Strangefox

Thanks!

But I don't know what your user name means

Oh, that's an unpleasant situation I hope everything will be fine!

What's that mysterious thing moving in your avatar?

I used Embark as well so may be I will be able to help you. You mean you enter the Syracuse application, go to the section with uploaded documents and see there the documents that you uploaded for Syracuse and also for NYU? I just do not understand exactly how can they be on one page there... If the app inspector says that the app is incomplete it must show you the sections where you need to change or add something in order to make it complete. What does it show you? I also had a small problem when I was submitting my Embark app and I had to contact their technical support. May be you can do that too?

Even if you get this phone call suddenly, you are in your right to say thay you are not able to speak now (may be you in a busy street! at work!) and they must let you reschedule. If they don't - well, that only will mean that it is a bad school and you should not choose it anyways.

I guess in most cases they will notify you. They must understand that you are not always available for interviews and that you must have a say in choosing when you will have such an important coversation. Otherwise that would be unfair.

Sure you can mention the things listed above (but may be not everything relating to being disadvantaged) in your SOP. Just do it in passing, don't dwell on it unless absolutely necessary and make it positive! Good luck!

Yeah, I would not do that exactly for this reason. If you want to show that the program is the ideal fit for you, mention all things that are great about the program. Talk about its vast resources: various facilities, labs, libraries, research centers - and explain how all of that will help you to conduct your research. Browse the school's website and find everything that makes it special and that the school can be proud of. They will be happy to know that you have noticed those features and that they are important for you. Good luck!

Nono, it's not weak, I believe it brings up the idea of chance! I mean, you were listening to the radio, you heard the word, you made it your name... I don't know, some pretty cool stories start like that

Total mystery

Oh my god, that's so cool!!!!

I wrote it this way: "I am exсited about the opportunity to learn from the school’s faculty members who explore different aspects of <...> and <...>, among them Professor A, Professor B and Professor C". You do not need to mention specific books and articles. Of course if you can do that it may be a plus.

That made me think about GRE

So is it like your biography or something?

I asked because personal statement and statement of purpose are often the same thing, as far as I know

I guess your course of action should depend on how much you have been in contact with the profs and how long ago. If you exchanged only a couple of letters two or more month ago, contacting them out of the blue would seem strange, I guess. But if you had an intense correspondense with them and sent/received the last letter only a couple of weeks ago, then why not. In that situation I guess I would contact them again. May be... Yeah, this is a really complicated issue.

I would not recommend doing that. If they had asked you to tell them when you submitted your app, then you could do that. But if you contact them without such "invitation", that may come as awkward. If you contacted them before the dedline, they already know that you exist. If you mentioned them in the SOP, they will be reminded about your existence by ad coms anyway. There are some old threads on this forum where people discussed this issue and the consensus was that once you submitted your apps and until schools contact you one way or another, sending letters to POIs is probably not a very good idea.

Just curious - why do you think that your SOP will be considered mediocre? If you have a brilliant writing sample it means your writing skills are great and that in turn means your SOP must be also great

Yes, you should not worry too much about that. Wait for a reply. If there will be none, call them. Also, how have you submitted SOP eventually or you have not? Good luck!

As far as I know, not everything in these forms is about research, so your employer can rate you only on things that are not directly academic (maturity, analytical skills and such like) and if there is something like "demonstrated research ability" he/she can choose, "don't know" or "unable to judje", which must be available as an option. If it isn't, well, I don't know. But in some forms it certainly is.

I do But not too often, don't worry

You are welcome! Good luck and Happy New Year!