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Posted

Hey folks,

I applied to 19 Ph.D. programs and expect to receive rejection letters from many more of them than I would like. How about we brainstorm a few ways of channeling our frustrations and using our rejection letters as our artistic medium? Here's my list:

-Giving rejection letters to my pet bird Jerry to shred to his little heart's content

-Shredding them to a pulp, forming paper mache, then molding into an enlarged middle finger with an appropriate caption, then sending finger to admissions office that spurned you

-Good for fishwrap

-Light them on fire, let them slowly burn

-Exercise in denial: white-out your name, put in someone else's

-Those cute little umbrellas that you get with drinks

-Exercise in denial #2: Cut out each individual letter, rearrange them so that the letter reads that you've been accepted

-Mobius strips (they have only one side....whoa)

-A highly ineffective method of birth control

-Forward to Santa

-Hole-punched paper confetti

-Nothing; just laugh at how programs actually spent money on mailing you a rejection letter when they could have just emailed you

That's all for now. Good luck to everyone!

Posted

Adding onto your idea a bit:

White out your name and and the university name, and change it to the professor's name and "(your name)'s totally awesome life," respectively. Send it back to admissions.

Posted (edited)

After I got all rejections last year, I stuck one on my fridge for motivation for this year. Eventually I felt I was sufficiently motivated and discarded it.

Edited by newms
Posted

When you get those credit card offers in the mail, stuff the prepaid envelopes with them and drop them in the mail. I usually stuff carpet cleaning coupons, plastic spoons, and new Q-tips in those, but rejection letters will work just as well.

Posted

In my mind: I am meticulously saving them all. They will be carefully preserved and framed. One day, I will be super famous and possibly embarrassingly wealthy. Then I will paper a room/gallery (open to the public) with these and laugh...all the people who said the equivalent of "guitar music is on the way out" can go down in history as the poor fools they are, a la Decca Records.

Yes, my day dreams are v. pompous...;)

In reality: They will go in a junk drawer/file cabinet and be lost in the next move.

Posted

Great idea! Will definitely do that *evil grin*

OT: 19 applications?? That is just insane :o

I hear you--I tried to make sure my recommenders were comfortable beforehand with submitting letters to 19 schools. Still, I think I spent a lot of "capital," as it were, eroding my relationship with my recommenders (3 out of 4 of them had already written their recommendations for a master's program to which I had previously applied, so I don't believe this affected the overall quality).

I did vet all programs for fit, and though some programs are better fits than others, all programs have faculty doing work that converges with my research interests. (I'm interested in prejudice broadly speaking but I'm also interested in benevolent sexism/benevolent stereotypes and contact theory more specifically). Also, I thought that applying to a range of programs would offer me an array of choices if I were fortunate enough to receive offers from a few of them. And of course, Ph.D. programs are extraordinarily competitive! I didn't want to later regret not applying to more schools that were good fits. Indeed, research fit was my only criterion when selection which schools to apply to--I didn't consider location, cost of living, etc. (Thought it would be wise to consider those things when weighing offers.)

Posted

I have to visit a school that rejected me in a few months, I'm thinking of tacking my rejection (name cut off) to the prof's door. Thoughts?

Posted

So, despite my best efforts to provide dental floss, my Dad has this vile, disgusting habit of using paper to floss his teeth (gross, I know). So, I'm going to save my rejection letters for him to floss his teeth. Maybe I'll burn at least one of them...

Posted

So, despite my best efforts to provide dental floss, my Dad has this vile, disgusting habit of using paper to floss his teeth (gross, I know). So, I'm going to save my rejection letters for him to floss his teeth. Maybe I'll burn at least one of them...

Paper cuts on your lips? :blink: Not worth the risk.

Posted

Since I will likely get an e-mail rejection (if I get one, think positive!!!) then maybe I will bounce it back and make them thing my e-mail address is no longer valid and just show up in September, no rejection = acceptance... right?! unsure.gif

Posted

I burned mine from last year, it felt very good. Since I work at the place I'm applying I think displayed prominently at my desk will be my best bet.

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