after phone interview, what now? help!

[meow123]

hey guys, I just talked with a potential supervisor on the phone. it was real quick, like 10 minutes or less. and he basically talked the whole time about his ongoing projects and how competitive it is to get in and how my experience is "neat".

he did say that he would like to talk to me in person and mentioned the campus visit in late december. he was kind of like,"send me your name and everything and remind me who you are after applying, and i will @#$% a campus visit invitation after december." i cant really understand his blur at that very important word and i was afraid to ask again to confirm...

what shall i do now?? i already sent him a "thank you" email and i got no reply.

so nervous, i am thinking that i said too little or said sth wrong!

Help!!!!!

[DarwinAG]

First! Breathe! Then breathe some more. I would say relax for a bit then come back to the problem in an hour. After that, you can start preparing for the in person interview. I would not worry too much about the phone call since he has invited you to come in person. Familiarize yourself with the projects he talked about and think of potential follow up projects.

Let go of your evaluation of the phone interview. Look forward to the in person interview.

[meow123]

First! Breathe! Then breathe some more. I would say relax for a bit then come back to the problem in an hour. After that, you can start preparing for the in person interview. I would not worry too much about the phone call since he has invited you to come in person. Familiarize yourself with the projects he talked about and think of potential follow up projects.

Let go of your evaluation of the phone interview. Look forward to the in person interview.

Thank you!!

I was wondering if I should email him and ask just to confirm if he is really getting me a campus visit invitation. but i know that is a stupid question to ask.

it's only because december is so far away and so many things can happen in between that i am not sure what to do.

but thanks again, I will keep my hope high for an invitation and prepare for it!!

[TakeruK]

I understand how you feel! But while every interaction with a potential supervisor is incredibly stressful and exciting to us, to them, we're just another prospective student. They don't want to invest too much time into us at this stage! They will speak to dozens more this year and probably hundreds over their career.

So, I'd say to breathe, relax, and calm down. You did the right thing in sending a short thank you reply after the interview, but what would you expect him to reply with? The missing word isn't that crucial, what could it be? The most important part was his instruction -- send him an email reminding him who you are AFTER you send in your application. Once you've applied, just send him a note saying that you and him had a chat about X on date Y. Mention something about you that you think would trigger his memory of the conversation (after all, by that time, he has probably spoken to many students): he said your experience was "neat" -- do you remember why exactly? You could write it down now so you don't forget.

As for the campus visit, it sounds like a major department event. He's not going to forget about it. Depending on their policy (do they invite all applicants? only the best ones? only the ones they've already accepted?), you will hear about the visit later. If you really want, you can just bring it up in your email after you apply (e.g. "you mentioned something about a campus visit during our conversation in August." and ask for some more details maybe).

But for now, the best thing to do is move onto the next potential supervisor and prepare for that chat. Or, if you are all done, then just focus on making your application awesome. I think you shouldn't contact this prof again until you've submitted the application!!

[lewin]

^^ This advice is good. Send another email after your application is in with something like, "When we spoke on the phone you asked me to email you when my application is in to arrange a possible campus visit....."

Also, I would wait to email until within a day or two of the application deadline. They won't start organizing visits until ALL the applications are in and you don't want to be smothering.

[MJordano]

I definitely agree with the above advice. Have you actually applied to this school yet? Either way, it's great that you got an invitation to sit down with the professor to talk about working on his projects. Many students probably don't even get these invitations