was1984

Well, one thing we can judge from it is that they are still giving out acceptances. I was a little worried because so many people have reported acceptances already. I doubt they would ask about your GRE scores if they weren't still doling out acceptances.

I'd say the main reason is lack of access to facilities for olympic lifting. The school I'm at right now definitely doesn't have them, at least for regular students. Also, those lifts definitely require good technique or you can seriously hurt yourself. That scares a lot of people away.

I always assumed it was a corruption of PI, since it usually refers to the person that would have been said student's PI. The first time I saw it I assumed the person made a typo, but then I kept seeing it, and didn't know what it was supposed to mean! Thanks for asking!

I believe most do yes. Also, many states don't allow students to gain residency, so in those states the schools won't expect you to change your residency either.

I'm mostly backcountry skiing and climbing (inside) right now. It certainly does help, especially the climbing.

I would say it is almost universally a good sign if a professor wants to talk to you at this point in the game. They either want to interview you or welcome you to their lab. They aren't going to reject you themselves.

I'll give it a whirl: "Well, his statement of purpose was interesting until he suggested that completely obvious project idea. If that's the best he can come up with, he clearly isn't XXX material." (Since submitting my applications I've thought of numerous far more interesting ideas, of course.) "No publications submitted? What the heck has this guy been doing for the past two years?" (I'm the only one in my advisor's lab right now, so my only publication will be my own original work, which should be submitted in the next few weeks.) "Wow, what happened to this guy his senior year of college? Sure, he has a 4.0 in his M.S. program, but look at his undergraduate grades!" Positive things they might say (in my subfield, at least): "Well, we do need another diversity candidate." (I'm a white male.) "Maybe we should accept one or two domestic students this year."

I don't know the answer to your question, but I do know that many public schools (depending on what state they are in) will request that you attempt to obtain residency in that state as soon as possible. In those cases you definitely would not be able to vote back at home.

Oh I know that's how we do things, and I actually have little difficulty making decisions in general, but it's just the qualitative->quantitative conversion that I've always found difficult. More than anything I'm just intrigued by people who easily make that conversion, which was why I made the comment.

I think in a lot of cases this is true. Be aware that 2 years ago when I applied for my M.S. degree I didn't hear anything from any of my schools until mid-march. You may hear sooner than that, but put yourself in that sort of mindset and the next couple of months will be a lot more pleasant for you.

EE seems to be one of the later areas to receive notification. I'm assuming you're talking about Stanford admitting some students the last couple of days, and this is unusual for them based on previous years. And yes, generally acceptances will come in February while rejections will come in March, for a lot of programs.

This is why I could never be a social scientist. Arbitrarily assigning values to things gives me the heebie-jeebies.

I thought this was interesting and wanted to share it with those of you who are also biding their time. http://www.nsf.gov/statistics/nsf11306/intro.cfm

Wow, I thought I was having a hard time coping with waiting.

I'm pretty sure it's normal to feel like you won't get in anywhere and you submitted the worst application in the history of mankind at this point. At least I hope it is...

I'd suggest you take a class on ethics. Does going back on your word mean that little to you?

Any school that demands an 800 in math is culling out a lot of good candidates. I got a 790 myself and I was perfectly happy with it. I think everyone knows that the difference between a 770 and an 800 is a careless mistake on an early problem.

I have an extremely common first, middle, and last name. My parents' lack of creativity really pays off in this modern era. I can use the internet confident in my complete anonymity, since there are probably 500 people in the U.S. with the exact same (first, middle, and last) names as I have.

Writing my thesis keeps me pretty busy, but I'm also doing a lot of skiing.

I grew up in Texas, and unlike most of you for both my masters and PhD I intentionally applied mostly to schools with either mild or colder weather. I absolutely hate the heat of the summers, and it forced me to rule out several good schools in the south.

I'm not seeking a bioengineering degree, so I can't help you directly, but I will recommend a website: http://graduate-school.phds.org/ This site has some more relevant data than a lot of the other ranking sites out there like average time to a PhD, placement rates, etc. I think you might find what you are looking for there. Of course, graduation time has more to do with your advisor than anything else, so if you want to graduate quickly you should speak with students in the lab of your potential advisor and find out how long they have been there.

You might like some of these: Band of Horses Bon Iver The Decemberists Fleet Foxes The National

The Shins. 'nuff said.

It's not difficult to obtain funding with an M.S. thesis degree program at many schools. You just have to be a little bit proactive. I was able to secure funding for my M.S. degree by talking to a professor I was interested in working with before starting school. As a result I haven't had to pay for any of my M.S. degree. I know a lot of other students who are also funded M.S. students, either as TAs or RAs. Don't listen to people who say funding is difficult/impossible to come by as an M.S. student. Try anyway. To directly address the question asked, I think it's much easier to get into M.Eng. programs, especially at private schools, because these are cash cows for the university. Since you won't be doing any useful research, you aren't likely to receive any funding either. It's always possible you could get a TA position if the department's rules don't explicitly prohibit it, though.

Here's mine: