No such thing as a safety school

[lingstudent]

...or is there?

 

I've often heard that the concept of safety schools doesn't exist when it comes to grad school applications. I agree that the graduate school application process is quite different from the undergraduate application process and that finding the right program means finding the school of "best fit" more than anything else... but, just for fun, where did you apply as a fallback? 

 

I've been lurking the threads for a while, and you all seem like really smart people, but I'm not as confident about myself.  I'm looking towards sending in my applications this fall and since I'm a very cautious person I'd really love to hear some of your "safety schools". I'm interested in hearing about both MA and PhD programs in theoretical (not applied) linguistics

 

TIA!!

[fuzzylogician]

I'm in the "there is no such thing" camp. There are many threads you can read about this in the Applications forum and most (if not all) will apply here too because this is not a question that's specific to linguistics.

 

This is not undergrad; whether you apply to a school that's lower ranked (whatever that even means for a PhD program) or to a top program, the question on the adcom's minds will be the same - does this applicant fit in our school? Can their research interests be supported by our faculty? Do they appear to appreciate the magnitude of the project that are seeking to begin here and can they carry it out? Can they articulate a well-defined set of questions that is coherent and relevant to the program in terms of conceptual interest, methodology, theories, etc.? Did they indicate that they are aware of the resources at our school and are willing and able to use them? None of these have anything to do with ranking, and again I think that using rankings to define "safety schools" is misguided at the grad school level.

[fuzzylogician]

Having worked in an admissions office, you're in a unique position to know how the process know. This is completely opaque to most students at the time of applying, and most will not have applied for anything similar before beginning the grad school app process. Of course this process can (and does) look different in different departments/schools, but having seen many applications, what stood out to you? What kind of SOP made you want to read more and accept the student? What made you not give a student a second thought? When it was time to make the tough decision - once all the remaining candidates were strong and deserving - what made the chosen ones stand out?

 

I really know know what "accessibility" means exactly, but I understand that the question is maybe about the less-known schools that might still be a good fit? You have plenty of time to research schools and invest in the writing. Linguistics is a rather small field so a good way to get advice about where to apply is to ask your professors--once you have clearly defined research interests. Another is to read up on your chosen subfield and track down the people doing work you find inspiring - that is, work your way from a potential advisor to their department (for the bigger picture). But if you've worked your way through the linguist list, it'll be hard to find new schools -- instead you should concentrate on learning more about the schools you've already discovered. (for reference, I did the same thing before I applied, and I still managed not to realize how good/bad a fit some schools were. The best way for me to know more was to read faculty pages more closely and ask around about their current interests, which are not always well-represented on their websites.)

[fuzzylogician]

By the way, there is a thread in the Sociology forum that I think it extremely valuable by a student who has served on their department's adcom. There is lots of good advice there, much of which is also relevant for Linguistics.