stereopticons

Hot toddy

Government jobs accrue leave pretty generously and you can always take LWOP (leave without pay) if you don't have enough paid time. I'm planning on using my annual leave (vacation) for interviews. But I also work in a research center in a large government agency, so everyone expects that this is going to happen.

Seconding @TakeruK's comments about lease terms. Everywhere I've ever lived (many apartments in several US states), after the initial 12 months was up, I had to sign either a new 12 month lease or pay $200 more a month to have month to month. I'm actually worried about that in my current apartment. My lease is up in April but if I get into a PhD program, I won't move until July or August.

ping pong

Are you drinking heavily, @DBear? ? Beer goggles

I've never been kicked out of an apartment. But each state has its own tenant rights, so what rights you do have depends on where you live.

Most places do ask for a deposit or extra rent here, unfortunately. And I've never gotten my pet deposit back. I would look into bringing an animal to the US before you get one in France. Sometimes there are quarantine requirements and they have to get special kitty passports, which I imagine can be expensive. And I'm not looking forward to moving with them because traveling with cats is awful. They are terrible travel buddies.

I haven't had problems finding apartments that will allow cats. The deposit can be high but I haven't noticed that the rent itself is higher. I had two cats while getting my Masters, and they helped my sanity somewhat. I have three now. I'm not looking forward to moving with them, but I love them anyway.

Water bottle

Wear a suit for the interview. I've typically worn dress pants and a blazer, and flats because there's often a lot of walking. For the socials, if you have time to change, you can wear something still professional but not necessarily a suit, like a sweater and dress pants. If you don't have time to change, I wouldn't worry about it. Good luck!

Board member

Bomb shelter

I would talk to the other grad students in the program to get a social climate of the city and what the pros/cons of the area are. Be careful, though. Grad students do often have a say in who is accepted.

Car seats

Musical theater

Dinner date @DBear sorry about that! I'll ship you some hot pockets

Formal dress

Too real, @DBear, too real. Mess hall

Hot pocket

Can the people who got FSU interviews PM me? I'd love to know who your POI is! I haven't heard anything yet.

Wear pants. In all seriousness, do dress professionally as you would for an in-person interview. If you have an office where you can do the interview, I would do that rather than at home. I did a Skype interview for a job at home and my cat wandered on screen. A great thing about Skype interviews, though, is you can have your cv, answers to sample questions, SOP, or whatever document you think will help open on your computer at the same time for easy reference. Otherwise, they are mostly the same as in person interviews.

This might be field-specific, so I'll offer my opinion from a psychology perspective. I would choose the publication. Yes, the admissions committee could easily find it, but they review a lot of applications and probably won't. Assuming your publication is peer-reviewed, this is overall more impressive than an unpublished report

My understanding of a terminal masters for psychology is not that it ends in licensure, but that you earn the masters and then that's it, you don't continue on with the program. Most PhD programs in psychology, you earn your masters in the process of getting the PhD, but you don't leave the program. Most of these schools use the terminology "terminal masters". Perhaps it means something different in counseling/social work, but in psychology specifically, a terminal masters doesn't end in licensure. Thus, UTSA, and the other schools I mentioned, including William and Mary, where I got my MA, are terminal.

Silver bells

Final exam