bleem7

Yes, agreed, I'm sorry, I wasn't saying one can't get in without prior contact, rather that it's either prior contact or an interview in some cases, so that people who report getting into a program "without an interview" may in fact have that prior contact count as their interview. I guess I would be pessimistic about getting in without either, that is just mentioning who one wants to work with in the application, never approaching anyone, and then despite no interview after applying, still get accepted. My guess is that the interview might be a way to avoid the whole informal and uneven prior contact process, like at U Chicago where they expressly tell people not to contact faculty, but seem to interview everyone they take.

One question I'd ask is whether (aside from UCLA, which appears to have a fairly clear policy of no interviews) it is frequent at any school for an applicant to be accepted without any interaction with faculty. I think it's not uncommon for students who communicate with a POI informally prior to applying (or after, I suppose) to get admitted without a formal interview. The prior interaction seems to be a sufficient substitute at least in some cases. But how often does someone get accepted who has not communicated with faculty at some point? At UCLA the application seems to encourage interaction (they ask you who have you talked to, not just who do you want to work with). Some schools discourage interacting with faculty, some encourage it, others are silent or say it doesn't matter, but whatever you do don't carpetbomb everyone in the department with an email. I wonder if it's possible to just apply, list faculty without interacting with them, and then get in without an interview. My bet is that it would be infrequent with at most a few exceptions.

So they accept 2-3 applicants plus additional people focused on those regions? Are they considered together or do the centers have their own schedule? Thank you!

I saw a post a while back ( 1/27) (page 8 ) that said there were 15 candidates who had been selected for interviews and that the process was otherwise being finalized. I was wondering if the post on the stream was just one of those or if maybe they were still looking.

Just saw a Brandeis interview on the results stream. I thought the interviewing for Brandeis was finished. Are they still interviewing or starting up again?