Asking for rejection feedback. How?

[IRdreams]

People on these forums have mentioned asking for feedback from schools that rejected them. How does this work and what is the etiquette?

[Dreams]

People on these forums have mentioned asking for feedback from schools that rejected them. How does this work and what is the etiquette?

When I inquired about all of my rejections, I always made a phone call to the Admissions Director, DGS, or other similar person. They were all polite and briefly put me on hold while getting my file. Then I pummeled them with questions on why I was not taken in :twisted:

No really, I just asked about weaknesses in my file that could be addressed in the event I were to apply again. In all instances I got invaluable feedback.

[leetchisgod]

I've done that with some of my rejections, if you're paying $80+ per application, you want to make damn sure you learn something about your application, because I just don't have the money to shell out on a weak app. McMaster informed me that they can't discuss the details because it's "confidential and comparative". But he did boost my confidence by saying it wasn't because my application was junk, which was my biggest worry. Hopefully it works out somewhere so I won't necessarily have to use my learning from this round of applications.

[limeinthecoconut]

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[missashley]

Has anyone ever done this for job interviews?

I recently applied for a job - for which i was over-qualified to say the least - that would run from may to august.

The company with which i interviewed even paid to fly me to new york to meet them ($600 tickets) and put me up in a hotel. The interview went great, lasted about two hours, and they promised to call within two weeks. they wrote me to tell me that they were deciding, and then i didn't hear for a month and a half. i just wrote to check in, and they wrote back "we hired someone else, it was really tough, thanks for applying."

Do you think it is whiny to write and ask what happened? they had essentially started training me during the interview...

what do i say in the letter?

grrrr....

[Joel418]

I just did this with a couple of my applications, and I got two very different responses. The first professor very graciously offered suggestions for next year, and the second simply said (to paraphrase) that I wasn't their type of student. I think the reason I got such helpful information may have been that I that I wrote, in so many words, that I wanted frankness rather than consoloation. It was tough to hear from one of the professors that "they just aren't that into me" :wink: but it's better to know that now rather than later when I've spent another application fee for a school that wouldn't ever consider offering me admission.

[abluedude]

Recently, during a paid visit to one of my top three universities, the graduate coordinator and department chair must have been having a day of policy transparency because I got the "low down" on their selection methodology. The department chair told me that he has *nothing* to do with choosing students to invite/fund, although he does write fellowship letters for those students whose names are provided to him by the grad coordinator.

The grad coordinator has the job of shaping the incoming class as she/he sees fit. This means different things for different departments. I'm in English, so to the English dept., this means shaping a class by sub-specialty. If they get 25 applicants who are all fantastic and acceptable -- but who are all 19th century American poetry folks -- they can't very well take all 25. They try to select students who represent the entire range of the department's specialties, so in some instances, the "best" applicant doesn't even make it in. For example, if one college's Eng. dept. has a shortage of postmodern drama scholars, and your work focuses primarily on the works of Latina playwrights of the 21st century, you won't get in, and you shouldn't want to because who would you learn from? Similarly, if you are among 50 applicants who want to focus on the same exact subject -- queer theories -- then you're applicant pool just got that much more competitive.

In short, your rejection from any number of universities could say less about your personal worth and more about the commonality of your sub-specialty for this application year. Perhaps in the future you might consider tailoring your statement of purpose to a more specific intersection of your field, so as to convey a more specific niche within the common field. I hope this "rejection feedback" helps, but I'd certainly suggest emailing/calling the graduate coordinator, as she/he seems to be the one who is responsible for thinking through the exact questions you would want answered. If that grad coord. is worth her/his weight, she/he will provide you with helpful, constructive criticism and encourage you to reapply. If s/he doesn't do that, I'd say choose another school to apply to next go around -- I wouldn't want anything to do with a department who can't make time for the individual student's success.

Best of luck to you and to all of us in these horrible financial times. Don't let rejection determine your worth -- there's so much more going into these schools' final choices than the quality and diversity of your experience.

[DefinitelyMaybe]

I started the thread about whether or not people feel like they deserve a reason for rejection.

I got into the school I've had my eye on for two years and am extremely excited, but was rejected from the two other schools I applied to. I seriously considered asking them for their input; one school, the grad coordinator was very nice and accessible to me and I'm sure she would have helped me. The other even gave me his office number and a time frame to call him to discuss my applications and ways to improve it.

But I decided I don't give a damn about their reasons or feedback. I got into the school that matters. There won't be another attempt to go to their schools because I'm going to school in the fall. At this point, what purpose would it serve? Besides, this whole process is the pits.

I'm happier not knowing.

[IRdreams]

That's kinda where I'm leaning. I've been admitted to two very good programs and some others as well. However, I had a Professor at my undergrad has nothing to do with my application belittle my work and my worth by saying "I've done nothing of distinction" and claimed this was the reason why I got rejected at some other places so its left me a little bit mystified and upset. I was considering this conversations not so much from the perspective of reapplying, but from the perspective of I want to see what my weaknesses were this time around because they might apply when I'm on the job market for Academia. If I know what they are, I will be more able to address them before that time.