Admissions Committees

[aditi123]

I was just thinking who are the people that go though our application materials.One of my aunts (who's involved in the administrative departments of a university) says that it differs from one school to another.Who are the members of this committee that decide on taking in students?Does it only consist of Professors and Faculty members?I really would like to know...

[Genomic Repairman]

Usually a group of professors (tenured or tenure-tracked only) and administrators (representative of the dean or the dean themself) and in some cases students.

[Tiglath-Pileser III]

It depends. At my current institution the following is true. For PhD applications, the adcomm consists of the tenured and non-tenured (full-time) professors. These decisions are made entirely at the departmental level. For MA applications, the adcomm consists of university administrators, who are filling a certain number of seats and are making decisions based upon requirements and the amount of volume that they receive. These administrators have a minimum MA but at least one PhD must sit on the adcomm.

[mudlark]

At my MA and PhD schools, adcoms consist of the graduate chair (a rotating position filled by established faculty) and 3-5 other professors who are chosen partly because it's their turn, and partly because taken together, they have expertise covering most major areas that people are applying to study.