sciencegirl

@chuck.. I wouldn't assume that based on the profs listed in the earlier post.. my guess is that @darthvegan's interests are in political sociology which is a fairly broad.. I think your field, environmental sociology is one of those truly niche fields where "fit" matters the most.. I would venture to say though that most, maybe over 90% of applicants have interests that are not so niche and can be applied almost to any top 30 program. Chicago also seems to be one of those places that is hands down well regarded for training, regardless of interest. (Wisconsin is another place that I would put in that framework).

@xdarthveganx - I would apply broadly and if your goal is to go to a T20 school, discrediting Chicago because it doesn't immediately fit your research interests with faculty working on exactly what you want to work on is a bit shortsighted. Also, I've learned from this cycle that adcoms are incredibly finicky.. think 7-8 professors (from a pool of 30-40) trying to decide on 20 admits from over 400 applications. You have no idea who next year will be on the adcom of a given school. What are your research interests and why would Chicago not be a good fit? I actually think Chicago has produced an incredible array of scholars from the last ten+ years doing work on almost everything.

Any reason to decide now, as opposed to waiting until the first week of April? We all get until April 15... and I think most people plan on accepting or declining in late March after all their visits. This would provide schools with a more clear picture of WL admits at that time. I think it really depends on the school as to the difficulty on getting on or off a WL... but I would also add that it seems that for many schools, getting off a WL is really hard, especially ones that admit larger cohorts. (The smaller cohort schools that admit 2-3, seem to be easier since if 2 people decline, they dont' want 1 person, so they will reach into a WL) Anyone here get off a WL from a previous year want to share their experience?

OK.. so I wasn't crazy this last fall then.. I was trying to apply and was looking for info this past August and then someone just told me "Oh, you must have missed the deadline" but was so confused... that is sad about the Javits.

Yes... I am sure some people here also applied to the NSF predoctoral fellowships and the Javitts. There is a long thread on these in "The Bank" section. I was told by advisors to apply and I did submit an application for the Ford NSF predoctoral fellowship mostly to get the practice and experience in applying. Even though it was an extra application, I'm glad I spent the time to get that experience so I know what to expect for the next 4-5 years every Fall during grant application season.

I think splitends is referring to the process at more professional journals.. which take over a year from start to finish because of the review process and then the revise and resubmit part... for undergrad journals it could be much quicker. If you submit to an undergrad journal now, you could very well hear by the time you start working on apps. @lovenhaight - beyond ASR and AJS, I'm not quite sure how to rank the regional ones, and then other other social science ones (ie, Qualitative Sociology).. I think a good rule of thumb is looking at the CVs of your mentors in your field. The journals they are willing to put on their CV and publish in are probably good bets as solid ones to aim for. In terms of ranking a list, thats probably not the best approach since I bet that after the top 2, there is a set of journals that are roughly the same as still really great to get published in.. and then a set of journals that you would probably be advised against. I figure in grad school I hope to get really good advising on this. I mean, this is why we are going to school right? To learn?

For the job market at the top tier competitive level, it's basically 1-2 really solid journal publications as a single author- ASR and AJS are basically the gold standard here. I have heard that having 1-2 articles in those journals will trump more articles in other journals (though there is a hierarchy beyond that based on subfield). The field has really shifted in the last ten years.. it used to be that 1-2 journal pubs anywhere was a good thing, but recently, there really has been a push for quality as opposed to quantity (lower ranked journals/co-author, etc). A few friends were just on the job market and qualifications were often expressed in terms of "so-and-so has an AJS already". A book contract is helpful, and apparently, there has been this recent phenomenon where 2 graduate students in Sociology in recent years have pulled off published books when in graduate school. (I can list names in PM, but they both now are starting TT jobs at Ivy departments). Of course, that is super ambitious and above and beyond all the expectations of most graduate students. Aim for 1-2 journal entires in decent journals, if in AJS or ASR then you've already really proven yourself.

The Associate professor thing is a bit weird for some top tier schools - Harvard for instance has been infamous for having the "Associate" position as a non-tenured position, whereas it appears that "Associate" at Stanford is a tenured position. In the UC's, across the board, "Associate" is tenured I believe. Generally, the grad students will already know their school's policy so I figure I'd just ask them when visiting.

Lol.. false info? Like on the results page or false info about an acceptance? Now I'm intrigued... when online worlds collide with real ones!

@sociologymang.. HHAHAHAHAH - for real! @fertfigmort is amazing at sorting these things... we went through a series of PM's and I'm fairly secure now in which program I am considering the most - won't firmly decide until I have a chance to visit each one, but @fert is a wonderful resource.

I was also actually in that same situation this past weekend speaking over the phone to a professor from a prospective school (Why do they just call you out of the blue??!! I need more time to prepare for such calls! So nerve racking...). I had some advice though from other friends which was to not name other schools in these conversations if they happen - the reasoning is that you are more likely to say something/come off in a certain way that could potentially come off badly. I can be bad at such things too as I tend to ramble. So I made a rule that I would discuss other programs only with maybe current grad students that I trusted.. but no other school names would be mentioned when speaking to profs on the phone. So of course in this phone call, the professor asks, "May I ask what other schools you are considering?" And as I rehearsed with my friends, I just said warmly, "I don't really want to name them, but your program is definitely one of the top ones I'm considering, and I really look forward to my visit and deciding more between programs after that." I think it came off well, and it refocused everything to their program and school, and did not become awkward. I also heard though that if you are going to bargain funding, ONLY do it if you really want to go to that program and that getting the desired $ figure will actually make you change your mind and go there. Hence, I am not really thinking about funding types of questions at the moment. First priority is figuring out which program is best, then worrying about $ questions last after all my visits.

I never really get sick - maybe its a combination of always getting flu shots and taking good care of my body, then over the last 2 weeks, *after* getting into programs, my body just broke down and I was sick for over a week... this never happens to me. I realized that its probably from internalizing a combination of @chuck's #1-4. I'm honestly a bit terrified. Just hope that I succeed in grad school... that I don't let anyone down... also, which program is best for me (while also taking into account #1-4).. glad other people are feeling similar anxieties..

@dizzidawn... I think its a decent mix of people/tiers honestly. In fact, I was private messaging with some others here about how I think a lot of people in the top 15 school category don't post here at all or feel a bit shamed away, which in all honesty I think is too bad since we could all probably learn a thing or two (or at least future years could) about the process from people in all tiers. Like from those students who were really successful in getting into a lot of top programs, what are their study habits? Note organizing systems? Time management tricks? Networking strategies? I would love to pick their brains, instead of just asking really quickly for "stats." There were a few of the top 10 schools where 1-2 people just peeped a quick, "I got in," and nothing else, and then don't post very much and I sort of wish this site could crowd-source such knowledge and be more of a resource in that way, instead of people getting defensive about top 50 vs top 200 vs top 10 vs top infinity-what was your GRE score again-blah-blah-blah. I think ultimately we are all scholars of sociology, and the more we can learn from each other, the better. I just wish this site could be a bit better at that part... trying to get all people who don't post to actually feel ok to open up more without too much judgement about their strategies for success and experiences. Heck, we just all want to be better right?

That's actually very helpful.. I have a background in American studies/cultural studies so I know the complications well that you are talking about. Decades ago, before the advent of cultural/visual/film studies and the popularity of American studies, many departments just used English as the catch-all for studying those fields. However, I think now, these departments have gotten bigger and more prominent and less students who study in those fields now go into "English". I don't know how this would work in Canada though... and honestly, its been a few years since I considered going into the humanities at the phD level so I'm not sure what the state of things are now. Have you tried posting this question in the "Interdisciplinary Forums" ? I know a lot of them have such similar struggles.. ie, between applying to English vs. American Studies/Cultural Studies programs... I think if you post there about your quandary, you should be really specific about the departments you are choosing between. Your initial post here sounds absolutely confusing (the course X and course Y thing).. rather, you should just ask if as a cultural studies person, would going into an English program be difficult -- I'm sure plenty of applicants there have mulled over the exact same question, and would provide better answers than here in this more general forum that might not get the Interdisciplinary folks involved.

@Frozenroses... when you say courses, do you mean disciplines? From what I gather, it sounds like you applied to both English PhD programs (to work with this one specific person) and then maybe also Film Studies programs? Your background/interests are in film? If this is the case and its entire disciplines (not just courses), I would strongly say go with Y. Entering an entirely different field just to work with one person who happens to overlap in two fields and your interests is a huge mistake I think.

Hahahaha.. this is so funny.. my first CD was actually "Mariah Carey" - her first album... shows my age!! And maybe I wasn't kidding after all.

that was a joke, btw

lots of Mariah Carey

@fertmigmort.. how does one go about transferring? Is that common? Does it almost always have to happen with an advisor transfer, or does a student just make contacts with another program and negotiate this under the table?

In sociology, only one person who posted got a phone call, and then was wait listed. We haven't heard rejections yet though... so its hard to say. We had the same thing happen where no one posted about phone calls on the board... then suddenly after the fact people were like "oh yeah, I had a phone call last week" -- I don't know if they might be politely telling applicants not to talk about the interview with anyone. From what we are gathering though, they definitely implemented it in some fashion in this round. But this is in social science, and American studies might be under different purview.

Do you think graduation rates are higher at private schools with better funding, than larger publics where it might be more sink or swim/get lost in the crowd/tight competition for funding? The Duke number seems high (which is great!).. for some reason, I was thinking that it was more around 60%, but maybe this is from public programs?

Yeah... I'm going through this a little tiny bit with some of the schools I'm deciding between. I've noticed some programs are really clear about having a page that shows placement of recent grads... but two programs I'm looking at, one top 5, the other top 10.. don't have this. However, I do know that they have placed students... but its hard to know who and where (I actually did start looking at all the other top 20 programs and their assistant professors to try and find recent placements from the schools I was looking into). My thoughts on this might be that maybe in today's job market, recent placement for all programs have been down somewhat and schools have decided that it detracts in a way that might not be their fault as a program. For instance, one thing that really surprised me was seeing Harvard's page: http://www.wjh.harva...udentplace.html Since the economic downturn, the selected list shows only one placement at Northwestern (2009), one at Cornell (2008) but nothing more recent. Yet 2007 was a great year for them... at the same time though, I was a bit more surprised that they weren't able to show a few more great placements in the last 3 years. Perhaps other schools have just responded to this by not putting up the info - and this might not necessarily mean they don't place well, just that the last few years have been rough for everyone.

I think it might be helpful to look at the placement of recent grads from their program with the ones you are deciding between.. are the programs University of Washington and UCLA? Or are they other programs? Also, do you know about funding? Your interests also matter - and also what advisors you might see yourself working with. Those are in reality much more important than "ranking". I would say its safe to think that its a top 40 program, but could fall *anywhere* in that top 40. The rankings methodology too of USNWR is messed up of course. And yes, I've seen fewer US professors from Canadian schools than the other way around...

Are you trying to decide right now then between programs and its hard since UBC isn't included in USNWR?

I think this might be relevant, but are you a US or Canadian citizen? And what country would you rather work in? Honestly, I didn't even look at Canadian schools only because as a US citizen, I've heard that things can be more complicated when trying to go abroad either as a student or for a job.. but then again, there are plenty of successful international Sociologists working/teaching in the US, so I don't know..