maximalist

Anybody claiming the USC Annenberg results post? Apparently, a fellowship offer went out via email?

Ha, sounds good! I don't have anything to celebrate just yet either. But, once I/we all do, we should make that Skype drink happen.

Skype, anybody? And many congrats on the Temple acceptances, folks!

I received two rejections this week, but both from cultural studies programs. Weirdly enough, after speaking to two of my LOR writers, I still have pretty high hopes for the rest of the applications.

Haha, isn't that the truth! Hopefully not...from lurking around on College Confidential and here, it looks like they extended the deadline last year as well (seriously though, what are the reasons a program might do that?), and most decisions went out in March. But, who knows! For now, we'll remain tortured.

I only have a few Comm apps out, but none of them have really notified earlier than now to mid-February, with USC being the latest at the end of February into March, so I'm not stressing too much yet. However, one of my cultural studies programs has notified applicants this week in the past, which is nerve-wracking. As I was saying to my professor-mentor the other day, the waiting has become far more acute now that it's February. That reminds me though, for those who are applying to USC, the PhD deadline was extended to February 11th. The Annenberg Admissions News page was updated a couple of days ago with a final date and not just the ambiguous "the deadline is being extended" bit. Not sure what that means for results, but I'm hoping it doesn't delay them too much. On the bright side, I do know that my USC app is with the committee now, after getting a disappearing LOR back into their hands, via the admissions coordinator.

Perfect. As long as nobody's getting updates, there's no reason to worry.

Has the materials received/online status been updated for anyone?

Well, I'm glad it wasn't just me who had issues with UNC and LORs. Two of my professors ran into glitches while attempting to upload their letters (just a few days before the deadline), so one was kind enough to deal with calling UNC's general application tech support to get an alternate email address to send them to. Both did that, so I sat back and breathed a sigh of relief. Except, surprise! When I emailed the department to check the status of the LORs (because the online status hadn't updated after a week or so), I received a reply that they'd received neither. The Communication Studies coordinator is freaking awesome though, and she just had them email the letters to her email address.

Finally, after a bit of emailing and a phone call, a "missing" LOR for USC should be taken care of...well, provided it doesn't get lost in the abyss again, and with USPS, who knows. I don't really understand how an uploaded document that was marked as "submitted" in November can be misplaced, especially when the prof writing it is no tech dummy and managed to get the rest of the online letters uploaded. Oh well, I can only hope that, in the end, the slight hassle is worth it.

My USC app just changed status to "in review" yesterday. I actually had just checked it that morning, when it was still in the "first stage," and by the end of the day, it changed, and I'd received an email because of a missing LOR (even though the online system has it marked as submitted long ago...oh well, it'll get sorted out because Annenberg was nice enough to contact him themselves about it). So...things are happening! But, I still don't expect to hear from them until at least late February, based on GC's results search.

Wow, that's terrible! I will say that I just checked my status again out of paranoia, and my GRE scores are marked as received on 11/10. The only stuff missing in the status updates are the official transcripts, SOP, and writing sample (LORs aren't tracked, apparently), which are only the materials that the English department wanted in hard copy.

I'll echo this. I'm also applying for the English program at UW (all my materials are "missing" yet as well), and since the application was due January 2nd (a Sunday), I doubt they've had the chance to process all of them yet. On the application status page, it says to give 2-3 weeks for the department to update the status. Plus, the department gets 400-500 applications per season, which I imagine takes quite some time to process.

Mostly Josh Kun, as well as Sarah Banet-Weiser. USC is at the top of my list right now, but truthfully, I'll be grateful to get in anywhere, especially considering there's a limited pool of programs/people working on popular music. Thanks, and good luck to you as well! This really is a wonderful place...like you said, it's nice to know we're all in the same boat.

Ah, another USC applicant! Out of curiosity, who are you looking to work with there?

My apps are in various programs, but the two Comm departments I applied to for a PhD are USC (who are apparently still taking late applications, according to their admissions news. Ugh, that's worrying to me...) and UNC, and I applied to Minnesota for the MA.

I applied to the U's cultural studies program (and go here as an undergrad, so I've spoken to a few in the department about the application process) and treated them as the same document. I guess that might be my bad down the road though. If it makes you feel better, the applications at the U go straight to the departments electronically...within an hour of submitting mine, I received an email from the Graduate School saying my program could view it immediately, and that the Graduate School would enter my application info into their university system online (which, when finished, you will be notified about). Basically, I worried more about department requirements, as theirs ended up being in overlap with the Graduate School's on virtually everything.

I had this issue with one of my transcripts too...try saving the PDF in black and white instead of color.