cautiouslyoptimistic
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Posts posted by cautiouslyoptimistic
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To the person who posted an interview invite at Stanford for affective sciences would you mind telling me who your POI is? Feel free to PM me. Thanks and congratulations!
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I can empathize! I don't know if anytime during this process I've had my wits about me. I've applied to UVa, Yale, UMass, UT-Austin and UC Santa Barbara. Have not heard from anyone yet. During my personal correspondence with Dr. Haidt (my POI) in UVa, he mentioned that he liked my personal statement but I'm a long shot because of my GRE and GPA... I still applied, I should probably assume the worst. I just hope they'll be nice enough to at least send me a rejection notice... would not like to be in application purgatory!
Congratulations to those who've had some positive news, good luck to the rest!
I do know that Virginia is still in the process of sending out interview invitations, however, I believe Haidt is going to be a visiting professor at NYU's business school next year and thus is most likely not taking on any new students. Sorry to be the one to tell you that...
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I think I'm officially going crazy now. I held it together last week, but now I'm at the point of thinking...come on already!!
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Well, I just called the Boulder POI.
He was very understanding and said that I could either:
1) Go to the Boulder weekend instead.
2) Go to the WUStL weekend as originally planned, and find an alternate date to visit Boulder.
He basically said that most professors understand that there's some level of competition to get students for the same interview weekends, and they understand that students have to make tough decisions, figure out alternatives, etc.
He was really nice about it.
Having said that, he did say that I might be missing out on the full experience if I'm not there for the official Boulder interview weekend (which is probably true).... I think this is the option most of you have been advocating.
I'm going to have to think about this.
The "full experience" of interview weekend is not all that spectacular. I mean it's nice to get to know lots of people in the department and see if you are a good fit socially, however, you also have to spend all day with people you just met in what is kind of a marathon interview. I think your relationships and reputation mean a lot in this field and the last thing you want to do is start off your career by going back on your word with something. Also, keep in mind that if you pass up on WUStL, you may alienate them, AND you still might not get into Boulder. You could potentially shoot yourself in the foot by switching to Boulder, however, what you could potentially gain from being in Colorado on the exact interview day may not be much. I STRONGLY recommend you stick with WUStL, and tell Boulder that while they are your first choice, you simply couldn't go back on your word, however you are really looking forward to visiting and appreciate that they are flexible with your visit date. That is just my opinion though, and I am only one person.
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Get in touch with professors whom you used to work with and ask if they have any suggestions and/or contacts. I got my current paid RA positions that way.
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Just called WUSTL psych and apparently they are in the process of sending out interview invites (for the social program).
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To whomever received the interview at Stanford for social psych, would you mind sharing who your POI is? Feel free to PM me if you'd like. And congratulations!
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i think stanford and harvard have already finished sending out social psych interviews invitations
i heard some student from stanford say there'll be some "action' from wed-fri this wk. today i saw what the latest poster on stanford psychology said and figured so that "action" probably = sending out invitations
harvard started sending theirs from 1st - 3rd wk of jan. it's the end of the 3rd wk now so i, for one, am giving up hope now that i haven't heard back from them.
if there's someone here who actually received those interviews, congrats!! and do you mind sharing a bit about your portfolio?
I don't think Stanford has sent out their social invites actually. I saw that post from the Stanford person about invites going out on Wednesday or Thursday, but did you notice that that is the day all of these cognitive people posted interview invites for Stanford? AND an actual grad student at Stanford in the social program said that they were just getting to reviewing the applications this week. So I wouldn't give up on Stanford just yet.
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To the person who got the interview invite at Virginia--was it a phone interview or an in-person interview? And if it is the latter, can you please share what the interview date is? Thank you and congratulations!
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Hey folks,
Anyone else disappointed at the incongruity between good correspondence with POIs and lack of interviews? I honestly thought POIs were interested in my application--they encouraged me to apply and recognized my fit with their research program--but I haven't heard back from these schools and am losing hope.
Even if I was a great fit, did I simply fail to meet the admissions standards (combination of GPA, GRE, research experience, etc.) of these programs?
Given that programs reject 90% or more applicants, chances are there are a lot of people who believe they are excellent fits but nevertheless didn't receive even an interview. Join the club!
Most of the really top programs have a 3 or 4% acceptance rate, so it becomes an issue of whether you are the top 1 or 2 people for your POI, not just do you have a great application. If you have a fantastic application then it's not terribly hard to be in the top 10%, but it's a whole other ballgame when you are talking about needing to be the best or second best person who applied to work with a particular prof. In addition to that, there has to be funding available for you, which can be dictated by so many different factors and has been a particularly pressing issue the past few years. But like someone already said, most programs still haven't notified people, so don't get too discouraged just yet.
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Does anyone know if the Cognition and Perception interviews are held along with the Social Psych interviews?
The C&P people at NYU conduct a separate interview process from those in Social. And this is typical of most psych departments.
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To the person who posted the UNC invite, could you please let me know who your POI is? Feel free to PM me if you feel more comfortable with that. Thanks!
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Hey.. I've applied to the management programs as well.. Haven't heard back from any of the 8 schools I applied to!
I also wanted to ask you if you received a confirmation email from Columbia? I received a confirmation email (one that confirms your application has been "submitted" and then one that confirms it has been "received") from every other school except Columbia. It does say "Application Submitted" when I log in though.
Thanks and all the best!
I did receive a confirmation email from Columbia, however, if it says online that your application was submitted, then I wouldn't worry about it. If you want to double check though, I would just call up the administrative assistant for the management program (or the entire doctoral program), explain your issue, and ask for him/her to confirm that your application was submitted.
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Overall, it seems like you had a good conversation and that just by having the conversation at all means you are on a short list. But she probably called 5 other people and is narrowing it down to 2-4. If you have a shot at a particular fellowship, then you have a leg up on everyone else and will probably get an interview regardless of how the other phone calls go. I know of someone who got into a top 10 program last year without any research experience because she qualified for a fellowship. So it definitely helps.
Best of luck!
Oops, my replied are inserted between your comments (in the green).
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I've had two phone interviews thus far, and I'd like to know what everyone thinks are 'signs' an interview went well.
How should I interpret the following (which was said during a recent interview)?
"I think you'd make an excellent candidate for such and such university fellowship which will guarantee you full funding for three years..."
You're probably one of the top 5 people that prof is considering, but also may have some particular thing about you or your work (i.e., you are a minority, have a particular past experience that makes the department look good, or are interested in working on something that usually garners special funding--e.g., mental health research) that makes you eligible for a particular fellowship. If that is the case then you have a better shot at getting in than the other top candidates because most likely not all of the other people at the top of his or her list qualify for the fellowship.
"If you come to xyz school, I would like you to work with me on abc project..." at which point, POI goes on to describe project at length.
This prof clearly has an agenda and is more interested in finding a capable grad student who can help him/her carry it out rather than someone who will be working on mostly their own stuff. I don't think that means you won't get to do any of your own research, but you would probably be heavily involved in her work.
BUT THEN...goes on to say...
"You know, I can't really guarantee whether you are in or not. Professors send their recommendations out to the grad division, and then grad division makes the final decision. Although, 90% of the time, the people we recommend get in..."
The key thing here is that she didn't say "I AM RECOMMENDING YOU", she said those that get recommended usually get in. So i'm not sure if you can deduce anything from this just yet. One of the biggest things that seems to be determining offers these days is funding, and if she has you pegged for a particular fellowship, then that's pretty great.
Also, I didn't get a definite timeline of when I'd be hearing back for a formal interview. More of a "in a few weeks..." response.
Should I even bother to interpret these tidbits?
Thanks so much in advance. I know I'm paranoid
Also, as a side note, anyone heard back from UCSB yet? Or Stanford?
Overall, it seems like you had a good conversation and that just by having the conversation at all means you are on a short list. But she probably called 5 other people and is narrowing it down to 2-4. If you have a shot at a particular fellowship, then you have a leg up on everyone else and will probably get an interview regardless of how the other phone calls go. I know of someone who got into a top 10 program last year without any research experience because she qualified for a fellowship. So it definitely helps.
Best of luck!
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Hi guys,
I couldn't find a thread for management/OB phd programs so I thought I would start one. I applied to a handful of social psych programs as well as a handful of management/OB programs and I was just wondering if anyone else on this site applied to management or organizational behavior programs in business schools. Also, do you happen to know when interview invites are sent out or any other insider information? The business programs I applied to are as follows:
Columbia
Harvard
Stanford
Stern
WashU
Wharton
Best of luck everyone!
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Thanks for the replies. Although I'm interested in social, some of the research I'm interested in is being done in clinical, and I've been told by an advisor that a masters can be harmful for an applicant specifically in clinical programs. Does anybody know if this is true? Also, any advice on whether to pursue the field that you're generally interested in or to go into a field that happens to have some specific research interests even if i'm not interested in clinical in general?
Having a masters can be seen as harmful in top social programs as well. Generally speaking masters aren't considered research degrees, and thus, they don't really help you out in the application process. In other words, you don't get bonus points for having a masters. The only way a masters helps you in social is if you had bad grades in undergrad, but stellar in your masters program (so it helps make up for your mediocre undergrad GPA), you are now affiliated with another top university (for example, if you went to Berkeley for undergrad and then got a masters at Harvard, then you are now affiliated with two top schools, not just one), you somehow get additional research experience in your masters program, or you get great recommendations from profs in your masters program. But even the last three can be acquired by having a full-time (or even part-time) research job. My opinion is just one of many (and thus, take it with a grain of salt), but I've worked at labs at four top-10 social psych programs, and all of my advisers have told me not to go into a masters program, unless it's a statistical/methods based one. And even then, it may not help you much.
As for going into clinical or social, I would go for social, but apply to schools that also have a clinical program. Then you can collaborate with clinical people but still stay in the overall discipline that you are probably supposed to be in. Also, keep in mind that clinical is MUCH harder to get into. I mean all psych programs are hard, but clinical is the hardest with the lowest acceptance rates of all the major disciplines (i.e., cognitive, social, developmental, etc.).
Good luck!
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On 12/19/2010 at 4:37 PM, isapr5 said:
Among the more popular programs I'm applying to are Princeton, Stanford, Yale, Harvard, Penn State, Northwestern, Columbia, and WUSTL. Anyone know how whether these programs interview people?
All the best, and may your hard work pay off!
The best of the best (i.e., Michigan, Harvard, Stanford, WUSTL) sometimes don't interview. Columbia interviews, and has sent out invitations already. I don't believe WUSTL interviews, but another person on this forum said they do. Yale definitely interviews. I'm not sure about the others. Best of luck!
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Does anyone happen to know if UVA interviews applicants to its social psychology PhD program? I searched the results postings from previous years and didn't see anyone mention a UVA interview, but then there aren't too many postings from UVA social psych applicants to begin with. I can't tell whether that means they don't interview, or just that no one posted about their interview at UVA.
Also, congrats to whoever got the UCLA social psych interview! Good luck! =)
Yes, Virginia interviews.
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Stanford, Princeton, and Columbia all interview; I am not sure about the others.
You yourself linked to the results database, I believe. Isn't the info in there?
I thought Stanford admitted without an interview. I used to work there and that was their policy then, but maybe it has changed in recent years. Columbia definitely interviews, and has already sent out invites.
Social Psychology Application Thread 2010-2011
in Psychology Forum
Posted
To the people who got the invites at Stanford (affective sciences) and Berkeley (social) can you please PM me with your POI? Thanks and congrats!