ANDS!

I was going to ask "What does studying abroad help you other than studying abroad. . .and then saw your field of study." I would communicate your situation first to UNC; gauge their recommendation on what you should do. It involves them in the process and says "Look, I love your program but you folks know this is a great opportunity." At least you open the door to returning. Of course, it is rare to get funded for a Masters. . .which is the long term goal. Or is that short term? If your long term goal is PhD, I'd say grab the Masters; but then studying abroad in Poland would certainly look nice - nicer if there were some research component to it. I say go with the sure thing, and apply for the fellowship after your first year.

If these students don't warm up to you for artificial reasons - f*** em. Let them stew in their jealousy (and there probably will be folks there who deep down have issues, that they wont vocalize - and shouldn't). Plain as that. You are there because you are just as good as they are, regardless of age. I could see if this were a Psych program, or something where "life experience" is something valued in an applicant. o_0 I doubt this is something most people should have to worry about; and that if it did happen, it would happen for a VERY small class and be something spur of the moment. I - wouldn't be worried about it.

LMAO. What the hell? I feel we're not getting the entire story from this thread-resurrection. . .

There is probably a marginal difference between the two (according to USNEWS).

I wold say it depends on where you want to go. There are a finite number of Ivy League graduates, so someone is hiring these other graduates.

If your Mac has the black keys and backlight, you'll be fine. The bottlenecks for those programs is running through data analysis on huge dataset's; you don't want it taking 5 hours to run a 15 minute job.

Unless you have something super ancient you will be fine; of course it is a statistical analysis program, so if you're dealing with large data sets you'd want some I think fairly modern. Dual Core and above will be sufficient.

Maybe they think you're a Jedi.

Where have you seen this enumerated; I would be very curious. And it has nothing to do with disrespect/respect so lets please not get into histrionics on this issue. There is ZERO credible reason an instructor has to not allowing his or her course to be recorded by a student for private/personal use and as a study aid. They can take the matter as "seriously" as they want; at maximum we get to have a discussion about protected intellectual property and allowable reproductions of - garauntee the student comes out on the winning end of that conversation.

Yale's BioStats seems lost in their school of Public Health. I would definitely go for the MS at Columbia.

That instructor is blowing smoke out of their ass and should be ashamed for having such a reaction. Theres no way they wouldn't get laughed out of the Presidents office if they even tried such a thing. If the instructor says "no", just get a Livescribe pen, or find a spot where the instructor can not see.

Any score from this point on will be exactly what you see at the end of the test, and its corresponding ranking on the concordance table. And yes ETS are thugs. 160 bucks a test. . .smdh.

What deposit have you given the school? If you withdraw an acceptance for a funded offer, its unlikely a school is going to take you to court. It's not a "contract" that forces you to attend their campus (especially for a Masters). Some folks will say "Oh well once you accept that's it and you don't want to get on a schools bad side, burn bridges, etc.", but I find a lot of that talk requires a certain amount of stars aligning for someone to so bitter about a students withdrawal that they carry this grudge for years into the future.

Take the offer. What would be changed from this year to the next that you think would increase your chances of success? Independent study/research might be nice, but you've no way of knowing if that was the deficiency that "did you in. . ." so to speak. As for the prestige; there are only so many graduates of the Ivies and what not - they can not fill all the jobs. Someone from "ok" schools is getting work.

Before people start funding a liquor and gun budget, remember you may not hear until after April 15th as well - certainly April 15th is when a lot of those waitlists will start getting some attention, but you never know how deep these wells go.

If you REALLY want them to have something unique, might I suggest a Zazzle mug, with your chosen school's emblem on one side, and perhaps a personal message on the other.

A masters degree in the US is considered a "professional" degree in that it is generally the requirement for more-than-entry-level work in related fields. This is generally because the difference between masters curriculum and PhD is one year of "advanced coursework". However, with a Masters you will be limited in income potential; the most lucrative jobs are generally for those with PhD's. If you're fine with that I might go for the Masters, though study (and living) in New York is not cheap. I would do some job search to see just what the job requirements are for those "top notch" ME jobs (I'm looking at Indeed.com and, indeed, the top spots strongly prefer PhD applicants for industry positions).

Get a good one and sit near a side board, or window. Place it on a ledge before class starts, and you will be good to go.

Well, I hope that was more of a not-serious-joke-borne-out-of-frustration than a "it is certainly possible for me to not accept". I would agree pushing them to initiate a re-review is almost a tacit acceptance on your part.

The program should tell you how many, if any, credits you will be able to transfer. As the previous poster said, you will essentially be reapplying with the general population.

I would remove the program from your profile and list the cities; it may be that the locale of the campus is small, but there are cultural activities within a reasonable distance. Many great schools are like that (Iowa, UConn, UGA. . etc). Also I make the same comment I usually make on stipend worry: you can't really compare them across cities due to cost-of-living; so one stipend may be absolutely smaller, but doesn't mean its relatively smaller.

It would help if we knew what the difference between those two acronyms was. I'm quite certain most will tell you to take the Columbia offer; be aware though that a 15K fellowship in Bmore is worth about 23K depending where you like in NY (it is in fact 27K if you live near Columbia, which of course I doubt you would).

At this point I doubt they will decide against you. I mean if I were in the Grad. Depts. shoes and I wasn't going to budge, I wouldn't even bother saying I'd review the case; I'd just tow the party line "It is the students responsibility to blah blah blah". Going forward I would laugh it off in your interaction with your new department. They absolutely know they dropped the ball on this as well (who doesn't recognize a diploma isn't a transcript?) - if you're accepted by the Bueracratic side, just move on. As has been said, how you manage yourself during this time is going to determine "first impressions" so to speak. You want those to be as positive as possible. For what it is worth, I seriously doubt you are the only one in this situation. I wouldn't be surprised if this happens more often than not, yet most people dont bother to dig deeper to find a resolution.

I would take the education over the immediate job; especially since you're going for a Masters which is a professional degree. You're looking at two-years max to bolster the rest of your future. Always take the long bet, not the quick cash-out.

I think everyone shares blame in this situation - or rather anyone who reviewed the application and did not notice transcripts were missing, including the OP. However, realistically, all of this wouldn't have happened had the correct document been uploaded. If things are decided against you - that is likely the line that will be taken. You've gotten good advice here; at this point there is nothing that can be done but let the right people confer and make a decision. I can see why they might not want to accept your application (it is ultimately your responsibility - not the graduate committee's - to make sure it is complete and accurate), all you can do is hope they understand how easy it is for such a mistake to happen, a mistake that could have been corrected if you had been made aware of the error.