PhD Admit, NC State

[ruud9]

Hi All!

 

This is my first post on the forum. The forum is great, kudos to the admins. 

 

I have got an official PhD admit from NC State. The decision is available in my App Yourself web-link and the link is superseded by an official letter of acceptance. I have a few questions to ask regarding admit and funding in general:

 

1. The letter states that the graduate program, not the graduate school, will be able to answer questions about the financial support that I may receive. Nothing is mentioned about the financial support in the letter.

 

I had applied for an MS+PhD program indicating in my application that it was meant for Admission+Financial Aid. (a) Does that mean I will receive financial aid for my Masters as well as my PhD? ( Do I contact the graduate program regarding this matter or will they contact me once they decide the funding?

 

2. Also, it is mentioned that in order to complete the process of admission, I will have to fill in a CFR form, but no deadline is mentioned. Anyone travelling on the same boat, could you please help me with the deadline for completing the CFR and confirming the official acceptance.

 

3. In addition, I would like to know in general the difference between an MS admit and a PhD (MS+PhD) admit. Does a PhD admit ensure financial support for the Masters program as well?

 

All replies are welcome and I'd appreciate your time for answering my queries.

 

Thanks,

ruud9.

 

 

 

 

[RubyBright]

Hi Ruud9. First, congratulations on your acceptance! I am in a very similar situation (accepted to MS + PhD, but nothing said about funding yet), and waiting to hear back from my program coordinator. You definitely need to contact the program about whether or not they are providing funding throughout. A good program will typically fund you for the entire thing (MS and PhD), because you are technically being admitted as a PhD applicant. However, we all know that budgets are tight right now, and sometimes that doesn't happen. You absolutely must check with them to see. Call your program coordinator, and if you are unable to reach him/her, send them an email.

[ruud9]

@RubyBright:

 

Thanks for your reply and suggestion. I too am waiting to hear back from my program grad coordinator. I hope they will be able to make things more clear, or at least give a tentative date as to when they can specify about the financial support.

 

By the way, is there any information on the deadline to fill in the CFR forms to complete the admission process. If we knew about the funding then I guess it would be easier to fill in that form.

 

Thanks,

ruud9.

[RubyBright]

Sorry, Ruud9, I'm not even sure what a CFR form is!

[gruxy]

@RubyBright

I think Ruud9 is referring to a Certificate of Financial Responsibility. They are often required of international applicants to show that they can pay for school/living expenses.

 

@Ruud9

I am not an international student myself, so I don't know how the CFR process works, sorry. Congratulations on your acceptance, though! I too was accepted to NC State recently (different program), so please share any information that you come across.

[ruud9]

@gruxy:

Yes, it is the Certificate of Financial Responsibility form, that is required for International students. 

 

@gruxy, RubyBright:

I got a response from my Grad Coordinator, telling me that he is not aware of any funding offer for me. He has also suggested me to contact faculty of my interest to check if they were planning to make an offer for me. 

 

(a) Does that mean that I am still in contention for the departmental assistantships/fellowships(and a decision is yet to be made) or has a decision already been made? (I had asked the same question and am waiting for a reply)

 

I would appreciate your advice here. ( If a Professor is palnning to make an offer, he will eventually do it right. I cannot force him into doing it, so in my view asking the Professor for an Assistantship will not enhance my chance, or will it? Do the relevant Professors get to review your application materials and make an offer? or will they be known of your application only when you contact them.

 

© Also, could you please shed some information on how the funding policy works in the Universities in general. The department and the Faculty in coherence should make the best offer possible right?

 

PS: Congrats to the both of you too.

 

Thanks,

ruud9.

[TeaGirl]

They may make their own decisions, but now that you've been accepted it's still a good idea to scope out those professors who you'd like to work with and bring yourself to your attention. They may have dozens of accepted applications to the department, so it's not likely that each professor is gonna go through all of them or if they do, that they will spot yours. If you contact them, then if they need students, they may look up your specific application and see if they want to interview you.

 

From what I know, the way funding in universities usually works is first they accept a bunch of students. Then they wait while the professors interested in new PhD students are asked to look through the applications and see if they find someone suitable, OR, while some of the accepted students contact their POI and then their POI looks for that application. Also during this time different POIs will contact different students (whether the POI or the student initiated the exchange) and which may lead to interviews. Some of the students will receive an RA. For the rest, the department looks at how much funding they have and assign TA and Fellowships to the other accepted students.

At this point, if some students decline their admission, they may make new offers to additional students.

[ruud9]

Thanks TeaGirl for your response. That really helped.

 

Just to digress from the topic, what would a typical interview consist of ?

 

Would it consist of matching of interests, future plans of the student, discussing the projects of the POI or anything more like say, technical stuff ?

 

Thanks,

ruud9.