bottles

I second everyone who has said they cannot wait until they start hearing back! I only applied to Arizona State and the University of Florida for their PhD in literature programs. I focus on psychology in Cold War literature. I split my applications this round: 2 are going to PhD in literature schools, and 4 are going to library science schools...I am passionate about literature, original research, and teaching...but the state of the humanities in this country kept me from applying anywhere I wasn't dying to go. I just recently turned 21 and will be graduating this spring with two degrees, so I guess my rationale is that I have time to reassess my situation in the future if things don't work out! Good luck to everyone

I looked at LSU's program and it really scared me off with that sort of talk. If you are accepted to the program & enroll, I believe they're obligated to let you finish, but I wouldn't completely count on it. I would call the office and see if you can talk to someone about it, they'll probably have more of a feel for the future of the program. If you want a program in the southeast that also has a dual masters program in history and SLIS, check out the University of South Carolina: http://www.libsci.sc...gram/joiint.htm As far as how hard it is to get into these schools...grad schools do a really good job of hiding those statistics. I do remember the University of Washington (ranked in 2009 as #4 by Newsweek) said: "The level of competitiveness for admission into the MLIS program fluctuates from year to year depending on the applicant pool and on the number of admission spaces available. For the 2010 admissions process, we had 535 total applications and a 44% admit rate." That's really one of the only hard-and-fast statistics I have come across. It gives you a bit of perspective as far as a top 10 school goes. Again, I can't really provide too many concrete answers because it does depend on your application & the applicant pool, but I would expect a relatively good acceptance rate at LSU, especially if you're one of the only people to apply since everyone else was scared off!

So, OK. I took the GREs for the first time today and got a 580 verbal and a 460 quant...I felt pretty good about the writing section, but that's another story. I've been reading various posts regarding GRE scores and how they factor into acceptances, fellowships, etc., and obviously when I got a 580 my life got infinitely more complicated. My real question is, as a BS/BA student with national and regional conference experience, creative publications, research grants, a 3.7 GPA, president of honorary, so on and so forth--should I spend another month studying for the GRE again to hit the 600+ mark for verbal, or should I shoot for working harder on my SOPs and writing samples? I am between a rock and a hard place--I feel like it's important to do well on the GREs, but I know that in the end the SOPs and writing samples tend to matter more. Is it worth it to retake? I am looking to apply to schools such as Florida, Minnesota, Arizona State, and UC San Diego for PhD programs in American Literature, mainly big research schools outside of the top-10. and I had so hoped this GRE crap would have stopped being an issue today!

Yes, yes, and yes. This is easily one of the most helpful ways to narrow down schools. It's a bit tougher when you're doing a lot of interdisciplinary work, but definitely gives you a rough idea about the sort of research that is going on at specific universities. Great advice.