0% Confidence of Acceptance

[0000000000AAA]

As no one's added to this heap of fear and misery all year, I will.

I sent off Brown's today, really my top choice. And basically, I think it's hopeless. My scores are good, but my statement never quite---gels? clicks? comes alive?

[coffeeplease]

My scores are good, but my statement never quite---gels? clicks? comes alive?

That's exactly how I feel about all of my apps.

[ecritdansleau]

As no one's added to this heap of fear and misery all year, I will.

I sent off Brown's today, really my top choice. And basically, I think it's hopeless. My scores are good, but my statement never quite---gels? clicks? comes alive?

You know what's funny? I had the same feeling about some of my SOPs, but not others. And in retrospective I realize, it's the schools I *REALLY* want to get in to that I have this particularly endless unease/dissatisfaction/regret about my statement of purpose, despite the fact that all my submitted statements are fairly similar. Which suggests that it's more my perception of the statement (and its functional importance to that school) than the statement itself. I keep thinking about the potential faculty members who will be reading it and imagining what they will think of different parts of it. Really, I think way too much about these things.

Oh well. I guess the really strange thing about this process is that unlike anything other kind of evaluation I've gone through, there is no base indicator of how this will turn out, and no way of estimating if/how/where I might actually end up. Unlike the other academic hurdles I've juggled, there is no practice test to give me a sense of my percentile ranking. In submitting all these applications, I put everything out there, and out there, and out there. And I get nothing back. It's so strange and faceless. And now it will be a full TWO MONTHS before I know what is happening with my life. I don't expect that the adcoms could do it any faster. But I wish this process was a bit more transparent. I'm questioning my choice of schools because of the circular logic that (to me) the departments I applied to seem to be the GREATEST; in turn, everyone else probably wants to go there; thus, it will be too competitive for me to make it in!

But maybe it's better to have remained in this perpetual uncertainty as I submitted applications than to have been too aware of how awful the odds are. The doom and gloom reality of this process is so bleak that I have to feign uncertainty to even attempt these odds.

[andsoitgoes161]

ecritdansleau (a wonderful screen name, by the way)--I completely agree with the appraisal of SoP's being extremely similar, but subjectively more awful when the weight of their recipient is considered. Given that UT (a top choice for me) required a universal application with SoP attached to be submitted before the link to the actual English department app came through, I've been kicking myself since the end of November when my neuroses about a lag in receiving the link for the subsequent part had me submit a rough SoP literally hours before they announced the due date was being pushed back two weeks. Needless to say, I have very dire hopes about getting in anywhere at all since I've relegated myself to the belief I won't be getting into the one school I actually want.

I'm currently working on my Master's thesis and also intermittently reading The Marriage Plot, both of which are fueling a sickeningly hopeful and recklessly covetous desire to get a PhD and steep myself in the undulations of erudition and academia my mind so myopically hankers after. And just to kick myself while I'm down, this post is the residual effect of rereading the admissions requirements website for UT five minutes ago, and a desperate need to voice my self-incurred invitation for definite failure as if it might somehow soothe this 0% Confidence of Acceptance mindset that will most likely remain in place until March when I experience a 100% Denial of Acceptance everywhere I applied.

But then! I slap myself on the wrist and I remember that The Secret was a huge success, which has to speak for something, and lambent threads of hope start emerging in the beneficence of vision boards. Bellowing out good energy into the cauldron of the world necessitates that it will have to reverberate with an equally as benevolent response...right? Do I dare invest in even some tiny sense of blind optimism?

My conscious solicitation of a three month period plagued by vacillation is exacerbating my already extraordinary neurosis.

[emmm]

@coffeeplease and Livepoetry -

Sorry you've been getting such aggravating reactions from people around you. I was hesitant to tell people about my plans to apply to grad school (non-traditional, worried people would think I was crazy), but the support I got from almost everyone was one of the best parts of applying. It made me feel that even if I got rejected everywhere, the process itself was a good, worthwhile experience. I hope the people who are being negative are not people who are all that close to you. The process can be so stressful. I think it's really important to have people around you who believe in you for the times when the process has sapped all your confidence.

[Timshel]

@coffeeplease and Livepoetry -

Sorry you've been getting such aggravating reactions from people around you. I was hesitant to tell people about my plans to apply to grad school (non-traditional, worried people would think I was crazy), but the support I got from almost everyone was one of the best parts of applying. It made me feel that even if I got rejected everywhere, the process itself was a good, worthwhile experience. I hope the people who are being negative are not people who are all that close to you. The process can be so stressful. I think it's really important to have people around you who believe in you for the times when the process has sapped all your confidence.

I stupidly told most people I know, and now I'm dreading the proverbial "walk of shame" if I don't get in anywhere. I feel like most people don't understand the process and how difficult it is to get in (especially my LORs who have been out of school for 20+ years and 2 out of the 3 only applied to one school and got in on their first try). I feel a lot of pressure, and a lot of people expect a lot from me, and I'm starting to wonder if I can deliver.....

[indalomena]

I stupidly told most people I know, and now I'm dreading the proverbial "walk of shame" if I don't get in anywhere. I feel like most people don't understand the process and how difficult it is to get in (especially my LORs who have been out of school for 20+ years and 2 out of the 3 only applied to one school and got in on their first try). I feel a lot of pressure, and a lot of people expect a lot from me, and I'm starting to wonder if I can deliver.....

Exactly my position, I will not only be extremely upset but also deeply humiliated if I don't get in, because so many people know. It's just hard to evade direct questions about my applications. And I don't think anyone I've spoken to about it quite realises what sort of competition I'm facing. I've come through the British system with good enough grades to ensure PhD funding over here, but the US schools are a whole lot more competitive (than perhaps even some of my LOR-writers realise).

Wish I could have afforded to apply to some "safety" schools, but I ran out of money after 5 applications

[vertige]

Man, feeling the anxiety today. I'm working through Germany's kafkaesque immigration bureaucracy to be allowed to work under a contract, so that I have a set salary rather than a capricious free-lance income - to make the money I need, I have to wait for weeks to get approval from some faceless "authority'. This has translated into me not having enough money to apply to all of the schools I wanted to. Bureaucracy sucks, but it's worse when you're faced with 12-syllable German jargon words that you're expected to process and discuss in real time, knowing that the process relies partly on your ability to argue with emotionless bureaucrats. This is just compounded by the fact that I've only applied to a few top schools, and if I don't get in anywhere, I will have suffered through two years of poverty and anxiety in Paris and Stuttgart for nothing! My cheap brötchens (buns) and salty butter afford only a fleeting sense of comfort in the sea of adrenaline that surges every time I think back over my applications. I think my SOP was decent, but the more I read it, the more neurotic it looks - too many themes and writers covered over 2 pages, and then only fleeting, unceremonious lip service to the profs I would "benefit from working with".

If I get in, then it's all worth it, and I can hold my head high even as I tell my landlord or insurance carrier why my bills aren't being paid. But if I don't get in? Gah .....

Edited January 2, 2012 by vertige

[Mr Grimwig]

Good to hear I'm not the only one who feels my professors and LOR writers do not understand how competitive this process has become. Even some of my younger professors seem to think I will be accepted by at least two or three programs, without a doubt.

It's frustrating to hear their easy-peasy stories about applying twenty years ago. One of my letter writers bragged about how she had mediocre undergraduate grades but eventually decided to do a Ph.D. and got in on her first try. She only applied to one school (a top ten program) and she got in, no problem. She said she wasn't really worried or anxious, either; she assumed she would get in. I just can't fathom such a relaxed process!

It is ridiculous, when you think about it, that we can be strong students and apply to fifteen or more programs and not even realistically expect to get into one.

[wintergirl]

I'm way in this thread again today. I'm also in both camps of "people being very supportive/unrealistic" and "people being unsupportive dicks/too realistic for me." I've put everything on the line for this, and if I don't get in I can't even begin to think about what I'm going to do.

Is it too late to bring back the magic eight ball??? I mean, it has as much chance of being correct as our own worst fears/highest hopes, right?

Q: Will I be very sad in March?

A: Ask again later.

HAHAHAHAHA. Oh, Magic Eight Ball. I love how you just get me.

Edited January 2, 2012 by bespeckled

[rawera]

Yeah, we're dumb.

[0000000000AAA]

We might actually be dumb. Trading 6-10 years for a 50/50 shot at a job is...not wise.

[lolopixie]

@ Grimwig - My professors were the same way last year. Everyone thought that I would have a choice of programs to go to, even my "younger professors" that had been teaching for only 4 years. They applied about 10 years ago and all had choices. When I was rejected across the board they were shocked. They could not believe I had been passed over by 10 programs. It is a completely different ball game now.

I attribute a lot of it to the economy and peopel pursuing higher education because they can't find jobs. I think it is ridiculous to pursue a PhD just because you can't find a job...not a good reason. That person will probably drop out. Ugh, I felt good about having all my applications submitted. Now I'm freaking out again. Yuck.

[coffeeplease]

I stupidly told most people I know, and now I'm dreading the proverbial "walk of shame" if I don't get in anywhere. I feel like most people don't understand the process and how difficult it is to get in (especially my LORs who have been out of school for 20+ years and 2 out of the 3 only applied to one school and got in on their first try). I feel a lot of pressure, and a lot of people expect a lot from me, and I'm starting to wonder if I can deliver.....

Yeah, this. I was just reading a different thread about whether or not to mention professor names in your SOPs and now I'm stressing over whether or not I made the right decision (I wasn't really happy with my essays to begin with). The whole process is an emotional rollercoaster because I am simultaneously really, really excited about the possibility of grad school and terrified that I'll be rejected, that the adcomms will just shake their heads at my application, and so on...

And of course everyone I know knows that I am applying. Sigh.

[lolopixie]

I stupidly told most people I know, and now I'm dreading the proverbial "walk of shame" if I don't get in anywhere. I feel like most people don't understand the process and how difficult it is to get in (especially my LORs who have been out of school for 20+ years and 2 out of the 3 only applied to one school and got in on their first try). I feel a lot of pressure, and a lot of people expect a lot from me, and I'm starting to wonder if I can deliver.....

I did the walk of shame last year...it sucked. And of course everyone knows I'm applying again. Well family and friends. I don't talk about it that much this year. Only 3 people I work with know I'm applying....which now seems like too many. Ugh.

[bdon19]

I did the walk of shame last year...it sucked. And of course everyone knows I'm applying again. Well family and friends. I don't talk about it that much this year. Only 3 people I work with know I'm applying....which now seems like too many. Ugh.

Literally everyone I know knows that I'm applying. It's been impossible to avoid that; I can't think of anything else, ever. I'm reeeeeeally going to regret this if I don't get in everywhere... :/

[lolopixie]

I just found a typo in my Kansas SOP....ugh. Stupid, stupid, stupid. It is minor...but ugh.

[Timshel]

So, instead of working on my last apps, I have been looking over the results boards to figure out which schools contact people first and when. Ugh.

[andsoitgoes161]

I just found a typo in my Kansas SOP....ugh. Stupid, stupid, stupid. It is minor...but ugh.

I just reread my SoP for my top choice school.... "Stupid, stupid, stupid" pretty much just sums up the whole thing. I think it's time we all start getting positive, though. I know i have been much too indulgent in my cynicism, and it's starting to drive me a bit insane. An inherent implication of us completing this process (a feat in itself) is an elevated faculty for potential that is not common in many, and I think we kind of rock. Perhaps a repossession of our remarkableness, and a collective promulgation of positive thought might generate some uncanny mass movement of acceptance in 2012? Maybe?

[lolopixie]

So, instead of working on my last apps, I have been looking over the results boards to figure out which schools contact people first and when. Ugh.

I did that the other night and my anxiety went full throttle for some reason. It appears that KU is going to be my first school to report from historical reporting.

[lolopixie]

I just reread my SoP for my top choice school.... "Stupid, stupid, stupid" pretty much just sums up the whole thing. I think it's time we all start getting positive, though. I know i have been much too indulgent in my cynicism, and it's starting to drive me a bit insane. An inherent implication of us completing this process (a feat in itself) is an elevated faculty for potential that is not common in many, and I think we kind of rock. Perhaps a repossession of our remarkableness, and a collective promulgation of positive thought might generate some uncanny mass movement of acceptance in 2012? Maybe?

I've been relatively positive, but when I saw the error I was like OHMYGOD and had a moment. It has passed...for now.

[Timshel]

I did that the other night and my anxiety went full throttle for some reason. It appears that KU is going to be my first school to report from historical reporting.

Yeah, for me, it will be Emory first because they do interviews, and historically they contact people around January 15th, so I will know very soon if I am even being considered....And then KU is next......

[andsoitgoes161]

I've been relatively positive, but when I saw the error I was like OHMYGOD and had a moment. It has passed...for now.

If it makes you feel any better, I did a "select and replace all" little jig in Word to revise "PhD" to "Ph.D." in my app, missed a typo while doing it, replaced them all with "PhD.", and didn't notice until after every single one of my apps was already submitted. I have a feeling my seeming unfamiliarity with how to abbreviate the program to which I'm applying will raise some adcomm eyebrows. I also made several poor vocabulary choices in an SoP whose entire premise is based in my desire to be a rhetorician and to refine a pedagogy on how to best connect with an intended audience--I'm pretty sure the erudite audience to which I was writing is going to severely analyze the mistakes in a paper whose inherent structure both forms and is formed by those ends.

[wintergirl]

So, instead of working on my last apps, I have been looking over the results boards to figure out which schools contact people first and when. Ugh.

I did that the other night and my anxiety went full throttle for some reason. It appears that KU is going to be my first school to report from historical reporting.

Oh dear. I just did that too. MASOCHISTS, ALL!

[coffeeplease]

Oh dear. I just did that too. MASOCHISTS, ALL!

I did, too. It turns out, one of the schools I applied to seems to request phone/Skype interviews from applicants, and it's making me really nervous. They haven't even requested an interview from me and I'm worrying about it! Gah!