gradstudent84

I will consider this as well.

Update my facebook status. Hahahah! No one's mentioned it yet but I KNOW for a FACT that more than half of you will do this (assuming you all have an account) Then I will email/visit my letter writers, take my family out to dinner, and gloat share to all my friends. Just being honest here.

I'm sick of this too. I get enough of this at school.

Thank you. Good luck to you too. Keep me updated on your progress, I am relieved and happy I've found someone I can commiserate with. What's even WORSE is that others pick up on the competitive vibe and totally treat you like dirt with no reason at all. I feel the antagonistic, passive-aggressive attitude towards me even though I have never done or said anything to make them feel this way. And I know this is true because a couple of people have expressed it towards me verbally. There's a lot of negative energy where I am. I can NOT wait until I get my first acceptance letter.

I totally, TOTALLY understand how you feel about this. I empathize with you 100%. I dread attending a couple of my classes only because I am so over the competitiveness, the attention seeking, and the brown nosing.

Just out of curiosity, why/how did you apply so early? Did you have everything totally ready at the earliest possible moment? And is your user name taken from the song title by the Sex Pistols? I immediately thought of them when I saw it.

Haha, I just recently posted on another thread about sort of going through this same thing. I tend to brood and overanalyze little details. But then I realize that whatever I did, I did to the best of my abilities and now it's out of my hands. So I try to keep busy. Like I go pamper myself, go window shopping, and I recently started up bikram yoga again and that has really helped me relax and just try to enjoy the time I have now that this whole cycle is over.

For me, I'm paranoid about how "effective" my letters of rec are. I waived my rights to read them, but one professor allowed me to read the letter he wrote for me, and it was very positive. I'm worried about the ratings of the evaluations because I don't really know the other two professors beyond the professional/student-teacher relationship level. Actually, one of the latter two I have known for more than a year and I can have a more "casual" relationship with her because I've spoken to her many times and she is someone I feel more comfortable with. I am a little paranoid about getting rejected from all 12 schools/programs I applied to. Is this even possible? I keep worrying about the worst case scenario and this would totally make me feel defeated because of the time, energy, and money I invested during this application cycle. I'd probably run victory laps around my house if I were to receive even one acceptance letter.

All right, so a bit of an update: I emailed another professor and miracle of miracles, he agreed to write one for me TODAY, and requested that I send him the appropriate documents. So awesome how the teacher said he'd do this when it's so last minute, but since I only had this teacher for one class, he said the letter will be limited. I appreciate the honesty, and I think a letter is better than no letter/incomplete application.

Thanks. The thing is though, I already gave her a thank you card and a small gift...but as a show of gratitude, I will say thanks to her again once I get acceptance letters and make sure she knows that she did make a difference in the schools she submitted letters for. And I decided to just let it go and find someone else to complete the application. I think it will keep me calm in that I don't worry I antagonized her with persistence. It actually spoke volumes to me when she did not respond to my reminder emails

Thanks. I'll definitely need the luck. I wasn't fully over it until I got home and took some time to relax. I will try to give the professor a benefit of the doubt and not take it personally. It has all been a bit of a shock...I expected more encouragement, but I guess everyone has a limit..

I decided to ask another professor for a letter. Something tells me that she is also very much done with this whole process and that she won't upload another one because she is over it. Which is understandable. In that case, I don't think another email or even approaching the professor directly will help; i'm afraid it may exacerbate the situation so I will just let it be and find someone else. i've thanked her so many times it's crazy...I even wrote a thank you note as a show of appreciation so I'm sure she knows how thankful/grateful I am

I don't think she uploaded the letter for this particular school at all BECAUSE in her own words, she completed all the letters for all the schools. She was sent reminder emails and even the link to the application a few times, and she confirmed that she received these. And yet, she did not say anything to assure me that she will get this done. I can definitely take a screenshot of the page that shows she never submitted the letter, but I dont' think this will prompt her to upload one, seeing as how she did not upload after those reminders were sent. I think it's a good idea if she had TRIED to upload the letter, but as she said she never knew there was one more school to upload to, I dont think she cares to do it. I'm trying to think of a way to approach her in a non-aggressive but polite way about this because this application was very expensive..

I don't know whether I should feel embarrassed or what, but one of my letters of rec was not uploaded by the deadline by one professor. I gave her a follow up email one week before the deadline, then a few days before the deadline, even resending the link to the online application. I go in to see her during office hours and I say hello and politely ask how she's doing. Then I said that her letter wasn't submitted for two programs.(she submitted letters for ALL the other programs but these two). Regarding the first school... She looked really confused and said she thought she completed them all, and I said no, and I tell her what university it was for and what system the online application was. I also said that I sent reminder emails (she remembers them too). She said that she actually finished all the ones that her students gave her links to, and she doesn't know what I'm talking about. She also pointed out that she completed letters of rec for 15 other students, completing letters for like 10 schools each, and that she had gotten the exact same link from five other students besides me. I said that I understand that it is a lot of work, and I said maybe the system did not update or something (assuming that she still submitted the letter). She repeated the statement that she finished all the letters. It was a little awkward because she just sat there insisting she finished them all, when she clearly didn't. Regarding the second school, I was very polite and calm throughout this exchange, and then I excused myself after I told her that one letter for program with a later deadline was not yet submitted. (this was one was started, but not officially submitted). I asked if it was all right if I may resend her the reminder email, and she said yes. Am I making any sense? I'm sort of shaken up by this because I always thought she'd be more approachable and she just seemed sort of cold and indifferent. I mean...I sent all my recommenders information with clear instructions, listing schools, contact numbers, emails, program names, stamped envelopes, etc. and because this school somehow slipped through the cracks, she wouldn't budge and wouldn't say anything about uploading the letter for me. I made it extremely convenient and easy for the letter writers, even sending them the materials months before the deadlines. It's just frustrating how a miscommunication like this leads to an incomplete application. Also she is one of the professors I really look up to and admire, and hoped to establish a great professional student-teacher relationship, but it felt just awkward, with me standing there mentioning two schools with incomplete letters and her saying that they were complete.

One letter was not uploaded and the deadline was this past Saturday. It's strange how my professor uploaded ALL the letters for other programs (even some with later deadlines) but not the one with the earliest deadline. Was it forgotten or something? I sent a couple emails last week but I will go talk to the professor tomorrow or Wednesday.

She's applying to grad schools same time as me, and everytime I see her on campus she expresses her anxiety over the possibility of not getting accepted. Her GPA is 3.85. Some programs are noted to first look at GPA over anything else,and everyone keeps telling her that she'll be okay. I try to change the subject, and she somehow doesn't get it, and simply keeps talking about other people's successes, failures, how people with 3.9 GPA have gotten waitlisted, etc. As someone whose GPA is not THAT high, it can be quite annoying to hear the same things over and over (and over..) again. So now, I try to avoid her. I need to calm down for the sake of my own insanity as well and being around highly anxious people isn't too helpful...

I think what annoys me more is the fact that some people are just SO SURE you'll get in somewhere. My parents put no pressure on me, and they are very supportive of my decisions, which is a blessing. At the same time though, whenever I talk about my anxieties and worries about this whole process my family tells me, I don't know what you're so worried about; you'll get in somewhere. You're applying to 10-12 schools; you'll get in. Do I sound paranoid? Yes I'm applying to many, MANY schools (when the average number of schools to apply to is around 5 in our department) but seriously, I want to keep it as realistic as possible. It is a competitive field and I just want to make sure everything goes right. Also, some of my classmates keep asking and asking. I can't avoid them, so because they keep asking I just respond, yes i applied. Yes im waiting for the results. So then they say, you'll get in. Don't worry, you'll get in. It's not that easy. I love the positive attitude and I appreciate their words of encouragement. However, these are the same people who will ask me in about three months if I got in anywhere, and I so do NOT want to tell them where I've gotten rejected. It's none of their business. And I know for a fact that I won't get in to all the places I've applied. And one more thing...I have a classmate who keeps asking me about this whole process. She keeps asking me where I applied, etc. I want to tell her to stop talking about it; it's over and done with. Argh.

Just something that got me wondering recently, that's all. Do they? I just don't think it's fair of them not to notify us if something didn't get processed and somehow got lost in the mail, which may result in our applications not being reviewed. I know some schools have online applications that keep track of our paperwork; i'm referring to the schools that don't have this option.

He used the word terrorize? Professors should understand that letters are extremely important and that the student's future is on the line here.

I just didn't want them to think I was careless...I know, I sort of sound like a psycho...but sometimes you can never be too careful....

Speaking of statement of purpose, I just now noticed that for one application, i accidentally typed in a wrong letter. I was listing the courses I was interested in, and the course id was BBSQ, and for one, I typed in BBSW by accident. I know it's a really small error but will the committee judge me by that? It's not a grammatical/spelling error, I just got the course ID wrong.What a dumb mistake

Ohhh..ouch Trin..im' sorry did your professor send you an email or something?

Yes, my documents for a previous school's application was already uploaded by default. I don't think I was able to check my status; the most I could do was review my completed application via pdf file.

Yup, the documents I submitted for NYU were on the page for Syracuse as well. Seriously, it was weird. I had to delete the documents I uploaded for NYU just in case the admissions office doesn't get confused. App inspector directed me to the page, but I didn't realize I had to complete the second step, which was to properly upload the document after clicking on the chosen document from a drop down menu on the bottom of the screen. Also, the little "preview" button had to show up for the document to completely upload. I hope I'm making sense? I got the hang of it, but I was getting frustrated that it was taking me so long. I prefer applyyourself over embark any day.

Oh gosh..i'm sorry everyone..I just now figured it out So apparently, if you have already submitted an application through Embark before, the system automatically saves your data, so you can delete/upload new files based on what you already have. So it's basically a two step process Step 1: Upload document (which is "archived" in a way) Step 2: Choose document, and then "submit". I guess for applicants using Embark, it is helpful to keep this in mind.