bugbear

Oh, and I almost forgot, Anti-depressants are a MUST!

Ya but it is April 9th. Funding decisions have already gone out. You have a list of schools. You read about said schools. Make a decision. It isn't that life altering. You are getting a degree. You don't want to weigh it lightly but grad school is simply learning how to learn. These people that are waiting to the last minute are simply being selfish and indecisive.

People are going to hate me for this but, hey, it's honest. When I applied to MA programs and again to PhD programs, I decided on April 15 both times. Both times there were two schools that I was having trouble deciding between and I had already turned down my other offers (to hopefully help someone on the waitlist for either admissions or funding). While I realize that it sucks for someone on the waitlist at the schools, I needed to wait that long before I was sure of my decision. And, even after I'd decided for the PhD, I was petrified that I'd made the wrong decision and almost switched back (there were extenuating circumstances that would've allowed me to do so). So, yes, I waited until April 15 (and we're talking 7pm EDT on April 15) to make a decision on PhD programs.

I went to law school as a wet-eared 22 year old and treated it like college. I mean, I worked really hard, but it was sporadic.

I remember that what time I showed up at the library depended on how much work I had, but however early I got in, this one student was there before me. When finals came, I was hitting the books until all hours, but he was rarely there late. I asked him once about his study habits and he said:

"I get here at eight every day and leave at five. If I run out of reading, I re-read, I read ahead, I read supplements. If five o'clock comes and I have more to do, I ask myself if the extra work is worth an hour not seeing my wife, my kids or taking the time I can with my parents or friends. If it's not, I leave. This is just a job. You do it right, but it's the means."

He finished near the top of the class and disappeared into a middle-sized firm that paid him like crazy and let him take family vacations. Man had developed priorities that I totally did not get. I'm still not sure I do, exactly. But I do know that working has changed my attitude toward education.

Experience has something to say for it. I often feel behind when I think about finishing eight years from now ... almost 40. But I've stood up in court and made arguments that the judge should take someone else's children away. I've argued to free people I knew should be in jail. I celebrated marriages and births with friends and cried with them during divorce and miscarriage and been through a lot of it for myself. It would be insane to think that won't add to my experience studying again.

Everyone takes their own path, but they mostly lead to similar places. Your career, your whole life, eventually gets put into perspective. This is not to take away from you young gunners that got your shit together and hit the Ph.D road at 22 (you'll find your own ways to grow, obviously), but I'm glad to be embarking on a new phase with a little bit of history to fall back on. There are some things you can't learn until you're older; going back to school later is a trade-off, not a loss.

haha at thinking you would be hanging out with cool people in grad school...it's full of nerds, social outcasts, and the socially awkward. Try to find a cooler department (psych, crim j, comm) to hang with - still dorks but at least they go out. i am in poli sci and it's a bunch of friggin' losers. 4 years of these clowns and i've had it. i have an undergrad GF too - good deal if you are good looking and cool enough to swing it - most grad students aren't. do your best to meet new people - join an intramural sports team or volunteer or something. and don't tell me you are too busy. if you have time to sit around and whine on here, you've got time to get out there and meet some new people.

Loans.

Don't do it. You can't even comprehend how much happier you will be as mid-level administrator for Hibbing County than a perpetual lecturer at East Southeast New Hampshire state with a $200k sword of Damocles nicking your jugular. It almost never makes sense to leverage your future sense of mobility and freedom for that kind of dough.

One day, your Future Self will look lovingly at your three-year-old son, then your doting spouse and think "Thank the Good Baby Christ Child I can ditch that whiny little bastard with Grandma and take a week in Honolulu to finally be a sexual creature again". Then Future Self will realize that such a vacation would be impossible with a $2k/month loan payment and Future Self will thank Present Self and GopherGrad (the wizened, but oddly still totally hot Phantom of the GradCafe) because were it not for that very moment on the Internet you would be looping the leaf blower's electric cord over a garage rafter instead of planning a vacation.

Hi all,

I am given an admission and have received quite a large amount of fellowship. I absolutely love this school but there is a school that I would love to go (but I am currently waitlisted) because of personal reasons (boyfriend issues). The potential faculty advisor sent me a very nice email, hoping I could join his lab. I really do want to but would like to hear back from the other schools first, which may take quite a while. What do I do? How do I write back? I know perhaps letting him know about boyfriend issues is ridiculous, but how can I tell him that I really like his lab but cannot give out any decisions yet with no apparent reasons?

Thanks!

OK, someone has to say this--this thread seems like a collection of cheesy college application essays. You're already in grad school. Do you still need pads on the back? Here, good job, good job.

You know you did good work and made good choices. Other people know you did good work. But so did virtually everyone else who got into good grad schools. No one is going to look down on you for coming from low-income families or for being first generation students, and if they will--they're just a bunch of jerks.

I grew up in Eastern Europe and came to the U.S. at 19. My parents' combined income at home was less than $1000 a month, for a family of five, which wasn't much more when adjusted for PPP. Yes, I went to a college well below in USNEWS rankings than others I was accepted to, based on financial aid. Yes, I had to work crappy jobs in college. Yes, I studied while some other people went to Bahamas for spring break. Yes, I worked hard academically and missed some fun. But so did numerous other people from way wealthier families. In America, parents' income does not equal kids' income. A lot of my upper-middle class friends had to serve tables, work at supermarkets or for maintenance to pay their college bills, but they never asked for a pad on the back. I am well aware of the outcomes of my graduating class, and it's those that were motivated and worked hard that succeeded, regardless of parents' education or income. In terms of grad school applications, parents rarely ever know enough to be more helpful than, say, thegradcafe.

In my graduate program, the vast majority worked very hard to get here, and still work hard. Grad life is not a lifestyle of luxury for virtually anyone. Things valued in grad school are intelligence, motivation, hard work and humor, not family background.

So, I suppose it was worth answering someone who was unsure about the social environment and attitudes in grad school, but 5 pages of rubbing each other's egos for "overcoming the odds?" I thought it would end on page 2, at most. You've made it, congratulations! Now get over the "disadvantages you had to overcome" and get down to work to continue to succeed.

Back to the admissions process, I'd like to ask what determines the timing and manner of notifications of decisions. The 'Fall 2011 cycle' thread, and, indeed, most of the rest of these forums, consists in a whole bunch of anxious and nervous people waiting for news. So, why? I know you can't speak for every school, perhaps, just yours.

1) Why do some schools not send out all decisions at the same time? I recently commented on that other thread that there were some schools which sent out some acceptances but no rejects, thus leaving those, like myself, in limbo and perpetual hope. If the department has already made such decisions, I'd humbly submit that it would be much kinder to let people know at the same time.

2) Couldn't there be a fixed date of notification? That is to say, couldn't a department send out an e-mail once the application deadline has passed, saying, in effect, "We've received all applications, will begin the process of reviewing them, and will notify all applicants on March 1", or whatever day. That would also alleviate a great deal of nervous waiting and worry, waking up in overinflated hope every day, and checking e-mail every ten minutes. If we knew the date, we could all relax, and, god forbid, get some work done?

Perhaps there are logistical reasons for all of this; I'd like to hear them, if possible. I hope this doesn't sound rude or whiny, it's just that there seems to be a whole lot of unnecessary emotional distress as a result of this process.

Some of you have held out hope for applying again next year. I wouldn't rule it out, but for your application to do much better, something major has to change. For instance, you did a great senior thesis this year and now have a prof who says you walk on water. Or you pursued advanced Arabic study in Egypt and also made a bunch of friends while hanging out in Tahrir Square. Or you did a very techy MA program like the Columbia QMSS program and stood out.

If, by contrast, all you'll have done is polished your application essays and pumped up your GRE scores by a hundred points with a tutor, don't expect a drastically different outcome. You might get lucky, because there is always a lot of randomness in this process, but probably you'll just do a little bit better. You might also do worse, if your activities this year were not that impressive, or if we recognize your application and realize this means all of our peer institutions must have rejected you last year, too.

My intention here isn't to be mean, but poli sci is a tough field to get ahead in so if you fail this year you should really consider whether there is something else in the world you might enjoy doing.

waiting for good news
oh god, email is silent.
tonight I get crunk.