kbupz

Reading this, my thought was that there may be a correlation between personality type and political views. Here is an interesting page that shows the results of a survey of 3000 Americans that asked (among other things) their MBTI personality type and their political party. People who go to graduate school, I think, are often IN types, who typically "are interested in knowledge for its own sake, as well as ideas, theory, and depth of understanding." Among those, the T/F distinction makes a world of difference. The "T" types are more strongly republican (or independent), while the "F" types are strongly democrat. These results were actually what I was expecting, as I think that the thinking types would be more likely to be found in the hard sciences where there is the link between theory and practice is easiest to substantiate, while the feeling types would be the ones in the social sciences and humanities (I too am lumping them together ), where there are strong overtones of "social justice," as I believe someone said very early on in this thread. Of course, since the data preceded my hypothesis, this is not scientific, but it would make an interesting study for one of you statisticians/social scientists (at least, I think it would be interesting). P.S. Sorry to those who are unfamiliar with the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator, but I'm sure Google can help you out.

I just did that, but judging from the fact that their visiting weekend has happened already, I'm pretty sure I know what the answer is going to be. Oh, as I was typing this got an automated email from the graduate coordinator saying he'll be out for the next 3 days and will respond when he returns. Guess I'll have to wait a little longer.

That is so weird. Mine shows "Completed," which I'm pretty sure is the same status it's had since I submitted it. No idea what that means.

I'm curious, where are you seeing the "under review" status? It just tells me that my app is submitted, as far as I can tell. I wish they'd just tell us if we weren't getting in, honestly.

6 rejections. 1 acceptance with no funding. Had I done this before getting 3 rejections,the prediction would have looked more optimistic.

A question for all you CS folks out there who spent some time working in the "real world" before applying: Did any of you end up working somewhere that allowed you to gain useful research experience in some field of computer science? I'm aware there are plenty of jobs out there that can be gotten with a computer science bachelor's degree, but I'm curious if any of them provide good preparation for graduate school. In a nutshell, does there exist a place (outside of academia) where one could better prepare oneself for computer science doctoral study with just a bachelor's degree? (I know a master's degree is the obvious answer, but just humor me)

Once I didn't get the letter from RI when I knew they were already sent out, I pretty much knew it was over. So mine was not at all unexpected. Wish some place would let me in though, by clerical error or something.

Thank you for the hope, csApplicant. I am among many who could use it right now. And yes, my MIT rejection didn't even phase me, maybe since I'm used to the feeling from when I applied there for undergrad I'm trying to wait for all the chips to fall before getting seriously bummed out, with some success.

I'm feeling the same way, not having heard anything from any school. But no news is technically better than a rejection (if only slightly).

That's good to know. I was also wondering if I should apply for a Masters if I get across the board rejections to PhD programs, but wasn't aware that getting a Masters degree might inadvertently make it more difficult to get into a top PhD program.

Out of curiosity, where does one find detailed rankings by subfield such as what the OP is referring to? Is it just from US News after you pay them to get the full version?

http://www.eyezmaze.com/eyezblog_en/blog/2009/01/grow_tower.html You try to build a tower based on different pieces by figuring out how they interact with each other. It's more interesting than I made it sound.

Depends on who it is. One of my recommendation writers specifically told me to remind him as often as possible, knowing he'd be busy with other things and frequent reminders would likely help. He did end up completing all the recommendations I asked him to, albeit the day before they were due.

Been listening mostly to Spiraling, but I'm also really enjoying Chinese Democracy (somewhat to my surprise).

CMU, Cornell, MIT, and UPenn are the schools I'd really like to go to. If I don't get into any of those (which is certainly possible), I'll have to seriously consider whether it might not be better to get a Masters' or more work experience first (the former would probably help more). For now I'll just remain hopeful, and remember that there's a large school near me with a late deadline for their master's program if worst comes to worst.