fuzzylogician

This website does not provide writing and editing services. If you write an SOP and post it here, some posters may be willing to read it and leave comments, but it is your responsibility to get started.

It doesn't say what the decision is. If it's a rejection, that is an incredibly cruel email to send, so I want to hope it's an acceptance. It usually is the case that after the department makes its decision to admit a student, that decision needs to be approved by the school. I would assume that this is what they mean in this email, although it's unfortunately vague, so you will have to wait, or email back to ask for clarification (although the vagueness would lead me to expect that you will not get a straight answer). Do come back to tell us how it worked out. Good luck!

Yeah, I agree with the others that it's time to call the departments to ask if there are any updates and to ask for an extension from the other school. But more generally this sounds like a concern that you should be taking very seriously when you make your decision. Before you accept the offer is the only time you have any power in the process and they should be courting you. After you accept, you become powerless. If they are ignoring you now and these really are the people who you would be dealing with later, then there is every reason to expect this behavior to persist and even get worse. I would personally prefer to attend a school where people respond to my emails in a timely and helpful manner, although the funding issue is a big and important one. I hope this gets resolved soon and in a way that you are happy with.

If you have the time, scan your notes, keep them electronically and recycle the actual notes. I've done that for all my notes and it's made moving that much less complicated.

- If the admissions folks are not the people who you would be interacting with as a student (they are in a different department or administrative unit, they are professors who you wouldn't work with, etc.) then their behavior doesn't teach you very much that is relevant. The people who you would work with could still be great and attentive. If these are your potential advisors, that is a different story. - What matters in terms of offers is what the department told you and not what the website shows. Lots of schools are slow at updating the website or might never do it. - Reimbursements can take forever to be processed. Welcome to academia. - For the offer with funding, I am confused about why there is a problem. For the offer that didn't say anything about funding, have you followed up and asked?

You should be eligible for AT. It doesn't need to be an official part of the degree requirements. There are criteria you need to meet like having been in your program a certain amount of time and (I think) showing that the work is related to your studies, but I think that can be relatively loosely defined (caveat: I was on an F-1 visa and OPT might be slightly different).

I suggest you start by browsing and reading relevant posts in the international students portion of the board. Several of us have written long and detailed posts about practically all of your questions in the past. Once you've gotten started and have more specific questions, then it will be easier to help you. http://forum.thegradcafe.com/forum/22-ihog-international-house-of-grads/

I think a PhD program is hard to get through even if you are 100% motivated. If you don't know that you want it, it'll be even harder. It's something you should really think through and figure out before you embark on a difficult multi-year adventure that will be emotionally taxing, where you could instead work in a profession and increase your earning potential if you choose to instead get a Masters and/or join the workforce. I think the important question is what you want the PhD for. Are you hoping for a career in academia? A job that requires the PhD degree or the relevant training? If you don't know, stop and figure that out before you do anything else. If you have a goal that requires the degree, then you need the degree. If you have goals that do not require this degree, then getting it may not be wise, for the reasons I listed above. You may even make yourself over-qualified for some jobs you might want, or may be inexperienced compared to others who did a Masters and got hands-on/internship experience. So it's really about what you want and whether or not the PhD is the right way for you to get there.

In this situation you wouldn't transfer but apply to start a new PhD program from scratch. I would second rising_star's advice not to mention anything about mental health problems. I would just say something vague about "personal problems" or "(now resolved) health problems" that led to a leave of absence and your subsequent withdrawal from the program. The details aren't anyone's business, and really all they should care about (and all that you should care about, too!) is that whatever the problem was is now resolved so that you are now ready to attend a graduate program again, hopefully a better fitting one, and be successful.

It means that there is a chance you will get an offer but nothing is guaranteed. This is not a yes, so don't get your hopes up, you could still get rejected.

I don't think it's an admissions offer but it does sound like they think you'll have a good shot at the Masters program.

To reply, click here:

I would strongly encourage you to get in touch with current international students at this program and ask them this question, as well as your intended advisor, if you have one. The chances that those few people who this question is really aimed at read this forum aren't too high, and you don't want to rely on our speculations. You might also ask the department's admin person if they know rough numbers for how these positions have been distributed in the past few years. The bottom line is that no one can make you and promises and going to an unfunded program is a risk.

You need to provide information that will allow the reader to understand the question you are asking and why it's interesting, and how specifically you went about asking it. Define any variables that you tested, explain how you obtained the data, how it's coded, anything else we'd need in order to understand your analysis and results and put them in context. I could easily see that taking up the entire 3 pages you have left, although your wording here suggests you don't. If you think you can do all that in 1-2 pages, that's fine. No one wants to read unnecessary text if you can say the same thing in fewer words. Without knowing more about your thesis, I don't think there is much more that we can say.

Everything connects to the USB hub -- keyboard, mouse, etc. Then the hub connects to one of my two USB ports and leaves one free in case I want to plug anything else in. The monitor connects to the laptop separately, using a VGA adapter.

I think the point is that if you are planning to apply during your Masters, that means that by the time you apply, you will have been in the program for less than a semester. That's not nothing, but there isn't a whole lot that you will be able to show for it. Your letters will be from people who will only know you a few months, you won't have any grades yet, you'll have very limited research experience, and probably no research outcomes to speak of (applying to conferences takes time, producing manuscripts takes time, even doing any meaningful research probably will take longer than those few months you'll have before applying). It's hard to see how being in such a one-year program will be a game-changer. Really all it adds is that this program accepted you (which won't count for all that much), but it won't say much on your research abilities or compatibility with PhD programs. Any experience you gain will come too late to count for the upcoming application season starting this fall. The program will have more of an impact if you apply after you graduate.

Asking the same question in a different forum isn't going to lead to different outcomes. To reply, click here:

Same. All my externals (keyboard, mouse, two external hard drives, speakers) are connected to one USB hub so when I come home all I have to do is plug in the hub and the screen, and I'm good to go.

Imagine going on a first date and telling the person that you chose to date them over someone else that most people would consider more attractive. Is there any way that you can see that being interpreted positively? It's one thing if they ask, but I would not volunteer this information and I don't think it'll go over well if you do.

1. Basic search skills: if you google "2-year requirement" the entire first page of the search gives you exactly the answer to your question plus lots of extra details. In short, if you accept certain fellowships you are required to leave the US and go back to your home country for two years. This means you won't be able to take another job in the States after you graduate. 2. Yes. (And again, google would have told you that).

This is not a great hardship, it's part of university policies and follows from common sense even if it wasn't. We don't even know that the professor lost the assignment, this is all speculation. What's more, the student in question does have a copy of the work, or so he says, he's just refusing to scan and send it to the professor. I fail to see how the professor is doing anything inappropriate here. Unsubstantiated assumptions about anxiety have no place in this discussion. If we were to go down that path, we could be discussing the hardship of meeting deadlines, having weekly assignments, having to ever speak up in class or give a presentation, and so on. If a particular student has a particular (preferably documented) problem, it is their responsibility to bring it to instructor's attention. There is only so much a person can guess or accommodate without reason. All we're talking about is a professor asking a student to resend a copy of their assignment, this is completely ordinary and would not be a big deal if the student didn't make it into one.

Whenever I submit anything via email I always say something like "I would appreciate a reply confirming that you have received my submission." If I don't hear back, I'll follow up and confirm again a few days later. Since you didn't write that and you haven't received confirmation, I think it's fair to follow up and make sure. I'd wait maybe a week, then do it. Since you say the deadline hasn't passed, it's totally possible that the professor just isn't dealing with the applications right now. But as long as you're polite, there is no harm in asking.

Is this someone who is going to be important in your life as a student there, if you accept the offer? If not, then who cares about them?

You're asking about a specific department at a specific school. You've already been told that this is not a situation where there is just one answer, so you need to get information directly from the department. This is not a place where you just want to rely on internet strangers for information, because that could be costly. If this is a school that will pay for exactly 30 credits and you take 33 because someone on the internet told you it was ok, you may end up paying a lot of money. Since you've already emailed the department, I also don't see what speculations here could do to help you. You'll just have to wait and see.

My question is this: suppose he tells you you have to figure it out on your own. That's possible. You're already in this position of figuring it out by yourself, so what have you got to lose? So of course this is one possible outcome, but even if this is how it ends, at least now he knows so any future conversation can build on it and your efforts to improve. I think that coming from a place where you say "I've struggled in the past and that's affected my performance; I'm working to improve my situation but I worry that my past has made it slower and more difficult, and I worry about the possible implications of that. I love my program and enjoy being here, and I want to make sure that I can stay" is something that he can at least understand, if not relate to. And of course there are other possible outcomes to your conversation, like that he can think of ways of helping you out. Maybe he knows more experienced students who've gone through this and can give you feedback or support along the way. Maybe he knows the professor in question and can intervene if there is a need. Maybe he can help you draft an email if you ever need to write anything formal that it'd be good if someone looked at before you send it. He's your advisor, hiding things from him isn't a good way to start the relationship.