Required to list all other programs you've applied to?

[noumenope]

Hello friends, so I'm seeing this question in most of my applications. Most don't list it as one of the required questions to answer but I'm wondering - does it look bad if you leave it blank?

My concern is that I'm applying to a high number of programs due to their competitiveness (12) and I don't want that to count against me (like - "oh, it seems unlikely he'll even matriculate here why offer acceptance?").

How have you all approached this question? Do you answer it when not required? Have you heard of any reason why not answering it would be held against you?

-- Similar, secondary question: if they ask whether you've applied to the school before, are they referring to just graduate level programs, or does that include undergrad? Thanks!

[MonstersU-Terp]

It doesn't look bad to leave blank. The universities are inquiring so that they may record statistics of what programs they are in competition with. It's a fair way for them to to measure their ranking/standing in comparison to other graduate programs.

[rising_star]

From the applications FAQ that @fuzzylogician so helpfully wrote:

"The application asks what other schools I'm applying to. Why? What should I say? Should I leave it blank? 

This information is used by schools to gauge who their competitors are. I have never heard of it being used in any nefarious way. If you are concerned about this and it's optional, just leave the question blank. Otherwise, I would suggest picking 3-4 schools that are similar to the one you're currently applying to in terms to the research interests and methodologies it can support, and are generally similarly ranked in your subfield."

For more, see here.

[MarineBluePsy]

Now that you mention it, this is the one question I haven't seen (required or optional) on any of my applications and I'm also applying to a lot of programs.  When I applied to programs previously every application asked this and I left it blank whenever possible.  When I had to enter something I just listed one other school that was similar to the program I was applying to since I figured saying "none of your business" wouldn't leave the right impression lol.  Even though I get that each program wants to see who their competitors are I find it really annoying that they'd try to collect this information during the already stressful enough application season and not necessarily anonymously.    

[TakeruK]

57 minutes ago, MarineBluePsy said:

Now that you mention it, this is the one question I haven't seen (required or optional) on any of my applications and I'm also applying to a lot of programs.  When I applied to programs previously every application asked this and I left it blank whenever possible.  When I had to enter something I just listed one other school that was similar to the program I was applying to since I figured saying "none of your business" wouldn't leave the right impression lol.  Even though I get that each program wants to see who their competitors are I find it really annoying that they'd try to collect this information during the already stressful enough application season and not necessarily anonymously.    

To add to the reply from fuzzy though, in my field, there's a reason why it's not anonymous. It's because the school wants to also gauge the chances of you accepting the offer that is made. For example, for a particular subfield in my program, our biggest competitor is Harvard. Almost every single person that do not accept our offer in this subfield goes to Harvard. And, we have also noticed that students with attributes/interests XYZ (not giving details for some anonymity) tend to choose Harvard more often than not, if they have Harvard as a choice. So, if we are aiming for, say, 6 students, we might normally make 10 offers. However, if say, 5 of them have attributes XYZ and also have applied to Harvard, we know we might want to make a few extra offers just in case. On the other hand, if say, 8-9 out of the 10 do not have Harvard listed, then we are more certain that they will come here and might stick to only 10 offers. 

This information does not affect your own offer, but it could be used to help the program decide how many other offers to make. My school will certainly not say "well this person applied to Harvard and is probably good enough to get in, therefore we don't want this excellent student" (?!?!!) At least in my experience, this type of information is not used to hurt you in any way (and I can't really think of a reason for a school to not want a student because they applied to a certain other school).

Also, even if you leave it blank, if you have an interview or any contact with the faculty there, one of the most common questions you'll be asked is "where else are you considering?". I always ask this when I meet prospective students because I might have visited the same places and their followup question is often "Why did you pick [your school] over [other school]?". It's certainly fine to leave the field blank, and it's also fine to be evasive if you get the question in-person. Be just be prepared to have a smooth answer so that it doesn't sound weird. After all, if you replied "I don't want to tell!" to that question in person, it would be strange behaviour. Instead, if you asked what other schools are your top choices, you can say something like "Well, I'm not sure yet until I visit them!". In my field though, although we certainly compete with other schools, it is friendly---a prof here might even suggest certain colleagues at other programs for you to talk to during your visit there.

[fuzzylogician]

14 minutes ago, TakeruK said:

In my field though, although we certainly compete with other schools, it is friendly---a prof here might even suggest certain colleagues at other programs for you to talk to during your visit there.

I second everything TakeruK says and I just to elaborate on this bit: For me this was actually a part of how I made my decision where to attend. At some schools when a professor would ask about the competitors and I would say that I'm also visiting schools X and Y, they would say "those are great choices. Profs A,B, and C would be great advisors." At others, they would say "school X? meh, they're not that good at all, and did you know that school Y [just had this bad thing happen]?" That was a major turnoff, and those people and the schools they represented were crossed off my list.  

[amolang]

@noumenope My number is actually higher than yours lol.

I just listed 5-6 programs among my full list so that I don't seem needy, and made sure that other programs were from various levels of reputation so that they would not think "this applicant would not choose us anyway."

 

Edited November 27, 2015 by amolang