About "recommendation" from admission committee

[stevensu]

Dear all,

 

I received an email from a professor, who said that "I have received the highest recommendation from the admission committee...". This confused me because I always believed that the admission committee is the "highest authority" in the whole process. So the question is, to whom do they recommend me? Does this mean I have been admitted by that school?

 

Thanks~

[ruud9]

I have an idea about this. I have mentioned it in my other post. Anyone confirming it or appending further details to it would be of great help:

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I guess in general it works like this:

 

The program admission committee decide which applications to accept/reject and notify the grad school. The grad school verifies the credentials and sends out admission decisions. Meanwhile, those applications which were accepted by the admissions committee in a program are circulated through the faculty of the department. Then based on your research interests and the competition, suitable faculty will make you an offer if they have an opening in their research group (with financial aid either from the department or the faculty himself or with no financial aid).

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So, to answer your question, the admission committee gives its recommendation (highest or lowest) (1) to the grad school (2) to the Professors among which ones application is circulated.

 

And, yeah, it generally means that you are admitted, unless there is some eccentricity in your application materials (like say, abysmal GPA, or extremely low GRE/TOEFL scores).

 

Hope this helps!

 

Thanks

ruud9.

Edited February 17, 2013 by ruud9

[stevensu]

I have an idea about this. I have mentioned it in my other post. Anyone confirming it or appending further details to it would be of great help:

-------------------------------------------------

 

I guess in general it works like this:

 

The program admission committee decide which applications to accept/reject and notify the grad school. The grad school verifies the credentials and sends out admission decisions. Meanwhile, those applications which were accepted by the admissions committee in a program are circulated through the faculty of the department. Then based on your research interests and the competition, suitable faculty will make you an offer if they have an opening in their research group (with financial aid either from the department or the faculty himself or with no financial aid).

-------------------------------------------------

 

So, to answer your question, the admission committee gives its recommendation (highest or lowest) (1) to the grad school (2) to the Professors among which ones application is circulated.

 

And, yeah, it generally means that you are admitted, unless there is some eccentricity in your application materials (like say, abysmal GPA, or extremely low GRE/TOEFL scores).

 

Hope this helps!

 

Thanks

ruud9.

Thanks for your response! It helps a lot! After all, the letter is from my top dream school~~ I'll wait for the notification from the department.

Good luck to your application!

[queenleblanc]

Yep, just as much as the ad comm wants to give you admission... they forward their recommendation to the people in charge of that.  The graduate school as an entity offers the official decision, which starts rolling the ball in other ways- financial aid, assistantship details, scholarship stuff, housing info, student health, etc.  Once the ad comm knows they want you, it is nice of them to tell you, although they certainly don't have to (and in many cases are not allowed to tell you; only the graduate school has that privilege).  So you are IN if you get that communication from ad comm.  The only thing that could be a problem is if your overall stats aren't at least the minimum according to the graduate school's individual standards, or they don't have an official transcript or whatever.  Usually there aren't problems in this area because most graduate admissions offices are very thorough in vetting the applications before they are sent to committee.  A lot of employers  have this two-party check system: the manager makes the decision on who they recommend to be hired, but ultimately HR has to check credentials to make sure the potential employee meets the minimum standards for job requirements. 

[Makeda]

Yep, just as much as the ad comm wants to give you admission... they forward their recommendation to the people in charge of that.  The graduate school as an entity offers the official decision, which starts rolling the ball in other ways- financial aid, assistantship details, scholarship stuff, housing info, student health, etc.  Once the ad comm knows they want you, it is nice of them to tell you, although they certainly don't have to (and in many cases are not allowed to tell you; only the graduate school has that privilege).  So you are IN if you get that communication from ad comm.  The only thing that could be a problem is if your overall stats aren't at least the minimum according to the graduate school's individual standards, or they don't have an official transcript or whatever.  Usually there aren't problems in this area because most graduate admissions offices are very thorough in vetting the applications before they are sent to committee.  A lot of employers  have this two-party check system: the manager makes the decision on who they recommend to be hired, but ultimately HR has to check credentials to make sure the potential employee meets the minimum standards for job requirements. 

 Yesss The last two sentences explains it well---nice analogy to HR. This puts my mind at rest (for now).