2020-2021 Application Thread

[NeedaMormon]

26 minutes ago, Mad Scientist Malfrost said:

As someone who has taken programs or learned both R and Stata I can say I prefer R over Stata nine times out of ten! Can't say I've ever worked with LateX but in general improving your coding in any language is a super good idea. 

For people who aren't proficient in LaTeX, I learned how to make my CV using LaTeX and that helped me out a lot.

- LaTeX CV Tutorial (Overleaf has a great amount of tutorials for learning LaTeX. I'm not a fan of using LaTex on their website though but that's a personal preference.)

For the departments that I've talked to it appears that R is the main statistical software used now. Especially for younger professors. There are some people using Python and other software languages but those are more niche.

For R here's some resources for people who want to learn certain skills:

- Blogdown (This is R adajcent, but if you want to create a website to show off projects you worked on this is fantastic.)

- TidyTuesday (Data Visualization. They put out datasets and it gives you opportunities to try and visualize the data in fun ways.)

- swirl (Basic R tutorials within R. It's a great way to start learning the program.)

- R for Data Science (Great supplement to learn R. Focuses on a package group called "tidyverse" and skills in that are very helpful.)

There's also a number of good books about R that are more focused on social sciences. Some of those include:

- Quantitative Social Science - Kosuke Imai

- R for Political Science: A Practical Guide - Francisco Urdinez, Andres Cruz

- Political Analysis Using R (Use R!) - James E. Monogan III

I think a final note on learning R is find a niche! Think of R as the Mariana Trench. R is DEEP. And there are a crazy amount of parts within R you can explore. But pick one thing and learn it very well. Then branch out to other parts of R. Having a strong foundation in one part of R can be helpful in learning adjacent things.

@timeseries If you have anything to add about learning R/LaTeX that I am missing please add it.

Edited February 9, 2021 by NeedaMormon

[Dwar]

For those who want to learn how to use LateX, I strongly suggest looking into Overleaf. It was how I learned how to use it and it's a great way to use LateX, while still having some semblance of an UI. 

[suovren]

5 minutes ago, NeedaMormon said:

For people who aren't proficient in LaTeX, I learned how to make my CV using LaTeX and that helped me out a lot. I'll see if I can find a link to the tutorial I used.

For the departments that I've talked to it appears that R is the main statistical software used now. Especially for younger professors. There are some people using Python and other software languages but those are more niche.

For R here's some resources for people who want to learn certain skills:

- Blogdown (This is R adajcent, but if you want to create a website to show off projects you worked on this is fantastic.)

-  TidyTuesday (Data Visualization. They put out datasets and it gives you opportunities to try and visualize the data in fun ways.)

- swirl (Basic R tutorials within R. It's a great way to start learning the program.)

- R for Data Science (Great supplement to learn R. Focuses on a package group called "tidyverse" and skills in that are very helpful.)

There's also a number of good books about R that are more focused on social sciences. Some of those include:

- Quantitative Social Science - Kosuke Imai

- R for Political Science: A Practical Guide - Francisco Urdinez, Andres Cruz

- Political Analysis Using R (Use R!) - James E. Monogan III

 

Kosuke Imai's book has really helped me. It has a lot of good exercises and starts from the basics. Good for self-study. 

Edited February 9, 2021 by suovren

[icemanyeo]

If anyone is comfortable moving outside the US/CA/EU spectrum, I wanted to recommend the master's degrees in IR/GA/PS offered at some top Korean universities. Most of their applications have yet to open for Fall 2021 and they offer generous scholarships to international students. 

[cbsag123]

So it appears as though MIT released acceptances and rejections over the course of two days in previous years, or at least that's when people posted them on the forum. Is there still hope to get an acceptance later today or tomorrow?

[polisci_gal]

9 minutes ago, cbsag123 said:

So it appears as though MIT released acceptances and rejections over the course of two days in previous years, or at least that's when people posted them on the forum. Is there still hope to get an acceptance later today or tomorrow?

I would say there is still hope. This year is very unusual! (and by that I mean, very different than previous years)

Edited February 9, 2021 by polisci_gal

[mmads]

43 minutes ago, Mad Scientist Malfrost said:

As someone who has taken programs or learned both R and Stata I can say I prefer R over Stata nine times out of ten! Can't say I've ever worked with LateX but in general improving your coding in any language is a super good idea. 

Another vote for R. It's also free, so huge plus (in my opinion).

[poliscihopeful2021]

So Michigan, Chicago, Berkeley and MIT have all released acceptances? No MIT claims here in the forum yet. Haven't seen any Michigan waitlists either.

[Habermas]

5 minutes ago, poliscihopeful2021 said:

So Michigan, Chicago, Berkeley and MIT have all released acceptances? No MIT claims here in the forum yet. Haven't seen any Michigan waitlists either.

Yeah, wondering about the Michigan waitlist too...

[gradpumpkin]

29 minutes ago, NeedaMormon said:

For people who aren't proficient in LaTeX, I learned how to make my CV using LaTeX and that helped me out a lot.

- LaTeX CV Tutorial (Overleaf has a great amount of tutorials for learning LaTeX. I'm not a fan of using LaTex on their website though but that's a personal preference.)

For the departments that I've talked to it appears that R is the main statistical software used now. Especially for younger professors. There are some people using Python and other software languages but those are more niche.

For R here's some resources for people who want to learn certain skills:

- Blogdown (This is R adajcent, but if you want to create a website to show off projects you worked on this is fantastic.)

- TidyTuesday (Data Visualization. They put out datasets and it gives you opportunities to try and visualize the data in fun ways.)

- swirl (Basic R tutorials within R. It's a great way to start learning the program.)

- R for Data Science (Great supplement to learn R. Focuses on a package group called "tidyverse" and skills in that are very helpful.)

There's also a number of good books about R that are more focused on social sciences. Some of those include:

- Quantitative Social Science - Kosuke Imai

- R for Political Science: A Practical Guide - Francisco Urdinez, Andres Cruz

- Political Analysis Using R (Use R!) - James E. Monogan III

I think a final note on learning R is find a niche! Think of R as the Mariana Trench. R is DEEP. And there are a crazy amount of parts within R you can explore. But pick one thing and learn it very well. Then branch out to other parts of R. Having a strong foundation in one part of R can be helpful in learning adjacent things.

@timeseries If you have anything to add about learning R/LaTeX that I am missing please add it.

Thank you SO much for this- it's exactly what I've been looking for! For those recommending the Imai and Urdinez/Cruz books, would you say they're worth the $50/$100ish price tag? And which would be better for people starting as beginners? 

[smug-face]

I'm still holding out some hope for Berkeley given that a lot fewer acceptances have been claimed on the results page than in previous years! Hope dies last

[gbheron]

Wait so are those MIT acceptances real? Is anyone claiming?

[icemanyeo]

Just received an email from the Student Affairs Administrator at Chicago, my application was forwarded to MAPSS instead of CIR!

[brickinthewall]

29 minutes ago, gradpumpkin said:

For those recommending the Imai and Urdinez/Cruz books, would you say they're worth the $50/$100ish price tag? And which would be better for people starting as beginners? 

I haven't used Urdinez/Cruz, but Imai is great and I found it has a solid explanation of the statistical intuition in addition to the programming basics. It was definitely worth it for me.

 

Also, another resource in addition to the great list from @NeedaMormon is Happy Git and GitHub for the useR - a useful guide to setting up version control in R with Git/Github 

[MEESASOBOREDSA]

Hello everyone. I cannot understand the rationale behind sending acceptances or rejections in different times... I am still waiting for Indiana Bloomington and I saw that many people already got their results. ?

[Mad Scientist Malfrost]

1 hour ago, icemanyeo said:

If anyone is comfortable moving outside the US/CA/EU spectrum, I wanted to recommend the master's degrees in IR/GA/PS offered at some top Korean universities. Most of their applications have yet to open for Fall 2021 and they offer generous scholarships to international students. 

Which universities would you recommend off the top of your head?

[iamlia]

1 hour ago, btermite said:

Did anyone here happen to also apply to the Social Policy PhD joint degree program at Harvard?

I applied as a total crap shoot, but it seems like such a cool program I figured why not.

Me! It was also a really long shot for me I think, but it really seems like an amazing program, so I thought the same. Fingers crossed and good luck!!!!

[icemanyeo]

4 minutes ago, Mad Scientist Malfrost said:

Which universities would you recommend off the top of your head?

Korea University and Yonsei are two universities that come to mind. I would also recommend Peking and Tsinghua in China.

Edited February 9, 2021 by icemanyeo

[FuyuhikoSomeno]

Re the disputed MIT acceptances: according to the results page, the department released acceptances and rejections simultaneously via email in the past few years.

[spotted]

Just now, drmantol said:

Re the disputed MIT acceptances: according to the results page, the department released acceptances and rejections simultaneously via email in the past few years.

so... trolls?

[comradecommissar]

Just now, spotted said:

so... trolls?

Thats just sick if true. Trying to troll pol sci applicants is such a weird niche when it comes to trolling. 

[icemanyeo]

I've previously seen people on twitter post about trolling the gradcafe results page for political science.

[Mad Scientist Malfrost]

2 minutes ago, icemanyeo said:

Korea University and Yonsei are two universities that come to mind. I would also recommend Peking and Tsinghua in China.

I'll look into those, thank you! I lived in Seoul for a number of years as a small child because of my father's work and remember enjoying my time there immensely. 

[spotted]

Just now, icemanyeo said:

I've previously seen people on twitter post about trolling the gradcafe results page for political science.

Thats so odd, yet i guess thats confirmation that it actually is a real thing lol
(also a friend of mine very into korean media just got me to start watching Start Up so im glad to finally understand the gif in your signature!)

[Polysciapplicant21]

2 minutes ago, spotted said:

Thats so odd, yet i guess thats confirmation that it actually is a real thing lol
(also a friend of mine very into korean media just got me to start watching Start Up so im glad to finally understand the gif in your signature!)

Honestly, reading the comments on the acceptances today makes me feel like they’re fake. They’re all like “wow wasn’t expecting this! It was my reach school!” which is normal on a forum but super odd on a results page...