fuzzylogician

You can thank your recommenders either after they finish submitting their letters or after you've submitted all your apps, which might be around the holidays and hence make it easier for you to give them a small gift. A book or a gift certificate for a bookstore would be nice if you don't want to give food/drinks, though a nice card is enough for someone who you don't have a close relationship with. Of course you should also thank the person who asked you to write a letter yourself; he might just sign and mail it unchanged but many times professors will use your version as a basis to work off of and will write a letter themselves. In any event, it's nice to send professors a short thank-you email once they've submitted all their letters to let them know the letters were received and then again when you've received your answers and made a decision where to attend. Then a card during the holidays, around the time you submit your apps, seems ideal to me.

Describe your independent study and explain how it lead to your current research interests, developed them or helped narrow them. Since you don't have a lot of background, anything you can include that will convince the adcom you're serious and know what you're getting into will be greatly beneficial. And as habareno suggests, it's probably also a good idea to address your lack of background and explain how you're planning to overcome it. The adcom will be asking itself two questions -- (a) are you sure you want to do a graduate program in [field] (do you really know, given that you don't have a strong background); training a graduate student is a large time and money expense and it's not worth wasting on someone who will not fit well in the program or who will likely quit before graduating; and (b.) do you have enough knowledge and skills to complete the degree successfully and in a timely fashion, or does it look like it would be possible for you to catch up in a reasonable amount of time. Your SOP should convince the adcom that the answer to both of these questions is YES.

Hmm. It sounds like they are asking for 1-2 sentence descriptions of your jobs and not much more; it's possible that it's repetitive and it's hard to imagine what it's good for. It's even possible that it's not good for anything and that it's a leftover from an older app version or that it's just a universal feature of the app system that the school is using and the adcom will never even look at it. Regardless, even though it's annoying, just give them what they asked for. How much space do they leave for the answer? Is it a small textbox or does it look like they want the answers in essay form? I would guess that they just want to create a short timeline describing your adult life (or just your undergrad-life maybe), in which case a short response like you suggested seems appropriate.

Well, normally you first get very passionate about something and then decide to go to graduate school to study it and not the other way around. Going to grad school without a clear vision of what you want to do will almost certainly lead to difficulty and disillusionment. It's hard enough to keep motivated even when you _do_ start out very driven.

I put things like that on my cv as: (expected) feb-may 20XX : fancy intership. I think it's perfectly fine to list things you've already been accepted to, as opposed to things you're just hoping for, which I wouldn't list.

No need to physically go back. They can reprint the letter, put it in an envelope, sign across the seal and send it to your schools. It's the standard requirement at many many schools and it shouldn't be difficult for your recommenders to do given that the letter itself is already written. You can just email them a list of schools/addresses and deadlines.

Did you get any feedback on the assignment? If you still don't understand how it earned you the grade you got, ask your professor. Ask for a meeting to go over the assignment. Your efforts to improve your performance will be appreciated. Don't compare yourself to others, that's never a good idea. In the end the question is one of content and not of speed and all that matters is that you understand what was expected of you and how to do better next time. Maybe it came easier to someone else but that doesn't really matter in the long run.

I don't know about that, isn't it customary in some fields that graduate students join existing projects that their advisor or some other person in the lab already successfully pitched to a funding agency -- hence something that already has an initial writeup and that some thought has gone into? I also know a number of students in math/CS who just work with an advisor on whatever problems the advisor thinks are interesting. Of course that's very different than randomly asking for topics from Internet strangers.. But not coming up with a topic does not by itself guarantee failure.

I'm not sure why contacting your recommenders is such a big deal or why you (or they) think it's such a hassle. If the letter is already written then submitting it online isn't all that difficult. Not to mention, it's part of a professor's job. If all three of your recommenders can't be bothered to go online and submit letters for you, I'd doubt their commitment to you as an applicant and I'd be worried, as an adcom member.

I agree that you should ask yourself if there are places where you can improve your short SOP but I also understand where you are coming from. I felt that my shorter SOPs were stronger than my longer ones--more concise without sacrificing any of the content--when I was applying. I ended up submitting a version that was about 600-words long and based on my very concise 500-word SOP whenever I could. Not that my long version was all that long--it was about 850 words--but there is something appealing about the very condensed very precise text that you have to write when there is a tight limit. Submitting shorter essays definitely didn't hurt my application, in the end it's still all about the content. As long as you believe that you are submitting the strongest piece you can, don't worry overmuch about being under the limit.

Yeah, I wasn't sure if it's EU residency or just UK residency. But either way I know UK citizens who didn't get the lower fee because they lived elsewhere before. I agree - it's worth the try.

I assume you'll be considered British in terms of citizenship but as far as I know the fees are determined according to residency. You have to have lived in the UK 3 years prior to starting school to qualify for the reduced fees.

Some professors are notoriously bad at answering emails. Try and come by his office and have a chat. If he agrees to write you letters, you need to establish a way of keeping track of the letters being submitted--agree that you will stop by and let him know when he should be expecting prompts from schools, and ask whether he will be in town around the deadlines (if not he may flake out and disappear and leave you with no options at the last minute). Maybe this is one of those cases when it's better to submit paper letters even if there is an online submission system. You should get a letter from your advisor if possible. Some adcoms will be suspicious if you don't. 18 months ago is not that long, maybe he doesn't need reminders. You should meet with him and try to get a feel for what he might write in the letter. Also, how is his placement record? If many of his former students are currently doing PhDs in good schools, that would be a good indication that his letters are solid.

I don't think this needs to be rewritten from scratch but you should shift the focus from the past to the present/future. The whole first paragraph is redundant, I would leave it out completely or else find a way to expand the last sentence and integrate it in a paragraph that discusses your interests in greater detail. Condense the discussion of your journalistic past and discuss it only once; right now you're repeating it in several paragraphs. Third paragraph: too general. Be specific, and use less conversational language. Fourth paragraph: repetitive; cut or move. Fifth paragraph: I'm not sure you need to explain away undergrad grades since you're not applying straight out of college but it depends on your record. The explanation feels a bit long, though, maybe there is a way to tighten it up. Last paragraph: more of this, please! expand on your plans and interests. Also, add a dedicated 'fit' paragraph and be more specific about why the program you're applying to is right for you.

Sounds like he didn't understand you were asking for a LOR. If there is no confusion about this point but he still doesn't understand why you want him to read your application materials, I would be suspicious and slightly worried. As dimanche correctly points out, it's possible that he just prefers to write LORs based only on his recollection without reading any other materials but it's then important to make sure that he remembers you well enough to write you a strong letter. I would follow up on this issue, as well as try to email the other professor again. Emails can get easily lost and/or forgotten so don't read too much into one ignored email.

Are they sending the letters themselves or are you picking them up and mailing them together with other parts of your application (transcripts, etc.)? If the schools allow it, it's better to pick the letters up and mail them yourself (with some sort of tracking/signature required service) -- that way you have one less thing to worry about. If that's not an option, as far as I remember my recommenders all preferred to use official university letterhead and envelopes which had the department's return address. That seemed like a safe bet at the time.

Did you try to set up a new account or just input your existing username+password from the Princeton app in the Stanford app? One of those has to work - either you already have an account (=you can use the same ApplyWeb account for all your ApplyWeb applications), in which case you can go ahead and enter your username+password and proceed to the application; or you have to create a new account for the Stanford app (=you have to start over, the other ApplyWeb account was only set up locally for the Princeton app).

I'd recommend looking up not only faculty CVs but also those of graduate students in the departments you are applying to. The format and content of other students' CVs will have a closer resemblance to that of a PhD applicant. FWIW I have the following categories (in order): education, publications (journals, proceedings, other), presentations (refereed conferences, posters, workshops and other), teaching, fellowships honors and awards, research experience (for several RA positions), service and membership, languages (including programming languages and other software).

I live in Cambridge and I love it here. It's not New York but that doesn't mean it doesn't have its own charm; I would choose Cambridge over NY any time. Personal taste aside, It took me more than a year to get fully acclimated in my program and feel like it really fits me, but now I am having lots of fun and enjoying pretty much everything I do (though I have to admit that my program was my first place before I even applied). Which is not to say that everything is perfect, but I choose not to dwell on the parts I enjoy less and make the most of the parts I enjoy more. I agree with the other posters that you shouldn't give up just yet. I also think it might help you to try and think less negatively about where you are and imagine great things about where you are not. "What-ifs" are just not realistic and imagining that everything would have been perfect if you had made a different choice is a little bit naive. Maybe this is harsh but you're at a great place and besides you've already paid for this semester so being positive and making the most of it is the best course of action at this point.

Obviously there is some measure of freaking out involved in deciding to finally submit the app, and submitting can also feel strangely anti-climactic ---- now what? You go from being very busy working to having lots of free time to sit in front of the computer and refresh your inbox. (or have a life, whatever). If the schools you're applying to don't have rolling admission, I think it may be advisable to just let the app sit without looking at it for a few weeks, 3-4 if you can afford it. Things change with time and from the perspective of a few weeks of rest and contemplation you may find that you are able to refine some points in your SOP/writing sample or else convince yourself that you've done the best you can in each and every part of the application. There is nothing in particular that you should pay attention to - the obvious is making sure that you submit everything each school is asking for, making sure you answered all the questions; if you started writing in the summer -- make sure the prompts you were working off of are the same ones that are on the website now (sometimes formats change around September, when apps are reopened). Make sure you have the right school name in each SOP and that you spelled all the profs' names correctly, that kind of things. It's unavoidable that you'll find typos or other small things you're unhappy with later when you review your app so don't even worry about being perfect. Assume that's impossible and go from there..

Professor 2, no doubt. If you have the option of submitting a fourth letter, you could also ask Prof 1. But if not, your thesis advisor is the better choice.

It cost me about $1500 three years ago.

Except this is a different situation than yours -- there is indeed nothing to be gained from submitting early if there is a fixed deadline. But there is a clear advantage to not waiting too long in a rolling admissions system.

What are you applying for - PhD, MA; professional, research-oriented? what is the rest of your application list - do you have strong LORs, research experience, publications, a strong writing sample? it's really difficult to tell you what to do based on the partial information you've provided. The question is how well you'll do with a lower GPA, but that depends on what else you have in your application that could offset it. If this is your only weak point, discuss it in your SOP and don't wait. If you don't have much else, maybe it's better to submit the stronger transcript. Either way, you should contact the programs you're applying to and find out if it's possible to update your transcripts after you've submitted your application - maybe they will reconsider your app if one factor shows significant improvement?

OK, so writing a paper is obviously a useful skill to have in grad school. I'm not sure what you mean by "I've never written a paper completely on my own before" -- I'm guessing you mean that you had mentors to consult with throughout the process who read and commented on drafts, not that you actually can't write by yourself? It does sound as though you have a topic in mind and you're doing some reading, however. I don't know what stage you're at exactly, but from reading between the lines I think you may be at a stage where you've developed some sort of argument but it's not fully formed yet. In that case: - I find that it help me to write out my argument on a large blackboard (I like chalk but any piece of paper will do..). I start with all the pieces in a list and I rearrange the pieces until I have a good structure that I could tell someone with general knowledge in my field but no specific knowledge about the details of my work. "Telling a story" forces you to think about the ordering and clarity of the argument. - Once you've done some thinking: It sounds like you do have professors who are interested in your future, run the argument by them! - Start writing! don't read too much or you won't be able to find your way out of the mess of keeping too many details in your head. - Start by making a detailed outline of the paper. By detailed I mean detailed. Preferably, not only sections and subsections but once you've worked out the main argument in your head/on paper: a one-line description of every paragraph in every section. This is painstaking because it reduces your argument to its bare form but it'll help you see how to organize it and help it flow. It also helps the writing process - once you know exactly what you want to say, in what order and where, it's almost mechanical to transform one-liners into full paragraphs. - Start from the easy parts: whatever those might be in your paper. It feels good to have some portion of the paper ready and it'll help you feel oriented when it's time to start writing the difficult parts. - Get your friends and family to read your essay. They may not understand all the details but they should be able to know if you're not making sense or if you're disorganized. I'd wait with the beer until after they've read the paper:) - Ask professors for comments. It sounds like they want to help so I'm sure they will agree to comment on advanced stages of your ongoing work. ETA: re: mentioning this project in your SOP: it depends on how it turns out. If you learn things that are relevant to your proposed field of study, formulate ideas that you would like to test in grad school, concentrate/change your research interests, etc., then it'd be useful to reference the paper in that context. But if all you have to say is that you wrote the paper independently, I'd suggest having a recommender do that.