TakeruK

I agree with this. Don't go on a long paragraph explaining why they were so great but you just had to pick another one. It will just sound patronizing. Honestly, they won't be too sad about it. As for the "exit survey" you got, this is standard practice. I actually encourage you to be honest because it's anonymous and information like that is how schools are able to advocate for changes. For example, if a lot of people said they picked another offer because the stipend is too low (or the cost of living is too high etc.), then this is evidence/data that the faculty can take to the Graduate School and try to get more funding for the students. Sure, it doesn't help you since you declined that offer, but other people doing this to the school you've accepted in the past probably helped you now.

I don't get a US tax receipt for my tuition waiver. The school recently changed the accounting and we don't even see the amount. Maybe it depends on how the school applies/charges tuition? I basically have no US documentation that says I even paid tuition or got a tuition waiver. (For Canadian taxes, I do have my school fill out a Canadian tax form because I basically have to do what you describe that's how Canada treats tuition waivers...although it's still not taxable income so it goes as future tax credit for me to carry over when I graduate).

I thought that if you get a tuition waiver or if you get paid money that is then used to pay for tuition, then that income is exempt from taxes? (i.e. if it's the latter, then they may still withhold taxes, but you can deduct money spent on tuition (and other mandatory fees) from your taxable income.

Check with your school. Because you are doing fieldwork as part of your studies (I think?) you may be covered by some policies that the school takes out for people doing work on behalf of the school. This may just cover big picture things like work related injuries etc. but it might be a good idea to check. Next, I would say talk to your the insurance company that has your renter's (or homeowner's) insurance policy. I know that my renters insurance covers the contents of my vehicle as well and also things like storage containers (when moving). And I asked about what would happen if someone broke into my office (at work) and stole my laptop while I'm at lunch and they said it would be covered. I am not 100% certain but my policy (from State Farm) seems to protect my belongings, wherever they are, not just in the property that I rent (I don't want to say this too strongly since you should definitely check with your own policy!). Note that typically renters insurance is meant to protect you in case you burn down your landlord's apartment and cause damages you can't afford to pay, however, many policies come with riders/add-ons where you can insure your stuff against damages and theft as well. You pay a certain amount in annual premiums to protect up to X dollars of your property. This latter part is what protects the contents of my vehicle, the storage containers when I was moving and my property in my office (and I think, but am not certain, my property in general, no matter where they are). However, it may not really be worth it if you are only concerned about your laptop. I think the add-on to my renters policy is something like $100/year but there is also a $500 deductible for any claims. Also, typically, they will only pay out the current value of your property (i.e. if you bought a laptop 2 years ago, they won't pay for a new one, but only for the depreciated value which might not be very helpful). But, you can also pay extra premium to get an add-on that will pay out the original purchase price (not adjusted for inflation). So, if you have an renters policy, I would recommend talking to them! (and if not, it may be a good idea to get such a policy anyways) Then you can determine whether or not the money spent on the policy is worth it.

When I was starting as a grad student, I talked to many other people about this, at all levels (grads, postdocs, faculty). At first, I only talked to people in my field and the advice I got was never ever pay out of pocket to attend. Even professional growth and networking is your department's responsibility. But then I talked to more people in other field (some on this forum, some from cross-campus organizations) and learned that this is not the norm in other places. For some people, they have to pay out of pocket even when they are presenting. (Or, if you don't have good credit / big enough bank account balance, since everything is reimbursement-based, you might have to pay for registration and flights up front and not get the money back for months, incurring interest charges etc that won't be reimbursed!) Then, I talked to even more people in my field and learned that I was wrong to think it's so simply field divided. There are certainly many postdocs or adjuncts in my field at places with little funding where taking time to do professional development counts against vacation days and has very limited funding to present at conferences (certainly far fewer conferences than some of the people they need to compete with for tenure tracked jobs!) I also know grad students, postdocs and even professors that incur personal costs for things like childcare when they need to attend conferences. At my school, our department offers a first year travel award that specifically does not require you to present at a conference, i.e. it's for networking and professional growth only. This is because we aren't exactly "tied" to an advisor yet in Year 1 and we may not have enough work done in the first year to present (the big field specific meeting is in December, and abstract deadlines would have been back in the summer, before we even got to grad school). Beyond the first year, our advisors are expected to pay for us to attend workshops and other professional development opportunities where we don't present. Beyond first year though, we would be expected to present at the conferences because in our field, the bar is pretty low to present a poster at a conference---many grad students present work in progress or just an update. All of that said, I think some people overstate the value of networking at conferences. Don't get me wrong---networking is very important and conferences are one of the best places to do this. However, the quality of the networking really matters. Some people seem to give advice that sounds like if you just show up to a conference, then you'll magically gain all of this networking goodness and everything will be great. But honestly, I think it's very easy to pay a lot of your own money to go to a conference and not really get a lot out of it. So, especially for a new grad student, I would probably not advise paying out of pocket for a conference. I think that if you do have to spend your own money (ideally you won't but I realise we don't live in an ideal world!), I would save it for later in your career where you know you will get more value out of it. But, I also don't want to tell you how to spend (or not spend) your money, so instead, I'll say some points to keep in mind when deciding if a conference is worth going to for networking reasons (whether it's your personal money or your advisor's money because even if it's not your own, there is still a budget so you would still have to decide which ones to ask your advisor to pay for): - Keep an eye/ear open to all opportunities. Sometimes a flashy big conference might be in a faraway city but another decent sized conferenece might be nearby and the latter might give you more value for cost. - Sometimes conferences have their own travel grant system, especially if they are run by your field's national society. - Join your field national society for travel grant opportunities! (I just received a travel award for a flight to Europe for a conference this summer!). The annual fees are something like $100 (and you usually get the first 2 years for the price of 1 if you are a new student). They also provide discounted registration rate for members (discounts often more than the membership fee). Also, some advisors are willing to pay for your society membership fees (I am part of 2 major societies and my advisor is willing to pay for one of them). - Talk to your faculty members and senior students about conference reputations. Some conferences are much better for networking than others! Some meetings, especially the really big ones, are very "clique-y" and basically if you are a new person that doesn't know anyone, you'll find yourself just attending talks and not really networking. Everyone would already have lunch plans or dinner plans or already chatting during the coffee breaks. The best way to "break in" to these groups is to have a senior student help introduce you to a few people etc. (I do this for new students now as others have helped me out in the past!) - Decide on your networking goal: Do you want to establish yourself as a member of a specific subfield? In my field, the best way to do this is to present and attend a small meeting, where small is 200-400 people. Or, do you want to just expose yourself to the variety of your field? Then attend your field's big annual meeting (my field, this is 2000-3000 people). For a new student, a big meeting like this isn't really going to help you get noticed by other people, especially if you are not presenting, but it will help you notice what's going on in the field. - Really try to present something if you can. Maybe field norms are different, but in mine, poster presentations are basically a ticket to the conference. Talk spots are hard to get, but it's pretty rare to find the few attendees out of the ~2000 people who aren't presenting at least a poster. In my field, the rule of thumb is that as long as the work is so incomplete or poor that it would make you look bad, then you should present it as a poster (unless you think someone could scoop you). And if your work is that incomplete, then I think you might be better off spending time getting work to a presentable level before doing things like networking/professional development. This became a little more rambling than I wanted, but hope it's still helpful.

Want to keep further details private, but you may be glad to hear that the misogynistic comments did result in repercussions for the faculty member.

Wow, I am disturbed to hear about the bashing of other groups! Although maybe it is also disturbing that I am not really surprised to hear this happens In my program, as far as I know, we do not do this. In fact, we often want to hear where our visiting students are also considering so we can tell them what's great about the other programs (if we have visited or know faculty there). We just want the best for the visiting students, whether it's here or not! --- Sharing these stories could be personally risky, so I'm going to list a few stories in which some details are changed (but the gist is the same). Also, this is a mix of things that happened to me or my friends (who are in different fields) but I won't identify which stories belong to who/which fields/schools. - The visit basically consists of flying students to the department, paying for the hotel but not planning any events, not scheduling any meetings, so the visiting students just wandered the halls with no one to talk to (and no one currently in the department approached the visitors either). Luckily, the visiting students had friends already at that school who were able to show them around a little bit. - One of the professors noted the visiting student was a coauthor on some other paper, and then harassed that student for not citing the professor's work in that paper. - One of the professors, when talking about one of the students they graduated, admitted that they thought they wasted 5 years of their life training this person. - While addressing all of the visiting students, a faculty member made multiple sexist remarks, suggesting that women just aren't capable of the same research potential as men.

1. I don't report US income on my Canadian taxes. In 2014, I called the CRA and they specifically told me not to report income used to support graduate studies. I don't think the tax law changed though? This is consistent with when I was a grad student in Canada---I was not taxed on income supporting my graduate studies (however, TA and RA work in Canada don't count as supporting studies, but as an employee) I guess I don't know what to say here? I'm not a tax expert so I don't think I can overrule the CRA agents, but I am confused why your CRA contact told you a different thing. But if you do the T2209, you should not have to actually pay any additional tax on your Canadian income (my spouse does this because their income is not to support their grad studies). 2. Oops. I was using "deemed" and "factual" interchangably because both requires you to report all worldwide income as if you were in Canada, but you are right that they are technically different things. After checking the definition, you are right that we are certainly factual residents. 3. All of my TL11A submitted in the past has been accepted so I don't know what the difference is. Quick question---are you just filling in the TL11A yourself, or are you getting a school official to do it? You need the school official to fill it out (I just submitted mine to my school today actually). Ensure that they filled it out correctly (it's understandable that they are not familiar with Canadian tax forms)---they need to indicate the time you're a full time student and the total amount paid in tuition & fees (it's a blank in the paragraph in the first section so if they missed that, it could cause issues). Otherwise I'm not sure why?? 4. I fill out the 540NR Long form because of the Canadian income from NSERC, as you said. --- Extra note: I got a pleasant surprise when doing the 2015 taxes. It was the end of my NSERC award, so I only had half the normal income from them but I picked up a US based fellowship, so my income split was: NSERC: $10,500 US Fellowship: $10,000 (issued a 1042-S) From my school: $9,500 (issued a W-2) Apparently, according to the tax software, this means I am eligible for the Canada-US tax treaty which applies only when the relevant income is under $10,000. And it seems like fellowships (i.e. 1042-S income) is not counted as relevant under this tax treaty (the software knows about both US income sources!) so I don't have to pay any federal tax on the W-2 portion at all (I still pay California state tax though, and again using the Long Form). So even though the US fellowship doesn't change my overall stipend, the reduction in taxes is like an effective pay boost! (Also, I'm lucky that my W-2 income sources was just under $10,000 because it's not progressive; if you earn $10,001 then you pay full taxes!).

I am not from Australia but I share your frustrations as an international student too (from Canada). Part of this is because applying internationally is always a pain (Americans will have issues applying to US schools, and while it's easy for me as a Canadian to apply to Canadian schools, I know they ask for more from non-Canadians!). So unfortunately it is just part of the game. The US seems to have a few extra things, like the GRE or other exams (depending on your field). I can answer one of your questions though. Yes, for F-1** student status, you do need to prove funding for 1 full year covering tuition and living expenses. At many US schools, this adds up to about $40,000 to $50,000. However, if you are in a field that fund their graduate students, for example, through a tuition waiver and a stipend (either fellowship, RA or TA) then this should meet all the requirements. That is, you are allowed to use the school's funding package to count towards the $50,000 (or whatever it is) that you need to prove to get the student visa/status. All of this happens after you get accepted, by the way. So at the application stage, I would not worry about it for now if you are planning to apply to funded graduate programs. After you accept the school's offer, in about 1 year from now, the school will work with you to sort out all of the immigration stuff. If you are planning to apply to non-funded programs though, then it might be a good idea to ensure you have the funds to pay for your schooling before spending a ton of effort on applications. In the meantime, it sounds like you will be applying in Fall/Winter 2016/207 to start in Fall 2017 so between now and December, you should ensure you have met all the application requirements. If you haven't taken the required exams etc. yet then maybe doing it over the (northern hemisphere) summer would be a good idea! (** F-1 status is the standard international student status. J-1 is also an option, mostly used by students when they have a spouse that wants to work in the US, but the requirements are a little different. If this is your case, I can talk to you about this too as I am on J-1 status!)

Oh, sorry for the misunderstanding (i had thought you meant you preferred Nick but then the later sentence about wondering how the other prof used Nick instead of Nicholas made me doubt myself). In addition to what I said above, I also think the purpose of the LOR is to get a (professionally**) subjective recommendation from someone who knows your work well. Every LOR should say great glowing things about the candidate, the committee isn't looking for an unbiased opinion. (** I say professionally subjective to distinguish it from getting a letter from someone like, an uncle who is a prof is a different field and would write great things about you because you are their relative!)

This response is a little slow (was traveling, sorry). Hope it's still helpful. My opinion is that you still aim for Lab 4 as your chosen lab but have a backup plan. Whether this is Lab 2 or Lab 3 is up to you (I think Lab 2 is more sustainable for me, but we are different people!). Lab 1 sounds like a definite bad fit. I think that although it's better to have a lab earlier than "end of summer", it's worth waiting a few months to have a chance at the right lab fit. If you do get into Lab 4, then the following X years of a great fit lab will greatly outweigh starting a few months "late". I think what you should do is have a serious conversation with the Lab 4 PI. Make sure they are as enthusiastic about you as you are about them. Talk to them to ensure there is no miscommunication (i.e. they really do want you and the only thing that is preventing them form taking you right now is that they don't know about funding until the end of summer). You don't want to be in a place where you think Lab 4 is a viable option and then the PI declines you even if they get the funding. Sometimes PIs use the lack of funding as a reason to say no nicely, so make sure that everything is all set. If this is the case, then you should also have a frank conversation about what happens if the funding doesn't go through. Make a plan with the Lab 4 PI. Is it possible for you to be funded on TA work? Are you applying for fellowships, e.g NSF GRFP? Talk about all the options and scenarios. Start with these example scenarios where it's just "contained" in you and Lab 4. Then, move onto other scenarios that involve collaborating or other labs. For example, is it possible for you to split your time between Lab 2 and Lab 4 over the summer, with both PIs on board and knowing that if Lab 4's funding comes through, you would switch to Lab 4 full time and if it doesn't, then you'd switch to Lab 2 full time? This is less ideal because it means one PI will have a half-time student in the lab that will leave after the summer, but if there is work that could be done with this timescale, then it could work out. You never know unless you ask / bring it up. Alternatively, would Lab 2 (or Lab 3) still accept you as a student if you began in the fall instead of the summer? That way, you would just do an additional rotation (or spend more time continuing on rotation work with one of the labs) over the summer. This would likely require coordination with the department as well. Basically, I'm suggesting you get an exception to the regular timeline because of the funding complication.

Maybe this is just a cultural difference between the letter writers. In North America, I would expect my letter writers to use "Nicohlas" but never "Mr. X". I would even say that if I had a choice in how the letter reads, I would prefer it say "Nicohlas" because "Mr. X" is so formal, it sounds like the letter writer doesn't even know me well enough to call me by my preferred name. However, as I said, this is a cultural difference, and most letter readers are wise enough to understand that in some cultures/writing styles, "Mr. X" is the way one would write while "Nick" is the way another person would write. They would understand that there is no need to deeply analyze the choice of name used by the letter writer, so I would not worry about it as they would evaluate the letter on its content about you, not the name. ---- With all that said, you should be addressed by the name you prefer. In North America, it's common for people to mistakenly assume that people named "Nicholas" or "Johnathan" or "Benjamin" to want to be called "Nick" or "Jon" or "Ben" instead. However, if you want to be called "Nicholas" instead of "Nick", it's fine to correct the other person and say that you prefer Nicholas. There are several ways you can accomplish this: 1. Sign your next email to the professor as "Nicholas" and see if they catch on. 2. In your email response to the professor that called you "Nick", you can just add a sentence that indicates that you prefer to be called "Nicholas". Sometimes this can be viewed as being overly stuffy/formal, so I would try to phrase it in a friendly way and sandwich it between other lighter comments. 3. You could wait until your next in-person interaction to correct the other person as in-person corrections like this are less formal than an email. But, you might not see this person for awhile and by then, it might be harder to make the correction. Unfortunately, it's going to be a little awkward to correct a professor on your name, but it's your right to be called by your preferred name. They should not have assumed in the first place. If you just simply and politely ask them to use "Nicholas" then it should not be a problem at all. They would understand!

PM didn't work for some reason, but just wanted to say good luck with everything! It was fun having you around as another regular poster and then also being a moderator with you!

Remember that NSF awards are very difficult! From the experience of my friends in earth sciences (as a non-citizen, I don't qualify for NSF), you basically need all "Excellent" ratings to win an award. My friend won one after 2 previous years (honorable mention one of those years). This year, the score was all E, but in the past unsuccessful years, they were some E, mostly VG and a few G. I also think that if you are getting lots of VGs and Es but not chosen, it's not that you could have done a lot better, but there are fewer awards than deserving proposals. So, would have to just try again in the future, if that's possible!

To me, this does not sound any different from any other RA appointment. I have never heard a professor say something like "I am going to pay you 20 hours a week for this RAship but you don't have to work all 20 hours." Also, if you are in a field where your RA appointment is actually work on your own dissertation (like my field), then you will be working much more than 20 hours a week on the RA appointment! Right now, I am paid as an RA 20 hours per week for my thesis work but I probably work for 40-45 hours per week on thesis work, like a full time job since I don't have any other work (no classes, no TAing right now). In other fields, the RAship is actually work outside of your own thesis work (and you don't get paid for thesis work) so in those cases I would work just what the contract says. But when it's my own thesis work, I think the expectation is that you want to put more hours into it so that you can get a good thesis (and a job) out of it. So, I view my 40-45 hours per week as 20 hours paid work and 20-25 hours "coursework" (technically thesis work is a course I am taking). But that's just one way to view it "on paper". The RAship is paid at a pretty high hourly rate, something like $30/hour. Practically, I think of it as getting paid $15/hour to do 40-45 hours of work per week and to get my PhD. ** Also, as an international student, we are not allowed to work (on paper) more than 20 hours per week, which is why almost all TA and RAships are "on paper" 20 hours per week. So, I would not interpret the professor's comment about expecting to work all of your paid hours as meaning you will be overworked. If the professor has said something like "I expect my students to work 80 hours per week" (as some professors have actually said!) then I would be concerned.

I agree--this is not really a negotiation. A negotiation requires both parties to want the deal to work out, but it does not seem like the case here. Instead, this conversation is purely information gathering---you want to find out what the actual support is so then you can decide whether or not you can attend. I think @MathCat original advice still applies---be honest and clear on the fact that you cannot attend without better funding and ask for it politely. Express how interested you are in their program and see what they say is possible. You don't have to worry about being "firm" because there is no way you will walk out of this conversation being "forced" to take an unfunded offer: the worst case scenario is that you walk away knowing that you cannot attend this school with the offered package. You also don't have to worry about burning bridges because you aren't going to be making demands either (since this is not a negotiation). Think about it as getting clarification and details on what the funding package really means and what the future possibilities are (i.e. is there a chance that you'll get a different offer closer to April 15? etc.) Another important factor is comparing this offer to the norms of your field. Is your field one where fully funded PhDs are normal? (by fully funded, I mean all tuition is waived AND you get a paid al living stipend). If this is true, then I would actually consider unfunded (or partially funded like this offer) offers to be soft rejections. Basically, they did not accept you but want to give you a chance to still attend if you are somehow willing or able to pay for it yourself. In this case, I'd echo the above advice---don't do an unfunded PhD. Also related is whether or not this offer is the same for all accepted PhD students at this program. If all of the other PhD students have fully funded offers but you do not, then you are essentially a second-class student. Again, I would not advise taking such an offer and I would consider this "offer" as a soft rejection. However, if this type of offer is normal in your field and all incoming students have similar partial funded offers, then it's up to you whether or not this offer is worth the cost of grad school. I personally would not pay for graduate education, but I know fully funded offers don't exist in other fields. At least if you take a partially funded offer in this case, you know you are not in the "soft rejection" case and unfortunately this is just how the field is and you have to decide if you want to be a part of it.

For the funding issue, then the only major factor remaining is whether or not finding a TAship in your 3rd year at Program A will be a sure thing or very tricky. Usually programs set up like this will have it be a "sure thing" but you should check with both the faculty and the current students (ask: has there been any students who wanted a TAship in 3rd year but did not get one?). If it is not a sure thing, then I would pick Program B in a heartbeat because being stuck without funding after committing 2 years is really really bad. However, if it is a sure thing, then Program B is still favourable in this aspect, because in general, RA funding is less time commitment on your part than TA funding (as you already state, I think). For the work load issue, how do you know that your Advisor at Program A will push you beyond what you are comfortable with? Did they say this to you directly (if so, then wow, I'm really glad people are so up front and honest!)? Or did current students tell you about the workload. If so, then yeah these are good things to think about. But, if you are just guessing based on stereotypes about new TT professors then it might not be a good idea to put so much weight on this concern. My new TT advisor does not push me to work any more than I am comfortable. My advisor themselves sets limits on their workday---they do not work on weekends and keeps very reasonable hours in the office (~9:30am to 5pm, and maybe a little bit of reading/writing in the evening). My advisor encourages having a healthy work-life balance in their students too and I am glad that they lead by example in this regard.

The general answer is that it really doesn't matter. For a few specific cases, it might matter depending on your subfield. Some (sub)-fields have important software that only run on certain machines. For example, in planetary science & astronomy in general, most students have Macbooks or other Apple products (I am typing this on an iMac that my supervisor bought for me to work on). However, there are some software to fit asteroid orbits that only run on Windows. And in geology, there is a very important/popular geological mapping software that only runs on Windows. That said, if these things exist for your field, you would probably know about them by now. Maybe compatibility was an issue a decade ago, but now, most software exist for both operating systems. For example, my school provides free version of MS Office for both Windows and Mac computers. So, when the profs send out class notes in powerpoint format, or a collaborator wants to use the "Track changes" in a word document, I can easily do this on my iMac/Macbook (I used to use Windows before grad school and I see very little differences between using MS Office on Mac and Windows). So, I think you should get whatever you prefer yourself. Generally, Mac OS seems to be more expensive. For a given budget, e.g. $1000, you can probably buy a more powerful Windows laptop than a Macbook. However, if computing power isn't an important thing for you, then I think it's justified to spend the extra money if you prefer the look and feel of Mac etc. (Note: In my field, computing power is really important so our group has a couple Linux computers dedicated to this. We use our iMacs as workstations to connect to and send computing work to these Linux computers instead of doing a lot of the heavy duty computing work on our iMacs. Instead, the iMacs is used for things like writing papers, making presentations, reading papers, etc. that are easier and more fun in the Mac OS).

In my field, you graduate when you find a post-PhD job (whether it's industry or academia). In my program specifically, there aren't a lot of milestones beyond the 3rd year that would hold someone back from graduation. The minimum time to graduate here is 3 years and basically at any time after 3 years, if you have your next thing lined up, you will be able to graduate (here, the assumption is that if you did not do enough work to graduate, then you wouldn't be able to get a post-PhD job lined up). At first, I was aiming for 4 years too (since I had a 2 year masters before, this would be 6 years total). However, after awhile here, I came to the same conclusion as fuzzy---the extra year where I don't have to be constantly applying for the next job/grant is very valuable and I would rather spend 5 years here and get a great postdoc than to hurry and finish in 4 years with a mediocre postdoc. Finally, something I didn't realise when I started was that the postdoc life is extremely transient. In my field, postdoc appointments are usually 2 or 3 years. So this means that starting in your final year of grad school, you are on the job market every single year. Being on the job market is a very time consuming task! You spend weeks/months writing proposals, setting up talks, visiting, etc. Even postdocs on 2 or 3 year appointments (in my field) will be applying for better jobs during the first year of their new postdoc. Some postdocs here just graduated 12 months ago, started their postdoc 6 months ago and are currently interviewing for TT faculty jobs. Other postdocs are applying for prize fellowships or better positions. Most of the postdocs I know who aren't applying for jobs are those who: 1) Have a 3-4 year postdoc (rare in my field) or 2) already have a prize fellowship (although most of them with prize fellowships are top candidates for TT positions so they are applying for those!). There are a few postdocs who want more stability and aren't applying until their final postdoc year though, but most people want to keep their options open and like being able to apply to additional jobs "without pressure" (i.e. they can stay for the 2nd or 3rd year of their appointment if they don't find something better). So, after realising this, although grad student isn't the best paying position, if you want to aim for TT positions in my field, it sounds like one could gain a lot more out of staying in grad school for 1 extra year (where you can do research without worrying about funding yourself) than to start the postdoc game early.

What field are you in? And what does guaranteed funding mean in your field? I ask this because in my field, the offer letter usually only states 1 year of guaranteed funding (with additional funding conditional on performance) but this means that everyone will continue to get funded unless they fail out of the program. So, in my field, offer letters with 2 years of funding vs 4 years of funding are equivalent. I also think that in my field, the difference between a new TT professor and an experienced professor is mostly a preference of style. I know that in some fields, a full professor is required to chair your committee and/or new TT professors do not really supervise students (and/or students are advised to avoid these professors). But in other fields, there is pretty much no difference between full professor and new TT professors. I could have had my entire thesis committee made up of professors all hired in the last 4 years if I wanted to (but I chose not to). Some of the advantages of working with a new TT professor are: 1) they generally have a lot of projects and lots of things for you to and many of these things are new ideas so you might end up on the cutting edge of research, 2) they usually have a large startup grant and if you're their first/only student, you're going to be the biggest beneficiary of this large grant, 3) they want to gain a lot of visibility so they will likely send you to a lot of conferences, 4) they might be able to connect with you more readily since they were a grad student not long ago, 5) if you're also looking for non-academic jobs, they may still have network connections outside of academia (e.g. many of their friends probably left academia too and they may still be in touch). Some of the advantages of working with an experienced professor are: 1) they have a large and reputable body of work and immense wisdom/experience that you can draw on when seeking help, 2) they may have a lot of existing grants that can pay for things, 3) they would have a very large research network, 4) you're entering a very established group and the projects might be more reliable/guaranteed to deliver good results. A lot of this depends a lot on the specific person too. That's where the downsides could come in. A new TT Professor could turn out to not be that great of a researcher (although unlikely if they are hired at a top program like in your case) or they might end up leaving and moving (but established professors move too). An experienced professor may already be "past their prime" if you know what I mean, and they may not care as much about research output of their group since it doesn't matter to me as much. So, it's hard to say one is better than the other. I've worked with both types of professors and they were both good experiences. Personally though, if I had to compare, I would slightly prefer my experience with the new professor over the experienced professor. I really liked being part of a new group and being one of the first students, and getting a chance to be part of shaping the group and training new students etc. But that's my personal preference.

I think asking "What makes your school different from X" is a bad question. It's a little off-putting but you are talking to people who work at a different school---how do they really know what X is like? If you asked me that about any school then I wouldn't know what to say since I don't want to misrepresent the other program. Instead, I would second the other suggestions to ask things like "What makes this program different from others in the field?". It's also fine to ask students where else they were deciding between and why they chose their school instead of the other ones. These questions do not need to be private one-on-one questions, it's fine to ask them in a small groups. Large groups aren't very helpful since it takes a long time to through each person to answer each question. In general, I feel like large groups (maybe 8 or more other people) aren't very good environments for asking questions about grad school since most of the group will be doing nothing while 1 or 2 people speak. These big groups are better for just social interactions and getting a feel for what the students are like.

Yes, you can definitely do that. We (grad students) have contact info on the website so that people can contact us. If you don't like randomly emailing people, you can ask the one student to put you in touch with other students who would be in similar living arrangements.

I recognize that my own experience cannot be generalized to everyone else. But with that said, at all the schools I've been at, I have always been fully honest with every prospective student I've met. And I think prospective students are smart enough to figure out when grad students are lying. Personally, I believe I can judge the environment from observing how grad students interact with each other and how they talk about each other etc. during a visit. You don't have to directly ask upfront. Faking friendships and good relationships is a very tiring thing. I think you can tell when you see the current students interact with each other during the visit days. Their interactions show you how much they know each other, whether they are friends or just colleagues or barely acquaintances. If the environment is bad, I think it will be even less likely that everyone will cooperate to put on a fake show of collegiality. I have visited schools where I didn't feel the students gelled as well and it definitely impacted my decision (of course, what is a good environment for me could be terrible for another person---I'm not saying everyone should go to a place where everyone is BFFs if that's not what they are looking for). Also, the school I am at actually has a huge reputation for competitiveness. It was one of my biggest worries prior to the visit. I later learned that it is not what the reputation says it is, and also most of the reputation comes from another department but then the rumor mill distorts the information, exaggerates it and applies it to the whole campus. And, some of the information was true of the students a decade ago, but grad student populations have short lifetimes. I've only been here 4 years and I would already say our current grad student population is noticeably different than it was when I started. And finally, especially at schools with competitive reputations, there are many people like me that were initially apprehensive about the program, visited, found out what it was like and stayed. We understand the concerns because we had them too. So, if we are asked, we are definitely honest about it. I think it's more likely that we will be up front because we understand why the question is being asked. But again, this has been my experience with the small number of schools I've visited and attended. There are probably bad places to be that somehow fool students into thinking they are good places. I personally would prefer to place more weight on my own observations/data of the program in question than to rely on second-hand accounts of reputation, which may or may not refer to the right program, people, or time.

I agree with Eigen---also, why not talk to a few other grad students that are more similar to you in terms of living arrangements and total household income?

Yes, based on what you say here, the professor didn't do anything wrong here. Unless you have a reason to argue that the professor acted unfairly or against the school's policies (again, based on what you say here, this does not sound like the case), there is nothing else you can do except to hope that the professor is kind enough to give you an extra chance. I would also say that you should't think of the professor being "stubborn" because no professor is obligated to give any student, graduate or not, another chance to raise the grade. Your best chance is to take responsibility for what happened (you are the one that did poorly on the exam) and show the professor that you are willing to work extra to demonstrate your knowledge and hope the professor is willing to give you another chance. If they say no, then you should accept it and move on. You are better off spending the energy on doing well in other courses or your research. Also, continuing to complain about this (since it's not a case of unfair grading) could hurt you in other ways---it will make you look unprofessional. Sometimes we screw up things and that's okay. It's important to demonstrate that as a graduate student, we can accept failure and move on and work on other things.