2018-2019 Application Thread

[sandmoon]

Looking at phdstipends.com... Princeton's stipend is 36k and Duke's is 37k? Wow

[Leo_gstspl]

Hi everyone! I am an international applicant and currently on the waitlist of GWU and Minnesota. I guess it's a highly unpredictable process, but does anyone know the possibility of getting admitted by these two schools later? They are both good fit and I'm a little bit worried now...

CP subfield by the way. Thanks! 

[eggsalad14]

47 minutes ago, sandmoon said:

Looking at phdstipends.com... Princeton's stipend is 36k and Duke's is 37k? Wow

Duke's is not generally 37k lol. Maybe after winning an NSF award or some other fellowship or negotiating but the standard package (summer funding not included, because I think that's only guaranteed at that particular rate for one year) is substantially less than 30k. 

Their funding package is weird to read but the base 9 month stipend is about 24k. 

[Theoryboi]

3 hours ago, yubs89 said:

Do you guys think USC is done sending out its acceptances?

Not too sure. I've noticed a trend that the mid-ranked schools often get turned down by their top picks (and they know it), so they could have a 2nd round or a very active waitlist I suspect. Just my guess though.

[HanZero]

21 hours ago, Tedmonkey said:

Don't give up hope until all schools have responded. However, if you do need to reapply next round I can let you know what I did for my second round that has been successful. I studied and retook the GRE to improve my scores, I personalized all of my SOPs with detailed information on my fit to each individual department, I also have been working on an independent research paper and submitted it to present at conference (and was accepted). One other thing I did was to create an Excel file of every PhD program in the country, and a few Canadian ones, where I created a formula that weighted different factors of fit. For example, since my research deals with the LGBTQ community, does the school contain a PhD, Master's, or Graduate Certificate in a field related to gender or sexuality studies or political science faculty that did research in this area. These columns were weighted at 3 times value, other things that are more wish list were weighted at 1 times value, and some between at 2. Then I sorted by the total of the weighted value and chose high, mid, and low ranked schools to apply to. Last year I applied to 11 schools and got 10 rejections and 1 wait list (that failed). This time I only applied to 5 schools and so far am at 2a/0w/1r/1p and 1 withdrawn application (back-up school and already got in somewhere I prefer more). The school I am thinking of going to, at this point, is ranked around 50 so a solidly mid-ranked school. Also, reevaluate your reference letter sources and see if you could have done better there.

My first post here. I had been following what people were saying, and attempting to shore up my deflated morale. Applied to Princeton, Harvard, Brown, UPenn, Johns Hopkins SAIS, Michigan Ann Arbor, UVA and McGill in CP. Had written to POIs at these places and they had written back saying they thought the proposal was a good one. GRE was ok V:168,Q:163, AW: 4.5, one joint published paper, but no conference work. I did have 5 years of work experience relevant to the field I was proposing my topic in; some POIs even highlighted this point as a strong part of my application.

Two months of intense tension later, I have rejects from Princeton, Brown, Ann Arbor, UVA and possibly McGill. Any attempt to email said POIs is returned by a ‘sorry we had too many applicants’ rather than how to improve the application. I am expecting rejections from the last three as well, Harvard was a bit of a stretch in any case. 

Thanks a lot to people like Tedmonkey, for putting out how to try and get back at this application process. I’m at a total loss right now, after having put in almost 8 months of concerted effort building every part of the application. I don’t know, at this point, what I can do to make it better...

In any case, if there are people like me here, who got wiped out this application cycle, and who are trying to get back on the application cycle, maybe we could create a separate thread and support each other over the next year, which I have all reason to believe, will be brutal.

 

[pineappolis]

Still waiting for official responses from UC Davis, BC, Chicago, Brown and Notre Dame.. I know it’s probably all rejections but it beats radio silence. Looking forward to the closure so I can get on with life. 

Congrats to all who have gotten admits and are deciding between programs!

[Theory007]

12 minutes ago, pineappolis said:

Still waiting for official responses from UC Davis, BC, Chicago, Brown and Notre Dame.. I know it’s probably all rejections but it beats radio silence. Looking forward to the closure so I can get on with life. 

Congrats to all who have gotten admits and are deciding between programs!

My guess is that you're waitlisted at Brown if you have not heard anything yet.

[TheBunny]

51 minutes ago, pineappolis said:

Still waiting for official responses from UC Davis, BC, Chicago, Brown and Notre Dame.. I know it’s probably all rejections but it beats radio silence. Looking forward to the closure so I can get on with life. 

Congrats to all who have gotten admits and are deciding between programs!

I think you are waitlisted by Brown because acceptance and rejections went to people

[Onwarrdz]

What the hell is happening on the results page?! Someone literally just posted about not using it for discussions and now there are like three discussions happening on it! Grrrr! 

[Marius G]

Called UMD-College Park & UPenn. 

Upenn: 1-2 weeks from today. 

UMD: max 10 more days. 

[IcedCovfefe]

8 minutes ago, Marius G said:

Called UMD-College Park & UPenn. 

Upenn: 1-2 weeks from today. 

UMD: max 10 more days. 

Wow, that long for Penn?  Anyone else feel like a lot of schools are on a much later schedule than usual this year?

[CoffeeMonster0]

15 hours ago, yubs89 said:

Do you guys think USC is done sending out its acceptances?

Still waiting to hear from them as well...they said early this week.

[IcedCovfefe]

22 minutes ago, Onwarrdz said:

What the hell is happening on the results page?! Someone literally just posted about not using it for discussions and now there are like three discussions happening on it! Grrrr! 

Perhaps we can report those posts or get the mods involved somehow?  They’re ruining the results page and it’s not like there nowhere for discussions. 

[schuaust]

28 minutes ago, IcedCovfefe said:

Perhaps we can report those posts or get the mods involved somehow?  They’re ruining the results page and it’s not like there nowhere for discussions. 

I've been reporting them as spam as they are posted. I haven't looked back through to see if they've been deleted over time. 

[Guest]

14 hours ago, sandmoon said:

Looking at phdstipends.com... Princeton's stipend is 36k and Duke's is 37k? Wow

I was admitted to Duke this cycle and offered 30k

[eggsalad14]

6 minutes ago, Slamm said:

I was admitted to Duke this cycle and offered 30k

Are you including the summer funding? 

[Guest]

3 minutes ago, eggsalad14 said:

Are you including the summer funding? 

24k for SY and 5.5k for summer

[vesperalvioletta]

I'm starting to get pretty worried having not heard back from the school I applied to, and I can't tell if I'm being realistic stressing myself out over it. I'm an MA applicant and I applied to solely to my alma mater's English program. The application period closed on January 15, but seeing everyone here talk about acceptances has me pretty nervous that I haven't heard anything. It seems like most people on here are Ph.D applicants who had to apply before the end of last year, but I can't help but make the comparison when others are hearing back and I'm not. Ugh. It's killing me. 

Edited February 21, 2019 by vesperalvioletta

[Ubah1]

4 hours ago, HanZero said:

My first post here. I had been following what people were saying, and attempting to shore up my deflated morale. Applied to Princeton, Harvard, Brown, UPenn, Johns Hopkins SAIS, Michigan Ann Arbor, UVA and McGill in CP. Had written to POIs at these places and they had written back saying they thought the proposal was a good one. GRE was ok V:168,Q:163, AW: 4.5, one joint published paper, but no conference work. I did have 5 years of work experience relevant to the field I was proposing my topic in; some POIs even highlighted this point as a strong part of my application.

Two months of intense tension later, I have rejects from Princeton, Brown, Ann Arbor, UVA and possibly McGill. Any attempt to email said POIs is returned by a ‘sorry we had too many applicants’ rather than how to improve the application. I am expecting rejections from the last three as well, Harvard was a bit of a stretch in any case. 

Thanks a lot to people like Tedmonkey, for putting out how to try and get back at this application process. I’m at a total loss right now, after having put in almost 8 months of concerted effort building every part of the application. I don’t know, at this point, what I can do to make it better...

In any case, if there are people like me here, who got wiped out this application cycle, and who are trying to get back on the application cycle, maybe we could create a separate thread and support each other over the next year, which I have all reason to believe, will be brutal.

 

What program did you apply to and what is your GPA?

[OmniscienceQuest]

1 minute ago, vesperalvioletta said:

I'm starting to get pretty worried having not heard back from the school I applied to, and I can't tell if I'm being realistic stressing myself out over it. I'm an MA applicant and I applied to solely to my alma mater's English program. The application period closed on January 15, but seeing everyone here talk about acceptances has me pretty nervous that I haven't heard anything. It seems like most people on here are Ph.D applicants who had to apply before the end of last year, but I can't help but make the comparison when others are hearing back and I'm not. Ugh. It's killing me. 

I heard back from the master's program I ended up attending on March 15th exactly. I think they have a policy of releasing all results that day. Masters is very different from PhD (I'm also a bit puzzled why you posted this in Political Science?)... In any case you shouldn't expect to hear an answer until March 15th and possibly not a day before, depending on the school. Best of luck

[CoffeeMonster0]

Has anyone else been admitted to a good school but have not yet received guaranteed funding?   Is that something to be concerned about at this point?  

[AndrewJake]

15 hours ago, morri081 said:

Have any of the Syracuse admits received their official letters yet?

I have not even gotten a decision...what program?

So it seems like everyone on here is pretty comfortable calling or emailing  the department their applying to  for updates as they wait?  I followed up once last month just to make sure my application was in order and haven't bothered them since.  Of course I want to scratch that itch, but also don't want to be a bother and at this point I can't see how it will have any impact on the outcome.

Good luck to all.

Edited February 21, 2019 by AndrewJake

[vesperalvioletta]

26 minutes ago, OmniscienceQuest said:

I heard back from the master's program I ended up attending on March 15th exactly. I think they have a policy of releasing all results that day. Masters is very different from PhD (I'm also a bit puzzled why you posted this in Political Science?)... In any case you shouldn't expect to hear an answer until March 15th and possibly not a day before, depending on the school. Best of luck

Oops, sorry about that. Ended up in the wrong thread by accident. Thank you for your advice though! ?

[HanZero]

52 minutes ago, Ubah1 said:

What program did you apply to and what is your GPA?

I applied to Political Science, Comparative. Undergrad GPA was 3.4, Grad GPA was 3.5 from MPA in a top policy school. With 5 years of relevant work experience.

 

[PBandMachiajelly]

Who else is sitting around wondering what's going on at Yale and Columbia?