Cristie

Do you ever just wonder if your name is on a white board in a room somewhere and someone is holding the dry erase marker as the roundtable discusses your fate? Like the cap is off while the debate is going on and someone stands there waiting to draw that red line. Or is it yes and no stacks in massive piles on that table? HOW does it happen--this process about my future?
If they had a live stream...I'd be Netflixing that shit 24/7. 
Do you guys have these kinds of thoughts too or am I just losing it staring at my email/phone and waiting?

Someone else please admit that they are carrying their phone into the bathroom....Just in case.
lol

You know, I felt that way about Florida State's rejection...COLD. Like it was nothing. But when I got rejected from Wyoming...it was the nicest and most personal rejection (a letter and an email), even encouraged me to apply again and waived the fee for next time. That might have taken someone an extra minute to type to me. But If I do this again, I'd apply to Wyoming again but never Florida State. All over a few lines and just being decent (and I HATE the cold). It's not like most of these people don't know what rejection feels like (they are all writers!). So I'm split, I I feel your frustration too, but also see Ydrl's point in that I don't want to wait forever either. 

You know, I felt that way about Florida State's rejection...COLD. Like it was nothing. But when I got rejected from Wyoming...it was the nicest and most personal rejection (a letter and an email), even encouraged me to apply again and waived the fee for next time. That might have taken someone an extra minute to type to me. But If I do this again, I'd apply to Wyoming again but never Florida State. All over a few lines and just being decent (and I HATE the cold). It's not like most of these people don't know what rejection feels like (they are all writers!). So I'm split, I I feel your frustration too, but also see Ydrl's point in that I don't want to wait forever either. 

I totally get the cold rejection letter thing. Anyone who gets a Syracuse rejection knows about the infamous "Dear MFA Applicant" nonsense instead of the person's actual name. I was going to apply again this year, but my recommender told me that if a school won't respect me enough to use my name, don't go there.

I don't write a sonnet a day but I know I'm a poet at heart.  I know that I am happiest when a poem can capture exactly, exactly, the tiny moment I had in my head.  And in a manner no other writing could for me.
This weekend a pal of mine from college read one of my poems (in my portfolio) at his sister's wedding for his reading/toast.  I didn't write that poem for her wedding...  I wrote it so it could just be.
Having that mean more to me than an acceptance, however, does not erase that these grad schools need to get their communication game together right the shit now, haha.

You know, I felt that way about Florida State's rejection...COLD. Like it was nothing. But when I got rejected from Wyoming...it was the nicest and most personal rejection (a letter and an email), even encouraged me to apply again and waived the fee for next time. That might have taken someone an extra minute to type to me. But If I do this again, I'd apply to Wyoming again but never Florida State. All over a few lines and just being decent (and I HATE the cold). It's not like most of these people don't know what rejection feels like (they are all writers!). So I'm split, I I feel your frustration too, but also see Ydrl's point in that I don't want to wait forever either. 

On another note, this morning while I was at work I got a call from an unknown number and got so excited! Unfortunately, my work is uh... posing naked for art classes, and I was mid-pose, so I missed the call. When I tried calling back later, I didn't get a response. I'm assuming it wasn't an MFA program, but oh, I wish it was... How funny would it be if I got the call while standing naked in front of a bunch of art students??

Yeah, I must've been visiting Neptune when I started my applications, sequencing my portfolio in fucking chronological order, as if somehow I imagined these people reading would go, "Oh, dope, he's got them in the order he wrote them, so we can see his progression and versatility as a writer!"  WHAT A MORON.
I'm not sure why I even bothered applying to grad school.  I went to the Peace Corps and almost immediately realized the bureaucracy and the red tape were going to annihilate all of my good intentions and obliviate (yes, that's right) any possible justification for the "work" they wanted me to do.  Spoiler alert: I was right, but at least I made a group of friends that will stick with me for my lifetime and explored a country I would've never otherwise.
I'm so tired of hearing about grad schools being swamped with applications.  So tired of emails and letters from these schools that read more pedestrian than a high-schooler with a half-decent grasp of the English language.  It's your motherfucking job: the least each of those individual can do is honor each and every person that submits their time and money (!) and their emotional state (!!!) for the 2-3 months they wait to hear back...  just to receive some loosely-connected, borderline-offensive letter full of the same word salad populated by gobbledygook that politicians use every time they open their mouths.
No.
Read every page we slaved over, even if they're no good to you.  You are literally paid to do this.  And not a single speck of creativity or worth or even a future can be found on a solitary page of writing.  They know that, or at least they should.  But they don't care, and no one's ever called them out to.
I'm not as angry as I read here; I'm just tired of living a life where I have to pretend 2 pages of a "statement of purpose" is all of me, knowing they're not, knowing the people reading know they're not, and knowing full well most will never even get past the first paragraph.
Just have us send the portfolios.  Interview us if you're interested.  Say thank you and maybe throw in some helpful advice (since, you know, this is your profession and you've just decided my writing's still not "up to par").  A little goes such a long way...
Oh, you don't have time to read all those pages?  Or make those calls?  Oh my goodness, just like we don't have the time to read 500,000 pages during grad school while also juggling a job or a class we're teaching and perhaps even some semblance of a social life so we can also continue exploring and learning about characters and living through interacting with others?  MAKE.  THE.  TIME.  This is your fucking job, and our fucking future (Fuck is unabashedly my favorite word in all dictionaries across all languages, in forever, and for always, in fucking eternity).
Aaaaaanyway, at least I got my rejection letter from Iowa.  So Boston U's decision is all that's left.
Suck it, grad schools.
 
Love,
Manny

While we wait and REFRESH repeatedly, any advice on Zoom Meet and Greet meetings? I have one Friday afternoon. A get to know you with faculty and students already in the program, Q&A. (This is also a school I've heard no word on funding from-and don't think (?) anyone else has either). 
In my current nervous state...Is this a test? Advice please...
Many thanks and big luck to everyone waiting.

Totally! I've had the exact same thought, like NYU made somewhere around $110,000 from its application fees in JUST the CW department alone and they haven't even bothered to send out waitlists or rejections! But I think it's also good to remember that institutions are kind of....messed up. Not saying that adcoms have to be directly motivated by money alone in order to consider/care for your work thoroughly, but they're honestly probably somewhat underpaid, not seeing that money, overworked, etc. It's tough. I think calling it an imperfect system would be an understatement. But that's all the more reason to pat yourself on the back if you get accepted (not diminish that accomplishment) but realize that it miiiiiiighhht not be as simple as "wow they've sifted through all my materials with a fine-toothed comb and I've been found lacking!" 

Nice..I hate those teacher's pets types..(groan)
I'm more thorn in your side, grumbling and plotting deaths from the back of the workshop room. 
I'm doomed.

Do you ever just wonder if your name is on a white board in a room somewhere and someone is holding the dry erase marker as the roundtable discusses your fate? Like the cap is off while the debate is going on and someone stands there waiting to draw that red line. Or is it yes and no stacks in massive piles on that table? HOW does it happen--this process about my future?
If they had a live stream...I'd be Netflixing that shit 24/7. 
Do you guys have these kinds of thoughts too or am I just losing it staring at my email/phone and waiting?

Do you ever just wonder if your name is on a white board in a room somewhere and someone is holding the dry erase marker as the roundtable discusses your fate? Like the cap is off while the debate is going on and someone stands there waiting to draw that red line. Or is it yes and no stacks in massive piles on that table? HOW does it happen--this process about my future?
If they had a live stream...I'd be Netflixing that shit 24/7. 
Do you guys have these kinds of thoughts too or am I just losing it staring at my email/phone and waiting?

This same thing happened with me with UNO, that red X... I emailed and asked if I should send it again. They said, nope, we have it and you are under review. The red X remains to this day. I think at some point in the process they just quit updating the portals. Good luck, 
Cristie 

Do you ever just wonder if your name is on a white board in a room somewhere and someone is holding the dry erase marker as the roundtable discusses your fate? Like the cap is off while the debate is going on and someone stands there waiting to draw that red line. Or is it yes and no stacks in massive piles on that table? HOW does it happen--this process about my future?
If they had a live stream...I'd be Netflixing that shit 24/7. 
Do you guys have these kinds of thoughts too or am I just losing it staring at my email/phone and waiting?

Speaking of BU,
I am freaking the fuck out because I went to my admissions portal just to feed my anxiety for the day and then be done with it and realized there's no visible upload of my college transcript.
I emailed admissions, as I'm pretty confident I wouldn't have just not uploaded it.  Besides, the portal is set up so every section is "checked" by a green check-mark once it's been completed, and I never received any notification about missing transcripts (just the standard email giving the applicant a heads-up on what else needs to be uploaded, like rec. letters, transcripts, etc., and a congrats) soooo...
Oh boy.  I'd hate to really put the Sisyphean cherry on top by not being accepted into BU because I missed a transcript in some fugue-like state of applying.
Surely a school wouldn't just let this happen without a heads-up...  Right?
I think age has made me cynical, but the Lost Boy in me always dares to hope anyway, haha.
 
Terrified.

Do you ever just wonder if your name is on a white board in a room somewhere and someone is holding the dry erase marker as the roundtable discusses your fate? Like the cap is off while the debate is going on and someone stands there waiting to draw that red line. Or is it yes and no stacks in massive piles on that table? HOW does it happen--this process about my future?
If they had a live stream...I'd be Netflixing that shit 24/7. 
Do you guys have these kinds of thoughts too or am I just losing it staring at my email/phone and waiting?

I'm not sure it's as dramatic as that. I wonder sometimes for the places that get north of 600 apps whether undergrad CW teachers' pets are wading through the slush pile determining our fates. 

Do you ever just wonder if your name is on a white board in a room somewhere and someone is holding the dry erase marker as the roundtable discusses your fate? Like the cap is off while the debate is going on and someone stands there waiting to draw that red line. Or is it yes and no stacks in massive piles on that table? HOW does it happen--this process about my future?
If they had a live stream...I'd be Netflixing that shit 24/7. 
Do you guys have these kinds of thoughts too or am I just losing it staring at my email/phone and waiting?

Do you ever just wonder if your name is on a white board in a room somewhere and someone is holding the dry erase marker as the roundtable discusses your fate? Like the cap is off while the debate is going on and someone stands there waiting to draw that red line. Or is it yes and no stacks in massive piles on that table? HOW does it happen--this process about my future?
If they had a live stream...I'd be Netflixing that shit 24/7. 
Do you guys have these kinds of thoughts too or am I just losing it staring at my email/phone and waiting?

Do you ever just wonder if your name is on a white board in a room somewhere and someone is holding the dry erase marker as the roundtable discusses your fate? Like the cap is off while the debate is going on and someone stands there waiting to draw that red line. Or is it yes and no stacks in massive piles on that table? HOW does it happen--this process about my future?
If they had a live stream...I'd be Netflixing that shit 24/7. 
Do you guys have these kinds of thoughts too or am I just losing it staring at my email/phone and waiting?

Do you ever just wonder if your name is on a white board in a room somewhere and someone is holding the dry erase marker as the roundtable discusses your fate? Like the cap is off while the debate is going on and someone stands there waiting to draw that red line. Or is it yes and no stacks in massive piles on that table? HOW does it happen--this process about my future?
If they had a live stream...I'd be Netflixing that shit 24/7. 
Do you guys have these kinds of thoughts too or am I just losing it staring at my email/phone and waiting?

Ah ok I really don't want to take out student loans so I only did the fully funded ones. I am on one waitlist so I suppose there is still hope but I think my odds are slim. Frustrating because my girlfriend has gotten into almost all of her grad school programs and I'm pretty sure her parents think I am an underachiever. Difficult to explain to people how competitive these dumb programs are. 

I GOT INTO EASTERN WASHINGTON. Literally speechless. No word on funding yet but hopefully soon. Came after 11 straight rejections. There is hope, people!!
1a/0w/11r/4p