JCoe Wants to Go to School

@the pedanticist My funding is all through HKU. They just built a brand new campus and have invested significantly in the research programs because all the universities in Hong Kong have just moved from 3 year to 4 year curricula for undergraduates. Moreover, instead of bringing in more grad students, they just hire more full time TAs. It's very different from the US system. Last application season the department did not accept any new PhD students. 
 
@duna Apologies, that did come off a bit pretentious. Probably stems from my own insecurities, but I wanted to be clear about the level of investment I'm willing to make. For those interested in applying, I would proof their SOI/Proposal, share my knowledge about the present state of the field, evaluate methodological approaches, and discuss what potential supervisors at different universities are researching. I do think that's worth a lot, and my supervisors only willingly gave me that amount of time when I was a confirmed attendee. We've only got 3/4 years to become expert teachers, writers, and researchers, not to mention conduct ground breaking work in our specific field. I for one am way behind, but I'm willing to spare that time, mainly because I'd like to recruit quality scholars for the students of Hong Kong. 
 
Anyway, I'm happy to answer further questions about other aspects of the application process to non-US institutions. It's pretty different. They didn't even accept my GRE score!
 
Will check back from time to time. Hang in there everyone! 

Dear All,
 
I'm currently a doctoral candidate at the University of Hong Kong department of Comparative Literature under the supervision of Esther Yau and Gina Marchetti. I am conducting cultural studies research of globalization and migration through film. I am an American citizen and did my undergraduate at Berkeley in Film Studies and English.
 
I'd like to offer my advisory services free of charge, specifically for those interested in studying abroad for their doctorates. My experiences have been formative at HKU, which is much better resourced than nearly all US institutions and serves as an international hub for social, political, and dare I say, theoretical activity. PM me if you want to know more. I want to help talented scholars from the US interested in more cosmopolitan educational, research and teaching experiences. I'm happy to discuss my personal experiences as a scholar living abroad. I've taken the road less traveled by, and that has made all the difference...
 
Good luck to all of you!
 
best regards,
 
Jason

Without knowing the list of places you've applied to this season, it's difficult to make a suggestion either way. However, most of the more prominent programs have already announced their admissions, or are very far into the process. The exceptions that I know of are NYU, Iowa, Harvard, Michigan (and a few others that I probably don't know of) which still have to notify anything. Regardless, I'd say it is pretty far into the process this time to try and turn things around by sending in new material.

Not everyone will have a successful season, given the severe competition all around (avg. admits seem to be on the level of 3-5 out of 100-150+ applicants). You'd be much better off using the upcoming year to gather up your resources and make another attempt in the coming fall, IMO.

1. It *totally* depends on the school and program. Some depts do competitive interviews, as you described; some are just looking to make sure the people they're already planning to accept know how to brush their teeth. However, it is a "competitive interview" the other way around, too--the school is giving YOU a chance to interview IT as well. It's awkward--it's *really* awkward sometimes--but it works, somehow. Pay attention to what's going on in the dept and on campus. Is this somewhere you see yourself living? Thriving? Do you click with the grad student cohort?

2. Be ONLY positive. Don't engage in any backstabbing or nastiness. Even if it's fake smiles. Be enthusiastic. You have already proven yourself to the adcomm academically; you wouldn't be at the interview if you hadn't! What they are most likely looking for is (1) confirmation that you really do know what your app says you know, so be ready to answer some questions about your research interests, and (2) future colleagues. Think of this as them auditioning people for the role of "being around me for the next X years." You want to seem like someone who will be, if not always a joy, at least not a *heartache* to have around.

If you are worried, "out loud", on the Internet, about possibly being rude and arrogant, my *suspicion*--and I have nothing to back this up, just a hunch--is that you have a tendency to sell yourself short to others. Don't let yourself do that. It's very possible (again, just a hunch) that your idea of 'rude' and 'arrogant' is really just 'has an opinion about [method].'

At my interview, there were enough targeted questions (i.e. aimed directly at individual people) even during group interview situations that even the people who talked incessantly didn't drown the rest of us out.

If the program is your top choice, say so. I don't advocate lying--what if you get in elsewhere and decide to go there instead? you don't want to burn any bridges in the professional world before you even get started!--but if it *is* your #1 school, it can only help you to let them know.

And look--yes, it's awkward, yes, it's stressful, yes, you have to be "on" the entire time and that can be a challenge for some of us. But you can also mess up collassally and still get in--I did. You know the ONE piece of advice for ANY interview situation that never, ever changes? Don't be late. Yeah, um, I was 10 minutes late for the very first activity. I am now in my second year of that program.

"...you know the unemployment level for artists is about 12%. What do you want to do after you get an MFA?"

"Go and get a PhD in Film Studies"

"So, you want to make films?"

:/

"No, I only want to talk about them"

"Oh..."

Smoke a giant bowl, drink a lot of beer, and hopefully survive to even make it to grad school!

I wrote up an exhaustive--and exhausting--list of questions before my visit last year and am pasting it below. Keep in mind that encoded within these questions are assumptions and preferences that are likely specific to me and what I was looking for. Also, though I asked many of these questions during my visits, I also found that, in the scheme of things, most of these questions--or, I should say, most of the answers--didn't really matter in my decision-making process. In much the same way that stats tell you something, but not necessarily something useful, about what programs are looking for and what your fellow applicants are like, these questions often tell you structural things about a department but not what it actually feels like to be there. Everyone's mileage will vary, of course, but I found myself not caring if, say, prelims were written or oral (though I had a preference) if everything else about the program was appealing. In the end, if it's a program you love, you'll jump through whatever hoops it presents. I highly recommend visiting schools, as there were programs at which my instinctive reaction told me everything I needed to know after about 5 minutes of being there. Additionally, visiting schools lets you make contact with people who will be important to your work regardless if you end up working with them directly. Good luck! It's an exciting, if unnerving time, and as difficult as it was last year to weigh the options, I found myself missing the sense of possibility after I had made a decision that I was (and am) very happy with.


-PLACES TO STUDY AND WORK
-Where do most people do their writing and reading?
-What study spaces are available? Do students get a carrel? Do those who teach get or share an office?

-LIBRARY
-What is the library system like? Are the stacks open or closed?
-What are the library hours?
-Are there specialized archives/primary sources that would be useful to my research?
-Are there specialist librarians who can help me with my research?

-FACULTY
-Are the faculty members I want to work with accepting new students? Are any of those faculty members due for a sabbatical any time soon?
-Are professors willing to engage you on a personal level rather than just talking about your work?
-Are there any new professors the department is hiring in areas that align with my interests?
-Students’ relationships with their professors – are they primarily professional, or are they social as well?

-FUNDING
-Is funding competitive? If so, do students feel a distinction between those who have received more generous funding and those who haven’t?
-How does funding break down among the cohort? i.e., how many people receive fellowships?
-How, if you don’t have much savings, do you make enough money to live comfortably?
-Are there external fellowships one can apply to? If so, what is available? Does the program help you apply for these fellowships? How does receiving an external fellowship affect internal funding?
-If people need more than five/six years to finish, what funding resources are available? (For instance, Columbia can give you an additional 2-year teaching appointment.)
-Do you provide funding for conferences or research trips?
-How often is funding disbursed? (i.e., do you get paid monthly or do you have to stretch a sum over a longer period of time?)

-COHORT
-Do students get along with each other? Is the feeling of the program more collaborative than competitive?
-Do students in different years of the program collaborate with each other, or are individual cohorts cliquey?
-How many offers are given out, and what is the target number of members for an entering class?
-Ages/marital status of people in the cohort – do most people tend to be married with families? Are there younger people? Single people? What sense do you have of how the graduate students interact with each other socially?
-Do people seem happy? If they’re stressed, is it because they’re busy or is it because they’re anxious/depressed/cynical/disillusioned?
-Is the grad secretary/program administrator nice?
-What is the typical time to completion? What are the factors that slow down or speed up that time?
-I’ve read that there are two kinds of attrition: “good” attrition, in which people realize that the program, or graduate study, isn’t right for them and leave early on, and “bad” attrition, in which people don’t finish the dissertation. What can you tell me about the rates of each, and of the reasons why people have chosen to leave the program?

-JOB MARKET/PROFESSIONALIZATION
-What is the placement rate? How many of those jobs are tenure-track?
-What are examples of institutions in which people in my field have been placed?
-How does the department prepare you for the job search? Are there mock interviews and mock job talks?
-Are the people helping you navigate the job search people who have recently gone through the process themselves?
-If you don’t get placed, is there anything the department can do for you? (e.g., can you stay an extra year?)
-How does the department prepare you for and help you attain conference presentations and publications?

-SUMMER WORK
-What is encouraged/required?
-If there separate funding/is the year-round funding enough to live on during the summer?
-Do people find themselves needing to get outside work during the summer in order to have enough money?
-Am I expected to stay in town in the summer, and what happens if I don’t?

-LANGUAGE REQUIREMENT
-What is done to help people who don’t have language proficiency attain it? Does the university provide funding?
-What is the requirement, and by when do you have to meet it?
-Given my research interests, what languages should I study?
-When do you recommend doing the work necessary to fulfill the language requirement? (i.e., summer before first year, summer after first year, while taking classes, etc.)

-LOCATION REQUIREMENTS
-How long are students required to be in residence?
-How many students stay in the location for the duration of the program? (i.e., how many dissertate in residence?)
-How is funding affected if you don’t stay?

-Incompletes on papers at the end of the term: What is the policy, how many students take them, and how does this affect progress through the program?

-TEACHING
-What sort of training is provided?
-What types of courses do people teach?
-Does teaching entail serving as a grader? Serving as a TA? Developing and teaching a section of comp?
-How are students placed as TAs? Is there choice about what classes you teach and which professors you work with? Do classes correspond to your field?
-How many courses do you teach per semester/year?
-How many students are in your classes?
-How does the school see teaching as fitting in with the other responsibilities/requirements of graduate study?
-How do students balance teaching with their own work?
-Is the department more concerned with training you as a teacher/professor or with having cheap labor to teach their classes?
-How, if at all, does the economic downturn affect teaching load/class sizes?
-What are the students like? Can I sit in on a course a TA teaches to get a sense of them?

-METHODOLOGY
-Is a theory course required?
-What methodology do most people use?
-Where, methodologically, do you see the department – and the discipline – heading?
-Is interdisciplinarity encouraged, and what sorts of collaboration have students undertaken?

-Typical graduate class and seminar sizes

-What should I do to prepare over the summer?

-Ask people I know: What are the questions – both about the program itself and about the location – I should ask that will most help me get a feel for whether this is the right program for me?

-Ask people I know: What do you wish you knew or wish you had asked before choosing a program?

-Is the school on the semester or the quarter system, and how does that affect classes/teaching/requirements?

-What is the course load for each semester, and how many courses are required?

-What kind of support is provided while writing the dissertation? I worry about the isolation and anxiety of writing such a big project. What does the program do to help you break the dissertation down into manageable pieces, and to make the experience less isolating?

-What do writing assignments look like in classes? Do they differ based on the type/level of class and/or based on whether you intend to specialize in the field?

-Ask professors: what have you been working on lately?

-Ask professors: What is your approach to mentoring and advising graduate students?

-How long are class meetings?

-How often do professors teach graduate courses?

-Are course schedules available for future semesters (10-11, etc.)?

-Can I see the grad student handbook? Are there any other departmental documents – such as reports on the program prepared for accreditation – that I can see?


-QUALITY OF LIFE
-Prices – how does the cost of gas, milk, cereal, etc. compare to other places I've lived in?
-Cost and quality of typical one-bedroom apartment.
-What does the university do to provide you with or help you find housing?
-When (i.e., what month) do people start looking for an apartment for the fall, and where do they look?
-Is it easy to find a summer subletter?
-How close to campus can—and should—one live?
-What grocery stores are there in town?
-How late are cafes, bookstores, malls, restaurants typically open?
-What do people do to make extra money?
-Does the town have more of a driving or a walking culture? What is parking like near campus (availability, ease, cost)?
-Where do most English grad students live? Most other grad students? Most professors? Where is the student ghetto? Do most students live near each other, or are they spread out far and wide?
-How far does the stipend go in this location?

I would recommend, perhaps counter-intuitively, that you begin by reading one of the most recent and forward-looking books in the area of film and visual studies: David Rodowick (Harvard)'s "The Virtual Life of Film." Follow that up by reading his paper, "An Elegy for Theory." In these two texts, Rodowick, who founded 3-4 film studies programs (Yale, Harvard, King's College London, and I think Rochester), both casts a brief eye over the history of "film studies" as it developed, and looks to the future of cinema studies as a discipline in a constant state of flux. The "cultural" turn in humanities (proliferation of race/gender/related issues) aside, perhaps the greatest concern in cinema studies has been the photographic ontology of film. Every discipline takes some object as its kernel: literary studies <-> text, art history <-> paintings/sculpture/other artworks..but what about film studies? How does cinema deal with the disappearance of film itself? Or is film not at all about film but more about the experience? In which case you open up onto a huge array of philosophical inquiries. Anyway, you can see how interesting and diverse it gets. Rodowick's two texts will give you a place to start. Get a hold of Andre Bazin's "What is Cinema" vols 1 and 2. By that time you should at least be able to navigate.

Hey all,

I got a 5.5 and i dumbed it down as much as possible. I stripped my writing of all nuance and originality. I wrote clean and straightforward sentences. And I made as clear a logical progression as possible. I knew what they were looking for, and it wasn't my thoughts on Foucault and auteur theory. It's a dumbed down and stupid test that is only testing your ability to write an intro paragraph with a thesis, three supporting arguments with topic sentences, and a conclusion that recapped everything. Yes, it's a little insulting to us Humanities majors, but it's a game and we might as well win. The entire GRE is like this, so it's best to think of it as a game that only tests your ability to play that game. It makes it easier. Good luck..

I had one question:
Is there a master list of conferences? I can't seem to find one online. I don't have any publications or conference papers and I feel this might be important for the next round of my applications.

Also here is an interesting thing I was told by a former university art history prof about research:
"Colleges evaluate research proposals based on how much money they can make off of them

Apply more widely. This field is competitive, but it's not like we're working with the odds of winning a nobel prize. With those numbers I feel like you HAVE to eventually get in somewhere attractive with money. Seriously-- UCSD and Indiana (my meaningful acceptances) aren't exactly Duke and Harvard, but they're competitive programs; I have a low three gpa from a top 30 (and that's on a good day) SLAC, mediocre GRE scores only slightly higher than your first try, no publications (couple of conference papers though) and I've never done anything but go to school and fuck around with school in my spare time. Your new GRE alone would land you an assload of $$ when you're accepted for Ph.D. So-- if I can get in at Second Best University, you can DEFINITELY get in at Tell Your Parents University!

In terms of real advice, why don't you have more people look at your SoP. Or did you already do that? It honestly might have just been the fac matches and some lack of clarity in your research goals that kept you back. A conference paper this year prob wouldn't hurt-- and talk it up in the new SoP. I think they like to have titles and topics to remember you by. Plus, network! Who are your rec writers, and who do they know? Milk that shit! Oh, and just to clarify-- from all that I've ever heard, "research goals" just means clearly stating the problems/questions you're interested in; you prob shouldn't feel the need to have a sentence in your SoP that says "I know that I definitely want to write my dissertation on representations of mailboxes in films made by colorblind fans of the show "Twilight" and that is what i'm going to do, thanks bye." Ugh, there's a reason why I'm not a guidance counselor.

Seriously don't stress. I have a funny feeling that you're going to be FINE if you apply again. And if you choose not to, well, then you'd be following everyone's advice about humanities grad school anyway.

It's a good idea to contact professors. Other than making you look like you are serious and devoted to applying to their school it really does give you a good impressions of the program you are appyling to if you can get a good response back from a professor who tells you a lot. You should contact professors when you are ready to apply. For example, I'm applying to Cinema Studies programs and deadlines are December 1st. In late August/early-late September I briefly emailed professors telling them how I was looking forward to applyling to their school, what my reasearch interests were and a few other specific questions about the department that could not be answered by the website. My emails were very short and to the point. I was overwhelmingly pleased with the positive responses I recieved. Also, the professors you contact should be ones who are working on subjects related to your interests. Read some for their stuff and mention that in your short email.

I sent in all my applications by the end of October. I made sure to mention in my SOPs and on my app-where permitted- that I contacted these professors. Now, when an admin looks over my app they will see I made contact. Most professors actually save an archive of these types of emails and if need be can rummage it up as a reference during ap descision time.

I think if you are to contact professors now it will be fine. Just tell them you are finishing your apps or already sent it in and are glad you applied to the school and tell them about yourself and ask a few good questions and you're set. I think they are too busy to think you are contacting them at the last minute. They don't read that far into the stuff so don't worry. To do it later would be bad timing because they would be too busy going through all the apps. Do it now to make them remember you and "look" for your app.

Contacting profesors before sending out your stuff is ideal because if you have a really good conversation with them you can add some of the stuff they told you into your SOP. Some profesors told me really unique things about their program that is not on the website and adding this to the SOP made it seem like I really knew the school, had a great conversation with a prof there and was genrally helpful in helping me decided if I'd want to go to this program.

I think most of the time profs are annoyed by applicants emailing them but that's only because I bet those who are emailing them aren't sincere and ask dumb questions. Again, short, simple and intelligent emails are worth while. I did it and I don't regret it at all.

Ok, not little

All too often people post here asking what their chances are at this and that school. I completetly understand their desire to know the answer. However, I also understand why some other people get somewhat annoyed by this question. Indeed, it is very hard to tell what somebody's chances are at certain schools, even if you know their stats and other details like a number of publications they have. That is why I decided to write this post. I will explain how, in my opinion, one can estimate one's chances and choose programs correctly. I hope that other people experienced in application process will correct me if I am wrong and add their advice. And may be, if moderators consider this post useful, they will be able to make it always stay on top of this board - if it is possible on this forum.

First of all, if you want to know whether your stats (GRE, GPA, TOEFL score) are good enough for you to be accepted to certain schools - there is one easy way to find the answer. Most schools post stats of students they have accepted, like on this page here. So try to find this info on websites of schools you are planning to apply to and if you can't find it, ask graduate secretaries/coordanators if such a page exists and if not, where you can find those stats. Remember that if your stats are low but not abysmal, that does not mean that your chances are low. It does not (always) go like - lower the grades, lower the chances (unless they are above some bare minimum) and vice versa. Because...

Second of all, even with the best stats, numerous publications, brilliant letters of reference, etc. you may not be accepted to a school if you have not chosen a program wisely. Because the most important thing in this game is fit. If a program thinks they are a bad fit for you, they will not admit you, however wonderful your application is. So you should apply only to schools that fit well your research interests and experience. How can you find schools with a good fit? First, of course, you schould know what your research interests are. If you know that, visit as many websites of programs in your field as you can find - and read about them, very carefully. Where can you find a list of programs? Well, browse the internet. When I was applying last year, I came across a biiiiiig list of programs in my field (it was not a ranking, just a list) and I spent a lot of time just going through all these program's websites. If you don't find such a list, just find some rankings. Not in order to find out what programs are the best in your field (many people don't believe in rankings anyway) but just to see what programs are out there. So, you read about the programs on their websites. From the way these programs are described you should get an idea if you would be interested in studying there or not. When I was choosing programs to apply to, I first used the list that I had found to make a shorter list of programs with a very general fit. Then, as I knew that I would not be able to attent a program without funding, I looked through this new shorter list looking for programs that were offering funding. As you can imagine, the list became even shorter after that Then I started to read about faculty in the programs from the last list, looking for professors who could potentially become my advisors. Then I contacted these professors, telling them about my research project, asking about their opinion. When some replied and I saw that they liked my ideas, I asked them if they would be taking graduate students next year. In the end I had only 5 programs left and I applied to all of them.

About contacting professors. As far as I understand, you can do that in all fields, except - for some mysterious reason! - English. (Here I ask other experienced forumers to correct me if I am wrong.)
BUT: If a professor is interested or even very very interested, that in no way guarantees that you will be accepted to this program because there are many other factors at play during the application process (most important of them being funding and faculty politics). But of course having a professor in a program who has expressed interest in working with you is a very good sign. It is definetely better than having no such professor. If you find a profesoor who is willing to take you as a graduate student but you are unsure about your stats, you can ask them about that. But of course don't ask it in the first letter to them!!! Only when you see that they are interested (and friendly).

Finally, I want to say, that all I have told above is based on my experience and it helped me - I was accepted to a school with a great fit (which is supported by the fact that they decided to give me a nice fellowship). May be there are other ways to choose programs and estimate your chances with them. May be in other fields (I am in social sciences) rules are different. I hope that others will correct me or pitch in some ideas based on their own experience with application process.

Good luck!