ThisSlumgullionIsSoVapid

Oops, I meant 'Lobby'. Not quite as comfortable as a lounge would be I suppose. http://forum.thegradcafe.com/ http://forum.thegradcafe.com/forum/3-the-lobby/

I still frequent the boards. Granted, I now do a lot of lurking on the 'Lounge' section but I'm still on here nonetheless. 11 more weeks til I hit the road!

What about right here? I'm looking into the Stephenson Mills apartments

http://db.tt/WdxOco0T

You should probably look through some old threads from earlier this year (January '12/December-ish '11). We had some in-depth discussions between the fall 2012 cohort about all these kinds of questions that the F 2013 cohort is going to be bringing up.

Ya I knew it didn't happen very often. I took a social networks course at my university and the professor had some really interesting data about the academic hierarchy in terms of job hires. The general notion was that the elite programs hired within each other and the most common (almost determinant) trend of hiring is that people place in a tier below where they graduated. I wish I saved his powerpoints because it was some pretty interesting stuff.

While on this subject, does anyone know of any programs that routinely (or maybe have recent individuals) that have placed a job in a program of higher (or maybe even equivalent) ranked university than the one they attended? One of my advisers did this (and landed at my university from a lower ranked one) but she had a specific reason for going to the lower ranked program she went to and also had significant research experience outside of academia.

You mean the whole United States wasn't illegally occupied by the United States?

I wouldn't say they're a waste of time to apply to (though it could depend on how strong of an application you have and/or if you care to re-apply multiple seasons). It also depends on what your goals are after your PhD. It isn't going to be any easier trying to find a job at a R1 university but there are ways to compensate. If you're looking for a job in the private sector then the prestige from the university hierarchy matters less. *Obviously, people will have different opinions and this is coming from someone who landed outside a top 40 but it seems to be a general 'not necessarily' answer that I've been given when I've asked the same questions before.

Woah, nice! Congrats!!!

That is certainly a good gesture. I e-mailed the few people I most got to know at the visitation to check in and see how their decisions panned out. Out of the few I hit it off with all but one decided to join my program as well which is pretty exciting.

lawl, I was downvoted for forwarding information my university's grad comm told me? The hivemind is strong with this one.

This isn't true. One of my letter writers who is on the grad comm said she explicitly looks for those kind of things because she wants a well-rounded person. She wants someone who has worked before and shows they have had prior responsibilities so being a ta/ra isn't a slap in the face when there are duties and deadlines one has to meet. Like I said, there isn't a clear cut answer to anything. You're better off including things that someone might just overlook than excluding things that might catch someones attention. It's not to say it's a make or break on an application but it can certainly help you be remembered more or just give you a little bit of character to your application.

You aren't going to find a clear cut answer. The gist of it is different people look for different things. It's encouraged to include anything you think might be relevant to someone on your cv. I put all my leadership positions, research positions, and volunteer work on my cv.

hahah same here and I've been lurking the thread with each new recent post. Kind of random bumping a 2 year old post.

PhD in Sociology

Also interested in what information others may have for us. Any words of wisdom from current grads would be greatly appreciated.

It's not up top for me either. Maybe they're updating it and/or relocating it? Though, I'd imagine they're just trying to update it or something. Edit: it's still on the homepage http://thegradcafe.com/survey/index.php

Any specific websites that people might be using to list houses for rent (besides craigslist)? I'll be heading to Notre Dame this fall as well for the Sociology PhD program

Just a quick comment on the SOP. You mainly need to be focusing on what you think is important to convey to a grad committee. Sure, your research interests might change in the next few months but I'm sure you have a pretty good idea considering you've done some research already. The important part is to present yourself in a relatively succinct way; you need to brainstorm what is important for you to include, the structure of it, and how you're going to be tailoring it. I wouldn't say sit down and churn out the entire statement right now but what I'm saying is you need to know what you're basically going to be saying about your history, about your academic experiences, why you want to go to grad school, why you want to go to that school, etc. When I wrote mine I was convinced it was pretty strong through all of my revisions but I left the last paragraph open ended because that was going to be my "why this school..." paragraph. In retrospect, I should have spent a little more time really nailing that last paragraph but I skimped on some applications on clearly delineating how and why I'm fit for their program. Lesson learned on that front but I am ending up at the place I really did have the best fit by far. Oh, and in the mean time, try and meet a few of these professors face to face. If you have any conferences coming up start seeing if anyone you want to work with is presenting at any of them and then attend their session and introduce yourself.

Start working on your statement of purpose now and go through many, MANY, revisions. I suggest getting multiple professors inputs (I had two I would consult with and each give me valuable and unique ways to revise it). You should also start prepping your written sample too. If you can get a 1200+ on the gre you'll land somewhere (there tends to be cut offs in programs from 1100+ applicants, 1200+, 1300+, 1400+ but if you can get a 1200+ a majority of programs that aren't top 20 will move on to other parts of the application). Also, start looking for fit. You could be the strongest applicant but if you're applying to the wrong schools you're unlikely to get in. So anyways, really polish up your statement and sample as best you can and prep for the gre. Give yourself enough time to take the GRE twice too (maybe take one late summer and another mid fall).

Whitehouse.gov Stipend Petition Not that they actually care or pay attention to anything that is ever petitioned on the site.... but just in the event that they do this does seem relevant to us.

got into my masters back up. Funded with a stipend better than I thought it would be for a masters program.

Waits' waitlist waiting.

That's not what it actually says in the e-mail. They tried paraphrasing it but failed horribly. It actually says: "Thank you very much for applying to the Graduate School of Arts and Sciences at Yale University. I regret to inform you that we are unable to offer you admission. As you know, the very high number of extraordinary candidates among our more than 11,200 applicants far exceeds the number of places we have in each program, so we are not able to admit many excellent candidates."