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I'm thinking a snowplow might be both the most effective means of transportation I could buy for Ithaca and probably the best guaranteed/easiest way to supplement a graduate stipend there. herstorian - as much as I'd love to have a fellow urbanite to commiserate with in the sticks, I have to say that UMich is at least near a major airport, and Ann Arbor seems to have a lot more going on than Ithaca.

Nicely put.

Well, I don't think any research university is literally "deep in the country" given they're inevitably surrounded by services needed to support large student/faculty populations. It's a relative thing. Even Albany and Syracuse can feel like villages compared to NYC...let alone a small town like Ithaca! So it's still a big adjustment.

As to the rumors about Columbia -- I've known a lot of grad students in that department. I met one person who was very unhappy, but most of the others seemed fairly well-adjusted and enthusiastic. That said, this was before the application process so I didn't talk to them much about specific issues like funding, access to faculty, etc. The department as a whole didn't seem to have much esprit de corps, but this may have been a function of its size and the fact that people tend to socialize more independently when they're in school in NYC.

It looks like I'm headed in the opposite direction! Anyone have tips for urbanites moving deep into the country? I'm trying to treat it like an adventure, but wonder how long it'll take before I miss the subway and convenience of a nearby airport.

I'd definitely be interested in hearing behind-the-scenes vignettes like these for other schools as well...these tidbits are really hard to come by on the interwebs.

They do seem to take from their waitlist, although I have a feeling we'd know if we were on it already. On the plus side, you can get lots of tuition remission for MAPSS -- they even give full scholarships to some students. It looks like Harvard rejects via postal service, so that could be why it's taking longer. Sometimes they don't seem to notify until a little into March. I know NYU has erratic ways, but I'm getting worried about it given a growing cluster of unofficial notices typically indicates decisions have been made...especially since all of these acceptances seem to line up with people interviewed/invited to their weekend.

Penn got around to sending its email, which looks like the most generic, default form auto-generated from ApplyYourself and doesn't even give the name of the school. I can see it winding up in lots of spam folders.

Well, that's all, folks. Anyone who applied to Harvard and hasn't heard back is almost certainly one of the condemned, chin resting under the guillotine, waiting for the ax to fall.

Great comment, Zephyr. There's so rarely any hope on the results board this late in the game that the snark is definitely welcome. I hope you didn't take the GRE just to apply to Columbia, though! And condolences all around. benedictite, I thought you were a lock with that Penn interview, too -- who knows how these departments think. And lafayette, you should definitely be feeling good. Three prestigious admits to choose from!

This is what I've heard, too, but if you're intent on doing a radically interdisciplinary project anyway, the history market might be difficult no matter what your formal affiliation (unless you train a lot to teach more conventional fields and sell yourself that way while pursuing an interdisciplinary dissertation). Unfortunately it's not my area and I don't know any profs who work in it...

Well, I checked the website and I'm officially a Penn reject, too. Had no way to even see it coming. What a strange line in their rejection letter that must sting a lot for anyone admitted nowhere or only to a safety school: "I trust that you have been, or will soon be, admitted elsewhere to a university of your choice, and I should like to take this opportunity to wish you luck and success in your graduate studies." Did any of this discuss waitlists? I looked back at previous years and waitlists always seemed to come on the same day. Since it seems like at least one has already gone out I'm betting the rest of us will be made MA offers.

^ WickedProblem, you sound like a good AmCiv/American Studies candidate, did you apply to any programs in that area?

All of these letters would be much improved with stats. How many taken? How many waitlisted? How many applied? Were there limits on certain fields? It would actually illustrate how difficult it would've been for a top applicant to get in, rather than just having to take a robo-admin's word for it. I can see why they might hesitate, though. If word gets out about any of that info, it discourages applicants in the next year, when conditions may have changed (it also reduces selectivity and the $$ that come in with application fees).

It must feel good to be completely done now, viggo! I have a feeling a lot more schools will be getting this over with this week. Finally some closure.

Just received my Columbia rejection. Let the slaughter of hopes and dreams begin.

Wow, you're lucky they were still able to make you an offer then! I guess we can all cross our fingers that this is what's happening at the schools we haven't heard back from...

Make sure you don't give too much weight to a school's "Ivy" status. In nearly every graduate field, including history, there are Ivy League schools that rank well below state schools in reputation, and it might not be to your detriment to choose said "very good school," particularly if the professors seem more responsive. But also don't attribute any lack of response or outreach to "unfriendliness". One of my good friends is an SJD (law PhD) at an Ivy League school; her advisors, at both the law school and history department, are very famous, international jet-setting academics who sometimes disappear to other continents for weeks. But when they are able to meet with her, the opportunities they're able to give her by picking up a phone wouldn't be equaled by a school where the profs were constantly available. Just food for thought.

They didn't even bother to type my state in the address or to put a space between my city and its zip code. Edit: I just noticed I didn't get a space between my first or last names, either.

The Stanford massacre is at hand! California really didn't want me moving there; oh well. Cold winters forever it is.

There are a few. Law School Discussion is the big one. There's also Top Law Schools and (if for some reason you're feeling like you want to supplement your law school admissions advice with lots of anonymous sexism and racism) AutoAdmit (xoxohth.com), which bills itself as "the most prestigious law school admissions forum in the world" (seriously). Note that if you're looking at JDs, you can't get one in a given subject, you'd just be a general law student and take lots of human rights courses in your second and third years if that's your primary interest. You could probably find an LLM in human rights, but those generally have JDs as prerequisites. And MAs in human rights law wouldn't let you practice as a lawyer (unless you already had a JD/license). If you or anyone else wants any other law school advice, feel free to PM me.

Or a Europeanist. Lots of tight quotas imposed. I assume US history gets the bulk of subsidies departments receive and philanthropic grants, etc. Anyway it looks like Penn admitted in two waves last year and someone was admitted off the waitlist, too, so no one's Penn dreams should die today.

Congrats, Bactrian! Was this a personalized-seeming email or did it look like a mass email all acceptees receive?

We only have one person saying an official email has gone out so far. Would be great if some others who were accepted could confirm.

^ This just goes to demonstrate how ridiculously arbitrary this process can be. In other news, I see a History/French Studies rejection for NYU. I wonder if this is indicative of general History decisions being made?