NDSEG 2019-2020

[ndseg_to_1000]

4 minutes ago, cellbiogal said:

I don't have high hopes for today. Since they already blew past the April 15th deadline they no longer have incentive to release results by a certain date. I think we're probably looking at a Monday release, at the earliest. 

my only glimmer of hope is that they have incentive to get it out asap so that people with other awards don't just say fuck it and accept someone else's offer

[cellbiogal]

Just now, ndseg_to_1000 said:

my only glimmer of hope is that they have incentive to get it out asap so that people with other awards don't just say fuck it and accept someone else's offer

That's enough incentive for them to get it out eventually, but not enough incentive to release today vs Monday.

(I reallyyyyyyy want to be wrong, but with how many times this has been pushed back I don't think it's gonna happen today)

[theLongestLurker]

When do the NSF GRFP people need to accept the award by?

[imposterimposter]

3 minutes ago, ndseg_to_1000 said:

my only glimmer of hope is that they have incentive to get it out asap so that people with other awards don't just say fuck it and accept someone else's offer

See, as a member of the December Gang, my only glimmer of hope is that they delay for a month and everyone who gets it has already accepted another offer....maybe then the dishonorable mentions such as myself might find some success

[OhTheStress]

Just now, cellbiogal said:

That's enough incentive for them to get it out eventually, but not enough incentive to release today vs Monday.

(I reallyyyyyyy want to be wrong, but with how many times this has been pushed back I don't think it's gonna happen today)

I'm with you on this - I'm kind of running low on hope that they'll tell us soon.  Admittedly, if it pushes people to commit to the GRFP or some other fellowship before hearing about this, that's good for those of us who didn't get the GRFP, and doesn't really hurt people who did - both are well-paying, prestigious fellowships.

[FormerNdsegLurker]

If they have until April 30th to meet the "April 2020" deadline I feel like we're not getting notified anytime soon... please let me be wrong though

[OhTheStress]

I just got an email and the subject line started with "Accepted".  I had a glorious nanosecond of hope, crushed by the immediate realization that it was just a meeting acceptance from my colleague in Saudi Arabia.

[cellbiogal]

3 minutes ago, OhTheStress said:

I'm with you on this - I'm kind of running low on hope that they'll tell us soon.  Admittedly, if it pushes people to commit to the GRFP or some other fellowship before hearing about this, that's good for those of us who didn't get the GRFP, and doesn't really hurt people who did - both are well-paying, prestigious fellowships.

That's my hope too. And based off of GradCafe results from previous years, a relatively high number of people move off the waitlist and receive the award (and that's when the NDSEG results are actually released in a timely fashion).

[vpaglioni3]

3 minutes ago, OhTheStress said:

I just got an email and the subject line started with "Accepted".  I had a glorious nanosecond of hope, crushed by the immediate realization that it was just a meeting acceptance from my colleague in Saudi Arabia.

same situation here haha, just got an email from a Conference accepting my paper and it got me excited for a second.

The wait continues

[somethingsimple]

34 minutes ago, vpaglioni3 said:

I emailed the generic contact email given on the website about an hour ago - I'll report back when I hear anything

I'm surprised he hasn't responded yet. Rob responded in a couple minutes to me yesterday. Maybe that means he's busy, with dare I say, releasing the results. One can hope.

Edited April 17, 2020 by somethingsimple

[SomGuy13]

Given the way the application has gone, I wonder if those accepted are able to get some kind of assurance, contractual or otherwise, that they will actually receive the promised funds in timely manner? Were I to get offered the fellowship, I would definitely be looking into this and requesting some type of assurance from the DoD and/or sysplus.

[vpaglioni3]

God hath spoken

 

Edited April 17, 2020 by vpaglioni3

[justanothergradstudent]

Just now, vpaglioni3 said:

The gods have spoken

 

lol its not gonna be today

[vpaglioni3]

Just now, justanothergradstudent said:

lol its not gonna be today

That's what I read, yeah. Sucks to be us I guess.

[cellbiogal]

Just now, vpaglioni3 said:

That's what I read, yeah. Sucks to be us I guess.

1 minute ago, justanothergradstudent said:

lol its not gonna be today

Nope. See y'all again on Monday.

Edited April 17, 2020 by cellbiogal

[thel]

Just now, vpaglioni3 said:

God hath spoken

 

You can tell that he has also given up hope on the process.

Honestly though, what kind of technical issues could actually be holding the process up? I mean at this rate they could just fax the applications back and forth and it would be faster...

[OhTheStress]

2 minutes ago, SomGuy13 said:

Given the way the application has gone, I wonder if those accepted are able to get some kind of assurance, contractual or otherwise, that they will actually receive the promised funds in timely manner? Were I to get offered the fellowship, I would definitely be looking into this and requesting some type of assurance from the DoD and/or sysplus.

Speaking from experience with SysPlus (the administer the SFFP program as well, which I've worked on) - they do pay on time and accurately.  I never had any problems with that.  They have other problems, sure (although here it sounds like it's not necessarily entirely on them), but their payroll department seemed to have their shit together pretty well.

[OhTheStress]

Just now, thel said:

You can tell that he has also given up hope on the process.

Honestly though, what kind of technical issues could actually be holding the process up? I mean at this rate they could just fax the applications back and forth and it would be faster...

Poor Rob.  I really do think he deserves a huge round of applause and some kind of thank-you gift for putting up with our crap and the DoD's crap.

 

Does anyone still have fax machines anymore?  My old job had one and the only thing it was ever used for was getting fax spam (which is apparently a thing).

[somethingsimple]

9 minutes ago, thel said:

You can tell that he has also given up hope on the process.

Honestly though, what kind of technical issues could actually be holding the process up? I mean at this rate they could just fax the applications back and forth and it would be faster...

Maybe it's a VPN service or some other issue that is preventing them from accessing their systems remotely? I think that's conceivable and something that the individual NDSEG offices wouldn't be able to control. Given that it's the DoD, I would imagine they need a lot of special permissions to work from home, but I'm not a computer person with no real government experience so that's purely my speculation.

Edited April 17, 2020 by somethingsimple

[robertac93]

1 minute ago, somethingsimple said:

Maybe it's a VPN service or some other issue that is preventing them from accessing their systems remotely? I think that's conceivable and something that the individual NDSEG offices wouldn't be able to control. Given that it's the DoD, I would imagine they need a lot of special permissions to work from home, but I'm not a computer person with no government experience so that's purely my speculation.

Really just depends on what type of system you're working on. Most of their employees (should) have their a regular laptop they can take home.

None of this is classified, so they wouldn't need to be using the classified networks (which are the computer systems that obviously cannot go home).

[somethingsimple]

Just now, robertac93 said:

Really just depends on what type of system you're working on. Most of their employees (should) have their a regular laptop they can take home.

None of this is classified, so they wouldn't need to be using the classified networks (which are the computer systems that obviously cannot go home).

I am affiliated with a national lab and what we do definitely isn't classified but we do require VPNs to access a lot of our systems/databases. The databases/systems are often plagued with bugs too so honestly either access issue is probable to me.

[vpaglioni3]

1 minute ago, OhTheStress said:

Does anyone still have fax machines anymore?  My old job had one and the only thing it was ever used for was getting fax spam (which is apparently a thing).

We used to fax stuff all the time (naval shipyard) - it was kind of weird. I expect the rest of the DoD still uses faxes too (probably not a lot though)

One time a new engineer got ribbed hard for faxing a blank sheet. He had never used a fax machine before and put the pages in upside down lol

Just now, robertac93 said:

Really just depends on what type of system you're working on. Most of their employees (should) have their a regular laptop they can take home.

None of this is classified, so they wouldn't need to be using the classified networks (which are the computer systems that obviously cannot go home).

We had a LOT of trouble getting passes to work remotely, even on unclass "low-side" work. So unfortunately even low-side, completely unclassified stuff like our applications may be difficult to access if their offices don't have established remote work procedures/capabilities. 

[robertac93]

1 minute ago, vpaglioni3 said:

We used to fax stuff all the time (naval shipyard) - it was kind of weird. I expect the rest of the DoD still uses faxes too (probably not a lot though)

One time a new engineer got ribbed hard for faxing a blank sheet. He had never used a fax machine before and put the pages in upside down lol

We had a LOT of trouble getting passes to work remotely, even on unclass "low-side" work. So unfortunately even low-side, completely unclassified stuff like our applications may be difficult to access if their offices don't have established remote work procedures/capabilities. 

Oh yeah, I just meant they wouldn't necessarily require special permissions, it's just more likely that their VPN system isn't up to snuff.

[robertac93]

4 minutes ago, somethingsimple said:

The databases/systems are often plagued with bugs too so honestly either access issue is probable to me.

This! I never had a single issue on our classified network, but my goodness. WFH one day and you want to remote in? Have fun with the VPN...

[SomGuy13]

6 minutes ago, robertac93 said:

Really just depends on what type of system you're working on. Most of their employees (should) have their a regular laptop they can take home.

None of this is classified, so they wouldn't need to be using the classified networks (which are the computer systems that obviously cannot go home).

Yeah actually this does tend to be an issue in DoD labs. You often require a lot of administrative approval to start working from home, and in the lab I worked in there were lots of people who simply did not. There is also rarely much budget for admin staff (part-time contractors who are not incentivized to work efficiently), so getting these approvals for remote access to your (unclassified) work can take a long time. 

However, given that the pandemic started a while before the deadline, I cannot imagine this issue would have been difficult to solve in some way before April 15...