TeaGirl

Yes. You want to do your masters in EE, and U of F has a very good program for that and you were accepted there. They will ask you how you know this, and you should tell them you did some research on some universities, maybe asked some of your profs and checked the program's website. Just be honest it's pretty simple and they're not looking for some deep answer to life's questions type thing. They asked me the same thing when I was going for my Masters.

No. Still waiting on that as well. Looking at last year's results, there were admissions as late as May 18, so this could take a while.

broken promise

Hmm... it seems that this is the case for older batteries. Lithium ion batteries on the other hand (which most laptops now use) should never be left to discharge completely, as that degrades the battery. It's recommended actually that you keep it plugged in. If you must store it, then it's recommended to charge it to ~50% and keep it in the fridge, since that slows down the draining process over time. It seems that leaving the battery in the laptop for long periods of time without plugging it in will slowly drain the battery and eventually ruin it.

What? You ruin battery life by leaving the laptop plugged in? Why haven't I ever heard of this? On a side note: I too leave my laptop plugged in all the time (I mean really, all the time), and my battery life after 4 years seems fine. Lasts the roughly 2+ hours of computing it's supposed to. Are you sure about this? *goes off to do a little battery googling...*

I think one can live easily on a stipend. At least if you are frugal. I used to get ~1550/mo. after taxes during my Masters. The best thing you can do? Learn to cook, eat healthily (never bought junk food), and bring your own lunch on most days. And kick that daily starbucks habit. I spent around $300 in total on groceries + all kinds of eating (including eating out around once/twice per week). I never ordered food, but did splurge on a lot of organic stuff from whole foods, and ate some type of meat at least once every day. I spent $445 on rent including utilities for a pretty decent studio, $15 on cellphone (had a cheap no frills phone), $30 on internet. I also often gave myself a $100 budget to buy things: like clothes, shoes, and personal stuff. I often had months where I was actually saving around $500-600. Sometimes I'd splurge, more often I'd save them to go on a trip somewhere fun. Actually, for that first year, I was only living on $800/month. Of course I wasn't buying organic, and kept an eye at the grocery store for items and produce on sale. I also didn't buy much and probably spent around $200 on groceries and food total. My motto was: "If I can live without it, I don't get it." It's a meager existance. It's probably why I felt I was living the high life money wise and was able to save a bunch when I got that additional TA.

born wild

It's not a sure thing until s/he actually makes the offer. I got emailed by 2 profs at different schools, I got waitlisted at one (he had a short list of candidates he was considering), and the other never replied back after that first email (and I still don't know what's going on :/ ). I hope you have better luck with that and get some good news soon!

street urchin

I'm addicted to tea (actual tea, not herbal teas). Figured it was appropriate. That's all

I'm afraid I can only offer advice on the research thing. You could try to get in contact with some professor in a nearby college/univeristy, and offer to help out with research (for ex. during the summer) in return for experience and a solid recommendation letter. You could email them to introduce yourself and if you get a reply try and arrange a meeting to discuss it further. Even better would be if you still know some professors from your MBA degree, if you still live in the same area. You can call them up, remind them of yourself, and ask if they have sometime to meet with you since you want to apply for PhD and would be very grateful for their advice. Meet up with them, ask them if they can offer advice on how to make your application stronger, whether you can do research with them and if not, to recommend someone with whom you could work, or how to go about it, etc. This would generally be unpaid, and you would need to somehow find some time for it on top of your job. I don't imagine it will be easy if you can manage for a few months, I guess you will need to make the decision on that. I really wish you luck with whatever you decide to do!

major league

I wouldn't just yet I've seen plenty of people on these forums who are on their 2nd or 3rd round of applications. Sometimes our luck just plain sucks. I'm sure if you try again next year, with all the time you've got to improve your application, get some additional research done, you'll see better results!

I guess the waiting is not done for a lot of us on waiting lists (or universities that don't stick to an April 15 deadline) I'm certainly hoping to get some final answers this week one way or the other.

onion soup

What a strange discussion. I've been both a student and a teacher, and I've given my fair share of 1's and 2's in my day (I've received none so far, thankfully). Considering that evaluations don't come with instructions on how damning a 2 is versus a 3, students are perfectly free to give the evaluation they think is fair according to how they interpret and experience the class. Even if one student gives an undeserved really low score, it evens out because there are other students in the class. That said, the OP is perfectly in his right to give a low rating if he feels that it is deserved. None of us were in the class with him. He also has the right of keeping his evaluation anonymous. People saying that anything you do in private, you should have the courage to do in public, well, that's a nice sentiment. Reality doesn't work that way. This is the reason why voting is anonymous, and why student evaluations are anonymous. Because the people you are voting against, or evaluating, may have the power to harm you and screw you over if they turn out to be small minded people. You, however, can do little harm to them. It is also anonymous to keep the evaluations honest. Many people would unconsciously change how they vote or evaluate someone in public to conform to what others think. Based on how the OP phrased it I wouldn't go so far as to say the professor is being unethical by asking him about his evaluation, since she didn't demand any details (i.e. which ones had a low score, and exactly how much that score was, etc.) And honestly, I don't think it's that big of a deal, or that any horrible politics is resulting from it.

Definitely ask him. There's no reason he would think badly of you if you are asking him for advice. A lot of students go through this all the time. You can bow out of even a PhD degree sometimes, but the important thing is emailing the school and asking for permission to change your mind if you want to, and very politely explaining your situation. As for the application, if you are set on applying for a PhD directly after Masters, then I guess UW would help with that. If, however, you think you can wait a year to apply (to finish your Yale degree) or at least a semester for a PhD, and get a job and save some money in the mean time, then this definitely merits reconsidering.

sugar crash

Depending on your budget: If you must carry the thing around, back and forth to school and basically just lug it around everywhere on foot on your shoulder/back then an ultrabook would be really good for that. Invaluable I'd say. If portability is not an issue and it will mostly be sitting around on your desk/office or being only carried short trips to and from the car, then I strongly recommend a regular laptop, but maybe one of the lighter models. Check the weight of the laptop you're buying and try and keep it under 6lbs, and you'll be fine. If it's to be your sole avenue of entertainment (as mine was) for watching stuff during grad school, you don't want to consider anything less than 14" if it's an ultra, preferably 15"+. I'm thinking of getting an ultrabook (if I get in), in addition to my 15.4" behemoth. I am tired of carrying this heavy 7 lb acer laptop everywhere, and just think twice before considering taking it with me or not. An under 3lb laptop sounds like a dream (even though this one has served loyally for almost 4 years now).

Call them. You'll get answers faster that way. There's probably been some mix up with your name ending up on the wrong email list of acceptance/rejection. I want to say that it's probably you've been accepted, but you can't be 100% certain till you call.

rock salt

I hope so. The one I'm waitlisted at said they should finalize their waitlist decisions by the end of this month. So next couple of weeks should bring some answers.

black hole

Same here. One waitlist, and the other... well, I have a small reason to hope, but at this point who knows? The absolute silence is unnerving. I had a mini breakdown a week or so ago. I may have another one soon though... I'm trying to mentally prep myself not to be too discouraged if nothing comes through and tell myself that there's next year. It's hard.

It definitely would, but you have to weight this against the cost of attending. Columbia is expensive and NY in general is a very expensive place to live. If you have to take out big loans to go there, it may worth rethinking it. Personally, I would go for either UCLA or UCSD... probably UCSD.