fuzzylogician

Well, I guess I must be so far down the slope by now you can't even see me from way up there on the peak. FWIW though, it's not half bad out here.

I am not banning anyone at the moment and I am also not about to waste my time "citing examples." I am (repeatedly) asking that you stop this.

I am done arguing with you. People are allowed to post even if they are inexperienced. That includes you, by the way. But you are applying to a different field and therefore should recognize that you are speaking without even the most basic knowledge about the field that you are trying to give advice about. That's a dangerous situation, and people are correct to point it out as a potential pitfall. There are ways of talking about issues you know less about, for example by flagging that "in my field, X is the case." or "as far as I know, X." Another thing I have (unsuccessfully) invited you to do in the past is open a new thread to discuss "how things should be (according to my opinion)" instead of derailing someone else's thread with those thoughts, because I do think that some general discussion of accepted wisdom could be interesting to other posters as well. But unqualified, confident-sounding bullshit runs the risk of confusing innocent posters, and that is what people are objecting to.

This is not kindergarten and I'm not going to have a "they started it" conversation with you. They are asking, and rightly so in my opinion, that you refrain from giving unfounded advice (or worse). Even people who will not get admitted deserve good advice and a fair chance. Getting in is a combination of some skill and some luck; there are more qualified applicants than spots in PhD programs. Not getting into a certain school does not mean you are not good enough or didn't fit. Even if it did, giving advice that will hurt a person's chances is unacceptable behavior.

You are trolling again, and I am running out of patience. Consider this your final warning. If you continue, we will have to suspend you again. The next step after that is a permanent ban.

Every year there is a not insignificant contingent of posters on this site who assume that what they know based on the one little corner of whatever field they are applying to must be true for everyone everywhere, and will refuse to accept that conventions might differ across disciplines. Your job, as responsible consumers of internet advice, is to recognize that not all advice is created equal. In particular, you should always consider the source and what their knowledge is based on. Otherwise, some well-meaning advice might cause you more harm than good.

Friends, dfinfley has been warned and ask to watch his/her language. I hope this solves the problem and the forum can return to being a helpful and friendly place for everyone. If this doesn't help, please use the reports to let us know.

Done! This is a great post. I think it's abundantly clear that this post is trying to be general, and it gives some great advice that everyone should read. Of course you should know the conventions of your field and you should use the appropriate language, formatting, structure, etc. conventions that apply in your field. But doing research about the program and about yourself is important no matter what field you are in, and I think DanieleWrites does an excellent job explaining how to go about it.

You are trolling again. Watch it.

Driving down with a friend and loaning her the car while you're in town both sound completely reasonable. It has nothing to do with being (un)professional. If anybody even thinks to ask why you don't have a car even though you used one to drive down to the school, you could just say you lent it to a friend, no further explanation is necessary - not about your travel arrangements and not about how your reimbursement will work. Since they are paying per mileage according to the trip there, it's very simple. They can have a good estimate of the distance based on google maps, and since you're driving straight there the number you give should line up with that - having your friend with you will not change anything. The travels your friend might make while in town are just irrelevant.

It might -- first, if it's a message about the OP's performance, it'd be good to know what it says. Second, sometimes for funding reasons you need to maintain a certain average. But yes, generally speaking, it doesn't matter much.

Likely anything about a B is good, but if it's an A- then it's a sign that some things could be improved. What exactly that is, you should ask the professor. As others have noted, there is no general right answer that fits all ivies, all history programs, or all programs in Harvard. These things simply don't generalize. You need to ask people in your program - students and/or a professor.

1. The first paragraph told me close to nothing about you. You presented a paper in an undergrad conference, that's all I know now. That information should already be on your CV, so there is nothing new here. Not what you are interested in, not why you want to study it. I'd rewrite to add details - what did you present, what did you learn, why did it make you want to study more? 2. The second paragraph is too wordy, and doesn't give much useful detail. The beginning rehashes details that should be on your CV with no additional information, the part about teaching is too long. Get rid of the discussion of doubts and uncertainties. What you wrote doesn't need to be more than 1-2 (short1!) sentences mentioning that you have teaching experience, what you taught, and the positive bit at the end about what you learned from it. Also, expand on this experience more. You have teaching experience -- that's good, but what did you teach exactly? Did you do anything different? Learn anything from the experience, besides "I like teaching"? Anything specific you realized students do/don't know, should/shouldn't know? Some material is better taught in this way or that, etc. 3. The third paragraph seems very shallow. I assume you are applying to PhD programs since you say that you completed an MA. If this is your main research area, you need to be more specific. Mention some specific issues or questions and tell the adcom why they are interesting. Give details!. You might also want to rewrite this to make it clearer how the school will support your interest. Is the author you mention a professor at that school? If not, I am confused about why you mention this book by name. Even if he is, I would explain how his research/interests will support yours, and not mention the textbook at all. That seems really out of place. 4. This again is far too generic. You don't say anything beyond "I am perhaps interested in X, but not committed to it." You don't sound passionate, or even like you carefully considered your interests. In fact, after reading this I am unsure why you want to go to grad school at all, what you want to study, and how the school is a good fit with your goals. Again, I would not mention a book unless it is clearly relevant, and "opened my eyes.." is just so uninformative it reads very shallow. You don't need to say you can't commit to a topic now, no one will be expecting it. What they will expect, however, is that you've actually given this some serious thought, beyond taking one class or reading one book on each topic you now say might be your PhD concentration. My overall impression is that at the moment this is quite short and unfortunately I think it needs a serious rewrite, possibly starting over from scratch. Give details. Be specific. What questions do you want to study specifically? Why are they interesting? Why is this school a good place to study them at? Have you done work in the past that prepares you for graduate school - what was it? You need to expand and give examples about each topic you mentioned in your SOP. If the best you can do is tell the adcom that one course here and one book there made you want to study for a PhD, you run a serious risk of coming across as unprepared.

Pinsker, if you were my friend or family member, I'd want to come right over there (wherever you are) and personally knock some sense into you. Two things. First, you CANNOT force a relationship, no matter how much you want it. It's just not how things work. Vetting every person you meet once for whether you want to marry them and have their children is NOT going to get you into a relationship any sooner. It's going to scare anybody with half their wits about them the hell away. You're moving at an unreasonable pace even for people who are also looking for someone to settle down with relatively soon. You're not using the early stages of dating for the right things - just getting to know the other person and finding out if you're in principle compatible. Slow down, there's a lot to learn about another person who you are considering having a committed relationship with, and as someone who wants a traditional family and marriage, you want to make sure you get this right. Second, and more importantly -- you are putting yourself in all kinds of danger by signaling so openly that you are so desperate. People WILL take advantage of that, and it will NOT work out well. You sound alarmingly trusting (parents can't be bad people, seriously??) and/or willing to take unreasonable risks for some imagined reward that is just NOT there in the way that you think it is. Snap out of it, things will happen when you least expect it, once you calm down and stop with this manhunt. Focus on just being with yourself and getting to know YOU and what you want in life, and I promise it'll lead to a better ability to be part of a couple down the line.

For cutting down 25% of the SOP, the tricks biotechie and TakeruK propose are good but will probably not be enough. Personally I prefer cutting out a complete point than muddling down everything in order to keep all my points. Choose something that you can do without - something that is likely to be in letters or that is in your CV, or that repeats at least somewhat another point you're already making, and just remove it. E.g. If you normally talk about two past research projects, choose just one. If you discuss relevant past courses, don't. If you discuss how you got into the field, cut that. The balance should favor your interests, future plans, and fit, so I suggest choosing something from the background discussion to cut. Lose any fluff in the intro/conclusion as well.

"Bang buddies," seriously? This whole thread is a joke.

I think the answer is that it really depends - on the reader, and on the mistake. E.g. if they misspelled your name in 5 different places, said something blatantly false about you, or sent the very carefully crafted letter explaining why you are the perfect candidate for school X to school Y, that may seem not great. If they misspelled a random word on page 3 of the letter, no one will likely even notice. If they addressed the letter to the wrong school but it's otherwise a pretty standard letter, I assume some people might notice and not like it, but it's unlikely that it's going to be the kiss of death. (Same goes for the wrong school name in the SOP, btw. Not great, but unlikely to kill your candidacy right there.) Everybody realizes you can't control what your recommenders do, so it'd have to be an outrageous mistake to seriously count against you. As for late letters, as we've discussed in the past, many schools are lenient with late letters and even have an unofficial later deadline for letters than for the part that is submitted by the student. As long as the letter arrives before the applications are read, it's usually not a problem.

Any research experience will help, and a strong letter from a professor who you did research with is also a plus. Bonus points if the letter is from a well-known professor, though that's not necessary.

My guess is some people are talking past each other because we are imagining different things as "unprofessional" or "disrespectful." If an email is lacking a "please" or "thank you" and is otherwise polite, I probably won't have a problem with it. However, if it's "hey did i miss anything today?," ignoring it is the nicest thing I might do. This discussion reminds me of this recent post: http://www.academomia.com/2013/12/for-future-reference.html: inappropriate emails from the perspective of a professor.

I'd ask. What have you got to lose?

I don't think there is any reason to tell them. They are paying for gas for you to drive down to visit them, and that's precisely what you're doing. Other travel arrangements you might be making are not any of their business and they wouldn't have anything to do with that information anyway.

Remember: Do not feed the troll. (Easier said than done.)

Stop worrying about things that are outside of your control, especially when there is no evidence that there is a reason to worry. The prof is experienced and I bet has a skeleton he can use for letters, so not everything needs to be done from scratch. Furthermore, it's not the first time he writes such a letter, he knows what he's doing. An hour sounds like a reasonable time to spend on this (and besides, that's what you've got so it had better do!).

Um, each one of my chapters will be about that long, for a total estimated length of ~200 pages (with a generous SD). For me, it's sufficient that my professors and friends read my drafts (and I return the favor for my friends). I get good comments and I think it's enough. OP - if you think the comments you are getting are not enough, is there a colleague who would be willing to help? A professional service is expensive, and if your advisor is not paying it could pile up. Perhaps there is a writing center at your school you could consult? I'd say you could get a non-specialist to read large portions of the work, though expect that they will not understand some nuances and may make some inappropriate edits as a consequence. This obviously also depends on the field. Whenever I edit work outside my field I always remark on things I am not sure about and point out things that are conventions in my field that the author should check regarding their own field.