fuzzylogician

"I am wondering how good a letter she will write you..." My point is that the refusal was not about the content but about outside considerations of the professor's.

Here is my logic: the professor said nothing about not being able to write a strong letter for the OP, this is more a matter of the OP asking for a letter rather late, and the professor having already agreed to write many letters for other people. The decision to put the cap at 15 is understandable but also arbitrary. I'm sure the professor is just trying to get a handle on the stress and workload in her life, but I don't think she would want to damage anybody's chances of getting into grad school. She probably hopes that the OP (and others she turns down) have other people who they could ask for letters of similar strength so they will be alright. If the OP is really stuck, maybe the professor will still help him out. I still think there is nothing to lose by trying here. If she says yes, I don't see any reason why she would write a bad letter--this is just about reducing workloads. Writing a bad letter is no less work than writing a good letter (it's the writing that takes time!) and besides I didn't get the impression that that's something you'd have any reason to expect would happen.

Yes. That should be the case whenever you ask someone for a letter. Any decent person should refuse to write you a letter if they can't say anything positive. That doesn't mean bad letters don't ever get written, but they are rare. If you don't know of a reason why you worry, I wouldn't.

For starters, I'd try writing back and saying very politely that although you understand the pressure she is under, you don't have any other people who you could ask to write a letter on your behalf. This creates a serious problem for your application, and you don't know what to do now. Would she be willing to reconsider? Say you would be very happy to help facilitate writing the letter in any way that you can (e.g. give her supporting materials, maybe even suggest writing bullet-points for the content or something, though I wouldn't actually offer to write a full draft for her unless she explicitly asks for it). Perhaps she'll change her mind; you have nothing to lose by trying.

Sounds like you're describing a professor who is currently serving in some administrative capacity (dept head, assistant/associate dean, etc). If so, the only reason I would consider not working with such a person is if their other (non-research) duties are taking up so much of their time that they will not be accessible when you need them. If you don't think that is a problem, I don't see why you think this advising relationship would be any different from other ones, and why the professor's admin position is even relevant. I'd approach this decision like I would any other: ask yourself if you and your potential advisor fit in terms of personality and in terms of research, find out what his mentoring style is like, how accessible he tends to be, how many other students he has (and has had recently) and how those relationships are doing (and where the recently graduated past-advisees have ended up), etc. The admin position has no bearing on almost all of these questions.

I completely agree. I don't think anyone is saying that having a hook is going to get you automatically tossed (or tossed at all), but rather that it's not necessary nor normally expected (with the usual caveats that fields differ, etc), and worrying about the opening paragraph before actually taking care of the content is absolutely not a good way to spend one's time and efforts. Personally, I think my SOPs were all personalized and unique because they told my story, which was personal and unique. I struggled for a while with writing a good "hook" in my opening paragraph, and I'm very glad that others here and elsewhere convinced me it was unnecessary because I think it made my application stronger and more professional. (but this is not to say that I believe that my outcomes would have been much different if I had had a different opening paragraph; if I had to guess, I'd say it would have made no difference.)

+1 to the statement that professors don't get paid to read SOPs (but rather to do their job in general, which may include reading SOPs along with many other things). But here is what I don't get: why don't you think that describing your research interests and your background and your future plans makes your statement unique to you? Your personality can come across in your word choices, in your past education and work, and in research interest choices. Your story is yours, and others' will be different. What probably won't be as different as you might imagine is your eureka moment or your 'ever since I was a child' opening. Even quotes tend to be repetitive. You can't begin to imagine how unimaginative these things often are, even though everybody thinks they are writing a very compelling opening paragraph. I've been reading SOPs on this website for several years now, and almost without a fault these "hook" beginnings are the most trite, common thing you can find. Of course, it's possible that you are a better writer than that and you can make it work, but I'd be very careful with that assumption. I'd start -- as TakeruK proposes -- with polishing the content, and then I'd see if I still thought there was any need to make the statement more "creative." But for those of you that want to have a career in academia, you need to recognize that this is the first in a long series of SOP-like documents that you will need to write. There are accepted ways these essays tend to look, and "creative" is not one of them. You stand out as unique and interesting because of what you do, and you can help yourself somewhat by also being a compelling writer, but having a quote, anecdote, story, etc. is just out of place in these documents.

That depends on the field (and I don't know which field you are in). In some fields, acceptance is contingent upon there being a professor who is willing to fund you - normally in lab-based sciences. This professor will be your main advisor, will fund you, and to a large extent determine the kinds of research you can do (often you'll be working on a project that they received some funding for). In other fields, you get accepted to the department as a whole and can later decide who you want to work with. Here too, it helps to have people who you've talked to because you do need to have an advisor at the end of the day and it's a good way to demonstrate fit, but it's less crucial. Many humanities and some social sciences are like this. FWIW, I never contacted any professor prior to applying, and I think my colleagues didn't either, and we obviously all did just fine.

Yes, as long as the questions you want to ask have not already been answered on the department website or elsewhere accessible. In that case you'll just make a bad impression and waste the professor's time. Also, some general questions are probably better addressed to the department secretary or to the director of graduate studies, so it really depends on the questions you have - you may be referred to these sources if your questions are ones the professor can't really answer.

Are you leaving on good terms? If so, I don't think there should be any problem with that.

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This is in addition to all the regular documents? If so, think of it as a cover letter. It can be kept relatively short, definitely no more than 2 pages, 1 if you can do it. Describe the position you are applying for, your research interests, and who you'd work with (the key part of the "fit" portion of the SOP). You can also briefly describe your past experiences that make you a good fit, in no more than one paragraph. I don't think there is any reason to talk about your teaching philosophy, unless this is a school that puts emphasis on teaching (as opposed to research). Also provide a list of all the documents you are submitting, including the names of your recommenders.

Also -- in addition to the good suggestions above -- use the text-to-speech function of your pdf reader or text editor. You can identify all kinds of odd things in the text when a machine voice reads it back to you. It's also faster than reading, in most cases.

Actually no, I think it's quite clear. Go by the description of the essay, not the name. If they want a statement of your research interests and plans for the PhD, that's what people on this website tend to call a "statement of purpose." A "personal statement" will always be a second document, in addition to the essay about your research interests, that asks more about your past and background.

How long have you waited? If it's been over a week, you can just resend the same email and apologize on top, saying that you're unsure what happened to your previous email, perhaps it was lost or went to spam, but you never heard back from this person even though several people (give names) suggested you write them, so you thought you'd resend the email. As long as you're polite, you have nothing to worry about. It's very possible that your email was either not seen or was seen and then forgotten in the shuffle, it can be easy for an email to get pushed down by other emails and then you may just forget because these people get multiple inquiries from students and it's hard to keep track of them all.

I wouldn't suggest panicking at all. First of all, try following up again in a few days and give it another week or so. If you don't hear back, could you find out from your friends if the professor is around and teaching this semester? Maybe the delay in response has nothing to do with you, but stems from a personal problem. Another approach is to contact the department secretary and say you've been unsuccessfully trying to reach this professor, and could they help. If you don't manage to establish contact, it'll be a great shame but hopefully then you could get someone else to write a letter for you. I'd start thinking about that in about a week, so you at least know you're covered and maybe you'll even end up with four letters if this professor replies late. Good luck!

I suggest you have this discussion with your teacher. I told you how I understood the assignment and your interpretation of it.

I'm just reading the instructions you got, not debating the larger points of why things should be the way they are or couldn't they be some other way. Seems to me that you just didn't do what you were asked to, and the grade reflects precisely that.

Maybe others in this forum will have more to say but it seems to me from a quick read of the prompt and then your essay that you completely missed the point of the exercise. You were supposed to write a snarky critique of a painting of your choice based on an alternative set of values (the painter comes from tradition A, you believe in tradition B, and therefore see faults in this work). You were supposed to pretend you are writing for a 19th newspaper and use language and style appropriate for that time period. Instead, here you are writing about what people in the future might interpret your chosen painting like, but it's not a witty criticism and it's not clearly a newspaper article either. I just think it really didn't deal with the issues that the prompt asks for.

Relax, it's a typo. It's the kind of thing you don't even notice when you read an email, and it's not the kind of thing that makes you think any less of the writer. I wouldn't worry about this and I definitely would not send a corrected email.

I spent the Fall of my 4th year basically feeling lost and unsure about what I wanted to do for my dissertation (you don't usually need to decide in my program until late in your 4th year, or even in the 5th, as crazy as that sounds--some people start applying for jobs before they know what they're going to write their dissertation on). I ended up slowing down, talking to a bunch of professors I don't normally meet with about how to choose a dissertation topic, how to frame the larger questions that I am interesting in, and how to continue from where I was. Later I also started writing up older projects so I could do something useful with my time. I also took on some volunteer teaching that helped me re-focus on what I thought was fun about my field. Things got unstuck as time went by, and now they're back to normal. I think it's normal to have off times, nobody can just go full steam ahead without taking any breaks or slowing down once in a while.

The thing is, this is not an exercise for a creative writing class. You don't need to hook your reader, they will read your essay either way -- or at least, skim it quickly for relevant information (ignoring here general cutoffs that may land your application in the rejected pile without your essays having been read, hook or no hook). What you want your essay to do is *help the readers answer the questions that they are asking themselves* - namely, is this a good candidate (in general), and are they a good fit (for our school)? You want to give them quick and easy soundbites, framing your research interests up front, and you want to show that this is a good school for you (e.g. by having interests that match potential advisors, by working with similar methodologies, by showing that you've been successful in the past and are prepared for what you want to study in the future). Yes, you could be the guy with the unusual interest in basket weaving or the girl with the inspiring quote from the Dalai Lama, but personally I'd rather be the applicant with the really interesting research questions and cool past projects.

Start with your research interests. This is an essay that is supposed to get your into a graduate program that will train you to become a professional academic. Tell them what you'll do when you're there and why they are the place for you.

You could try, but I wouldn't expect too much to come of it. These things are often subjective and there are more good applicants than positions. These people might also worry that being too honest might get them involved in a law suit, and they're also generally busy people. But you could try, I don't see what you have to lose, as long as you're polite and don't come off as accusing anybody of anything.

It's very common in the first year of graduate school. It improves. As you progress in your program, you will learn to organize your time better and to prioritize your obligations, and at the same time your course requirements become a less important component of the program and the emphasis shifts to research. As long as your advisor is happy with your progress, I wouldn't worry overmuch. If there are concerns from their side, then it's probably a good idea to ask for help on rethinking priorities and creating more time for work. From what your describe, you're just having a normal first year experience though, and it doesn't sound like there is anything to worry about.