Venting Thread - 2019 Applicants

[tuppert]

On 1/22/2020 at 8:20 AM, syn said:

Like music said, there's a few who will give acceptances out in late January, usually to those who they feel have a solid chance at a Fellowship. Most will be mid-February-ish.

Check out this sheet, on the 2020 Predictions tab there's a running list of predicted dates. Some of them are a little later than what I have down (for my schools, at least), but I think they're fairly good predictions: https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1yb_yciijFGEp5roVKYJ40U4eiREo3ZQTeSQkEjGMSsg/edit#gid=339976266 .

Hi all, just discovered these forums. I'm wondering if predictions for MA acceptance will be posted on the spreadsheet, or if they are just super variable from year to year? Also, I noticed that Catholic University is not on the list?

[Duns Eith]

13 hours ago, tuppert said:

Hi all, just discovered these forums. I'm wondering if predictions for MA acceptance will be posted on the spreadsheet, or if they are just super variable from year to year? Also, I noticed that Catholic University is not on the list?

The way it usually goes is that people report information about the universities that they are interested in. So, if CUA is not on the list, feel free to add the info, so we can continue to pool data!

[tuppert]

5 hours ago, Duns Eith said:

The way it usually goes is that people report information about the universities that they are interested in. So, if CUA is not on the list, feel free to add the info, so we can continue to pool data!

Ohh I see--as a passive seeker of information, I was hoping that the spreadsheet was some sort of monolithic external authority...but I might be compelled to fill in some of those slots anyways. Thanks for clarifying!

edit: also, I love your signature! always good to see my manz Aristotle on the internet

Edited January 26, 2020 by tuppert
noticed user's signature

[Moose#@1%$]

On 1/22/2020 at 11:21 AM, Coconuts&Chloroform said:

Anybody interested in exchanging samples, mainly just for reassurance? I'm at the point now where I see nothing but the flaws of my paper, and I no longer believe the people who told me it was good (I'm not sure that my advisor really did anything more than skim my most recent draft...). If anyone else is feeling similarly, it might be nice to exchange our papers and get some feedback from a fresh, unbiased, anonymous source.

Whats the topic of the paper? I don't have anything to exchange (already in PhD program), but I have a light work load this semester so I could look at it for you.

[Coconuts&Chloroform]

4 hours ago, Moose#@1%$ said:

Whats the topic of the paper? I don't have anything to exchange (already in PhD program), but I have a light work load this semester so I could look at it for you.

Cool, I'm always happy to have more feedback. Thanks for offering some of your time. 

It's in the philosophy of cognitive science. PM me for details.

[musicdegree4me]

22 hours ago, Moose#@1%$ said:

Whats the topic of the paper? I don't have anything to exchange (already in PhD program), but I have a light work load this semester so I could look at it for you.

Can I get in on this?

[Coconuts&Chloroform]

Given that only three people have posted acceptances by Berkeley, and that they all claim to have gotten called yesterday (the 28th), do you think it's reasonable to presume that another round of acceptances will come out? 

Edited January 30, 2020 by Coconuts&Chloroform

[Estudiante Graduado]

8 minutes ago, Coconuts&Chloroform said:

Given that only three people have posted acceptances by Berkeley, and that they all claim to have gotten called yesterday (the 28th), do you think it's reasonable to presume that another round of acceptances will come out? 

I sure hope so.

[Coconuts&Chloroform]

Okay, here's some cryptic stuff from Berkeley:

Checking the portal, I now notice that the mysterious expression 'Grad 20', which did not appear on my portal until just a few hours ago, is now all over my portal page. See the attached images. What could this mean? Am I 20th on some list? Does this just mean that I applied for acceptance in '20? If you applied to Berkley, it might be worth taking a look at yours to see if anything has changed.

 

 

[ericanei]

19 minutes ago, Coconuts&Chloroform said:

Okay, here's some cryptic stuff from Berkeley:

Checking the portal, I now notice that the mysterious expression 'Grad 20', which did not appear on my portal until just a few hours ago, is now all over my portal page. See the attached images. What could this mean? Am I 20th on some list? Does this just mean that I applied for acceptance in '20? If you applied to Berkley, it might be worth taking a look at yours to see if anything has changed.

haha I have this too dw dw. Must just be a reference to the F20 application season ^.^ 

I don't mean to speculate, but only logistical decisions are pending I think?

Edited January 30, 2020 by ericanei

[Coconuts&Chloroform]

2 minutes ago, ericanei said:

haha I have this too dw dw. Must just be a reference to the F20 application season ^.^ 

I don't mean to speculate, but only logistical decisions are pending I think?

Cool. So clearly they are actively doing something...

What do you mean by 'logistical'?

[ericanei]

6 minutes ago, Coconuts&Chloroform said:

What do you mean by 'logistical'?

A half thought I had was that maybe they have their decisions ready to publish on the website, but are waiting on candidate-specific details like funding etc.

[Coconuts&Chloroform]

6 minutes ago, ericanei said:

A half thought I had was that maybe they have their decisions ready to publish on the website, but are waiting on candidate-specific details like funding etc.

Yeah, that would make sense. Or perhaps they have decided on the candidates that they all agree on, and are now horse-trading over the rest.

[energeia11235]

10 minutes ago, Coconuts&Chloroform said:

Yeah, that would make sense. Or perhaps they have decided on the candidates that they all agree on, and are now horse-trading over the rest.

I hope you're right that there's still a chance, but I kinda doubt that they would send out acceptances if they hadn't figured out exactly who they were accepting (so as to ensure a balanced set of subfields, for example).

Also, they probably only accepted 5-10 people. Hearing from 3 of those 5-10 seems like a pretty decent number (the rest might be too shy/too excited to post or unaware of these sites or something).

Anyway, I have the "Grad 20" too—so let's hope that we get some resolution soon. (Best of luck.)

[Coconuts&Chloroform]

6 minutes ago, energeia11235 said:

I hope you're right that there's still a chance, but I kinda doubt that they would send out acceptances if they hadn't figured out exactly who they were accepting (so as to ensure a balanced set of subfields, for example).

Also, they probably only accepted 5-10 people. Hearing from 3 of those 5-10 seems like a pretty decent number (the rest might be too shy/too excited to post or unaware of these sites or something).

Anyway, I have the "Grad 20" too—so let's hope that we get some resolution soon. (Best of luck.)

We have no way of knowing either way. One thing that this makes me wonder is what percentage of applicants post their results to the gradcafe. If it's 30%, then the rest of us are probably out of luck. But if, as I suspect, most of us post them, then our chances may be better. Who knows?

[GeorgiaTechPhd]

11 minutes ago, energeia11235 said:

I hope you're right that there's still a chance, but I kinda doubt that they would send out acceptances if they hadn't figured out exactly who they were accepting (so as to ensure a balanced set of subfields, for example).

Also, they probably only accepted 5-10 people. Hearing from 3 of those 5-10 seems like a pretty decent number (the rest might be too shy/too excited to post or unaware of these sites or something).

Anyway, I have the "Grad 20" too—so let's hope that we get some resolution soon. (Best of luck.)

Just so you know, different schools have very different processes, and a lot of schools send out their decisions (even acceptances) on a rolling basis. In fact, in some cases they even have a pipeline so that all decisions that are made in a given week will be sent out at the end of the week (i.e. Friday). I know that's how Georgia Tech did their PhD admits last year. So just because some people have heard but you haven't doesn't necessarily mean that it's a bad news. 

Just hang out there, and best of luck.  

[energeia11235]

Just now, Coconuts&Chloroform said:

We have no way of knowing either way. One thing that this makes me wonder is what percentage of applicants post their results to the gradcafe. If it's 30%, then the rest of us are probably out of luck. But if, as I suspect, most of us post them, then our chances may be better. Who knows?

True—we have no clue whatsoever (ah, the uncertainty!). I'd also be curious to know what percentage of applicants tend to post their results...

2 minutes ago, GeorgiaTechPhd said:

Just so you know, different schools have very different processes, and a lot of schools send out their decisions (even acceptances) on a rolling basis. In fact, in some cases they even have a pipeline so that all decisions that are made in a given week will be sent out at the end of the week (i.e. Friday). I know that's how Georgia Tech did their PhD admits last year. So just because some people have heard but you haven't doesn't necessarily mean that it's a bad news. 

Just hang out there, and best of luck.  

Thanks for the well-wishes (and the concrete example of a decision process that's not just all-at-once). Hope your first year is going well!

[Coconuts&Chloroform]

I've been having a pretty rough go of it for the past week or so, checking my app portals religiously, posting here on the gradcafe far more often than I ought to, and generally stressing out about these applications. I seem to vacillate between total overconfidence ("What grounds could any program possibly have for rejecting me? I've got a 4.0, a 170 verbal, letters from preeminent philosophers, my writing sample is the best thing since the Tractatus! I'm going 12/0/0", etc.) and total despair ("I absolutely tanked the writing sample; paragraphs such-and-such and such-and-such are unclear, the introduction is too long, the conclusion is corny, I should have cited this paper and that paper, nobody even cares about my topic. I'm going 0/0/12 and I better accept it", etc.). It's all unhealthy.

Coursework doesn't really help except as a distraction - I'm taking one course that has nothing to do with any of my AOIs, and another in an area that I already know like the back of my hand from multiple courses in undergrad. Once I put my work away my post-application insanity remains intact, and it's hard to get excited about my courses when everything seems to pale in importance by comparison with the great verdict on my philosophical ability that the infallible arbiters at twelve PGR-ranked programs are about to deliver. 

I've tried playing video games to distract myself, but this seems such a obviously trivial pursuit that I can't enjoy it, even when playing games that I've enjoyed in the past. 

But, quite surprisingly, the one thing that has worked to restore my sanity is doing philosophy. Since this afternoon, I've been editing my sample, trying to strengthen its weaknesses not for applications but until I'm happy with it as a paper. I'm re-writing an old term paper, thinking about new ways to make the argument and considering new objections that I might have to respond to. I've been doing independent reading - which I used to do like a maniac in my undergraduate days, back when I was single and under 21 and had nothing else to do - reading some monographs in phil mind that I've had on my bookshelf for years but whose contents I haven't really read past the introductions. 

I don't know why it helps to do philosophy, but it does. Perhaps doing independent work like this, with no deadline and no real stakes, allows me to enjoy philosophy without the attendant stresses of having to keep up with a syllabus or wait for my work to be evaluated by my professors or by adcoms. Or perhaps strengthening myself as a philosopher by editing my work and reading new material helps me to feel more confident in my abilities, and relieve the feelings of self-doubt that inevitably come with the application process. Perhaps it's even that feature of philosophy that I used to find so appealing before I began to think of philosophy as a profession and a career, with which philosophy has been associated since antiquity: philosophical repose; the coolheaded sense of being aloof from worldly concerns that comes from sustained contemplation of philosophical material. Or maybe it's just being off my desk and back in my dear friend the armchair. Whatever it is, it's worked for me. I've checked my portals and my email only once over the past twelve hours, and that's saying a lot. 

So, if you're feeling stressed, overwhelmed, or obsessive about your applications, give it a try. Turn off your phone and computer, grab that one book or article you've been meaning to read for months, or print out some of your old term papers and give yourself some comments. See how it makes you feel. It's helped me go from a chain-smoking nervous wreck to being myself again for the first time since December thirty-first.

 

Edited January 30, 2020 by Coconuts&Chloroform

[musicdegree4me]

Coco - I should wager that channeling your energy into something positive is likely the best thing you can do at this point; ergo rewriting your paper as you are, is probably the best use of your time. So bravo for that. Perhaps you might also make a short term goal; maybe go to the gym each day from now until March 9th or learn the basics of a new language, etc. Personally, I've committed to reading one interesting paper per day (I am currently reading a paper on teleosemantics). I've also enjoyed reading and critiquing the samples and SOP's of other applicants to get a sense of who people are and what type of philosophy they are interested in; bonding together while we go through the agony of waiting and also further developing my own skills as a reader of philosophy while gaining the benefit of networking and community building with my peers. None of this solves the ultimate problem - I am going to be sitting around increasingly anxious over the next month while I await a response from the only programme I really wish to attend. But, we all do the best we can and it should help to know you're not alone. 

Also, it sounds a bit trite, but there is something to be said for the anxiety. The thrill of triumph is arguably enhanced when it's on the other side of struggle and pain. 

Finally, I am familiar with your application and I would suggest that you will place in at least 2 or 3 of your choices and as they are all top programs even one placement would be fantastic. And, when in doubt, keep venting here - it's largely what this forum is for. 

Edited January 30, 2020 by musicdegree4me

[Coconuts&Chloroform]

6 hours ago, musicdegree4me said:

Coco - I should wager that channeling your energy into something positive is likely the best thing you can do at this point; ergo rewriting your paper as you are, is probably the best use of your time. So bravo for that. Perhaps you might also make a short term goal; maybe go to the gym each day from now until March 9th or learn the basics of a new language, etc. Personally, I've committed to reading one interesting paper per day (I am currently reading a paper on teleosemantics). I've also enjoyed reading and critiquing the samples and SOP's of other applicants to get a sense of who people are and what type of philosophy they are interested in; bonding together while we go through the agony of waiting and also further developing my own skills as a reader of philosophy while gaining the benefit of networking and community building with my peers. None of this solves the ultimate problem - I am going to be sitting around increasingly anxious over the next month while I await a response from the only programme I really wish to attend. But, we all do the best we can and it should help to know you're not alone. 

Also, it sounds a bit trite, but there is something to be said for the anxiety. The thrill of triumph is arguably enhanced when it's on the other side of struggle and pain. 

Finally, I am familiar with your application and I would suggest that you will place in at least 2 or 3 of your choices and as they are all top programs even one placement would be fantastic. And, when in doubt, keep venting here - it's largely what this forum is for. 

Thanks, musicdegree4me. You've been real cool to talk to throughout all this and I'm glad we got in touch on here. The 'programme' (why do you spell it that way if you're in Los Angeles? ?) will work out for you, I'm sure of it.

I'm with you about the agony of the struggle contributing to the glory of victory etc... but all that is in retrospect, and we're not in retrospect yet.

Other news: according to the relevant people on facebook, the acceptances given over the phone by Berkeley the other day were early and unofficial. It's possible that there is just one PoI who is letting his/her applicants of interest know earlier than the others. Or that the people notified are on a shortlist while other acceptances are decided. So for anyone else waiting on Berkeley, I wouldn't worry about not having heard yet.

[sisyphushappy]

Anyone else sweating over Northwestern? It seems like they haven’t sent decisions to anyone yet, but my last three days have been spent religiously checking the portal.

[musicdegree4me]

I switch back and forth between program and programme depending on the referent. I am waiting to hear back from my programmes in the UK and you’re waiting to hear back from your programs in the US. Similarly, my dissertation proposal is on moral “judgement”. 

 

[energeia11235]

14 hours ago, Coconuts&Chloroform said:

Other news: according to the relevant people on facebook, the acceptances given over the phone by Berkeley the other day were early and unofficial. It's possible that there is just one PoI who is letting his/her applicants of interest know earlier than the others. Or that the people notified are on a shortlist while other acceptances are decided. So for anyone else waiting on Berkeley, I wouldn't worry about not having heard yet.

Thanks for the info—another possibility (just to add to the list): they're the ones being nominated for university-wide fellowships (I assume the departments have to figure out that sort of thing by a certain date whereas they have more leeway otherwise).

[modals]

sending out ~good vibes~ as anxiety levels ramp up!

did anyone’s you.usc portal go blank for a while a few days back?

 

[Coconuts&Chloroform]

This is not really venting, more gloating (though I don't intend it that way), but I just received a personal email from a major POI (one of my favorite philosophers, really) at UMD telling me how much he liked my sample. Someone whose opinion I respect very much, and who works directly on the subject on which I wrote my sample. And this after spending the last two weeks convincing myself that the sample was a complete pile of junk.

So be aware that whatever anxieties about the strength of your application that you have developed during the waiting period are probably irrational. You're better than you think you are.