ksalt

Anyone else waiting to hear back from them about graduate fellowships? Thought I would have heard by now..

I say, give it a try. The fact that you realize all these things about yourself and about grad school means you are probably more mature than you think you are. Also, you don't want to be asking "what if I had went to Michigan?" for the rest of your life. You have an amazing opportunity! Sure, it's terrifying, but imagine all the future benefits it will bring to you!!

mine were actually quite a bit different, but I also took the test during the awkward format change they did this past summer, so that might have effected things.

That's about how one of my interview days looked too. Good luck!

Figure out what your weaknesses in the verbal section are... I would suggest getting a book with a bunch of practice problems and tests and just working through them. You can also focus on learning latin root words and suffixes/prefixes if vocab is your weakness. 3 months should be plenty of time if you lay out a block of time to study each week. Good luck!

I don't think you need to worry. If they're looking to take on new students, I'm sure they are going to pull for you to be admitted. If you mentioned that you were in correspondence with them on your app, I would think the committee would take that into consideration...

If I were you, I would definitely tell them. Especially since this professor has been helping you out a lot. It's better to have them hear something like that from you than through the academic grapevine. If/when you encounter the professor in the future, I'm sure it will be one hundred times less awkward if you don't end your communication on negative terms like that. Plus, it just shows personal maturity and consideration for that professor, even if you don't want to study in their program anymore.

I don't know anything about how aerospace programs work, but I was always told that the name of the school from which you earn a graduate degree isn't as important as the quality and type of work you do as a graduate student. With that being said, maybe you should just go for a lesser known school and try to continue working hard (as it sounds like you already are).

Just found out I am the only prospective my POI is bringing in for the symposium... this can only be good news!

Thank you for all the advice everyone! Now to prepare myself...

I think it means you've been accepted, and that the graduate school just has to verify your transcripts are legitimate and that the things in your application are truthful. They might not be able to tell you that you've been accepted to the department until they're jumped through all of the graduate school's hoops.

Be prepared for any sort of weather. We've been having the most ridiculous winter ever. It might be 60 degrees one day and 20 and snowing the next.

You could try leaving a voicemail on their office phone to remind them about your email. (I was in a similar situation and this worked for me). It's likely that they get many, many email a day (as others said), and they simply forgot about it.

hmm.. okay, thanks! I'm just so afraid of getting my hopes up too much.

I just found out that I've been selected to visit a school I've applied to during a departmental conference. Both my flight and hotel are being paid for by the program, but I haven't been accepted yet. There was no mention of interview, just a visit.. Is this good news, or will I still have to beat out a lot of other candidates? (I'm a master's student, not a PhD, btw.) I know I still need to make a good impression, I'm just trying to figure how on top of my game I'll need to be during my visit.