Safety school rejects; top school admits.

[euges429]

This post is for all the grad school application ironies.

Me, applying to Ph.D. programs in marketing. Ohio State rejected me. But Yale accepted me, as did Minnesota and Toronto.

How about you guys? Which of your safety schools rejected you, but top schools accepted you?

[sashababie]

I only had one safety school on my list, SUNY Buffalo, reject Wouldn't say I had admits from "top" programs but they're good enough for me (probably too good :roll: ): U of Michigan and UIUC.

[Minnesotan]

The same thing happened to me two years ago. All three of my safeties rejected me, but I got in to a couple of top 20-30 programs, and one dream school.

It's all a crap shoot, I tell you.

[engguy]

Quote

I only had one safety school on my list, SUNY Buffalo, reject

That's funny, because SUNY was one of my top choices, and I got in there; my safety was Wayne State, and though I got in it was the last school I heard from and they never really clarified funding. Thought for sure I'd get into University of Washington and Temple, though I suppose neither could be thought of as "safeties" in that sense -- didn't think I'd get in to UCSC or UT -- my approach to this whole thing was rather naive, I must admit.

But, I did have a theory about this, which was that some sort of fairy dust must go into the envelopes you send to the schools you really want to get in to. I mean, I did put a lot more thought into making my SOP's specific to those programs, and put more research into my application to them as a whole. So I wondered if the other schools somehow sensed that I wasn't all the way committed to them, and focused on people they thought were not only better candidates but more likely to matriculate, as well.

And with that, I hit no. 30 on the posts... :roll:

[router]

I got rejected from UMD College Park and got into Stanford (as well as UCSD and UCLA). Also, I suspect UMass Amherst is going to reject me as they haven't responded yet and you'd think they'd want to send out acceptances before people decide to go elsewhere.

[euges429]

I only had one safety school on my list, SUNY Buffalo, reject Wouldn't say I had admits from "top" programs but they're good enough for me (probably too good :roll: ): U of Michigan and UIUC.

I went to Mich for my undergrad, and I took one class in Complit. But from what I know, they have a relatively-strong program. Plus the Michigan brand name will speak for itself. It's not Stanford, but it's within the top 3 among public schools (brand recognition).

[MebiggyNooby]

I got a reject from UMD (Why? Why? Why?) and an admit from CMU. I wish they would quantify the admissions process. Or perhaps not, because I feel that the CMU admit was because of my industrial experience.