dubu_soop

well i am desperate so i called and they said there is a good chance notifications will go out today but no guarantees. they said if not today then tomorrow but good chance it will be today

Okay, here are the announcement dates since 2015 I think:
2015: Tuesday April 21, 2015
2016: Monday April 18, 2016 
2017: Monday April 17, 2017
2018: Sometime during the third week of April 16-20th
2019: Monday April 15, 2019
2020: Wednesday April 15, 2020

Patience is key! I am sure we will get good news soon. In the meanwhile, the NSEP Annual Report for 2020 was released a couple of weeks ago. Worth taking a look at, maybe that will help us during this wait!

Also, 41% acceptance rate for Fellows last year, pretty good!

Here are some quick stats:
 

Yeah it is pretty reassuring, but I’ll be all the more frustrated with myself if I don’t get picked bc the rate is so high ? I wonder if more or less people are applying because of the pandemic?

Not official statistics by any means so this is about as close as we are going to get. 2017-2018 tracker and 2016-2017 tracker
I think the acceptance rate is a result of just how niche the fellowship is. I can't imagine a lot of grad students want to take a year off to live in a foreign country (a not so cushy one at that) and learn a (objectively difficult) language and then work for the government. But it's nice, because if all of that makes sense for you, then you stand a good chance!

Who is planning to apply for a Boren Scholarship or Boren Fellowship this year? The deadline is coming up, but I haven't seen a thread on this topic yet! I would love to hear what everyone is planning to apply for and how it's going. There might be a lot of uncertainty this year given the public health situation in a lot of countries, so I hope we can navigate through it together.