UofTexas-Austin recommenders

[Helpplease123]

I've emailed the school but guessing it's going to take them a while to get back and I may need to hurry up... has anyone applied to U of Texas - Austin? You can't notify your recommenders until application is submitted, does that mean application needs to be submitted by deadline date of 5th Jan but recommendations can come in after? Or that must submit application before then and make sure references are in by the 5th as well? Thanks!

[radioalfredio]

Having applied to UT-Austin for a Dec. 15th deadline, I would recommend applying at least a week or so before the Jan. 5th deadline, since your recommenders won't receive an email with a link to the recommendation site until you do.

Of course, this depends on whether or not your recommenders have submitted other letters for you yet. If all of your recommenders have already written your letter, then you can (generally) expect them to submit their letter a lot faster, and you can probably submit your application fairly close to Jan. 5th.

I know a lot of graduate schools and departments give a fair about of leeway for late letters of recommendation, but I think it's better to have everything in by the 5th, just to be safe.

[RomulusAugustulus]

The Texas common app (which Austin uses) makes it so you can (and in some cases have to) upload the actual important stuff for your application (like writing sample, statement of purpose, maybe even transcripts?) to your "status check" page AFTER you've submitted your application. So the application itself is mostly contact info, program info, etc. So it shouldn't be hard for you to finish up pretty quick, that way you can submit it, give your recommenders plenty of time, and still not need to have all the hard stuff done too quickly! I know its a pretty confusing system (and I'm not sure my explanation is helping that much!) but just take a look at their directions carefully and you'll see what I mean. Best of luck!

[RomulusAugustulus]

hm.. I was trying to find a good explanation of these directions for general graduate admissions but they are all a little vague. Here are the directions for Classics though, which makes it pretty clear how the whole "status check" submission thing works: http://www.utexas.edu/cola/depts/classics/Graduate/how-to-apply.php

here's the general instructions from the grad school (particularly scroll down to 'dept reqs'): http://www.utexas.edu/ogs/admissions/howtous.html

and I guess check the dept your applying for to see if they have any specific advice. Hope this helps!

[Helpplease123]

Thanks everyone that's really helpful! They have already written recommendations so shouldn't be too long but wanted to still give them time anyway as recommenders are notoriously unpunctual! Thanks for sending the link for the grad admissions pages process makes more sense now, almost gave me a heart attack though when I saw 4000 word writing sample but then realized you'd written that it was the classics homepage not general instructions (and I somehow missed the giant "department of classics" banner acros the top) haha

[natrajan]

Please note that the admissions Committee is interested in finding out which other universities and programs you have applied to (universities other than University of Texas at Austin.) Hence in their section for 'Guidelines for Statement of Purpose', there is a mention that 'Please also include each program and school to which you have applied and why you applied to that program'.