Kriegsspiele

Awards seem to be interpreted as a quantitative measurement/confirmation of your abilities, and therefore they tend to bring about more awards. Yet, had you not got these honors, chances are your achievements would have been the same. Hence, a person should really be judged by their achievements and not the bullet list in their Awards section of their CV. Unfortunately it's often too difficult to measure the value of these achievements, and the awards serve this purpose. But what is it that you want out of your career? You don't need to be honored to be successful. If you produce good results, and work your ass off, good things tend to happen regardless of whether your're formally recognized for your work.

No.

This is a good point. I've also heard you shouldn't try to tailor your proposal to the goals of the DoD, you should write it like any other research proposal. If your research really does contribute to the goals of the DoD, then include it, but too much emphasis would probably be transparent. I hear they're more interested in investing in smart scientists and engineers that could contribute to their country down the road rather than expecting great things from your PhD work...

I found this video while working with some geoscientists as an undergrad and asked them about it. The earth has definitely not expanded to an extant illustrated in the video. Cool concept, pretty pictures, but nothing more.

Eh. If it really was GPA and GRE scores that made the difference, you don't want such an "honor" anyways. In reality though, it's probably a lot of other things, especially for the first and second year graduates. The best any of us can really do is speculate. I'll accept the NSF GRFP. For those of you applying next year, good luck. Congrats to the winners from this year!

Mass rejection.

Balls. Anyone have a good theory on what the hell they are doing? I'm completely dumbfounded, someone seriously dropped the ball on this one and they're scrambling to make up for the lost time...

Ridiculous. Speaking of not having money, I better file my taxes...

Is this really the determining factor for NDSEG ? If so, someone needs a kick in the nuts.

Yes. I expect a rejection e-mail in the next 30 minutes.

I think I had had an orgasm.

It's impossible to say, really. I don't really understand their criteria as well as I understand the NSF GRFP criteria. Your undergrad experience is very similar to mine, and I also was a goldwater recipient, yet I was rejected for the NDSEG in my first year of graduate studies, and will likely be again this year. If you're in a field like Aerospace Engineering or Electrical engineering, you got a decent chance at the NDSEG, otherwise, the competition is very stiff and it probably comes down to splitting hairs. You still have two more years to apply though, so no matter what the result this time around, keep up the hard work.

I have a feeling we will know by today, rejection e-mails will probably be sent out as a mass e-mail towards the end of the day.

Seriously.. trickle here, trickle there, just open the damn floodgates already.

Now that was funny!