sadevilminion

Held off on posting this since Wednesday because it feels too surreal and I’m still waiting for them to email again saying “Whoops, wrong person!” But I got into UIUC with 7 years of very good funding ? I’ve turned down my offers from 4 out of 5 programs now. Waiting for UIUC to send the official documents before I turn down my last one. Thank you to everyone on this forum who offered advice and helped me keep a shred of my sanity during this crazy season.

I may have been accepted off the waitlist at Oregon State. They emailed a week ago to ask if I was still interested, and I said no. They could have just been gauging my interest, though ¯\_(ツ)_/¯.

I was accepted to CU Boulder ? , but it’s unfunded ?. I was positive it was a big no from them. I guess the “only accepting 2” meant funded offers. I’m still quite thrilled by the huge ego boost, even if I won’t be attending!

I totally plan on doing this. I did something similar with an undergrad prof for my current writing sample and I’m very happy with it. In other news, being inpatient with UIUC, I emailed their grad studies office manager (following the link in the application portal ultimately led to her, and the DGS mentioned somewhere on the website that we could email her as well, so I went with this one). Her response is that they are still reviewing applications and will send results in early April. I don’t know if the DGS knows more than the GSOM (my acronym, lol), but I’m surprised it wasn’t the “all acceptances have been contacted already” that others have received. Maybe she is too nice to tell me, lol. There is no way they’re still reviewing applications when the first admits were 2 months ago, right? edit: forgot to mention that this fuels my delusional pipe dream of being on a secret waitlist

Ah, thanks for this advice. They’re both MA programs. Both boast of placing students into PhD programs afterwards, but I’ll look more into that. I will probably go with the better offer, because yea, I’m not in a position to take out loans or spread myself thin with secret side gigs.

It’s really relieving to read these posts and see that a lot of y’all are in the same boat - selecting for funding, ranking, or dream program. My dream program told me I was in their top 3 but is offering a miserable stipend of $10,000 per year while expecting me to pay several thousand in fees and $4000 in mandatory health insurance (I think I could possibly circumvent this by getting on medicaid). The cost of living has skyrocketed because of the “covid escape to Montana,” as I’m calling it. Three different people from their department have reached out to me to answer questions and tell me how exciting my app was, and it’s breaking my heart that I won’t be able to go there unless a money miracle happens. They are pretty low on the ranking list. Another place has offered $13000 the first year and over $17000 the second! Their program is really unique, won’t make me teach the first year while I’m a research assistant, they’re higher ranked, low cost of living, department seems to have a reputation for being radical (a plus for me). Sounds amazing, but their program isn’t as tailored to my interests as the other one, and it’s in a corn field. The choice seems obvious, but my friends keep telling me to choose the other one. I suspect they just want someone to visit in Montana. How to choose ?

Oof, I came here to say I’m so mad after reading the Boulder waitlist who said they only admitted TWO people this cycle. I was initially iffy about applying there in the first place, but now I know I waisted time and money on their dumb app.

I emailed explaining that I was worried the stipend wouldn’t cover the cost of living, because that’s a big part of it for me. I didn’t mention other acceptances, although I’m sure they know that’s a part of it. Honestly I don’t think we owe them any explanation.

Boulder being a little careless with the spam email this morning ?

I hate them. Can't wait to apply there again when I finish my MA ?

I only applied to MA programs, and I’ve noticed a trend that some programs send out results for their PhD applicants and then send the MA results a few days or weeks later. Just wanted to throw this out here in case it helps anyone’s anxiety ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

I was just accepted into another funded program and am now at 3a/1w/2p! Forgive me for not saying which school - it's really small, not famous or ivy league, and in the middle of nowhere. Also I have a phone call with them next week and I'm sweating already! No rejections yet (still feels unreal after all rejections last year), although my dream school, UIUC, is definitely an implied rejection at this point. Would be wacky to get in everywhere except there, which also has the largest cohort (i think?) and personally the best fit with my research+POIs. Well, a girl can dream!

A couple people posted waitlists for Boulder. I'll start anticipating my rejection email

YES! Congratulations! ???? I’m genuinely so happy for you! I hope you get some sleep tonight!

Which one of you rapscallions posted the UIUC rejection? Spill the tea!

I got a job last week through a temp agency because I'll have to quit said job in 5-6 months for grad school anyway. I did a few local phone calls with them for interview stuff. Got a call from out-of-state - Illinois. I was so freaking excited thinking it was UIUC. I answered the phone like, "HELLO!!?" Well, you know where this is going. It was the temp agency.

Ok, I totally manifested good news with this post, because they have since contacted me with an acceptance!

Has anyone heard from Texas Tech? There are 2 acceptances and 1 rejection posted in the results, but I haven't heard anything yet.

I saw that someone posted that they were accepted to Texas Tech with $20k funding for four years and are turning it down. I was so shocked that I accidentally sat on my glasses. I was mostly able to bend them back into shape, but holy cow. Lord grant me the serenity to be a total badass like that someday.

Congrats! Cornell is a dream school for sure. I don’t have any advice, but they already accepted you, so I’m sure they won’t be grilling you or anything! I also applied to Boulder and havent heard anything. It looks like they typically don’t send decisions until late Feb or early March.

Oh yea, the unburdening and the early acceptance are huge. I finally understand what people mean when they say "you need to be sitting down for this"! My friends keep asking me how I feel, and all I could say that first day was "I'm so relieved." It's wild how relief is the strongest emotion at play here! Also, thank you to everyone for the congrats and warm wishes!

I finally heard back from somewhere, and U Nebraska Lincoln sent me a fully funded offer! I can hardly believe it. After I was all-out rejected last cycle, I spent the last spring and summer educating myself on critical theory, and I took a high-level course in the fall semester hoping to produce a decent paper under the guidance of a professor. I was crazy busy from April to December just working towards this. Just knowing that I'm actually going to get paid to go to school makes me weak in the knees.

Good point

I kind of thought my application for them was pretty decent, although it was my first submission this season and the writing sample wasn't past it's second revision yet :(. And I thought the fit would have been perfect, bc my focus is kind of niche, and they have faculty (whom I thought I saw somewhere that they were also on the adcom, though I can't find that now) that have very similar research interests. Alas, I haven't heard diddly-squat from them!

I am SO scared of opening last cycle's writing sample and SOPs. I know the writing sample is garbage because I did it three years out of school and without any guidance. I did re-read my old SOPs while writing my new ones, and they were surprisingly not as awful as I thought they would be. Still, I cringe at the thought of them. I had no one to guide me through the process or explain anything about applications, and while I did have some of that this year, I'm also still expecting to be rejected from all 6 programs I applied to. As for COVID making the competition worse, I'm not sure if that's true. I suspect the increase in applicants mostly means an increase in quantity, not quality. I like to think they are people like me who also submitted cringeworthy samples and SOPs! Well, that's how I reassure myself, anyway. For coping strategies, I don't know. Yeeting myself from this mortal coil isn't an option. Part of my reasoning for applying to certain schools was location, so if I don't get accepted anywhere, I'm going to try to still move to a different city. Maybe learn a new skill set. Programming bootcamps are really popular nowadays, hah. I think just coming up with another long-term goal to work towards will be helpful. As for the short term, hanging out with friends (if you can) has been very helpful in getting my mind off of things lately.