ritapita

I was a planner in Olympia. I miss it up there. Good luck with UW, keep us posted. I agree that we seem to have overlap for sure. I applied to 2 Geography programs - U Kentucky and Kansas State, as well as the CSUS program at Michigan State. I am implied and pending funding at Michigan, and in with funding (9 mo stipend via TA and tuition waiver for 3yrs) at Kansas. No notice either way at Kentucky. I was super clear about POIs in each of my apps. Because I am so specific in my work and few programs can support it, I only applied to 3. Now I wish I had pushed my boundaries a bit more and applied to a couple more, but I am still satisfied with what I submitted to.

Lauren - where all did you apply besides UW? My research will shift slightly based upon where I go, and therefore my statement did as well, but the statement in my SOP that I REALLY want to focus on was this: "... further develop work considering the cultural implications of policy actions surrounding natural resource acquisition, eminent domain, and market economies in remote agrarian communities. I expect to draw upon such theoretical concepts as post-Foucauldian biopolitcs, neo-colonialism, and the phenomenology of dwelling. Underlying themes of human-animal relationships, indigeneity, race, and gender are equally important in contextualizing such work...." etc etc.

Apparently Manhattan KS is not the talk of the town. I am seriously looking at feedback for others experiences here. I am an outdoorsy person...hiking, etc. I also can't live in an apartment (dog, and lots of stuff), and when I do searches for housing it seems awfully pricey...more than I expected. I just need a small house with a yard and garage and those are running about the entire cost of my proposed monthly stipend. Crazy. Any insight would be great. I am looking at doing 4 years max here...in and out with my phd...IF i accept my offer.

Ellis - did you get accepted to ASU? I am there now so if you need any info, let me know. I know that Kentucky has been closed since last week due to weather so anything that would have come out this week will most likely be a week or so more. Driving me crazy. Has anyone gone to Kansas State? I need some insight. Yes, lets keep this board more active!

They might be still dealing with this issue: http://www.cnn.com/2015/02/18/living/feat-carnegie-mellon-acceptance-letter-mistake/ I would say they are going to need a bit of time to get it all figured out...good luck everyone!

Thanks iphi. I have been going back and forth with early/late thoughts. I wouldn't even consider contacting them if they had a January deadline, but because it was a Dec1 I feel a little better about pondering reaching out. It is also much of a self-select type of program, meaning that applicants need to really fit the super specialized nature of the program, and need to have a designated POI applying for grants, etc on the applicants behalf. They don't do interviews, and my POI has been pushing me to do a visit for quite some time. I have been putting it off since I don't want to go out of pocket for a visit to a department that I am not 100% sure I have been accepted to.

I have a strongly implied acceptance to one of my top choices. The app was due Dec 1 for internal funding sources, and funding must be secured...there are no TAships, as it is strictly research. Had my app in on time, and have been communicating with my POI almost weekly about research, but who is clearly following protocol about not releasing details of admission, but has written proposals for fellowships, etc for me...full hardcore support. I need to ensure I have time to travel to the school to network for funding and am starting to stress about this. I have received other acceptances, so if this program is off the table, I feel I need to know this as soon as possible so I can coordinate travel to the other schools and figure out where I am going. This particular program does not have an online app system that I can check status. At this point, do you think it is out of line to email the grad coordinator to get a better sense of my application status...again, it was due Dec 1. Also, if I do so, any insight on how to approach such an email would be wonderful.

I think you will find that the general, basic funding for most of us is going to be along the lines of a tuition waiver with a 9 month stipend that semi-represents cost of living. Also, not all the people accepted to the same program will get the same funding. The top choices might get some giant fellowship, and the last couple might get super basic TA and tuition waiver....or everyone might get the same package. Some programs and some schools have better stipends. A top tier school doesn't always mean a larger stipend. Some small state schools/programs are rolling in the money and can fund their PhDs really well. Some schools will give you a summer stipend as well. Some schools might give you a fellowship instead of a stipend and that is very dependent upon the program and school and your qualifications. I guess what I am trying to say, is that we could all tell you what we received but it would do you no good at all in helping you figure out what you might receive. We are all super mega individualized in this process.

And then there is this one for ITT Printer Support PhD: Was rejected after a short interview. The interview consisted of many IT related questions that were work place related. Was rejected after I could not properly diagnose a specific problem related to the printer not being plugged in. Also, no funding was available.

All mine have been a one page attached PDF document to an email. States my acceptance, my funding and for how long, when they need an answer by, and who my advisor is.

Definitely ask! After posing my original question, I have seen a lot of stuff on here about people getting partial funding for international airfare. Good luck!

Following this. I would also like some insight from others, as I was offered the same (different field, different school)...3 yrs tuition waiver with TA stipend. Wondering about summer funding as well.

Breaking the bank is really truly only applicable to undergrads for the most part. If you are a field that gets funded at the masters level, then it won't matter where you go. If you qualify for federal financial aid loans, or are willing/able to do private student loans for grad work, then it also doesn't matter where you go. Some PhD programs will also take students directly from undergrad, but don't count on this as the norm. Most grad programs will have some scholarships, grants and fellowships to apply to at the masters level so the more qualified you are in your application, you might actually get full funding at that level. I guess my point is to not discount any school regardless of where they are at, because there is usually some way to fund it...just depends on whether you need to pay it back or not. It is more important to go where you are a good fit, and where you will be best served for your area of focus...especially if you want to be a professor or researcher. Different schools provide different outcomes....for instance, some are better if you want to go into the corporate sector. You will need to find out which ones are which. But if you are wanting to go beyond a masters to a phd, than my guess is you are more interested in research or teaching and you will need to ensure you go to a school that prepares their PhDs to go into academia and research. I think your performance in undergrad is much more of a determinate for grad school than where you go. We generally have less flexibility as to our choices in undergrad institutions, so it matters a bit, but not something you should really stress about. If you are at a lower ranked program, and you can't help that, just make sure you are a very high performer. If you are concerned that your school is mediocre, ensure that you make up for that a bit with getting good internships and other experience to beef up your application. Also, pull up the CVs of your area professors, and see what their backgrounds are. Get a feel for their reputations in academia - but without weirdly stalking them - and try to work with the ones that are more active in your field or have better reputations. Also see where they did their grad work. I bet some of them did their masters or PhD work at one of your Michigan choices. This could help when it comes time for letters of reference. They also would be good to discuss other potential graduate programs that are out there - see where they are alums. You might find other schools of interest this way. Chances are that some of your 100 and 200 level classes might also be taught by Michigan PhD students finishing up their dissertations. They would be really good for you to talk to about grad programs, because they are still in them. Also, as you move through your undergrad, consider unique options to your field..for instance there is economic geography, economic anthropology, law, etc etc... Stay open minded. I know I changed directions a few times in my undergrad...not drastically, but enough to make a difference in the long run. I started in journalism with a focus on environmental foreign policy issues, which morphed into foreign policy focused on water rights, which morphed into geography and environmental science focused on watershed regulation and mitigation. My grad work now is even more specialized. It all ties together and makes sense that I did this, but these slight shifts re-centered my grad work drastically as I am now technically a geographer dealing with land use and agriculture, when I started out a journalist dealing with foreign policy. I still use all that stuff I did before, but in a much different way. This happens for some people but not for others. You will be learning learning learning and you might change some things along the way and that is totally okay. It is easier if you are open to it and let it happen without feeling guilty about doing so. After all, you are preparing yourself to do something probably for the rest of your life, so ensure you are happy with it. I think there is a lot of benefit to starting in mid to late 20's. You will be about 30 when you hit your masters, and you have some real world experience under your belt, which helps greatly. I think the biggest disconnect you will find, will be in the social aspect of college. Many of your fellow freshmen will be 18-20ish, although there are more and more people going to school that are a bit older than that. You will find you are not going to be worrying about frats and partying and angsty new college dating drama, and being away from home for the first time, etc etc. Not that all freshmen deal with that of course, but the age difference will be noticeable on the social front. You might find yourself a bit invisible from time to time as you aren't really part of that social sphere, but I personally see that as a plus. You have far fewer distractions, and I know I was producing much more work than most of my fellow students. The big difference for me, was that I really felt like I was there for ME and not anyone else. So many of the students around me were consumed by dating, and hangovers, and impressing this person or that person, and really just transitioning to adulthood - with that came a lot of worrisome energy about everyone else around them. You will have a whole lot less of that. Sometimes you will feel 'old' and sometimes you won't...my advice is to stay centered on the fact that you are there for you. When you hit grad school, you will see a lot more people your own age.

I am not attached to the English department, but do a lot of work with them as I do incorporate some DH into my own work. The DGS is on my committee. It is an interesting department, and rather large so there are a lot of things going on. Lots of good interdisciplinary and interdepartmental projects.

Some of your questions are program specific, but to offer some general advice... 1. Do everything you can to maintain a high GPA. This is most important in your subject matter courses, but try to keep everything above a "B". - Don't do many "W" (withdraw) in courses or take incompletes that you cannot finish. - If you need to get help from writing centers, or math tutors, or anything else to help you succeed, do it. - Don't take any superfluous courses. If you need to take electives, try to find some that fit your academic interests. Make each course count. Yoga might be fun, but why spend money on a class that has nothing to do with your end goal.... - When looking for classes beyond your required core coursework, check ALL other departments. You will find some gems in there that you might not expect. Anthro might have a class like 'market economies of pre-colonized indigenous cultures', or gender studies might have something like 'immigrant workers in the meat packing industry'. These are just examples, but as you can see, you can find economic topics in a variety of course settings that will broaden your knowledge base and experience. They may also assist you in determining what capacity you want to function in or what you want to specialize in as you advance through school. 2. Try to get applicable experience through internships, etc. This might be more appropriate in your last couple of years but start researching options and interests for when the time comes. 3. If you know you want to get into certain schools, at the minimum go to that school website and identify what they consider a strong applicant, and model your undergrad experience to fit this. You can even contact the department, and ask them what the profile is for their best applicants...i.e. GRE scores, GPA, work experience, etc. 4. Know what you want to specialize in, and make sure the schools you want to go to can accommodate that specialization in grad work. Again, this will be easier to figure out after you have been in school for a while. If you want to stay in a specific regional area and only apply to specific schools, it is good to remember that you are going to possibly need to be a little flexible in your interests. If those schools that you 'must' apply to don't have faculty that focus on your interests, and you don't have the option to apply elsewhere, it is better to know now so you can tailor your education to that. 5. Begin to build positive relationships early with faculty mentors in your field. Also foster these relationships in your internship settings. You will need strong recommendation letters when you apply to grad school, and many undergrads have a hard time mustering up 3-4 faculty that know them well enough to write them a strong letter. 6. Do some sort of service activities with your university, whether it is volunteering in a certain student center, providing tutoring, departmental assistantships, etc. There are many things you can do, but as a student who also started undergrad at 26, some of the options I found very inapplicable to me on campus. Be creative, and ask your department about things you can do, or faculty that need assistance with projects, etc. 7. Take the GRE without a break from school. You will most likely take the GRE in the summer or fall prior to your graduation. I recommend spending the summer studying, and then taking in the fall with enough time to get your scores where you need to get them. You will apply for grad school somewhere between November and January of your last year in undergrad if you are going to transition to grad school directly after graduation. 8. Make a timeline and course plan for yourself, and keep yourself on schedule. I saw my undergrad much like a checklist. I made my course plan, and as I completed classes I just checked them off the list. It was satisfying, especially when you are getting through general ed stuff. Put stuff on your timeline like internships, GRE prep and test, grad school pre-app visits, etc. Whatever you need..having that plan makes it real, and easy to follow.

Arizona State is doing a lot of interdisciplinary DH work right now, and pushing for more in the future. I recommend you talk to the current DGS for the department at ASU.

if you are like me and prefer to print out your articles rather than read them online, I have those cheap colored file boxes with the labels on the front...one for each course, or paper research, or project etc. When I am done with a course, etc, I keep all the articles, syllabi if there is one, and related notes together its own box. Easy to stack on the bookshelf, colorful addition to the office space, and super easy to find things specific to something. http://www.organizeit.com/colorful-plastic-document-boxes.asp - amazon has them cheap too.

We are on grad cafe to talk with others and ask questions about things we don't know, or are concerned about as we go through the process. Much of this is due to the fact that we want to ensure we approach departments in a proper way. Many of us on here prefer to be as informed as possible before we contact department representatives. GradCafe is often our first stop for clarification...rather than your email inbox. My guess is that many of the applicants feeding you questions or doing things you don't like or approve of, are not GradCafe frequenters. We are here asking questions and researching info to make both our lives AND yours easier. I doubt you would rather field these questions. Most of us are very far from being entitled or helpless. Before making generalized insults, I hope you can somehow remember that you know very little to nothing about why we are here. We are in the middle of a process that keeps a large amount of us functioning around poverty level and highly in debt, with uncertain employment during or after, many of us working outside our programs to support this process, and many of us have families to support as well. You have a job because we want to be grad students. If we are so difficult for you to deal with during your job, why are you on here outside of work? If you are on here because you want to be helpful, I hope you reconsider your current approach.

Thank you for all the 'positive' responses, and as an incoming grad, understanding my concerns. There is a lot to consider when accepting a programs offer, and I know better than to just take things for face value, thus asking for advice from those that have been-there-done-that is super helpful. GradSec - helpful comments and advice are always happily received.

This is exactly my concern. If they only accept a handful of students but are either unable or unwilling to fund a visit of a few hundred dollars, it makes me extremely concerned about how funding and student support will be handled during my time there. I also have a major problem with either side willing to commit to the other site unseen. I will be dependent upon this department to support my research for several years and I will carry this experience through to my future beyond the PhD. I feel uneasy about making a commitment to a program without being able to at least see the facilities or meet the faculty. And if they are willing to commit to me without meeting me first, it makes me feel a bit like a quota. As MathCat mentioned above, yes it is a very minor expense in the long run, but I think the effort of the program in this regard speaks volumes. And no, I am not really in a position to spend several hundred dollars on a ticket, plus hotel fees, plus food for a visit. It might be a great place once I get there, and I might not regret shelling out money I I don't really have, to do a meet and greet before I decide, but it seems a bit one-sided to me. I did indeed apply to the program for a reason. It seems to have a lot to offer. However, now that I am 'in' and logistics such as this are a bit questionable, I feel it is certainly worth potential reconsideration. It is a dealbreaker to me to commit to several years in a program, several years of my life and time, to have a program feel I need to make this massive decision site-unseen.

I have been accepted to a program that I now have reason to believe does not fund visits for accepted students. This program is in one of those cities that regardless of how close you are, it is a pain to fly to because it is not a major hub, and tickets are stupidly expensive because of the location. There is no way I can go out of pocket several hundred dollars to visit a program that I may or may not attend. If it was like a $300 ticket, okay maybe. Honestly, one of the deal breakers for this program will be if they are unwilling to fund a visit for me to decide, especially if they do expect me to accept and I then have to spend at least a couple grand moving there. For me, it makes the statement that their students should want the program more than the program wants the students. I am all for going out of pocket if I chose to visit a program before I apply or before they accept me, and have done so a few times, but if a programs accepts you, isn't it kind of standard protocol for them to host a visit? Am I way off base with this? Recommendations on how I go about tactfully asking for them to fly me out?

Regardless of what offer I end up taking, I will be moving about 3000 miles. I am saving now for the move, but it seriously will wipe me out before I get that first stipend check. Between actual moving expenses such as truck, etc., there of course is the first month+ deposit on a rental, utility hookups, car registration, etc etc. Yes, budget budget budget...but I have just finished 2 masters so I am not exactly rolling in the dough..at all. I know I am not the only one either. Thing is, I have been chatting with friends that are already PhDs, and while none of them actually did this, they have mentioned that others they know were able to negotiate moving expenses from their programs. I had no idea this was even remotely possible! How common is this? Who has had success doing this? If you had success with this, how did you posit the negotiation...? Seems iffy to me, but I am going to seriously approach this if it is at all feasible. help...