If you aren't accepted anywhere?

[Curca]

Anyone else feeling "haunted?" Let's answer the dreaded question and maybe it will stop haunting us quite so much.

Edited January 22, 2011 by Curca

[Bukharan]

What a great poll!

[NadaJ]

I like this poll! Especially that we can check more than one thing. I am preparing to apply again if I need too, but I also have some other things I want to accomplish in 2011/12 if I'm not in a PhD program.

[newms]

I got shut out last year and immediately started planning to apply for this year. If I don't get in again, I really am not sure what I'll do.

[Golden Monkey]

At my age, I think that the PhD is definitely a one-shot deal, and if it doesn't work out this time, that's it. On the other hand, I'm almost kind of looking forward to moving on with my career (or attempting to) if it doesn't work out.

[sputnik]

Ok, the option, "Finally read, 'The Secret,' made me spit out my coffee! Thanks!

[PrettyVacant]

Ok, the option, "Finally read, 'The Secret,' made me spit out my coffee! Thanks!

It made me burst out laughing too. Reminds me of this review.

In all seriousness, I'll probably cry for few days, then who knows.

[OnceAndFutureGrad]

My tongue-in-cheek reply is: "Get married and pregnant"

Actually I have pipe dreams of becoming personal trainer certified and opening a gym called Viking Fitness that does normal gym stuff and also western martial arts/demo combat training. I would probably re-apply just once more, but I'm not sure. But I would like to get into fitness if medieval art history doesn't work out.

[sputnik]

It made me burst out laughing too. Reminds me of this review.

OMG that review made me spit out my pop! What is it with this board?! LOL

[Bonkers]

I got shut out last year and immediately started planning to apply for this year. If I don't get in again, I really am not sure what I'll do.

I agree that it is a tough decision. I applied two years ago and now in it for the second round. If I do not get in I might not apply for the third time only because in the two years between application terms I have done everything I could to increase my chances. If all the schools reject me at this point... that is it. I have done everything I could to be a desirable applicant. This is as good as it is going to get at this point in time. Even with that said... maybe I will put in two applications or so... eh I don't know.

[Eli-]

My tongue-in-cheek reply is: "Get married and pregnant"

Actually I have pipe dreams of becoming personal trainer certified and opening a gym called Viking Fitness that does normal gym stuff and also western martial arts/demo combat training. I would probably re-apply just once more, but I'm not sure. But I would like to get into fitness if medieval art history doesn't work out.

I want to open a yoga studio. Maybe we could pool our resources.

[kotov]

Hookers and blow!

No, seriously, I'll go to one of the mediocre MA programs I've gotten into and try to use them as a jumping-off point to something fruitful. :/

[Bonkers]

Hookers and blow!

No, seriously, I'll go to one of the mediocre MA programs I've gotten into and try to use them as a jumping-off point to something fruitful. :/

That's what I did! Not the hookers and blow... but the MA program. It was expensive but worth it. My undergraduates, I realize now, did not prepare me well for grad school. My profile prior to my Master's was not great.

[OnceAndFutureGrad]

My undergraduates, I realize now, did not prepare me well for grad school. My profile prior to my Master's was not great.

Ditto, ditto. Here's hoping, Bonkers et al., that we benefit from the extra work. Just remember, people like us when we first applied, are our competition this year!

[wanderlust07]

Other: Sell all my crap and move back to Europe. Get job as a) translator, pastry chef, c) itinerant writer/journalist/busker (people will pay me to shut up).

[TheDude]

Options:

Become an RA at a well known school- If this is the case than I really don't see me starting a Ph.D. for 2 years because no one will write you a serious letter if they have only known you from August to October.

Take the MA offer- at least in my subfield of interest it isn't uncommon for MA work to be counted towards your Ph.D when you later apply. This would make the MA, at the least, a fruitful effort. The plus-side would be that if I felt I had a promising job offer after 2 years I could check out without making anybody mad. The down-side is that I would need to assume more debt to live as there would be no stipend. EEK! However, out of the 8 schools I applied to I really only want to go to three so this might be the route I have to take.

Marry a rich girl and start living off the land in the middle of nowhere. Maybe become a shepherd?

I do know that I can not become a better applicant than I am now hanging around these parts. I've exhausted the research experience I could find, and spent far too much independent time, and pro bono work, doing so. Professors are reaping the rewards of a guy who really wants to go to grad school because I work independently and am putting in way more effort than the potential pay-off at this point. I'm really only still involved with work here to keep in an academic mind-set. I'm mentally taxed.

Edited January 23, 2011 by musicforfun

[Thanks4Downvoting]

I'm definitely taking a vacation. I will need it.

[HyacinthMacaw]

Volunteer at a suicide hotline; become a Big Brother or otherwise mentor a kid who needs support.

I've always assumed that if this academic life didn't work out, I might be happier as a high school guidance counselor. That would require a master's in school counseling as well as some kind of experience working with adolescents.

[Alyanumbers]

I would look for work in factories, mines, etc. I want to spend 6 months to a year living as a working-class person, to better understand the workers' rights movement. Then I'll reapply, and widen the net (apply to 8 or so schools in the US, plus a few ones in the UK and France). I could also go to Spain; the Spanish government offers scholarships to Spanish-speaking foreigners.

[Bukharan]

Alyanumbers, this is the coolest thing I have ever heard! This also perhaps reflects the liberal elitist atmosphere on gradcafe (no irony intended at all). I also thought of going back to the roots, moving into a small ancestral village somewhere in the European North-East where I spent my merry childhood, working with a plough at days and reading Tolstoy at nights. This is, perhaps, silly of me but this is something I really want to do one day.

I was obsessing about admissions for such a long time. I am sort of tired of this now. If I don't get in and don't get a job, then I will spend my few savings on travelling in Central and South Asia for a couple of months. I never understood people who would just leave everything behind and go somewhere far away and do something 'crazy', non-practical, without thinking of their career prospects and their financial stability and not knowing where they are going to be tomorrow. Now I totally get this. Life is too damn short and we were forced into being, well, too serious.

[SimilarlyDifferent]

If I don't get into any of the MLIS or history programs I applied to, I'll just apply for the history MA at my undergrad. I had previously considered applying there as a backup plan, but it isn't a very good fit for me, even though I love the undergrad program. It might be good enough to get an adjunct job at a Community College though.

[MoJingly]

Volunteer at a suicide hotline; become a Big Brother or otherwise mentor a kid who needs support.

I currently mentor a kid. It really puts things in perspective, and I think it's equally beneficial for both of us. Highly suggest it to all.

[Alyanumbers]

Alyanumbers, this is the coolest thing I have ever heard! This also perhaps reflects the liberal elitist atmosphere on gradcafe (no irony intended at all). I also thought of going back to the roots, moving into a small ancestral village somewhere in the European North-East where I spent my merry childhood, working with a plough at days and reading Tolstoy at nights. This is, perhaps, silly of me but this is something I really want to do one day.

I was obsessing about admissions for such a long time. I am sort of tired of this now. If I don't get in and don't get a job, then I will spend my few savings on travelling in Central and South Asia for a couple of months. I never understood people who would just leave everything behind and go somewhere far away and do something 'crazy', non-practical, without thinking of their career prospects and their financial stability and not knowing where they are going to be tomorrow. Now I totally get this. Life is too damn short and we were forced into being, well, too serious.

Heh, thanks! I'm just very aware of my privilege (I grew up in a left-wing middle-class intellectual family, went to French school, speak 4 languages, etc). I care about the workers' rights movements, and don't want to be involved as a privileged outsider. Your plan also sounds lovely...

I don't have any savings, but I want to go to South America (that might be easier to do if I end up in the US for the next 6 years!), and India, for two months each. I've planned to since I was 15, when it suddenly hit me that when I have a job, responsibilities, my own family (or at least aging parents who need me), I won't be able to do those crazy, non-serious, irresponsible things.

Eventually, I also hope to open a public library, something there is a dearth of in my country. I love books, so this would be an amazing project for me.

[cerebellumsdayoff]

I'm about to finish an MA in Social Psychology and Quantitative Psychology, so if the PhD applications don't work out, I'll have to get that thing that all of my friends have: a job (whatever that is).

I'm thinking of using my quantitative background to work at someplace like Gallup poll, SPSS, or another research-oriented position.

[BrandNewName]

As excited as I am to get the results, I think I've prepared myself mentally and emotionally to not get in this year. And, if I don't, there are some things I am really looking forward to. My partner and I have been living in southern Germany for 2.5 years now and we really miss being in Berlin. So we'll move back up to Berlin in August/September and set up camp there. He'll be spending a lot of time in London where he teaches and is working on his PhD. My plans for the year:

• 
  
  
• Pick back up with old translation clients to earn money as my current research/teaching contract is set to run out at the end of August.
  
  
• Get back on a regular sleep and exercise schedule.
  
  
• Spend about two months over the holidays back in the States -- it's always been so rushed since I moved away, it would be great to go home and spend quality time there...and perhaps see what it's like to be an adult in my childhood home, what it might feel like to attempt creativity at my grandparents' kitchen table, unburdened by lingering deadlines or upcoming conferences on the other side of the ocean.
  
  
• Write: academic and otherwise...probably more otherwise.
  
  
• Knit. A lot. And spend some time at the yarn shop picking up some new skills from the ladies that hang around there.
  
  
• Finally learn how to use the sewing machine I have had sitting in a cupboard for years now.
  
  
• Take some intensive German courses. Working in an English Department in Germany and having a partner, friends, and colleagues who all speak English means that I really only use German at the grocery store and when I meet a fellow dog owner in the park.
  
  
• Spend every sunny Berlin day in the park. With a beer, a book, and my dog.
  

I guess once there is some space between me and my rejections (should that happen), I'll make the decision as to whether I should apply again or not. Luckily, most of the work is done. Yes, there will be revisions/refinement and probably a new sample, but knowing the process is half the battle, I think.

Writing it out, I'm actually strangely in love with the idea of having a year of high quality life in a city I love. I'm not wishing for rejections, but if they come, it's not a bad alternative...grad schools aren't going anywhere and I'm still pretty young.