Radian

Congrats to everyone who heard from Cornell. 
 
Not many early acceptances this year...still waiting on NW and MIT. The days are going by so slowly...it's killing me! 

Wow seems like a good bit of people had bad experiences with phone interviews this admissions season.
 
I had two today, one with UT Austin and the other with Michigan. I wasn't grilled with any technical questions; in fact the only question I was asked was to describe one of my research projects. Then they told me about their research, the school, asked about my mathematical background/experience, my interests, etc. Everything was lighthearted, calm and respectable, and I never once felt like I was in the middle of an interview. One of the Professor's spent about 40 consecutive minutes talking about his research and problems he's interested in.
 
Both of them were pretty young (Ph.D. within the last 10 years), which probably had something to do with it.

 

@tarrman - Addition to Columbia, I also had interview from UCSD, Stan, UCB and UCLA. All of them were really good and were asking me details about the research I did ... with Columbia it was different ball game !!!
the Prof got into exam questions and was a pain in the butt to tackle ... it was really quite annoying ... 
 
any ways, i received an email from LA that they have started reviewing applications. Hope the results will be out soon!!

Cornell has started sending out MSE admits.

I just had a first phone call with my POI. In the email, he said he would call me to answer my questions. I was like "sure." And I prepared quite a few questions.
 
Then today, he called and bombed me with his questions immediately. It was really tough. There were some details about my research from two years ago that I really could not recall. He kept digging, and when he heard about the research I did this summer, he even asked why my adviser would start a project like that (He seemed to find this research pointless). I totally stuttered. How the hell should I know? My adviser said it was an interesting project and I found it interesting too, so I took it. How am I supposed to know why my adviser found this project interesting? In the end, he only gave me a few minutes to answer my question and he kind of lost patience when he found out I prepared more questions than he expected.
 
@Radian, your comments about the professors are probably right.

This Monday ? Maybe the DAY ! 

Should I get an acceptance tomorrow, I will be the most relaxed human on the face of the planet.

It's totally rational to think that decision emails will come in at 11 pm on a Sunday, right? RIGHT?

Seriously! When I started the application process for my PhD, I re-read the SOP I wrote for my MA apps. I was shocked I got in anywhere. Definitely not looking at any of the PhD SOPs any time soon... Thanks, RubyBright; that's what I figured. Also, I agree, girl who wears glasses. All weekend I couldn't wait for Monday and now I'm dreading a week full of trying to focus on work (and not my personal e-mail, grad cafe, etc). I really wish my dream school wasn't the first program I'm expecting to hear from!

Checking the result page for the 1000+1 time. Have no idea if that's due to forgetting ( I really don't remember the dates) or I just get stressed and wanna soothe myself by seeing that I still have time 
 
Meanwhile trying to write a Thesis !

Checking the result page for the 1000+1 time. Have no idea if that's due to forgetting ( I really don't remember the dates) or I just get stressed and wanna soothe myself by seeing that I still have time 
 
Meanwhile trying to write a Thesis !

ASU is also sending out admissions. I received my email from them today.

Check your emails folks: as confirmed above, a veritable bounty of admission letters went out it seems.
 
Also, listen to this song -- I received an acceptance about 2 minutes into it
 

Yea Stanford's MSE admits is up to 6 it seems. Anybody visiting 2/14? And anyone get funding info from them?

Thanks for the useful info! helps so much
All I need to do now is just waiting I guess, arghh
 
Anyways, good luck to you!

They are investing lots of resources in Solar Cell and have really cool facilities (mainly the EE department) called the QESST project ~ 35 Million $
 
city is pretty awesome and hot ! both in weather and other stuff
 
Job Market ... Hmmm ... I haven't heard anything bad. two labmates both are in intel now.
 
Program, in terms of courses and stuff : HUGH ! ... but you can take many courses from outside MSE, like the EE program which is literally FANTASTICCCCC ! I haven't really seen any other school with such wonderful courses in semiconductors and devices as the EE department here.

I was more speechless when I got mine lol...

Thanks! I'm really excited, I just keep reminding myself that it's not official until I get THE LETTER.
 
...I did allow myself to do the happy dance, though
 

This is exactly what I'm going through!  I keep telling myself not to get my hopes up too high...but my heart/gut is so optimistic, giving me visions and dreams (another one about Berkeley last night) of acceptance letters.  My mood changes from minute to minute these days.  Rating an 8/10 on my personal stress-o-meter.

Well for the past 2 years, the results on this website indicate that they send out acceptances on Feb 7th - Feb 9th. It doesn't look like there have been many interviews in the past either, so I'd assume that they've made initial selections and are interviewing the people who are on the edge of the cutoff right now, after which time the committee will review whether they have made the right decisions and then send out letters. That's just my take though.

Very few schools have made engineering/CS decisions as of yet, so I think it's the norm to not have heard anything back from any schools at this point if you applied to those fields. Usually early acceptances are given to superstars or people that look good enough but will not be offered funding. I got accepted to Georgia tech for a Ph.D 10 days after sending in my application, but I'm pretty sure I was only accepted that early because they didn't have funding for people applying to robotics programs, and that I would need to find an adviser to get myself an RA or TA position - hence the easy decision to admit me early.

Long story short: don't stress now. Wait until Feb 10th-15th. If nothing comes in the mail and you haven't gotten a call or email then start stressing

I felt like I had made a mistake by not contacting professors, but I hinted strongly in my SOP who I was interested in working with (by talking about the fields, e.g. plasmonics or low-dimensional electronic systems or whatever). So far seems to be working in my favor, got an email yesterday from an Applied Phys. professor whose lab was my top choice at the school. 
 
still..I guess now I'll never know if I could have prevented any rejections I might get. I think some schools, especially ones with larger departments like UIUC, are less likely to look for fit as they are to care about credentials, but other schools require that you basically be chosen by a professor.

Of course. Go ahead and do it. Even if no one response and you get in, you can refer to the email saying you were intereseted in their work from the begining.

For those of you who are considering Caltech Chemical Engineering for the upcoming year, I wanted to share my story with you. Please note that I'm not here to persuade your perspective of Caltech one way other the other - but simply to share facts about the chemical engineering department that I wish I had known before coming here.
 
I chose to attend Caltech above many other top tier schools for reasons not particularly relevant to this post. (I'd be more than willing to discuss that at a later time if anyone would like.) Overall I would say that Caltech is a fantastic graduate school. Everyone here is truly dedicated to research and learning at an extremely fundamental level. And I find myself extremely privileged to be able to attend this university. But frankly, thats where the feel goods end. 
 
In order to compete more seriously with MIT, Caltech has been looking to expand the number of graduate students per class (historically around 10) in recent years. They truly achieved their goal this year, with my class starting off with 22 students - admittedly a little larger than the department would have liked. Knowing the size of our class was quite large, a number of my class mates became extremely concerned that the qualifying examinations (equivalent to prelims at other universities) would be used to weed out people. Having been called to a special meeting with the head of the department, we were each all completely assured that the quals would be on par with other years tests. Sparring the nitty gritty details, the quals were far from equivalent to other years tests - in fact my advisor said they were the hardest (across all three subjects) that he had seen in his entire time in the department.
 
Three weeks ago my class consisted of 22 people. Now it is 17. 4 people (two women and two males of international descent) were asked to leave the PhD program for the MS program - two of them without actually failing the exams, they were just asked to leave for no particularly discernible reason. Another class mate left the department for the Bio E program. Now there are rumblings that the provost might be filing a lawsuit against our department, citing an infringement of Title 9.
 
Needless to say, I am beyond frustrated with this department. While I do not regret my decision to come to Caltech as I love my advisor, and my research project (reasons one should choose a graduate program). My fellow classmates are also some of the most loyal, intelligent and interesting people I have ever met. However, collectively, I think that the department has a "they're just a disposable grad student" type of mentality. That we're just an added cost to the department. I truly believe that the department had every intention of using the qualifying exams to cut a number of students from the program, and for this, I have little faith that the department won't continue to do so in the future.
 
I find it dispicable that those in charge of the department would use such horrific means to simply to balance their budget with such a reckless regard for young individuals lives. Especially after explicitly telling us they would not do such a thing. As I'm sure you all know, applying to, getting into, and ultimately being in graduate school is an extremely emotional (and expensive) process. To end the PhD careers of so many people (with a letter delivered to our mail boxes at 6pm on a Friday night, after the department was closed, without any prior warning and discussions for those who were pushed into the MS program) for their inability to answer 6 questions is an absolutely asinine, and frankly, completely unprofessional and unreasonable system.  Frankly, I am glad to hear that the provost has got wind of the situation. As I am afraid that without proper oversight, the department could spin further out of control.
 
Anyways, I could continue this rant for many more paragraphs. But with that, I will stop. I hope that those of your who are considering the Caltech Chemical Engineering program will find this informative and useful.
 
 

I was accepted to UCSB in the first round of admissions on Jan 9th which is great, because they are my first choice. I still havent heard from UIUC, Northwestern, UC Berkeley, and ASU. It doesnt matter too much. Ill probably commit to UCSB as soon as I see a legit funding offer other than their general "Nearly 100% are covered."

UCSB sent an email yesterday asking to register for their recruitment weekend by Jan 21 with faculty preferences so they can setup interviews. But recruitment weekend isn't until Feb 28 - March 2, so after Jan 21, I think they could still inform some people in the next few weeks. I don't think it'll take that much time to organize interviews...