How many times can you reapply...?

[orangebanana]

How many times can/should one reapply to the same school/same program if one gets rejected? How many times can/should one reapply to the same school/different program if one gets rejected?

Thoughts?

[Neist]

I kind of wandered into a sub-forum that I don't know much about, but you can generally apply however many times you like. Personally, I might give up after 3-4 years, but I'm sure there are others more persistent than I.

Besides, if a program was really annoyed by an application, they'd probably politely ask you to stop, and I doubt that'd ever happen because schools make a fair amount of money from applicants.

[orangebanana]

Thanks!

[TakeruK]

I would say that unless something major changes in your applications, I would not apply more than 2 or 3 times when applying to the same school/same program. Schools won't really tell you to stop applying because I don't think that's really an appropriate thing for a school to say. They will still evaluate your application. Most schools do not make a ton of money on application fees---that money isn't even collected by the department, so they have nothing to gain by encouraging you to apply. 

For a given program, based on existing needs and resources (i.e. money and time), the type of applicant admitted will change from year to year. And, the pool of applicants (i.e. the competition) may also change a bit from year to year. So, depending on what the program needs at the time, a student that is accepted this year may have been rejected had they applied in a different year, and vice-versa.

But, it doesn't change *that* much, so if you are rejected 2 or 3 times in a row, I would say it's unlikely that applying one more time will magically result in a different outcome. If this is the case, I would say it would be a good idea to wait until something changes before reapplying. Perhaps you can do additional classes, find a research position, do a Masters, etc. Sometimes you might get lucky/unlucky and change is due to reasons outside of your control (e.g. department made a new hire and they need more students, a prof has left the program, national funding level increases/decreases). There was one year in my program that is smaller than normal because it was an uncertain year for planetary science funding from the government. I would tell the people who weren't accepted in that year to try again!

[Crucial BBQ]

On 7/19/2016 at 5:26 PM, orangebanana said:

How many times can/should one reapply to the same school/same program if one gets rejected? How many times can/should one reapply to the same school/different program if one gets rejected?

Thoughts?

As stated, I believe you can reapply as many times as you want.  Now, if you are asking if there is a limit to the number of times the program will take your application seriously, I am not sure but imagine the above would still apply.  My advice is to contact the program director(s) and PIs if applicable to review application with you.  This is what I did after my first round of rejections and appreciated the candidness and found their advice helpful.  One caveat, if you were rejected from multiple programs you will hear varying reasons for the individual rejections.  As examples, with one program my uGPA was an issue but at another it was not.  One program even cited the fact that I did not explain a few low grades on my transcript, but otherwise had no issue with my GPA overall. 

 

I have a former prof who applied to the same Ph.D. program three years in a row.  With the third attempt, a PI from this program recognized his application from the previous two years and decided to bring him in based on his persistence, which this PI thought would be of value to his lab.  With that, I would suggest to not apply more than 3 times unless something in your application changes (new, higher, GRE score, a grad course or two, a challenging undergrad course--even at a community college--and so on).  

  

[Rocky123]

As many times as it takes to get into the freaking program!

Jack Ma applied to Harvard 10 years in a row. Got rejected every year. He is the CEO of Ali Baba.

I would say at least 10 times. 

#hatersgonnahate Keep pushing! Back yourself!

Edited February 1, 2017 by Rocky123