Admission chance with no interview

[Cletus12]

Waiting to hear back is torture as we all know. It's my first round applying to art history Phd programs, haven't been asked for an interview yet, is this a bad thing? What are the odds I would get accepted without an interview? It seems very unlikely my smaller schools and programs would accept anyone without directly talking to them first? Does anyone have any experience with this?

[tiarabun]

do you programs even conduct interviews? you should find out before sweating

[Cletus12]

They interview some but not all applicants, I've found no correlation to which of those people are admitted!

I've heard 2 schools of thought-- Interviews for the schools top choices or interviews for students they aren't sure about.

[tiarabun]

I hate to be the buzzkill, but I do think the chances are pretty slim if you weren't invited to the interview. Think of it as a job interview, would an employer hire someone they haven't met?

[zapster]

Actually, many programs do not necessarily meet all accepted candidates, or even some - for example - Brown American Studies mentions in its admission FAQs that they usually do not meet with anyone at the time of application review.

 

The truth i that this varies so much across fields, schools, departments and even individual POIs, that it is difficult to draw conclusions. One observation (based on a very small sample though), is that departments where the initial admission decision is made by individual POIs tend to interview more than when these decisions are made by an adcom. But I could be wrong.

[Kava]

As zapster mentioned, it depends on the program. For example, for the physical sciences it is very rare that interviews are conducted (all of my acceptances were without interviews). However, in the life sciences, humanities, and social sciences it seems to be common.

[n_psych]

It depends on the field, and even though there are formalities with this, exceptions can be made. However, this is not the norm. Usually, if programs have interview weekends and you are not invited, you are likely rejected. 

[compiler_guy]

I think it depends on the applicant as well. In my field, I've heard of people getting accepted without ever being interviewed, people getting accepted after a brief email correspondence with a POI, and of people getting accepted after a full hour long video Skype interview ( my personal experience ).

[Lamantin]

It not only depends on the field, it depends on the program. Program X may require some form of formal or informal interview, but the same program at another university of similar rank may not. It's hard to predict. You could use the results page and see if past posts mention any kind of interview at the programs you've applied to.

[Maggi]

It depends on the individual professors I think. I got an accept from a U Minnesota without an interview. POI later contacted me saying that he is offering RA to me and an official letter would come later. In my case, POI knew my recommender. He mentioned that he corresponded with my recommender and that he spoke good of me. So it depends on an individual's application as well as the POI