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Theories on How Grad Committees Decide?


nina gorman

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Hello companeros,

In the poli sci forum, a couple of the posters came up with the theory of the crapshoot to explain how grad committees select the accepted, (a crapshoot albeit with some players possessing more strengths over others). I proposed a derivative of Marxian theory to partly explain the crapshoot phenomenon ,i.e., that the variable of increasing competition in academia combines with grad committee selection criteria in order of this priority: 1) research interests matching those of the committe and dept. power holders 2) availability of funding specific to certain applicants (e.g. U of Az dept I applied two took 8 of 70, half of which about are funded with grants specific to Native Americans, if they follow last year's protocol- and I am both pro affirmative action and pro quota ) 3) references on and off the record, especially iinternal 3) GRE scores (Is 800 better than 790? ) 4) grades (Is 4.0 really better than 3.93? ) and random factors (e.g. does the applicant like hats or look good in them?).

Any other theories? Points for originality. Nina aka gurley flynn

P.S. a little edgy - rejected today by fU of Md soc, first preference, 2 down and 1 to go

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I'll be the predictable one and say that it varies from program to program, school to school, etc. However, that aside, I think its fun to toy around with the notion of which entity of your application bears the most weight. I think for universities with a stronger emphasis on research among faculty then I believe the need to demonstrate your research capabilities should be superlative. For smaller, more intimate universities that are emphatic on teaching and community, background information and diversity will come in to play.

These are simply suppositions but like I said, its fun to entertain the idea of how they decide, especially when waiting on 6 schools for 3 months :shock:

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Interesting reply. I wonder if that means that those of us with limited research backgrounds but research aspirations should aim for those schools somewhere between the prestigious research ones and the smaller teaching community based ones. Are there many of these left? nina

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e.g. U of Az dept I applied two took 8 of 70, half of which about are funded with grants specific to Native Americans, if they follow last year's protocol- and I am both pro affirmative action and pro quota

It's always good to find new ways of supporting racism!

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How is that supporting racism? I was just saying that programs have to work within their particular funding constraints, whether they be based on particular research grants or particular demographics. You are reading into it too much. Are you pro-affirmative action/ quota for underprivileged groups? i am proud to say I am, but sad to say I am a minority for my predominately anglo heritage. My great grandmother was Lenape Native American and my son's grandfather was full blodded Lakota. and I am in favor of Native American scholarships and am glad U of AZ has them despite my rejection from there. Where do you stand on this issue, that you are so quick to see racism with mention of this. Or do you fear stating your views? nina aka gurleyflynn

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I think they adapt the grading papers method by throwing the apps down a flight of stairs. Of course, even that isn't predictable. Some departments accept those at the top of the stairs, reject the bottom of the stairs, and waitlist the ones in between. Some departments reverse it and accept the ones at the bottom of the stairs. Some switch off year to year. It's well-guarded secret which method each program uses, though.

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How is that supporting racism? I was just saying that programs have to work within their particular funding constraints, whether they be based on particular research grants or particular demographics. You are reading into it too much. Are you pro-affirmative action/ quota for underprivileged groups? i am proud to say I am, but sad to say I am a minority for my predominately anglo heritage. My great grandmother was Lenape Native American and my son's grandfather was full blodded Lakota. and I am in favor of Native American scholarships and am glad U of AZ has them despite my rejection from there. Where do you stand on this issue, that you are so quick to see racism with mention of this. Or do you fear stating your views? nina aka gurleyflynn

Sorry, I was making an Affirmative Action joke, which I think is a method of fighting past racism through current racism, which cannot be helpful to society in the long run. The idea that people should be given or denied jobs (or spots in grad programs) based on their race is one of the problems that caused some groups of people to be in worse situations than they should be. I don't see the logic in fighting an evil against one group through the use of that same evil against another group.

Again, offering scholarships based on race is a tricky issue, and needs to be examined. Especially after that fiasco in Michigan, where a student group was disbanded and disciplined for forming a scholarship for white students.

All I am saying is that equality is what we should be striving for. That's not what we have now, when we examine the current policies and practices in academia.

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I'm sorry too for being rather defensive. It seems as if you are saying that you believe that any quota based affirmative action plans or set asides for historically underprivileged groups are really a form of reverse racism? and thus really are being inegalitarian or unfair? If we look at the legal changes since the Bakke decision (late seventies was it?, the trend has been for courts to rule in agreement with this view.

Personally, I would agree with banning white power groups, of which I think I would include a white scholarship group.

However, just like the current competition with jobs is linked with fear of immigration, so too in academia, it seems that the main problem is the lack of slots to go around. Thus, the upperdogs are less likely to want to share what little there is to go around. The refusal to give some kind of compensation or hand up to folks discriminated against historically though, seems to be like a race in which some of the runners get a head start (great schools, parents with more educaiton, in well connected good paying jobs) , while others have to carry large rocks as they run (e.g lousy educational systems, drug infested neighborhoods, racist employers, disrupted families etc). By not giving the underprivileged a break, isn't it like saying such a race is fair? If not set asides , what are the viable alternatives for academia to compensate for the unfair conditions of such a runners race on the historically screwed?

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I think that in the past, affirmative action would have made sense for various reasons.

Now I find, as Minnesotan suggested, that it is a sort of reverse discrimination. The most qualified applicant should be chosen - white, black, green, or purple. Unfortunately, life isn't fair to everyone - and it sucks sometimes. If someone is so determined to achieve something in life, they'll do it no matter what their circumstance or background (case in point, look at historical figures in the past, I shouldn't even have to name any). I come from a large family and had to pay (via loans) for my undergrad degree, and will be graduating $100,000+/- in debt because of it. As you can imagine, I wasn't exactly encouraged to go to graduate school because of that financial thorn in my side. However, I don't expect an adcom to sympathize with my situation- other kids have the debt plus other more serious problems, so I'm not suggesting that my situation is unique whatsoever. I am saying though that it's naive to think that given opportunity, every person will succeed. It's a nice thought, but when you get to the level of graduate (hell even undergraduate), applicants need to be looked at exclusive of their race or other hardship. I think I came to a different conclusion regarding a similar topic like this in another thread, but the more I think about it the more it really doesn't make sense to me.

I don't have anything against scholarhips aimed towards particular groups, because there is one out there for everyone (I get those annoying e-mails from fastweb so I can personally vouch for that). Like Minnesotan said though it's tricky as to how it started, why it's around, how it's being funded, etc., although I'm sure that events like those that happened in Michigan (which I am not familiar with) are few and far between.

We all run with 'rocks' of various sizes - that's just life, those who don't are simply lucky. I'm a moderate and extremely optimistic person, so don't let this post fool you! I don't mean to be pessimistic here, I just think that people need to earn an acceptance. And to get back to the point of the original post, I obviously don't think that race should have anything to do with any decision reached by a committee. (sorry to continue with the racism tangent, I just wanted to voice my opinion on the matter :) )

As for how decisions are reached...I just recalled the Coke commercial where it shows the strange process a bottle of coke goes through in the soda machine. That's pretty much what I imagine, although you are only adored by the strange creatures who live in the machine if you get acccepted, haha.

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I'm sorry too for being rather defensive. It seems as if you are saying that you believe that any quota based affirmative action plans or set asides for historically underprivileged groups are really a form of reverse racism? and thus really are being inegalitarian or unfair? If we look at the legal changes since the Bakke decision (late seventies was it?, the trend has been for courts to rule in agreement with this view.

Personally, I would agree with banning white power groups, of which I think I would include a white scholarship group.

However, just like the current competition with jobs is linked with fear of immigration, so too in academia, it seems that the main problem is the lack of slots to go around. Thus, the upperdogs are less likely to want to share what little there is to go around. The refusal to give some kind of compensation or hand up to folks discriminated against historically though, seems to be like a race in which some of the runners get a head start (great schools, parents with more educaiton, in well connected good paying jobs) , while others have to carry large rocks as they run (e.g lousy educational systems, drug infested neighborhoods, racist employers, disrupted families etc). By not giving the underprivileged a break, isn't it like saying such a race is fair? If not set asides , what are the viable alternatives for academia to compensate for the unfair conditions of such a runners race on the historically screwed?

While I see where you're coming from, I think the problem comes fundamentally in our very different ways of looking at the world. For instance, the idea of 'reverse racism' is a racist term, in my book. It implies that all cases of racism in the world have been perpetrated as a function of "white" vs. "other," and that suddenly in the last few years this situation emerged where white people (or some other "majority" group) can now be discriminated against. I don't think either situation is the case.

Moreover, to call a legitimate college political organization (I think it was the Young Republicans, or some such mainstream group, in the case of the Michigan scholarship) a white power organization is highly offensive. It implies that any attempt to make better the lives of white people is somehow targeting other races for hate crimes, or illegal discrimination. As it stands, private scholarship committees and philanthropic organizations have the right to hand funds to whomever they choose, based on whatever criteria they think fit. To say that scholarships for blacks, or oranges, or purples is okay, but scholarships for whites is not inclines me to think that racism is an issue, only it's what you would call "reverse racism."

Anyway, the reverse of racism is equity, which is what most people say they want. To mandate that the American public makes up for historical wrongs, no matter how we justify it, is really just a nice way of granting vengeance to anyone who feels their group has been mistreated in the past (even if it was before they were born). I've seen firsthand what happens when nobody steps up and forces a truce in these situations, where one group feels slighted by another, and takes vengeance, leading the second group to cry foul and want vengeance on the first. I don't think, as everyone cries out for more for their own self-identified group, that people realize the situation they are creating, the results of which can be quite devastating.

Philosophically, my point is quite simple: either everyone has to be treated equally with regard to race, or we're promoting racism.

And, to be clear, this philosophical consistency is how I try to live my life -- I'm not just talking about the issue in abstraction. If I knew of someone of any race being discriminated against because of their race, I truly hope I would have the courage to stand up for them, no matter what the consequences to me. Whether the object of the discriminatory practice was hispanic, african-american, or anglo-saxon, it should not matter.

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My two cents (while I was writing this, others said similar things, but oh well):

The way I learned it, affirmative action is supposed to work like this: given two applicants who are otherwise indistinguishable in terms of qualifications, you should go with the one from the historically disadvantaged group, because they've overcome more to get to where they are. (Whether affirmative action works this way in practice is a different story, but that's irrelevant here.) A common argument against affirmative action is that no two applicants are ever equally qualified, but I'm not sure that even that is true when it comes to applying to grad school. I get the impression that there are far more qualified applicants than slots at nearly every grad program, and that adcoms are really scrounging for ways to differentiate the applicants they admit from the ones they reject. And quite honestly? If I were a professor, I think I'd prefer a student who had struggled a bit to get where they were. Grad school takes a lot of perseverance and dedication, and someone who has dealt with other issues seems more likely to me to have the drive and purpose necessary to succeed. (I think "drive" and "purpose" aren't necessarily easy to discern from any other part of the grad school application, so it seems fair enough to take personal history into account along with letters of recommendation, statement of purpose, etc.)

BUT...why should this have anything to do with race? If you have had to work extra hard to get where you are because of active discrimination against you, or because your family wasn't so well-off, or because you had to survive in a rough neighborhood, or whatever...fine. But to assume that someone has struggled just because they belong to a historically disadvantaged group? Yeah, that is racist. I know plenty of people at my university who can legitimately check off a box other than "white," but who are at least just as privileged as the average student here (and since "here" is an Ivy League school, the average student is pretty darn privileged). At its worst, I would say that affirmative action favors students who are unusually well-off among others of their race, and thus accomplishes pretty much the exact opposite of what was originally intended. Even schools who openly tout the importance of "diversity" should look at the whole picture, and not just the race of an applicant.

I don't think or expect that people should stop applying for scholarships particular to their race/ethnic group...I think you should take any advantage you can get, and if you don't apply then someone else will. I am a female applying to PhD programs in the sciences, where women are historically underrepresented, and I certainly wouldn't say no to one of the NSF's "Women in Engineering and Computer Science" scholarships if they offer me one. But I can't say that I've had a tough time in the sciences just because I'm female - that's simply not true. For schools that asked me to write a diversity/personal history statement, I had to address the elephant in the room, but I talked about how the great role models I've had throughout my life have inspired me to be a role model to other young women interested in science. At any rate, I sincerely hope that I've been admitted based on my merit as an applicant, and not my gender. (I've been to one visit day so far, where 4/30 of us were female, so it certainly seems like gender wasn't much of a factor there...)

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I agree that historical screwing can take many forms and no race or group has a monopoly on this, although it appears that certain ethnic and racial groups have had it worse than others generally over the past 600 years or so. I wonder for the affirmative action set aside supporters, what would your ideal affirmative action program look like for an admit committee?

Would there be points for the impoverished regardless of race, the refugee from a war torn nation, the abused, the mentally disabled? Maybe race and all these factors should be considered in a formula?

For the neo-Nazi poster, if you consider neo-Nazi groups on campus as legitimate, what would you think of a campus org that advocates the enslavement and murder of all neo Nazis? Hmmm

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For the neo-Nazi poster, if you consider neo-Nazi groups on campus as legitimate, what would you think of a campus org that advocates the enslavement and murder of all neo Nazis? Hmmm

Let's read a bit more carefully, OK? She didn't say she was a neo-Nazi. What she said was that the right to free speech must apply to everyone. FWIW, that is the stance of most constitutional scholars. This is why the ACLU is willing to defend the right of, say, hate groups marching in minority areas. Restricting the speech of any group sets a dangerous precedent for us all. Besides, it's pretty well-accepted that nothing hurts a hate group like the light of day.

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Yes, you are right - I mistakenly thought when I first read it that she was claiming herself as a neo Nazi. The courts have been battling the debates in drawing the line between free speech and hate crimes for years. My question still stands, what what do you think of a group who advocates the enslavement and/or killing of another group? Where is the line?

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I dig the theories coming in on how admit committees decide. The hat and especially the staircase analagy are quite amusing. :D Hope they keep coming. No offense to adcoms who I assume are primarily hardworking profs taking time from their research to meet, plow through our often lengthy and esoteric writing samples, etc. It would be nice if they made known what system they did use. A member of Temple's soc adcom told me they use a point system.

Kudos to adcoms but We need to do something to cope with the waiting and let out some steam to deal with the intense competition and rejects. :o Any other theories? :)

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My theory? It's similar to law.

You present yourself to your professor that you want to work with along with like 50 or 100 other people applying for the same spot(s). This is a court case with many, many lawyers and lots of people wanting to join the Ivy Tower. You are judged by how you set up your crime. Did you do your crime and should do you do your time?

The Professor looks at and listens to each one of you. He picks a couple of interesting ones who will kick butt in the Supreme Court.

The Professor keeps you behind the bench and goes up to the 9 judges and presents your crime of why your case should go in favor of him. In other words, if you're in jail, he's responsible for taking care of you. And there are only so many cells to fill.

Those 9 judges represent all other professors with Chief Justice being the Director of Grad Admissions. They have their own interests in mind (Who hasn't heard of swing vote based on personal interest???) and they have to be convinced to go against their personal interests (the students THEY want to bring in).

All the judges submit their verdict.

Either you're guilty (admitted/rejected) or innocent (wait-listed).

Then they decide on your sentence which as follows:

Life without parole- Straight, full-funded PhD admissions (in other words, they owe your ass for a long time)

Life with parole- Straight PhD, some funding.

30 years with parole- Straight PhD, no funding.

25 years with parole- MA without funding but you may appeal for a PhD later.

25 years without parole- MA with funding

10 years with parole- MA without funding

And...

Death Penalty- Rejected.

--> Clause: You may appeal your decision by re-applying in the next round to avoid getting the Chair. Accepting this would mean you're out of academia forever.

oh I amuse myself. But i think this story can use some tweaking... :D

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I apologize to any and all who advocate the free speech of Nazis - I didn't mean to call anyone in this cat. a Nazi. I misread her e-mail as opening with an introduction of herself as a Nazi, as I mentioned. O.K?

So you don't consider groups that advocate enslavement and extermination of a particular group as crossing the line from exercising free speech rights to that of engaging in hate crimes, as is the stance of the ACLU. States in the U.S. vary in their laws on this, and the battle continues. Would you make an exception to your stand for governments that would engage is such propaganda? Or are there any other exceptions you would make?

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Ticklemepink,

You have tickled me enormously with your criminal justice system analagy. Have really turned the hallowed prize of PhD program access on its head. Re: tweaking- maybye the death penalty would be better switched to the top slot in your list as an indicator of having "Done Gradeeated" from a PhD program (albeit post full funding and full butt busting for 5-10 years).

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addendum to last entry- is hard not to go off track tho, when someone accuses you of being a racist and then subsequently you are misinterpreted as calling another a nazi. :o was trying to set the record straight. also, my original theory on how grad committees decide partly includes the idea of constraints for specialized fellowships which overlaps wtih the issue of treatment to compensate for past wrongs- another responder had detoured to free speech - re the white power group on campus. Best to keep it to the thread. 8)

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my intent wasn't to get the conversation off track, but i used the issue of free speech as an analogy, to point out that what applies for one group should apply for everyone.

I don't think the government has a right to police the ideas of anyone because they don't agree with them. the government has a history of disagreeing with a lot of people, among them civil rights workers and communists.

I am also not a neo nazi. a marxist maybe, but not a neo nazi.

I think Minnesotan put what I was attempting to say much more eloquently and adequately.

Either way, sorry for the tangent.

that said, I think admissions committees generally assess what side of the bed they got up on that morning, right means a good day for anyone with a GPA ending in an odd number, left means those with even numbers, and if the moon is in the seventh house, and jupiter aligns with mars, and on the way to the office the radio plays three different Simon and Garfunkel songs (preferably Cecilia, I am a Rock and sounds of silence), this particular faculty member in question will collect the applications of those wishing to work with him/her with GPAs ending in the appropriate number, shuffle them, pile them face down on their desk, call in their favorite and least current grad students. Each student will select one paper from the pile. the paper selected by the least favorite is rejected, and the one selected by the favorite accepted. A neutral third person, possibly an administrator, is called in to select a third paper which will be placed on the waitlist.To come off the waitlist, the sun must be at its zenith, with a full moon that evening, and the faculty member in question must watch one episode of CSI in each city, all in the same evening. If your name matches the name of one of the murdered people, or they watch the episode of Murder, She Wrote with George Clooney, you will be accepted off the waitlist. They also must eat a dinner containing ketchup in some form and have cocoa before bed.

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