LOL. I re-read it & GWU is offering me a merit award (more info will come later). So thank you for inadvertently reminding me, and good luck to you! ?

Hi all! I'm a prospective MA candidate and new to this thread. Could anyone give insight into negotiating offers from schools? What's considered a generous offer...? Most of the programs I'm looking at are in 30-50k+range. Acceptances so far: UNC-Chapel Hill (first choice, no word on funding yet) AU (neck in neck w/ UNC, they offered me $25k total in merit award w/ a grad assistantship and tuition remission) Tufts (Art History/Museum Studies; half tuition scholarship) GWU (no word on funding yet) Waiting on UT Austin & VCU now.

@killerbunny Hi! Thank you so much, yes if you could PM that'd be great.

Hi all, I'm a prospective MA in Art History candidate, and I was hoping someone would be willing to look over my writing sample (or at least parts of it, don't want torture you). My paper in short is examining the Civil Rights Movement's visual and sociopolitical legacy upon Black Lives Matter Movement photojournalism. Also, I know programs vary in capping the writing sample length. So for example, are we expected to edit 50 page essay to read cohesively like it's 20 pages, OR is it up to us which set of pages we cut out or choose to submit? Hopefully that made sense. Here's a little preview. God, I hate re-reading it, but shit's gotta get done. Please PM me if you're able to read more, thank you so much ahead of time!!! You'll have the undying gratitude of this stressed out student "...By the mid 20th century, the role of photographic imagery was integral to influencing the course of a social movement and hardening our collective narratives and memories. In the present day, photography remains a powerful tool in capturing the fleeting reality of an event as well as providing a more layered, nuanced form of storytelling. In essence, photography “makes the random, accidental, and fragmentary details of everyday existence meaningful while preserving the actual details of the scene.” It “simultaneously hosts an internal dialogue (content, style, the transformation of reality into a two-dimensional representation) and an external dialogue that changes as the time changes.” Consequently, the context surrounding photos and their transmission is a significant site to study. Whether consciously or unconsciously, contemporary photographers are appropriating the iconography from its predecessors of the Civil Rights Movement. Although the interpretation and contexts surrounding Civil Rights photographs have engendered different responses, they still deeply inform contemporary anti-racism movements, one of the most prominent ones being Black Lives Matter (BLM). This paper argues that photography from the Civil Rights Movement and Black Lives Matter share profound similarities in their construction, transmission, and interpretation of social protest images. Although BLM images have changed in conforming to present day modes of visual transmission, the contextual and visual parallels are crucial to recognize. Photographs from both the civil rights era and BLM can offer a “particular framing(s) of news events offered in newspapers through their selection and omission, depiction, symbolism and lexical context (caption and headline).” 3 This paper will thus focus on key protest images from both movements and put them into dialogue with one another."