PolPsychGal11

There are some NSF grants that support political science, and grants from other US government departments, like DoD (Minerva). But indirect costs -- which can be as much as 60% of the grant -- support research across the university. Some of that gets directed back to the PI that got the grant. But most of it is taken by the university to support the grants office. It's kind of like taxes: in the US, wealthy states basically subsidize the poorer states (California sends money to Wyoming, essentially). Same principle, though of course a bit more complicated. As funding dries up all over, the ENTIRE university enterprise has to cut back. It's not just grad admissions. We have hiring freezes, some universities are talking about trying to cut pay/benefits, and some are talking about layoffs. It's really not an us vs them at all, and I'd encourage to abandon that line of thought. Social sciences and STEM are getting screwed by Trump. Research grants brought in are one of the major sources of revenue for universities, which means that STEM grants support social science, and vice versa. But at the end of the day, most social science programs don't need expensive labs or equipment, so we're actually a bit better positioned to get through the coming shit storm. All we need is a laptop and occasionally a bit of funding for fieldwork. We don't need to buy genetically modified mice, or expensive equipment, or chemicals. So again: it's not us vs them. It has rarely been that way. And it's not helpful to go around thinking that or spreading it. Try to separate your disappointment at not getting an offer this cycle from making sweeping generalizations or trying to find correlations or other "insights" into the admissions process.

Omkar - I understand that you're anxious about waitlist and hoping that things work out, but (1) this is the most uncertain period we've seen in decades, and no one knows what is going to happen. As people have mentioned on other threads, offers are being rescinded, funding is uncertain, and it is an all around shit show. Trying to read the tea leaves is never a useful exercise, but it's especially perilous right now. (2) No. Waitlists are going to be incredibly rare this year. As many people have explained before, programs are going to err on the side of much smaller cohorts, because of the funding uncertainty. Almost every school over admits -- some by handfuls, some by just a few. Even schools that somehow exactly calculated their yield correctly (such that all admits accept, and that was the cohort size they wanted) are not going to go to the waitlist. If you have an offer that you are excited about, I think it's worth accepting it. If you have no acceptances and are waitlisted, I'm sorry to say that things are unlikely to get better this year. It's not worth spending the time and effort trying to predict what programs are going to do, especially since it sounds like you're unfamiliar with how university funding works (which is ok! no one expects you to be an expert in this!); asking the same question again and again isn't going to change the outcome of admissions this year -- it's just clogging up the threads and risks spreading inaccurate information.

Ehhh, I think this misunderstands university funding. We're all in outright panic right now. Acceptances to MA programs may be increasing, because students pay for those. But we're hard up to be able to guarantee PhD funding because of how uncertain everything is. The overhead/IDC costs from NIH, NSF, USDA, etc support the entire university. So while biomed and STEM are being directly hit right now, it's going to have effects on all of us. As I think I've said before, waitlists are not frequently used, and I think in this funding environment and uncertainty, it is very unlikely that programs will go to their waitlists, EVEN if they have a much lower yield than normal. We're looking at potentially really significant budget cuts, and the prevailing wisdom is that it is better to only have 5 students in an incoming cohort -- and not take anyone from the waitlist -- than to accept a couple from the waitlist and end up in an awful scenario where we run out of money in a year or two. Cohorts were already trending smaller. They are going to get even smaller. I hope we don't get to the point of having to rescind offers, but everything is very uncertain. If any of you folks have an offer you are happy with, I think you should accept it. Don't count on waitlists (good advice in normal years, but especially this year).

We don't see anything about disability or demographics when we review applications. HR separates that stuff out. All we see is CV/resume, transcripts, research statement, and letters of recommendation, and test scores if submitted. People focus on different aspects of the application packet, but we don't see that demographic or disability stuff. Same for veteran status or other protected categories.

I doubt it just because of the uncertainty. If anything, cohorts are going to be even smaller this year, and the longer-term uncertainty means that smaller cohorts will be admitted. This means that programs are (a) admitting fewer students, and (b) going to err on the side of caution and accept few, if any, waitlisted students. If things go really wonky -- for example, because international students decline offers at higher rates than expected -- one student may get admitted off the waitlist. But we've seen an overall decrease in the number of PhD admits over the past few years (ultimately a good thing given the state of the job market). That, combined with the fuckery of Trump, means much smaller cohorts overall. But, and this is important, even if all the Trump stuff were not going on, it still doesn't change the way the waitlist mechanism works. Student A declining an offer does not mean a department is going to quickly turn to Student E, on the waitlist, and extend an offer. Remember, there is always an over admit, even in the era of smaller cohorts. So all that's happening now is a smaller number of admits, an expected smaller cohort, and fewer students on the waitlist.

Guys - every year the few faculty who still lurk here have to remind you that admissions does not work this way. Do not pressure people into declining. Someone declining an offer does not mean someone on the waitlist suddenly gets an offer. It does not work that way: departments OVER admit. They know people will have competing offers, and they do NOT expect every person admitted to accept the offer. They expect many to decline. It is relatively rare to get in off of the wait list. So you should be pleased with a waitlist outcome, because it means you have chance, you need to understand that that chance is SMALL. And it will likely only turn into an offer if an unexpectedly large number of admits decline. Sorry if this sounds mean or like I am trying to dash your hopes. I am not. But you guys need to take a step back and understand how the waitlist works. Do not pressure folks into giving an answer sooner rather than later. It's best to treat a waitlist like a reject, so that you're pleasantly surprised in the rare cases it turns into an offer. (poli sci faculty)

Hey. I think your issue was not applying to better programs... often what happens is admissions committees reject applicants they think are likely to go elsewhere. It's not worth the time and effort to recruit someone who isn't likely to show up. I'm assuming you're interested in IR/comparative? Apply to better programs! Columbia, Penn, Stanford, Minnesota, Madison, Princeton, Washington, MIT, Syracuse, Northwestern (I know some of these were on your list). Make sure your personal/research statement is tailored to the school, and highlights your research interests. I would not change your writing sample, but make sure that it is original research from one of your master's degrees, and not a lit review-type paper. Having references that know people at the schools you're applying to can certainly help, but it's not a requirement. Your GRE scores should help. Highlight any language skills you have and if you have data (inc. qual) experience.

Someone rejecting an offer ≠ someone getting off the waitlist. Programs accept more students than they know will attend, so there's really no point in pressuring people to reject offers. Let folks get all of their offers, consider funding, even go on visits to places they aren't sure about. Rejecting an offer does not guarantee a waitlist, and programs are very, very unlikely to admit people off the waitlist until AFTER their first waves of admits have had to give a decision. This comes up every year, and every year people here try to say to decline offers asap. It's just wrong, and it's also not fair to folks who might be on the fence or not totally sure. I'm sorry to say that at most programs, maybe 1 or 2 students get admitted from the waitlist. MAYBE.

Yes and no. Teaching-focused schools need people who can teach across the curriculum, which means they need the broad training. Carbondale doesn't really offer that, and because of the overproduction of PhDs, and the people making lateral moves, we are increasingly seeing R2, SLAC, directional, and teaching-focused jobs being taken by people at top programs. If a person is not interested in academia at all, then Carbondale is fine. But I'd encourage folks who are even considering academia not to get their PhD at an R2 or a low-ranked R1. Resources, networks, reputation, and the quality of your research all matter. Yes, there are unicorns that come out of low-ranked/R2 programs, but it is not very common. Academia is already a tough gig, and you have to move to where the jobs are. There's no reason to give yourself any more of an uphill battle by attending a meh program.

I would not attend that program. Very small faculty, and programs that don't fund all of their graduate students are programs that don't have a business having a PhD program. Either fund all of the PhD students or don't have a program. Otherwise it sets up a caste system of the haves and have-nots, and can lead to a really crappy competitive environment. They also are not a full-service department, which means that PhD students coming out of that program will not be broadly trained in the subfields, and will have a hard time making the case that they can teach -- thoroughly -- the classes that most universities will want them to teach. The benefit of US PhD programs is that you spend the first few years taking classes and get broad exposure to ideas and core research in the subfield, especially those ideas that are not going to be directly included in their dissertation. But when a department has a limited number of faculty, and in very niche areas, they can't really do the broad teaching that we expect US PhD graduates to have. It is also quite concerning that they don't list their recent placements. Google "Harvard PhD political science placement" and you'll see what you should expect from every PhD program. Places that don't have this usually have poor placement records. If you want to stay in academia, I would not go to Carbondale. You really need to go to a top school, and barring that, a school that is a full service political science program and guarantees funding to every student. But even then, it's a risk to go to a place like Carbondale (or Buffalo). That's my honest opinion. There are a lot of schools that get mentioned on this sub each year that I think do a wild disservice by continuing to admit PhD students, and I always hesitate whether or not to warn students. So I hope this doesn't come off as too harsh or mean, but I do think that students -- especially those coming from outside of the US -- need to have a stronger understanding of the problems with mediocre PhD programs.

I would wait. Because if you don't get funding it doesn't matter at all, since you should not attend a program that doesn't commit to you fully for at least 5 years. And honestly even then, I don't think this is a program you should consider attending. By placements, I don't mean "careers" -- there should be a page on the Political Science PhD site that says "recent graduate placements" or "placement history" and it should list every graduate and where they landed. On the "careers in political science page" they are claiming Mark Huddleston as a "recent graduate". He is the RETIRED former president of the University of New Hampshire. The dude is old. He is 73!!!, and in no way a recent graduate. Listing him there is really shady and sketchy. Look, I hate to be incredibly blunt, especially as people are celebrating acceptances. But even if they gave you full funding for 5 years, there's no way I would recommend anyone attend this program.

I would wait. Because if you don't get funding it doesn't matter at all, since you should not attend a program that doesn't commit to you fully for at least 5 years. And honestly even then, I don't think this is a program you should consider attending. By placements, I don't mean "careers" -- there should be a page on the Political Science PhD site that says "recent graduate placements" or "placement history" and it should list every graduate and where they landed. On the "careers in political science page" they are claiming Mark Huddleston as a "recent graduate". He is the RETIRED former president of the University of New Hampshire. The dude is old. He is 73!!!, and in no way a recent graduate. Listing him there is really shady and sketchy. Look, I hate to be incredibly blunt, especially as people are celebrating acceptances. But even if they gave you full funding for 5 years, there's no way I would recommend anyone attend this program.

Congrats on your acceptance. I would do A TON of research into Buffalo's program before you accept, even if a funding package comes through. Programs should be incredibly transparent -- on their websites -- about their recent graduate placement record. Any halfway decent program will have, in its grad student directory, a description of the student's research, and places for them to list awards and publications. And all programs should have a list of graduate students on the market. Buffalo has none of these things, AND they're admitting students without a guarantee of funding. If your interest is staying in academia, you're in for an uphill battle. Sorry to be the downer and bearer of bad news, but it is not ok for programs to admit students without a guarantee of funding (and you should treat this like a waitlist rather than acceptance), and it's also not ok for programs to half-ass their student directory. If your interest is in earning a PhD and looking for government, think tank, or other industry jobs, that's a different calculation, but I still would not attend unless you are fully funded. Since your decision letter made it clear that you will only receive funding if others decline, I do not think you should email right now. Most decisions have not been released. If they have not gotten back in touch by mid-March, you can email and ask for a timeline about decisions re: funding, but otherwise it's just going to make them question if you understood the offer letter or not.

Hey all. I'm a faculty member at a lower-tier R1, and just wanted to comment on this because I see it repeatedly coming up on each year's admission thread. Please don't put pressure on people to decline offers they will not accept on the assumption that a waitlisted student will then get an offer. The vast majority of programs admit MORE students than they hope will enroll, so there is not a 1:1 decline --> waitlisted offer process. Once the decision deadline has passed, we (at both programs I have worked in) review who has committed and whether or not we have any funding left. Only then do we determine if we can make a waitlist offer. If for some flukey reason 90% of our initial offers decline within the first few weeks, sure, we'll turn to the waitlist with a few offers. But otherwise, the timing of declining doesn't matter, because we over admit. We know that not everyone admitted will attend, and so we wait until after acceptance deadlines to turn to the waitlist.

Hi - I'm a current assistant prof, and was on the market twice, both times I got a TT job (I moved up after my first job). This is patently not true. The market is tight, and people take whatever job they can get. Going to school on the east coast does not make it more likely that you'll get a job on the east coast. If anything, this works slightly in reverse: many schools in the middle of the country are skeptical of graduates of highly-ranked coastal schools. Sometimes this is an unfair assumption, other times it is based on making an offer and being burned. For those with multiple offers to consider: you need to have a good fit with your potential program, but you also need to go to a highly ranked program. I've lurked on this site for a while, and am always torn about weighing in when people are apply to poorly ranked and poorly regarded schools. Taking 5-6 years to do a PhD at a not great school might be an ok option if you want to go into industry (though there are significant opportunity costs), but it is just not a good idea if you have you dreams set on entering academia. I'd encourage you all to read this as you consider acceptances and what decisions to make: https://www.insidehighered.com/news/2022/12/07/faculty-member-issues-dire-warning-grad-students-about-jobs