Kelkel

Dammit. I've been anxious about the mail all day. I had a feeling. When it wasn't there at lunch, I remained anxious. Normally it comes around 11, but it JUST now arrived -- at 6pm. Lo and behold, there IS a letter for me from a grad school... one I've already been admitted too. Standard "hooray for the acceptance" letter and nothing like "oh yeah, here's all the money we want to give you." There is a sticker for my car though. A tad presumptious, I'd say .

Oh that's hilarious!

I want to make clear that in my post, she requested that my mom (a woman outside academia) title her as Mrs. When I said needless formality, I was refering more towards titling them Dr. over Prof. But yes, I agree the sexism is rampant in the South and it is damage. In notification news, if anyone is waiting for results from a school in Louisiana (LSU or Tulane), don't expect anything this week. Today is a (world's better) holiday for us and it's common for schools to take off most if not the whole week. HAPPY MARDI GRAS! Go eat your little hearts out before that 40 day fast.

I think that it's much more common for people to formally refer to men as their official title regardless, and leave the woman as a Mrs./Ms. I've grown up in the South and it's definitely prevalent (also prevalent: Mrs. Man's Full name... I think that's fine being called that immediately after the wedding ceremony, but not years later). My mom was addressing a sympathy card to a professor and husband, and asked what she should address it as. I told her Dr. and Mr. He's an engineer so she joked that she should write Engr. The professor (same lady-professor as before actually) later said she could have been addressed as Mrs. But the South (in my experience) is all about needless formality.

I think there's been a lot of great advice given out already, so I'll go with "do what you feel comfortable with." Sure, explicit directions are nice, but if you feel comfortable calling them by their first name and they've been addressing themselves as such -- why not! At my UG, we just addressed everyone by their last names. Sure, the older professors we'd tack on the Dr. because they were (literally) old school. Most of the professors had distinctive last names that just felt right. We had the kind of culture of a grad school (students and professors knew each other very well), but we were still STUDENTS. A bunch of seniors gathered outside the offices of two professors in our departments about a week before we graduated. We were having fun and being obnoxiously loud and we got onto the first name discussion. The two professors came back from lunch right around this time. The lady-professor told us we were allowed to call her by her first name AFTER we graduated, but not before. Much to both's dismay, we then had a good time of calling them both by their first names until class/test started (I think it was finals week). In the end, we all agreed calling the lady-professor by her first name was okay, but the guy-professor just has a cool last name and we couldn't imagine calling him by his first. Now the lady-professor gets mad if we DON'T call her by her first name.

Yes SL, that did answer my question fabulously! You are a great wealth of knowledge!

I know! I had a moment of super positivity last week about BC, but it's worn off slightly. I've come to peace with my MA options (and looking forward to another possible option besides an unfunded BC one). It's all good knowing this round is definitely ending better than last year !

Thanks! I think it'll probably be a "rejected, but here pay us for a masters" kind of thing. I'm guessing email, right?

Oh no! Someone just posted an acceptance for Hogwarts! Sorry goldie, I guess that makes your decision easier.

I like this thread. It's a good thread. So lets say I'm getting my MA and do all the wonderful stuff outlined above. And then I go into a wonder PhD program. It seems pretty standard that the course credits will not transfer. So while StrangeLight got an MA along the way, I assume I would take all the courses (or different ones) again and do research to start/further my dissertation? They wouldn't have someone with a completed MA thesis do another one right? (Unless you change fields like some people have discussed).

Like I haven't been doing that already.... I work better in absolutes though. I think I'm just going through anxiety of getting most of my decisions in one week and then having to wait for two(ish) more programs, which I know aren't coming until MARCH. Soooo frustrating. I don't want to start trolling Craigslist for a place that I don't know if I'll get it!

Well damn, if we didn't have enough proof that Safferz is amazing, she was the only Africanist accepted to Princeton! In other news, today has been so boring. I want this whole process to be done with as soon as possible so I can start obsessing about housing and stuff like that!

I think we all can forgive you. This once.

YAY CONGRATS! SEE NO MORE MOPEY SANDY!

Yes I did! I'm not confident in an acceptance at all, but it's my last PhD hope so I can pretend!

Yay that's so great!!! Let us know when you do hear from the department!

So who's claiming Boston College acceptance? I got nothing in the mail today (except a credit card app). I'm not expecting to get in, but at least decisions are being made!

Well, there's another Washington post on the board, so maybe results are coming for you guys.

Hahah I agree with Ganymede18. It's been over a week and nothing for me. I know it'll be probably two to three more weeks before I get any news at all. That KILLS me. Seriously. I want to know now now now!!!

How are YOU not qualified? You've had good success this cycle! I don't want to hear it! Although I would like to see the discussion of this question. I was thinking about other topics I could see myself researching (withing my pre-existing regional and thematic interests though). I know if I go for an MA first I can thoroughly explore these different topics. But I would like to hear about how people's work has changed over the course of an PhD.

yay! But what kind of encouraging news exactly? Straight admit? Waitlist? Masters? Tell ussss!

I agree! Guys, I'm so excited and ready to get back to studying and having that pressure on me. It's weird. That's why I want to get through Feb to March because now I just really want to put pen to paper and say, "Yes I'm going to _______."

Ooohhh Aedes, you are amazing. Those graphs are purdy. I would love to be able to work in quant stuff eventually. Minoring in polisci made me appreciate all those methods and stuff. And it was badass to be the only one in my Political Analysis to get an A, when I was the only non-major.

So after an hour and ten minutes my computer finally finished logging in. Luckily, my internet is working today (not the server though, so all the lovely files I need to work on are inaccessible). This place does seem kinda dead though. I wish it was March already!

So it seems like our computer system is still down at work (we have an idiotic IT guy). I'm teetering between enjoying the day again, needing to do some work, or wanting to be sent home (our boss would definitely do that). I hope you Rutgers people here good news today!!