Fall 2014 applications

[hoviariel]

to the deferring: I don't think you can defer that long. It's usually like a semester or a year because of issues like family or emergencies or 'exploration'. Besides, even if you could, you would not have a reason to go into a phd program right after doing another one. If I were you, I'ld either go with the 3-year and maybe apply for post-doc at ur top, or try to see if it's 'nice' to cancel your 3-year-place acceptance and go to the 'top' one

To interview: there's no clear answer because if you look around the cafe, you'll find people saying that they went to get interviewed because the uni wasn't sure how they were a good fit, but other people send interviews to their top 20 or so to get to know their desired candidates more to compare em better. And your question wasn't bad in itself, it would more about the tone of voice and you had phrased it. 

Edited January 31, 2014 by hoviariel

[vickysophie]

thanks for your reply. I know what you mean. the thing is, the phd i am doing now is more like a job (I actually have a 42h/week contract) and the "study" part is more or less sidelined. It builds up on my BA in political science (I'm doing research on social inclusion/exclusion of people with disabilities in switzerland using qual & quant sociological/pol sci methodology). The Phd in the US  (sociolinguistics at georgetown) would build up on my MA in Sociocultural Linguistics, but my project would also be related to disability, namely the linguistic construction/negotiation of disability/disabled identities. So, the two things would actually be related and build up on each other rather than being more or less identical... 

[hoviariel]

Ow. Well, ideally it would be awesome if you could do both PhDs so you could say you have a specialty in two closely related areas. But, I don't think it's possible to defer the 'top' for 3 years in the first. If anything, you may have to re-apply. But, maybe if you talked to your socio-linguistic POI he could give you better advice about this. Hell, the guy would be so excited with having a socio student getting non-linguistic grad education that he would look forward to getting you back in 3 years. 

[onzeheures30]

Hell yeah! Just got my first admission notice, from UTexas Austin. The letter says I'm recommended for admission + full funding for 5 years, and my acceptance 'is pending final approval by the Graduate and International Admissions Center.' Now, UTexas might not be my top choice, but I'm happy like there's no tomorrow!

[beccamayworth]

Congrats onzeheures!!! Austin is a really cool city, I'd love to live there someday.

[beccamayworth]

Inertia: I don't think the question was bad at all, and although we worry a lot about things like this, I'm sure the Prof will have forgotten all about it by tomorrow- so don't worry.

Vickysophie: I don't think it's possible to defer for that long but I agree with Hoviariel that the best to do is talk to your POI. If you do have to make a choice between the two, I'd say think about what works best for the career path you want...

[hoviariel]

Jan 31 guys... hopefully this forum we'll get busier next week, as we all hear good news

 

Oy vey it'll be gradmagedon

[Les-Souliers-Rouges]

Hey folks, 

    I am new to the forum. It is amazing that we have a community of future grad students. This seems like a great place to freak out, re-assure, build up some confidence and finally go through this process with a lot of moral support.

Edited February 1, 2014 by Les-Souliers-Rouges

[Les-Souliers-Rouges]

Someone from Harvard just called to change the time of my interview. I somehow ended up asking if she could tell me how many other people will be interviewed, and she said "of course not". Now I feel terrible for asking, but was my question really that bad? I just want to understand if they are interviewing all the candidates that they are considering admitting or if there's something wrong with only my application.

Hello Inertia,

       Just like another poster mentioned, I don't think it will matter a great deal that you asked the question. Odds are the professor or the GDA (GSA?) who called you will not even remember whose comment it was anyway. Also, they cannot blame a stressful applicant for asking such a question. Just relax and pretend that it never happened (unless they bring it up over the interview in which case you can just make a joke out of it.)

Good luck for your interview! I am sure it will be great.

[inertia]

Thank you so much for addressing my concern and making me feel better! I really appreciate the feedback.

[bluetourmaline]

I think Chicago enrolled 9 kids last year (I have also applied and am interested in the results there), and 11 the year before, and those are relatively large classes, historically speaking. Best regards, /B/

 

Yep. Chicago does NOT do waitlists, so they accepted students expecting about a 50% enrolment rate. Last two years, well, more than expected of the students who came to the accepted open house really liked the place *shrugs*. 

 

So they're trying to lower the acceptance rate this time around to not have the classes be so big. There were ~130 applications, and they're still winnowing them down, but the final accepted number should be smaller than in past years, probably under ten. Good luck to those here who are applying --- we can't wait to welcome you! 

Edited February 1, 2014 by bluetourmaline

[longforit]

Yep. Chicago does NOT do waitlists, so they accepted students expecting about a 50% enrolment rate. Last two years, well, more than expected of the students who came to the accepted open house really liked the place *shrugs*. 

 

So they're trying to lower the acceptance rate this time around to not have the classes be so big. There were ~130 applications, and they're still winnowing them down, but the final accepted number should be smaller than in past years, probably under ten. Good luck to those here who are applying --- we can't wait to welcome you! 

Thank you for the information of Chicago! 

 

I'd also like to ask: do they have the tradition of interview before acceptance? This years there seems at least one person (Onzeheures30) being asked for an interview... Did they do it to every applicant they're interested in?

Thanks!

Edited February 1, 2014 by longforit

[Les-Souliers-Rouges]

Does anyone know if NYU calls all their prospective candidates for an interview? I have not heard anything from them; I don't know if this means I am destined to rejection?!?

[tspier2]

Yikes, I forgot to check back in! I had a phone interview with UVA on Monday. While she stated that it was not an "official interview," any contact with a prospective graduate school is certainly worthwhile. It went pretty well; however, I was interviewed mainly to clarify some of my limited background in linguistics. My school has neither a department nor a program in linguistics, and I'm an English Education major. In case you have any upcoming interviews, good luck and stay calm!

[LinguisticMystic]

Got my admittance notification from McGill. Who's going to their open house at the end of the month? Feel free to message me! I'm very excited.

[Les-Souliers-Rouges]

Congratulations! Montréal is such an awesome city!

Got my admittance notification from McGill. Who's going to their open house at the end of the month? Feel free to message me! I'm very excited.

[Robertpt]

Got my admittance notification from McGill. Who's going to their open house at the end of the month? Feel free to message me! I'm very excited.

 

Me too! So happy! Hopefully we'll meet twice next month!

[longforit]

Congras to both of you!

[cadwallader]

Hey guys,

 

I'm in an MA in Hispanic Linguistics right now and I am considering to apply to some strong PhD programs in linguistics for Fall 2015. I am especially interested in departments with strong experimental phonetics and psycholinguistics specializations. Even though I know most of them are a long shot, I would say these are the institutions that go best with my interests:

 

UCLA

UCSD

Stanford

Ohio State

MIT (not so sure)

UT

U of Arizona

Northwestern

 

How would you rank them? Which one do you favor and why?

 

Moreover, I would really appreciate recommendations about other programs that could be of interest, as well as information about the acceptance rates and the admission procedures at any of these institutions.

 

Thank you very, very much        

[hoviariel]

You can use that QS Subject ranking http://www.topuniversities.com/university-rankings/university-subject-rankings/2013/linguistics

But to be honest the only way to know if a school is good at a field is if you just go to their site and read about their professors

Also, most schools don't give the acceptance rates of their individual departments. But just assume that the higher the rank, the lest the opportunities.

[cadwallader]

You can use that QS Subject ranking http://www.topuniversities.com/university-rankings/university-subject-rankings/2013/linguistics

But to be honest the only way to know if a school is good at a field is if you just go to their site and read about their professors

Also, most schools don't give the acceptance rates of their individual departments. But just assume that the higher the rank, the lest the opportunities.

 

Thank you for your answer! I am already doing what you suggested and I know more or less the strengths of each of the programs. However, with the post I just wanted to know if anyone from inside those programs, or who knew well about them, could give me some general impressions about them, like more personal commentaries and that stuff

 

[longforit]

I can give my impression for these programs, but is not necessarily accurate (since I've only looked into East coast/Midwest programs in terms of lab phonology). I think West coast has a great concentration of programs famous for their experimental phonetics/lab phonology/psycholinguistics. Stanford, UCLA, Berkeley are all the top programs in these areas (Not sure about UCSD). Northwestern and Ohio have professors specializing in various subfields of phonology/phonetics (I especially like Northwestern for that ) and they're, in my opinion (maybe biased since I've looked more into them), as good as west coast programs. MIT is more on the theoretical side; two of their phonologists are working on phonology-phonetics interface, but impresses me more as "using phonetic constraints to explain/model phonology". Besides these, I've considered Michigan, Chicago, NYU, Maryland and Stony Brook when I was applying. They're all among the top programs, with Chicago and NYU being probably more theoretical. 

It's hard to rank these programs since they're all AWESOME. As for the acceptance rates, maybe you can email students in the programs for information? (I'll guess Berkeley, OSU, Chicago, MIT and NYU are especially hard.. but just intuition with no stats..)

Edited February 3, 2014 by longforit

[LinguisticMystic]

Wow, is not it too early to make a 15-16 thread?

[longforit]

haha I think it's understandable. I started thinking about PhD programs as early as I entered my MA program..

[onzeheures30]

Congrats onzeheures!!! Austin is a really cool city, I'd love to live there someday.

Thank you!

 

From what I've learnt from my POI at Chicago (btw, our interview went splendidly well; I hope to be able to get to work with this person at some point even if I don't end up at Chicago), today they are having a departmental discussion about admissions. So, good luck to everyone who's applied there, keep your fingers crossed =)