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PhD Applications Fall 2019 Season


MonkeyMagic

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Hi, I'm a forum stalker and chiming in for the first time. 

Curiosity question: is it typical of American universities to keep you waiting for an answer until March even though they have already done their interviews? Do they keep people on the table until the very end, "just in case"? Or do they normally send rejection letters as soon as they have made their first cut? 

I applied to just one theology PhD program in the USA (plus several outside the USA) and was called for an interview, so I'm not too anxious at this point, but I really feel for those of you who are on the edge and waiting for that special email or call. 

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On 1/30/2019 at 11:04 AM, theofan said:

Curiosity question: is it typical of American universities to keep you waiting for an answer until March even though they have already done their interviews? Do they keep people on the table until the very end, "just in case"? Or do they normally send rejection letters as soon as they have made their first cut? 

This.  They like to keep us waiting don't they? I think admissions committees have a preference for sadists written into their hiring policies. 

Edited by rejectedndejected
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Hey folks, another long-time lurker here reaching the high point on the anxiety scale so I'm posting my anxiety here instead of emailing my faculty contact to ask where they're at in the process :) this is my second season of applications; had a pretty successful season last year (accepted to Emory, Duke Div, and Duke GDR) and decided to take the year off to get married (so I'm a dumbass in love) and this year I'm only applying to UVA because we're both from this area and don't want to move. 

Last year I heard back from UVA Feb 1 (I was waitlisted and ultimately rejected)...anyone hear anything yet, or anyone else also waiting for UVA? Cheers to all of you also waiting--may today be our day!

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20 hours ago, Areopagitis said:

Boston College acceptances have started going out 

Do you know more about how the admissions process works there? Do all acceptances go out at once? How many slots are available in each field? If no notification came yesterday, can one pretty well presume rejection?  Thanks!

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4 hours ago, EarlyXianity said:

Do you know more about how the admissions process works there? Do all acceptances go out at once? How many slots are available in each field? If no notification came yesterday, can one pretty well presume rejection?  Thanks!

Don't know anything about BC's process-- I just heard from a few  people who've applied (I did not apply there), and thought I'd share in case it was of interest to particular readers

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47 minutes ago, VoxNRama said:

Is it safe to say that, if you didn't get an interview at a school, you will not get accepted?

I applied to ND, BC, and a few others... didn't hear back.

At Notre Dame, the odds of getting in without an initial interview invitation are really slim. I didn't ask to learn if the process was changing this year, but last year, in Early Christianity, for instance, they invited 5 people for interviews for 2 available spots.  

At other schools, things work quite differently. Some fields will do interviews, and others will make decisions based off of applications.  

At Duke (GPR/Ph.D), decisions are not made by field. However many spots they have open, they invite that # of people to "interview" but it's really more of a preview day. If any of them, for some reason, don't matriculate, they move down their ranked list in order with offers. So, even if someone in New Testament doesn't matriculate, they might get replaced with someone in Theology and Ethics.  

I don't know anything about the BC process, so I'm as in the dark as you. There are some professors there with whom I would very much like to work, so I"d like to think that there are still possibilities there, but since they sent out some waitlist notifications, too, I'm not holding my breath.  

Edited by EarlyXianity
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Hey is Notre Dame already reviewing MTS and MDiv applications?  I see on the results page that someone posted a rejection for MDiv on Feb. 4.  This seems much earlier than usual.  Can anyone speak to this?

Having a thought here: Perhaps our suspicion (that there was an unusually small pool of applicants this year) has been confirmed?  Maybe schools are notifying earlier because sorting through the small number of apps took less time?

Edited by rejectedndejected
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6 hours ago, rejectedndejected said:

Hey is Notre Dame already reviewing MTS and MDiv applications?  I see on the results page that someone posted a rejection for MDiv on Feb. 4.  This seems much earlier than usual.  Can anyone speak to this?

Having a thought here: Perhaps our suspicion (that there was an unusually small pool of applicants this year) has been confirmed?  Maybe schools are notifying earlier because sorting through the small number of apps took less time?

To my knowledge, MTS can take a while. They frequently offer MTS spots to PhD interviewees that they want to keep in house.

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11 minutes ago, rejectedndejected said:

Any updates from your guys' end?  All I've had is radio silence.  Despite my previous advice to the contrary, I'm thinking about e-mail programs to see what my status is.  I'm sick of waiting.  And the late silence usually forebodes bad things.

Same boat. You're not alone. I received one rejection that was expected, but total silence from the others. 

 

I really do wish programs would inform those they reject as soon as they are passed over and put to the side.

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I've heard from one program (a PhD acceptance to Chicago Theological Seminary), but am still waiting on my other schools (Luther Seminary, Duke Divinity, and University of Nebraska-Lincoln). I'm expecting a rejection from Duke Divinity School LOL. 

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1 hour ago, cr615 said:

Same boat. You're not alone. I received one rejection that was expected, but total silence from the others. 

 

I really do wish programs would inform those they reject as soon as they are passed over and put to the side.

Truly.  We pay $50 to $100 and spend weeks toiling on our applications.  The undiligence of graduate schools in giving us peace of mind and closure (well after when decisions have been made) is indecent and needs to be remedied.  I'm not a complainy, high-maintenance kind of guy, but at some point, someone needs to make a stink. 

Maybe I'm just cranky because I'm shorting out my hard-drive refreshing my e-mail 90,000 times a day.

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Hey folks. Been following this thread religiously and just wanted to provide an update on Syracuse. Just got an email from them today for a Skype interview so it seems they've started reaching out to their preferred candidates. Hopefully some of you folks got some good news if you were waiting to hear from Syracuse. Still waiting to hear from FSU, UNC-Chapel Hill, and Vanderbilt.

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13 hours ago, Faelican said:

Hey folks. Been following this thread religiously and just wanted to provide an update on Syracuse. Just got an email from them today for a Skype interview so it seems they've started reaching out to their preferred candidates. Hopefully some of you folks got some good news if you were waiting to hear from Syracuse. Still waiting to hear from FSU, UNC-Chapel Hill, and Vanderbilt.

Nice! Best of luck with your interview.

I am still waiting to hear back from Chapel Hill, and I recently received an acceptance from FSU. Not sure if that means they already made offers to their preferred candidates, but it is worth noting.

Overall, it seems that the application process across disciplines (i.e., Religion, Theo, Judaic Studies, and ANE Studies) is following a pattern similar to previous years, despite speculation from certain posters about the impact of our bull economy on the process. So far as I see on other acceptance/rejection lists, a number of programs listed in this thread tend to reach out with offers between Valentine’s Day week and the last week of February, so I would not be worried about the silence just yet.

Edited by Nihilisticromantic
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