zilch

there's another thread for UIUC 2010 that's been bumped off of the front page located here welcome to illinois

@Hekog, I also got a second HM and it does sting a bit to have been close twice. I did get a rather hilarious comment that I thought I'd share. One of my reviewers who seemed to have a dislike for pronouns made a bunch of comments on my BI that seemed more like notes to him/her self (ie, has devoted time to X, understands role in Y) and then capped it off with a "Suggest presenting research in non-traditional ways". I'm not sure what this means or what it has to do with broader impacts, the first image in my head was Patch Adams. Somehow, I don't think that giving a research presentation dressed as a clown is going to help me.

HMed again 2010 IM/BI G/G E/E VG/G 2009 IM/BI E/E VG/VG E/VG both years I had one reviewed that seemed to love my app, one reviewer said it was good but pointed out specific areas where he/she would've like me to talk more about and one reviewer in the middle. my advice for those that will be re-applying, don't take the comments too seriously. I followed the advice given by the reviewer that gave me the lowest scores last year and this year all of the things my reviewers mentioned never showed up in my comments last year.

Orange County

A friend of mine who got it last year told me her notification email was time-stamped 3 AM, so I suspect they enter all of the names and emails to be notified and then set it send the next day so the system starts spitting them out at midnight or something.

when I was applying last year, my last acceptance came on April 11th. They still asked me to respond by April 15th. my last rejection came sometime in the middle of June. By that point I had made my decision months ago and I had actually forgotten that I never heard back from one of my schools. Pretty sure it went something like "hey look, something fell behind the cabinet" "hey, it's an application....." "oh well, too late now, reject"

duck hunt

at this point my hands are starting to hesitate slightly every time I type in my password to access my email even though it's not quite April yet.

cost of living in Champaign-Urbana is pretty low. Currently, rent is somewhere around 400/month for most of the people I know (that's if you have room-mates). It can get more expensive if you're looking at condo-style places or some such. 1000/month should cover all your living expenses (food, shelter, internet, etc) and it's feasible to do less. you should survive on your stipend just fine if you choose to come here. The humanities grad students manage to survive and their stipends are like half of what engineers get.

it can get cold at UIUC in the winter. If you're looking at the dollar amount in the offer, do consider the cost of living in both places. UIUC does have a lot of laboratory facilities and equipment for semiconductors, photonics and the like. Ultimately it depends on what you prefer. I would say that UIUC's reputation is actually in semiconductors considering the school spawned the transistor, LED and plasma display.

I don't know too much about Roland Realty, but the tenant union definitely knows their stuff. I have a few friends that live a block away from 504 E. White and the area isn't bad, it's a little bit busier than some residential neighborhoods because of its proximity to 2 busy roads and a public school nearby but it's also close to a small grocery store they just built. tenant union Roland Realty for things to do, Krannert Center for Performing Arts is a university venue that attracts world class performers (Krannert also hosts events like Krannert Uncorked which is a free wine tasting) The Canopy Club is a concert venue near Krannert Foellinger Auditorium is a campus building that are used to host special events arranged by organizations like Star Course Assembly Hall is where the basketball team plays but also hosts headliner concerts and events such as Cirque du Soleil, Blue Collar Comedy Tour, Daughtry, etc. Urbana Farmer's Market, as you mentioned earlier, occurs in the Fall.

which city you live in doesn't matter too much in my opinion. Considering the campus sits almost dead center between the two, it's fairly even in terms of where grad students live. the campus is gigantic, it actually occupies turf in both towns relatively evenly and you'll find rental properties of all sorts in both Urbana and Champaign. The closer you get to campus the more expensive, but it's not too hard to find something within walking distance of campus. The bus system is also very good (it apparently wins all sorts of awards) and the University has an arrangement that lets all students and faculty ride for free so even if you live a little farther away it's not a big deal. The university does also have a graduate student/post doc housing area called Orchard Downs (in Urbana), it's large area of apartments surrounded by lots of grass fields and an arboretum with a direct bus line to the heart of campus. It's a good place for those that have children or want a quieter neighborhood. There's also Goodwin-Green (also in Urbana, but it's like 2 blocks from the Urbana-Champaign boundary) which is another University apartment complex that's actually on campus. These tend to be a little more expensive than privately owned apartments but tend to be better maintained in my opinion. There are several rental companies in town as well (JSM, Bankier, Gabe's Place). It really depends on what you're looking for. The campus culture for undergrads is generally to live in the dorms for 1-2 years and then get an apartment with friends so most buildings will significant amounts of juniors and seniors living in them as well as grad students. In terms of time outside of class. There is a sort of main strip right next to campus (Green Street) that has many eateries and bars/pubs, at night it tends to be over-run with undergrads. I don't really do bars much but the nightlife in Downtown Champaign is what I personally prefer because the crowd tends to be a little older (although it is very possible to run into some of the younger professors there). links housing JSM Bankier Gabe's Place (tends to be very undergrad heavy) Royse&Brinkmeyer Ramshaw PPM Burnham (new building, might be pricier) Capstone There's also all sorts of individual properties and whatnot and as you mentioned craigslist is a good place to look. CU-Living is also a good place to find listings, parts of their website make it seem like they are a property management company but they are solely a listings site. random CU mass transit district - Bus routes and info Campus Map - The division between Champaign and Urbana runs along Wright Street Eat CU - Website that lists many of the restaurants in the area along with their menus, also has a system that allows you to order online.

For women, only certain fields give extra consideration (STEM fields). The way the judging is set up, being an under-represented minority or a female in STEM fields only helps you if you fall on the border between HM and getting a fellowship.

Urbana has more of a small town feel (trees everywhere, brick streets, etc), it also has almost no commerce because of an almost rabid adherence to keeping the small town image -> high property taxes and very limited shopping. Champaign feels like a suburb of a large city. regarding undergrads. it depends on what college you're looking at, some are extremely competitive for undergrad as well.

external hard drive to back up your collection of papers, data, etc. flash drive - useful for sharing larger files with colleagues, carrying presentations, etc. a dry erase board and markers - mount it on the wall, it'll make your life wonderful (sort of).

there's no special denotation with the award (at least not to the best of my knowledge). If you are female and fall into the STEM disciplines then you just have a slightly higher chance of getting one.

my dad went through grad school for part of my formative years. I have to say, from the child's perspective it kinda sucked. I could never explain to my friends what my parents did (partially because I didn't really understand it either) and was generally embarrassed whenever the topic came up. I constantly saw my parents going over the budget and pinching pennies so I always felt guilty whenever they got me anything -> I stopped celebrating my own birthday by the time I was 12 (saw it as a waste of money). Always felt a bit out of place during that time. Do be sure to explain things to your children (if they're old enough), they notice far more than you'd think.

the game. (everyone loses )

masters, may go directly to phd dual boot of windows and linux 1. matlab (free from university) 2. chrome/firefox (free) 3. microsoft word/open office (~50-60 for students / free) 4. Engauge Digitizer (free) - used for extracting data from plots in articles 5. GIMP/MS Paint (free/free) - photoshop for linux/basic place to paste an image 6. Google Docs, wave, etc (free)

I believe the first round of admits generally go out in late feb. These are the people being offered departmental fellowships and is a pretty small group. I think most of the normal admits go out in early to mid march. and they'll email you. or at least that's how it was done last year.

the increases will probably also depend on the application breakdown. If there just weren't enough good applications in one field, then another discipline may end up awarding more than their share the pie. I think it's unlikely for NSF to systemically increase awards in discipline over another without first making an announcement and changing the program solicitation. As it stands, all of the solicitation material implies that the disciplines are treated more or less evenly.

you could try the food service industry (waiter/waitress or pizza delivery). It's not glamorous, but it shouldn't be too hard to find a temp position, it'll give you insight and I've had friends that have made 100+ dollars a night in tips during tourist/holiday season. if you're really adventurous http://www.coolworks.com/ is a site with seasonal opportunities geared towards what carrar mentioned with national parks and such. you could also go home and work locally and just stay with your parents for a little bit. it'll probably be the last time you get to spend an extended period with them.

forum postings aren't a representative sample of the population. I would imagine that any such changes would have to be documented somewhere. NSF will probably need to revisit the list of eligible disciplines in the coming years, with so much focus on going interdisciplinary their current way of segmenting the applicant pool is going be outdated fairly soon.

no excuses.

April 9th, in the late afternoon. Because it's a Friday and it'll give people a weekend to read through everything before they start picking up the phones with questions already answered in press releases. Also, I've noticed that college admissions tend to send things out on friday afternoons for that reason.