DustSNK

Got my first acceptance today!!!!!!!!! Proud to report, with a lil hard work, you can get over having a 2.7 uGPA!!!!!! I went back to uni and took a semester of ug and grad courses, got an 4.0 GPA there so that was factored into my 2.7 gpa. Did lots of graduate lv research, and improved as a student. I will say if things don't go your way the 1st time around, GO BACK to school and take some non-degree grad courses. Worked for me I feel.

Got my first acceptance today!!!!!!!!! Proud to report, with a lil hard work, you can get over having a 2.7 uGPA!!!!!! I went back to uni and took a semester of ug and grad courses, got an 4.0 GPA there so that was factored into my 2.7 gpa. Did lots of graduate lv research, and improved as a student. I will say if things don't go your way the 1st time around, GO BACK to school and take some non-degree grad courses. Worked for me I feel.

Got my first acceptance today!!!!!!!!! Proud to report, with a lil hard work, you can get over having a 2.7 uGPA!!!!!! I went back to uni and took a semester of ug and grad courses, got an 4.0 GPA there so that was factored into my 2.7 gpa. Did lots of graduate lv research, and improved as a student. I will say if things don't go your way the 1st time around, GO BACK to school and take some non-degree grad courses. Worked for me I feel.

Care to talk about your experience getting into a Masters program with the uGPA that you had? I hear it is more forgiving on admissions.

Got my first acceptance today!!!!!!!!! Proud to report, with a lil hard work, you can get over having a 2.7 uGPA!!!!!! I went back to uni and took a semester of ug and grad courses, got an 4.0 GPA there so that was factored into my 2.7 gpa. Did lots of graduate lv research, and improved as a student. I will say if things don't go your way the 1st time around, GO BACK to school and take some non-degree grad courses. Worked for me I feel.

Got my first acceptance today!!!!!!!!! Proud to report, with a lil hard work, you can get over having a 2.7 uGPA!!!!!! I went back to uni and took a semester of ug and grad courses, got an 4.0 GPA there so that was factored into my 2.7 gpa. Did lots of graduate lv research, and improved as a student. I will say if things don't go your way the 1st time around, GO BACK to school and take some non-degree grad courses. Worked for me I feel.

A pure Ed degree is a route lots of high school/ middle school teachers take. In NY, normally you get your job (if you are lucky) and have a few years to get your MA. You can get your PhD after on your own dime, and I have a close friend who is doing this (Got MA, then job, now working towards PhD in Ed) and he tells me the average increase in pay from MA to PhD is 7000$ a year. Now if you want to teach in a Uni, you have A LOT to consider. Ed departments on average are disgustingly small at uni. It will be very difficult to find work. More so, and interdisciplinary degree is usually cautioned against if you want to teach at uni, because it is hard to find work (again small departments, and most of the time the interdisciplinary dept is just a structure made up of the pure discipline professors like a Social Science or Urban Studies dept will staff Sociologist,psychologist,geographers, so on). Keeping that in mind, getting an interdisciplinary ed degree will put you in SUCH a small small small niche I would say you are going to have the most difficult time finding work. The degrees are good, you have to be intelligent and a scholar to get them and that is for sure, but you got to know lots of uni's make these degrees to draw in people who want a higher degree.... it is most often than not a way for the uni to make money. Read up on it, it has been a very popular topic in the past decade that of universities making programs that really don't translate into any work. NOW I am not saying this all to discourage you, just you should know what you have in front of you in order to deal with the decisions. Personally I would stay with a pure PhD in Ed if you want to teach in HS/MS, and if you want to do non teaching work, an Urban or Soc ed degree is very attractive to government and business.

Care to talk about your experience getting into a Masters program with the uGPA that you had? I hear it is more forgiving on admissions.

Lol York is a publicly funded school, so their matrix of funding can change from year to year. Also they could have had international students who postponed admission. Trust me, I was denied across the board last year when I applied to programs only in Ontario, and I did my research to understand why..... being an international student is crazy silly competitive. If you really think there is Xenophobia you might have never been to Ontario I am guessing? In Ontario there are only 30% whites, you might get to say that about America cause people are VERY xenophobic (I'm American, trust me people are nuts esp in the midwest). Talk a walk down one of the parks in Mississauga and see TONS of Muslim women in the more conservitave burkas (where only eyes are shown) playing with their kids and family next to asian,white,and indian families and tell me the place is xenophobic again. I have never seen that kind of social setting happen in America,europe or Asia.

Lol there is no Xenophobia! Almost all departments can only accept max 2 international students. Reason being is that they have a limited amount of funding and when you are accepted they give you a special international scholarship to offset the high tuition. I'm an international student, and have spoke to several departments in Ontario. Lesson learned: If they can't give funding they don't like to accept students without it. Problem for international students is that this semi creates a special pool of applicants fighting over 2 spots, not say 10-15 spots. VERY competitive. I've been accepted into 2 programs and the international scholar ship they offer is a lot of $ so I understand why they have to limit their intake.

Your overall point is a valid one - the pleas from the wait-listed people annoy me sometimes too - but the way you put it is really jerkish. Grad admissions decisions aren't some straight ranking of merit where all of the people who get accepted are "better" than the people who were waitlisted. They're influenced by things like whether your particular advisors of interest know that they're going to have enough funding to bring on a new grad student (or for that matter, how much influence your particular advisors of interest have on the admissions committee). Or the random chance of who on the admissions committee happened to be the one to do the initial read of your app. I'm not trying to claim that merit plays little or no role in admissions decisions - obviously it plays a very large role - just that it's less straightforward than you seem to think.

I got accepted to multiple good programs in my field, and was not waitlisted anywhere, so this isn't my own self-interest or defensiveness talking here.

This kind of statement bothers me. I have seen it on many forums, not just this one.

Why would you ask someone to rush their own process, just to suit your needs? You were wait-listed for a reason. That reason being that you were not good enough to be offered the first time around. So don't take your frustration out on those that were initially accepted. If you've been accepted somewhere, you probably understand the feeling that you would like plenty of time to make your decision. Those that have been accepted deserve to have all of the allotted time to make their decision. You would demand the same, don't act like you wouldn't.

In my opinion, it is extremely selfish and unprofessional to partake in such behavior. Wait your turn; it is a wait-list, after all.

Just my two cents. Carry on.

h
No doubt I wouldn't live in the Slope period, whether or not I was going to SB, but the drive isn't [i[that bad, particularly if it's timed right. You figure this person will be going east when everyone's going west, and vice versa. My in-laws live out in Suffolk and I spent another 10 years before I got married visiting my wife out there. The Belt can definitely suck but really from the Slope you would take the BQE to the Expressway or better yet take the streets; actually the Slope is right near one of my favorite shortcuts which is Atlantic Ave to Penn Ave to the Interboro.
I don't see any reason why his/her drives will be any more than an hour and a half. Figure no Friday classes so no nightmares on spring Friday afternoons, no rush hour crawls. I get to Mattituck from Staten Island in 2 hours so SB isn't going to be 2 - 2.5 from Brooklyn.
On the other hand you are right on the money on the overpriced hipster hell that that whole part of Brooklyn has become. Poster is better off moving out to the Island unless something else is keeping him/her in Brooklyn.
Many people work at the Brookhaven Labs who are young and/or out-of-towners and rent places around there. I never got the impression from them that housing was hard to find or overpriced.

Just signed on the dotted line for the University of Toronto!

I graduated from SBU in Dec 2008 with a PhD in Molecular Genetics and Microbiology.
I lived in an apartment complex in Saint James my entire graduate career (was approx 1000 for a large studio, separate kitchen; 1600 for a 2 bedroom).
My "commute" was about 10 minutes. Grad students can get parking tags to park in student lots. It was about a 10 minute walk to lab.
Most of my classmates shared houses with other students. Everyone was able to make it on the stipend supplied to us. I lived a bit cushier because of my parents' help and then my boyfriend/husband.

Even though I hate suburbia, and SBU certainly has a less-than-regal campus, I thoroughly enjoyed my graduate career years.

Lol York is a publicly funded school, so their matrix of funding can change from year to year. Also they could have had international students who postponed admission. Trust me, I was denied across the board last year when I applied to programs only in Ontario, and I did my research to understand why..... being an international student is crazy silly competitive. If you really think there is Xenophobia you might have never been to Ontario I am guessing? In Ontario there are only 30% whites, you might get to say that about America cause people are VERY xenophobic (I'm American, trust me people are nuts esp in the midwest). Talk a walk down one of the parks in Mississauga and see TONS of Muslim women in the more conservitave burkas (where only eyes are shown) playing with their kids and family next to asian,white,and indian families and tell me the place is xenophobic again. I have never seen that kind of social setting happen in America,europe or Asia.

Lol there is no Xenophobia! Almost all departments can only accept max 2 international students. Reason being is that they have a limited amount of funding and when you are accepted they give you a special international scholarship to offset the high tuition. I'm an international student, and have spoke to several departments in Ontario. Lesson learned: If they can't give funding they don't like to accept students without it. Problem for international students is that this semi creates a special pool of applicants fighting over 2 spots, not say 10-15 spots. VERY competitive. I've been accepted into 2 programs and the international scholar ship they offer is a lot of $ so I understand why they have to limit their intake.

As others have already mentioned, it seems pretty clear that you've never visited York U, or Toronto, or even Ontario. Just FYI (since you seem to have no clue) York is one of the most multicultural, ethnically diverse universities in Canada. Students choose to go there specifically due to its reputation as an open-minded, culturally diverse, international community of learners. All you're doing in this thread, is making yourself look contextually uninformed about York and indeed, the cultural reality of living in Ontario, Canada.

Lol York is a publicly funded school, so their matrix of funding can change from year to year. Also they could have had international students who postponed admission. Trust me, I was denied across the board last year when I applied to programs only in Ontario, and I did my research to understand why..... being an international student is crazy silly competitive. If you really think there is Xenophobia you might have never been to Ontario I am guessing? In Ontario there are only 30% whites, you might get to say that about America cause people are VERY xenophobic (I'm American, trust me people are nuts esp in the midwest). Talk a walk down one of the parks in Mississauga and see TONS of Muslim women in the more conservitave burkas (where only eyes are shown) playing with their kids and family next to asian,white,and indian families and tell me the place is xenophobic again. I have never seen that kind of social setting happen in America,europe or Asia.

He was talking about being an international student. And yes, grad programs LOVE international students because they bring in the $. There was no context of "race" there. Actually, the only racilization made was thinking Singapore has a "race" to be "racialized" BOOM. Hahahaha not being aggressive just having some fun

I do recall somewhere on the study permit form about when you were planning on entering the country. I'd fill that out and see what happens. You may be able to come in even earlier that way. Worst case scenario, move up on a tourist visa, then come back home for a couple days in August, and reenter for the study permit.

Accepted to York's PhD program in Sociology! I've been sitting on the U of T offer for a bit, so it'll be nice to compare and contrast the programs and be able to make an informed decision (there will be so many neurotic pro/con lists)!

I can't believe I'm in a position to choose! I am open to any insight!

I am just finishing my undergrad at UVic -- as a general warning, our graduate students are not sufficiently funded. The GSS has been posting leaflets all over campus all year protesting the fact that funding for grad students at UVic is below tuition and cost of living expenses by a decent amount. I suggest that (unless you have a SSHRC) you ask some polite, but probing questions of the department about funding opportunities. UVic is a wonderful school and Victoria is a beautiful city (I'm typing this from my girlfriend's suite in Fernwood), but you really should be aware that money will be tight for you should you accept the offer of admission.

And on a side note, I've officially accepted SFU's offer of admission for an MA in philosophy over Dal/Waterloo/Alberta. Just got a (very polite) rejection letter from U of T's PhD program today.

*cries* Holy iheflwefobndfoboudgbaoudboubd@%$^%$^%@$@. Got acceptance email from Brock!! Not my first choice (McMaster is), but a critical theory program with the perfect advisor with international ethnography research in my area. OMG OMG OMG. What a great day. Don't want to gloat, this is just a LOT and I mean a LOT of hard work and sacrifice to get in after being rejected last cycle across the board. Moving from NYC area to Buffalo to be closer to Canada and my fiance (who is Canadian), putting off a wedding, taking non-degree courses just to boost GPA, living in limbo with every facet of my future life in question because once I'm in Canada I'm there for good... just ahhh. Great.

*cries* Holy iheflwefobndfoboudgbaoudboubd@%$^%$^%@$@. Got acceptance email from Brock!! Not my first choice (McMaster is), but a critical theory program with the perfect advisor with international ethnography research in my area. OMG OMG OMG. What a great day. Don't want to gloat, this is just a LOT and I mean a LOT of hard work and sacrifice to get in after being rejected last cycle across the board. Moving from NYC area to Buffalo to be closer to Canada and my fiance (who is Canadian), putting off a wedding, taking non-degree courses just to boost GPA, living in limbo with every facet of my future life in question because once I'm in Canada I'm there for good... just ahhh. Great.