repatriate

I don't want to make generalizations because I honestly don't know how accurate I would be. But you may be able to get some general information about assistantships from the university's Graduate College's website. This will give information that is general to the whole school (such as minimum stipends), though departments may add on to these policies (for example, some departments will pay above the minimum; others won't). I don't know what schools you are applying to, but as an example, University of Illinois' Graduate College gives this information here: http://www.grad.uiuc.edu/assistantships

Very nice! I hope that Embark schools make use of that. brouhaha deserves the credit here; don't want to take credit for someone else's work.

Now that the comments are coming in, there's some interesting follow-up. I particularly liked this proposed rejection letter from a commenter: Dear [sun Flower], We regret that we are unable to offer you admission to FSP University. The committee reached this decision for the following reason(s): [ ] (1) You would have been easily admitted most years, but the department/advisor you selected enrolled too many students last year, so nobody in your research area had a snowball's chance in hell. [ ] (2) You were a strong applicant, in range to be admitted, but the advisor you selected was slightly more enthusiastic about others. [ ] (3) You were a strong applicant, in range to be admitted, but someone on the committee just didn't like you. [ ] (4) While your application was otherwise strong, it showed weakness in the following area(s): [ ] (4a) Grades [ ] (4b) Curriculum [ ] (4c) GRE/TOEFL [ ] (4d) Research fit [ ] (4e) Recommendations [ ] (4f) Maturity [ ] (4g) Grooming habits [ ] (5) Unfortunately, your application was weaker in several areas. We wish you luck at a school more suited to your needs. [ ] (0) This application was incomplete, or otherwise not reviewed for administrative reasons. Wouldn't it be nice to get feedback like this? Sure, it's a generic form letter, but, in a way, is more personal than some of the rejection letters that schools send out.

FemaleScienceProfessor has once again hit on a timely and relevant topic for many at The GradCafe. She has posted a brilliantly honest rejection letter: http://science-professor.blogspot.com/2010/02/dear-applicant.html In the comments, FSP explains: What I wrote is not a real letter that would ever be sent to a student, but it expresses some things that I wish some applicants would be told when they get a rejection letter. In our department, some years there is the basic rejection letter (sent to those who are being rejected because their academic records/applications are somehow lacking), and also a "soft reject" to those who are qualified but for various reasons can't be given an offer of admission. What I wrote in this post was a version of a "soft reject" letter, though again, IT'S NOT A REAL LETTER. That alone says a lot: There are two kinds of rejected applicants. Sometimes it might help to know which kind one is.

This is definitely somewhat more common in the US. Typically, a university will have several university-wide fellowships. These may be endowed by alumni or foundations to promote specific types of research or students (e.g., students from traditionally underrepresented groups), and there is often a general "President's Fellowship" or something similar that is not so restricted. In addition, some departments may have department-wide fellowships for which faculty can nominate prospective students. Prospective students will be nominated for these fellowships by the departments (or faculty), and awardees will be chosen from among those nominated. It's a way for the departments to make more attractive offers, as these fellowships often pay more than other funding sources, such as RA/TA-ships; they may come without work requirements, unlike TA/RA-ships; and they look good on one's CV. By "investigate the opportunity further" he may mean that he is feeling out other faculty on the committee to see if they would vote to nominate you. As far as how to react, don't count your eggs 'til their hatched. Even if you are nominated, these fellowships can be very competitive, so it is probably still only a chance that you will get one.

I thought you were applying to English programs (or another humanities department). Is that the case? That might explain the confusion.

Email your referee. Explain that you just now saw that schools have not received the letter. Ask if it is possible to send one soon and resend any files/notices. Attach a draft letter and say that s/he can use that as a base if it is helpful. Find another referee, explain that your applications are in, due dates are past, and one referee has not sent one. Is it possible to write one quickly? Attach all relevant documents and a draft letter and say that s/he can use that as a base if it is helpful. Call the schools on Monday and ask if they will review your application. Also ask if there is an email address you can have the letters sent to in addition to the official channel (online form, snail mail, whatever) to expedite the process.

I am off overseas working on an MA while my husband has remained home to work. Since we're several time zones apart, finding time to talk depends usually on my being up a little late and his getting home from work at a decent time. We still send each other a dozen emails about little things throughout the day (a habit that developed when we were both working desk jobs) and we usually find 30-60 minutes a day to video chat in the evenings. The expense of overseas travel and our respective dedication to work and study means that there is little chance to see each other. Since my program started this year, he has been able to visit for a long weekend, and I was home for a 3 week break. I won't say it's easy being apart for either of us, but a few things have helped make it OK. It helps that we are both pretty practical, low affect people in general. I wouldn't describe myself as having a particularly rich emotional life, anyway. So although I miss him, it isn't a weeping, sobbing, pining kind of missing. We also rarely fought before. It really wasn't worth the energy or hurt in either of our minds to fight; we'd rather just compromise or appease the other person, and that kept us both happy. This has continued. We've always been very honest and open with each other, and this has also continued. So I just about never feel angry, hurt, suspicious, or any other negative feeling towards him. This prevents me from questioning our relationship. That he is willing to do this for me puts me in awe of him and makes me feel so grateful (and quite guilty sometimes). I don't know if it's made our relationship stronger, but it hasn't hurt it at all.

I got rejected a bunch last year and wrote to one POI, asking pretty much just this and also stating some of the things I was already working on. Here is what I heard back: Repatriate, These sound like good things for a person to do. I know it's hard to not take a rejection personally, and to scrutinize one's own record for flaws, but also keep in mind that our department receives around 150 applicants for panda raising slots in a year, and there are a lot of hard decisions for us to make. It often comes down to whose interests best fit people in the department. Good luck with your grad school applications! Overall, a kind message but not particularly helpful. This year, I read this thread from the Chronicle forums (not sure if it was posted here or if I found it elsewise): http://chronicle.com/forums/index.php?topic=60689.0 The general gist is that faculty find these inquiries irritating.

Yes. The scores specifically. That an American applicant was admitted to the PhD program in International Bar Hopping at Stubbleville University is less revealing of who that person is than that an American applicant with a 2.9 GPA and 1590 GRE was admitted....

I'd more concerned about people who know my numbers IRL viewing the results page than about forumites. Pretty much everyone who knows that info (friends, fellow applicants, people involved in admissions at these schools, supervisors) also knows where I applied. Probably paranoid, but eh.

I would be more comfortable giving my numbers if I knew that they wouldn't be displayed with my post. (The current submission page states that they may be.) I am all for providing the database with as much data as possible, but my number combination is pretty unique (one distinctively low and one distinctively high) and therefore would reduce the anonymity of my post if displayed with it.

My brother went ABD in CS (had problems with his dissertation and didn't want to spend another 1-2 years to fix it). He now works at a very big component maker, writing drivers and making pretty darn good money.

My point was that this rule may have the effect of weeding out most applicants, and that those applicants remaining may have specific qualities that the PI is seeking (e.g., connections to his/her close colleagues who can advise what s/he is looking for, boldness/assertiveness to request/initiate a phone call and send transcripts). If you're the sort of person who has more caution/reservedness when approaching faculty, you may not be what this PI wants. Perhaps it would be nice if the system were more transparent. I'm not saying it's good that it's opaque, just trying to find a way to make this type of rule seem less unfair (by suggesting that it does have some sort of useful screening effect by selecting for particular traits that this person wants in his/her lab).

It boggles the mind. The capriciousness of the subjective system ensures that there will occasionally be profs like this. But on the other hand, perhaps this is an effective way of ensuring personality fit (i.e., only those who are extremely savvy at having and exploiting connections may find out what this PI wants, and this PI wants only those who have and use such means in his lab)?

FSP put up a post today on her blog about grad school interviews: http://science-professor.blogspot.com/2010/02/grad-interviews.html Some of the choicest commentary so far: -- When I meet with grad candidates, I don't grill them with aggressive questions. I want to see some degree of focus, but the student doesn't have to know exactly what they want to do for their thesis research. I want to be able to have a conversation about the research possibilities in my research group/department/university, and it's nice if the student asks a question now and then so the conversation isn't a monologue. -- I find as a prof that runs a medium size lab at a R! university, I don't even glance at any application unless the student has 1)contacted me by email to set up a phone call (also included should be transcripts attached) and 2)called me and peaked my interest in them. -- For our interviews, we started with a 10-minute/faculty member run through of the research programs in our department (we're a tiny department with a huge diversity of projects, so this was important to do). After that we had students sign up for 4 20-minute interviews with faculty. (The faculty had about 10 interviews each.) Lab tours of the various labs were run during the interview times, so that applicants with no interview in a particular schedule could either hang out or take a tour of a particular lab. We had more tour slots than applicants, so these were mostly one-on-one tours. We ended the day with a wine tasting (a roughly monthly event in our department). -- Many of our faculty are very interested in the students' prior research experience, so we expect them to be able to explain that coherently. We also like to see students who are engaged in science - they don't have to ask brilliant questions or know all the answers, but they should be interested. -- I read your posts on GRE scores, etc., with a bleak eye. Many of us don't have the luxury to hold out for a student with good language skills and a basic grasp of algebra. We take what we can get. -- Many biomedical sciences departments interview students jointly with other departments on campus. Because there are so many labs involved, there are literally hundreds of students interviewing every week for more than a month in the spring! [...] It's impossible for anybody to maintain the same enthusiasm for recruiting students after the 4th week in a row. -- Since they're already admitted we mainly use this interview as a means of determining level of financial support. The small number of available fellowships and extra money will be given to the more impressive students. Nearly everybody will receive a teaching assistantship. Students that were either offensive (it's happened), obviously inept in person, or particularly undesirable for whatever reason aren't offered any financial support, and that's usually enough to keep them from coming. -- It's all interesting information, but it really just confirms how different the experience will be for every department/applicant.

When did you hear from UIUC and through what channel?

I finally had an admissions dream last night. I was flying to Chicago for an interview and left my carry-on bag on my connecting flight. It wasn't too big a deal because it just had some extra clothes and toiletries, things I could replace if I needed to. I had to rent a car to get to the school in Springfield. (Why Springfield? I have no idea; I didn't apply to any schools there.) The next thing I recall in the dream is being in some part of rural Illinois, walking up a small dirt road to a general store. I was wearing only a t-shirt (that I kept having to tug down) and two mis-matched tall, clunky heels. I found a group of teenagers and asked to use their phones because I left my luggage on the plane and just needed to call my husband to get my credit card numbers so I could buy some clothes and rent a car to go to my interview at the University of Chicago. (Why Chicago? Why was I going to Springfield? I don't know!) They all just stared at me and ignored me, so I went to the counter of the general store and asked to use the phone, but the manager wasn't going to let me make a long distance call. I went back out the teenagers and pleaded with them. They all said they had pay-as-you-go plans and didn't want me to use their credit. Finally, one girl took pity on me and offered to let me use her phone, but when she discovered it was a long distance call, she changed her mind. Then, one of the boys offered to let me use his phone and gave me this really weird, multi-part device that had a keypad on it I couldn't decipher. The numbers were not all on the same keypad and there were more than one of some numbers. When I would press the numbers, sometimes a different number would appear on the screen, and which number appeared kept changing. As I used it, the device got more and more complicated, with multiple keypads and some odd, heavy disc part. After playing with it for 10 minutes to the obviously great amusement of the teenagers (and with no help from them despite pleas), I realized that I was using some kind of fancy kitchen scale and not a phone. There were a few more attempts to get help from others, who mostly ignored me because I seemed pretty crazy in my t-shirt and heels claiming I'd just gotten off a plane and needed to call my husband. I woke up from the dream scared that I would never be able to reach my husband and live out my days as a hobo in Illinois.

As with everything, this probably varies by department. I know people on here have mentioned that some departments won't look at incomplete files. Personally, I've heard from two POIs who mentioned when asking for an interview that they didn't have my letters and asked for them to be sent (the letters were in but not attached to my file), suggesting that at least some departments will start evaluating applications before receiving letters. Whether they would make a decision without them may well be a question with a different answer.

If googling us is fair game, I don't see why checking out their conference participation wouldn't be. And I guess you could check out if they are presenting anything at the symposia; that way, you can get an idea of what their most recent research topics are. Dissonance reduced!!

If it helps with the sleep at all, remember SPSP is going on now, so your POI might have been preoccupied with getting ready for the conference. ... at least, that's what I am using to keep myself calm while I wait to hear back from profs I know will be there. (And how do I know they will there? Creepy internet stalking, of course! http://www.spspmeeting.org/attendees.php )

I've gotten this email twice. The first time, it was a preliminary interview to determine whether to invite me to the interview weekend held by the department. The faculty member who called asked me about my research interests and also about my previous research experiences (what methods were used, the hypotheses of the studies). This was a long interview, about an hour, I think. The second time, it seemed more like a recruitment call than an interview once I got on the phone. The faculty member asked how strongly I felt about attending the program, told me about current research, and asked a little about my interests. This call was about 30 minutes.

You could reply to him and tell him you have already applied to University B because of the work of Dr. X; you only mentioned Dr. X in your application because you weren't aware that Dr. Y would be moving, but you'd be happy to work with either of them and hope he will look over your application.

To give a little perspective on this, of the schools I mentioned, one department is in the top 10 in its field and the other is in the top 75. The one that explicitly mentioned 'safety' was the higher ranked one. That alone threw me off my game, nevermind the general pressure of being asked something like this. I notice that those who say they've been asked this are in the social sciences and humanities (psychology, anthropology, linguistics, English, history). Anyone on the other side of campus--engineering, physical/life/mathematical/computer sciences, etc.?

I wondered about this, too! So I googled it. Here is what I came up with (specifically on whether adcoms google applicants): http://leiterreports.typepad.com/blog/2010/01/do-phd-admissions-committees-google-applicants.html I think the best quote is, "I think the answer's obvious: they're just not that into you." That's a relief! But there is one faculty commenter who says she does google applicants.