Fall 2016 Applicants

[anactoria]

20 hours ago, ciistai said:

I accepted my offer to IPCAA at UMich and am about to decline my offer at UPenn. I know IPCAA is the best choice for me... well, I'm about 90% sure. But, AAMW is such a great program and rejecting it makes me feel crazy! Aside from that, I really liked everyone there a lot. I want to send an email to the faculty who met with me, but I find I don't know what to say. I don't want to be too self-flagellating but I think they're aware of my other offer (at least one definitely is)  and might be understanding of my tough decision.

I've been putting off just finally doing this for way too long and I just want to be done with it, especially so I can free up a spot for someone on the waitlist. 

Does anyone have advice for me on this very difficult email I have to send? How long should it be? How regretful? Individual emails or should I copy each faculty member I met on the same email?

Yeah ): I'm inching closer to declining Penn myself and am also having a tough time, since I loved the faculty and had a great visit in general. I think I'll email the DGS and then send a (separate) personal email to one of the professors who met with me during the visit (she also Skype interviewed me, put a lot of effort into recruiting me, and is the person I would have theoretically gone there ~for~). I think it's probably unnecessary to personally inform all the profs you met that you're declining the offer, unless they spent a lot of time with you or were personally involved in your admission.

[ciistai]

3 hours ago, anactoria said:

Yeah ): I'm inching closer to declining Penn myself and am also having a tough time, since I loved the faculty and had a great visit in general. I think I'll email the DGS and then send a (separate) personal email to one of the professors who met with me during the visit (she also Skype interviewed me, put a lot of effort into recruiting me, and is the person I would have theoretically gone there ~for~). I think it's probably unnecessary to personally inform all the profs you met that you're declining the offer, unless they spent a lot of time with you or were personally involved in your admission.

WAIT... did we meet??? Were you at Penn Prospie weekend? I was the lone AAMW candidate with the blue dress haha. (Why did I not make this connection before... so much travel must have got to me.)

Edited March 20, 2016 by ciistai

[anactoria]

Just now, ciistai said:

WAIT... did we meet??? Were you at Penn Prospie weekend? I was the lone AAMW candidate with the blue dress haha

Ahh yes I totally remember you! I was the extremely jetlagged one  I think we talked about the weirdness of Oxford and Cambridge?

[ciistai]

2 hours ago, anactoria said:

Ahh yes I totally remember you! I was the extremely jetlagged one  I think we talked about the weirdness of Oxford and Cambridge?

Hahaha yes!!! Well, I'm glad I won't be the only person who was there who will be turning down an offer from them. Such a hard decision, they really impressed me.

[Pertinax]

Can we talk about programs we haven't heard from for a second? I'll start: NYU, Texas, Duke, and Johns Hopkins. Other than Hopkins, which is notoriously late with their rejections, I'm at a loss as to what's going on. 

[Apogeee]

Rutgers (on the waitlist still, I think)

No word at all from SUNY Buffalo

Boston University

I think this is pretty late. It's nerve-wracking!

[pro Augustis]

7 hours ago, Pertinax said:

Can we talk about programs we haven't heard from for a second? I'll start: NYU, Texas, Duke, and Johns Hopkins. Other than Hopkins, which is notoriously late with their rejections, I'm at a loss as to what's going on. 

I was accepted to UT Austin. 

[Jimleko]

I have yet to hear from Toronto, I doubt I will at this point.  I'm still on the waitlist for Penn, I'll be emailing them in a couple of days to see if they have any news.

[Pertinax]

1 hour ago, pro Augustis said:

I was accepted to UT Austin. 

Yeah, I can see some people were after the visitor's weekend. Congratulations! But what gets me is that Texas usually rejects in February or, at latest, early March. Did they decide to skip that step this year? Hopkins usually rejects late, but as someone pointed out above, Duke usually rejects in February. NYU can be kind of everywhere, but seems to put out rejections regularly earlier than this. On Agrippina's list, Boston usually rejects early-mid March, and (from admittedly one example) SUNY Buffalo rejects earlier than this. On Jimleko's side, Toronto usually rejects in February. It seems a bit odd that a number of schools are delaying. I know it's likely nothing that can be identified, but postulating a reason (more candidates this year? Less candidates this year? Extended admissions process? Later interview weekends?) is my way of trying to maintain patience, I guess. I know some of us, if not all of us, still waiting on these schools for final word are also holding onto acceptances from other schools. Which unfortunately means we are holding things up for those schools/waitlisters. The road to April 15th is always a knot, what with decision making and waitlisters, but it's only going to be more tangled if programs are holding back/delaying rejections.

Edited March 26, 2016 by Pertinax

[ClassApp]

33 minutes ago, Jimleko said:

I have yet to hear from Toronto, I doubt I will at this point.  I'm still on the waitlist for Penn, I'll be emailing them in a couple of days to see if they have any news.

I called the graduate administrator the other day as I hadn't heard back either. She was very nice and helpful but said that if you haven't yet gotten a call from the director of graduate studies, it's extreme likely that you've been rejected. They have already sent out the first round of acceptances/rejections, but there will be another round of emails sent out in the next week or so.

I've been wait listed for WashU's PhD program, and I'm curious what the word is on this nascent program. There are a lot of aspects about it that I like (lots of direct attention from faculty, study abroad encouraged, and from the website typically they seem to offer fellowships in both the first and last years), but I'm curious what you've all heard about the program.

[pro Augustis]

I hope my last post didn't seem haughty; I just meant to convey that UT had sent at least some word but, typing on my iphone, may have been too brief. The lack of rejections (for me at Toronto, where I have heard nothing, though I assume that is tantamount to a rejection) really is rather frustrating. Some schools I know have an unofficial wait list, and that is fine, but clearly that is not everyone, for surely some applicants are immediately removed from consideration. The fact that schools don't seem to bother speedily notifying the rejected, even once they have accepted those they intend, strikes me as simply inconsiderate. 

[Pertinax]

11 hours ago, pro Augustis said:

I hope my last post didn't seem haughty;

Not at all. I understood it as informative, as was intended.

It just irritates me to see avoidable gridlock.

ClassApp's direct approach is probably the way to go, but getting someone with a straight answer on the phone or over email is not always the easiest.

[LtnLvr]

I called the Classics Department at NYU on Tuesday or Wednesday of this past week actually. They suggested I wait until the end of the week (yesterday) when more decisions were going to be made. I didn't hear anything yet though! They also took my name down. Just fyi...

[Pertinax]

Did you call Nancy Smith-Amer, or the general department number? I tried calling Duke and Hopkins a couple weeks ago, to no avail.

[LtnLvr]

I called the general department number at NYU. I didn't speak to any professors. 

[anonnoname]

15 hours ago, Jimleko said:

I have yet to hear from Toronto, I doubt I will at this point.  I'm still on the waitlist for Penn, I'll be emailing them in a couple of days to see if they have any news.

Hey Jimleko - I actually recently graduated from there and heard from one of my old professors that they were already having prospective candidates up to visit, so I think they may have already made their offers. You should definitely still email just in case! Sorry to be the bearer of bad news

[Jimleko]

4 hours ago, darlingviolet said:

Hey Jimleko - I actually recently graduated from there and heard from one of my old professors that they were already having prospective candidates up to visit, so I think they may have already made their offers. You should definitely still email just in case! Sorry to be the bearer of bad news

Hey Darlingviolet, it's all good!  I'm happy with where I'm going to end up.  The only thing I actually care about now is Penn's waitlist.

[ciistai]

On 3/26/2016 at 11:41 PM, Pertinax said:

Yeah, I can see some people were after the visitor's weekend. Congratulations! But what gets me is that Texas usually rejects in February or, at latest, early March. Did they decide to skip that step this year? Hopkins usually rejects late, but as someone pointed out above, Duke usually rejects in February. NYU can be kind of everywhere, but seems to put out rejections regularly earlier than this. On Agrippina's list, Boston usually rejects early-mid March, and (from admittedly one example) SUNY Buffalo rejects earlier than this. On Jimleko's side, Toronto usually rejects in February. It seems a bit odd that a number of schools are delaying. I know it's likely nothing that can be identified, but postulating a reason (more candidates this year? Less candidates this year? Extended admissions process? Later interview weekends?) is my way of trying to maintain patience, I guess. I know some of us, if not all of us, still waiting on these schools for final word are also holding onto acceptances from other schools. Which unfortunately means we are holding things up for those schools/waitlisters. The road to April 15th is always a knot, what with decision making and waitlisters, but it's only going to be more tangled if programs are holding back/delaying rejections.

Texas can be notorious delayers on contacting those they've waitlisted/ rejected. I hadn't heard from them by this time 3 years ago so withdrew my application entirely. I had emailed them earlier in March to ask what was up and they said something like, "please let us keep your name in consideration." Was I on a waitlist? No idea, kinda vague. In any case this is definitely not uncharacteristic of them.

Tangentially related - Duke finally rejected me! Feels weird to be celebrating a rejection but this is the much-awaited official end of my app season (besides the final response from Stanford which I'm sure will be a rejection). I also just signed a contract on an apartment in Ann Arbor. Woohoo. Wishing everyone the best of luck with final decision-making!

Edited March 29, 2016 by ciistai

[GoIncitatus]

On 26. März 2016 at 1:09 AM, Jimleko said:

Hey Darlingviolet, it's all good!  I'm happy with where I'm going to end up.  The only thing I actually care about now is Penn's waitlist.

Hey Jimleko, hey guys!

I'm also sitting on Penn's waitlist and I'm getting more and more nervous every day. If you get some news about it or if you get an actual spot from the waitlist could you perchance let me know? Penn is the only place I still would really like to go to so I can't wait to hear from them. 

Congrats to all of you who got into their fav programs!

Edited March 29, 2016 by GoIncitatus

[pro Augustis]

11 hours ago, ciistai said:

Texas can be notorious delayers on contacting those they've waitlisted/ rejected. I hadn't heard from them by this time 3 years ago so withdrew my application entirely. I had emailed them earlier in March to ask what was up and they said something like, "please let us keep your name in consideration." Was I on a waitlist? No idea, kinda vague. In any case this is definitely not uncharacteristic of them.

I have a friend who applied to UT for philosophy and is presently on a sort of unofficial waitlist. He was told that they would love to have him,  don't presently have the spot/funding for it, but that might change as other people decline. Sounds like a waitlist to me. Of course, I have no idea if every department there operates in the same fashion. 

[anactoria]

16 hours ago, GoIncitatus said:

I'm also sitting on Penn's waitlist and I'm getting more and more nervous every day. If you get some news about it or if you get an actual spot from the waitlist could you perchance let me know? Penn is the only place I still would really like to go to so I can't wait to hear from them. 

I declined a Penn offer (classical studies) the other day--hopefully the waitlist will move a bit!

[GoIncitatus]

8 hours ago, anactoria said:

I declined a Penn offer (classical studies) the other day--hopefully the waitlist will move a bit!

Massive thanks for that! I think you had exactly the spot I am hoping to get now! 

[Jimleko]

I've decided to officially accept my offer to Cornell.  I think the department was a great fit, and Eric Rebillard does exactly the kind of research I want to do.  If I get off the Penn Waitlist, I will of course pass it off to the next person.

[ClassApp]

1 hour ago, Jimleko said:

I've decided to officially accept my offer to Cornell.  I think the department was a great fit, and Eric Rebillard does exactly the kind of research I want to do.  If I get off the Penn Waitlist, I will of course pass it off to the next person.

Congratulations! Such an exciting time.  

[LtnLvr]

Really random question, but as I am on the waitlist at UVA while in at a higher ranked school, I'm curious: what is UVA's Classics program like? Anyone know? Particularly the Latin poetry side of things? How is it socially too? Anyone care to chim in?