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Communication/Media Studies Ph.D Programs Fall 2012--Apps, Decisions, and Waiting...


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@lamhere, that's actually a good question to ask the professor upfront if you're comfortable, (saying something along the lines of "I'm thrilled to have the opportunity to work with you on my statement and submit it for a fellowship candidacy. I still have some schools to hear back from before I make my decision, but I am very excited about your program. Please let me know what guidelines I should follow to revise my statement.")

generally departments have to nominate individuals for fellowships very early in the process. And there's no guarantee you'll get it. So as long as you don't send an email stating that you accept the offer of admission, you should be just fine to revise your statement and resubmit for candidacy. That being said, if you are 100% positive that you do not want to go to this school, then I would carefully consider whether you want the professor to take the time to help you with the statement.

You generally don't have to accept any offers until April 15th (ideally before that if you know where you want to go, they accept you, and you get the funding you want/need). So don't feel pressured. Any correspondence between you and the department that isn't in an official capacity (usually you'll have to agree to go to the school in writing, or sign some sort of agreement online) doesn't bind you to agreeing to go there.

Congrats on your acceptances! :)

Thank you so much!! I was really unsure how to deal with this matter. Still, it's one of the schools I've been wanting to go to so I guess trying out for a fellowship won't hurt. But I suppose I should be subtley careful about my wording.

Thanks for the advice!!

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WOW, that is indeed fantastic news!!! Congratulations Iamhere!

Do you mind sharing with us which programs have already sent you offers? I am still waiting for the seven programs I have applied to :( A million thanks!

I am still waiting for almost over ten programs!

I'm not sure if your schools overlap with mine, but anyways, I've been accepted to Purdue University and Ohio State University's communication Ph.D. programs. Another school has contacted me to set up an interview date.

Hope this helps!

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@iamhere : Congratulations on your acceptances! You must be super-psyched. I hope you get more good news.

I also applied to Purdue, but I haven't heard from them. They had a rather confusing set of deadlines, stretched over the month of December. I was reassured that a 12/31 submission would be on time for consideration. I don't know if I haven't heard from them because they don't want me, or because I submitted my application later.

Ah, the mind games we play with ourselves as we play the waiting game. *sigh*

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@nullsymbol: Thank you very much! It's nice to get some early news.

I'm pretty sure you haven't heard from Purdue because of the submit date! Let us not play the mind games and concentrate on something else :).

Or refresh ourselves!

I wish you the very best of luck!

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I am still waiting for almost over ten programs!

I'm not sure if your schools overlap with mine, but anyways, I've been accepted to Purdue University and Ohio State University's communication Ph.D. programs. Another school has contacted me to set up an interview date.

Hope this helps!

I also applied to Ohio State, but only a few days before the January 15 deadline (and my last letter or recommendation was submitted there on the 14th), so I'm guessing there's time until they get to my file.

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Congrats, @fanon_fanatic!

I just heard from Purdue -- for some reason they never received one of my transcripts, so I resent it. Bah.

And then I discovered that one of my schools had this supplemental application they wanted me to fill out, so I logged in and filled that out. Boy did I feel dumb. I hope this won't hurt my chances at either school -- that would suck.

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Not only have I not been accepted to any programs yet, the Penn Annenberg application portal is offline now, so I can't even go through the cathartic "check to see if my status has changed" process. Sigh. I did, however, just re-read "The Children of Men" in 1.5 days. I'm about to start on "The Marriage Plot," I think.

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Not only have I not been accepted to any programs yet, the Penn Annenberg application portal is offline now, so I can't even go through the cathartic "check to see if my status has changed" process.

I haven't heard back either. The portal being down is a good sign though: Either way it'll turn out, we'll know soon ;)

It's nothing carthatic about it for me, I guess. I am just distracting myself from my courses :D

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@fanon_fanatic - Thanks for starting this post. As painful as the waiting process is...it is comforting to have something else to fanatically check for information! :-)

My research interest is in organizational communication. I applied to Purdue, Arizona State, UC Santa Barbara, Michigan State, UC Boulder, Rutgers, UNM, and USF---in that order of preference. I'm taking the fact that Purdue is still asking for info from @nullsymbol to complete his/her application file as solace that they are still making decisions instead of being discouraged by @lamhere's acceptance.

@lamhere - congrats!

@nullsymbol - keeping my fingers crossed with you!

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This is an outdated question now that we've all applied already, but how did you all figure out program rankings/how much did that play into your app decisions? I had a terrible time finding ranking systems and finally scoured websites of a bunch of the programs ranked in the NRC rankings (http://chronicle.com/article/NRC-Rankings-Overview-/124717/) to look for programs that fit my interests. Did anyone have a better strategy? Is it my imagination, or do comm rankings not really exist?

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This is an outdated question now that we've all applied already, but how did you all figure out program rankings/how much did that play into your app decisions? I had a terrible time finding ranking systems and finally scoured websites of a bunch of the programs ranked in the NRC rankings (http://chronicle.com...erview-/124717/) to look for programs that fit my interests. Did anyone have a better strategy? Is it my imagination, or do comm rankings not really exist?

I also used the National Communication Association's Doctoral Reputational Study. It's from 2004, but it seems like it is the most recent ranking by subfield.

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@brancan, I was shocked. I haven't really been expecting to get in to any of my programs - I applied half so I could tell myself I gave it my best shot before I settle down to journalism. Good luck to you, I hope you hear good news soon.

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Yes it seems U Mich is out. I also got an email :)

When looking for schools I usually consulted PhDs.org and its NRC ratings.

But then again I think ratings are a bit meaningless in the field of communication, as communication is a broad area, and schools each have their own strengths in particular fields.

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This is an outdated question now that we've all applied already, but how did you all figure out program rankings/how much did that play into your app decisions? I had a terrible time finding ranking systems and finally scoured websites of a bunch of the programs ranked in the NRC rankings (http://chronicle.com...erview-/124717/) to look for programs that fit my interests. Did anyone have a better strategy? Is it my imagination, or do comm rankings not really exist?

@clarisse09, I found programs via a variety of methods. For communication schools, I started by using the 2004 statistics that you mentioned to give me a list of programs to examine (for information schools I used a different set of rankings from US News). I eliminated any that were in regions where I was not willing to live, and any that were unlikely to be able to offer me funding. Then I examined each program carefully to see how well it matched my interests. During this process, I realized that there were some top-notch schools missing from the ranking. While I couldn't comment on the quality of those schools' doctoral communications or information science programs, I felt that this warranted further investigation. So, I went to some more generic rankings and looked for top 50 schools in the regions I most wanted to live, and then looked at their programs to see if they could fund me and if they were a match for me. This process was laborious and at times it made me want to tear out my hair. I'm sure I missed programs that would have been suitable. But I think applying to nine programs was more than adequate. :)

In the category of good news, today I received a request for another interview today, and an offer of admission from Purdue Communication! *does the happy dance of joy*

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