Annoying Application Quirks

[carrar]

Okee dokee, here's my annoyance of the day. Today (01/15) is my deadline for UMass Amherst.* I applied a few weeks ago and kept checking my status link to ensure the letters were in on time. Yesterday I sent an email reminder to two profs (the with-it ones) who had not submitted yet, and they both replied they never received a link to do so. So I went back into the Spire program to resend it to them, and there's no way I can do it. I called the Graduate Admissions Office, and the very nice woman asked for my ID number and said she would resend them for me. But wouldn't it just be easier to develop the system so that I could resend it myself rather than wasting their time?

Whoever mentioned developing an application program for universities, if you ever do, I will seriously join you! I currently do some corporate website testing, and the 2001-era, lack-of-foresight programming for these apps is driving me bonkers!

*Yes, today. Not February 1, like the department website said until mid-November, after I had prepared all the scheduling materials for myself and my LOR writers. This is not the only school that has changed or had not consistent deadlines on their department pages well into application season (*cough* Northwestern).

[ColorlessGreen]

Okee dokee, here's my annoyance of the day. Today (01/15) is my deadline for UMass Amherst.* I applied a few weeks ago and kept checking my status link to ensure the letters were in on time. Yesterday I sent an email reminder to two profs (the with-it ones) who had not submitted yet, and they both replied they never received a link to do so. So I went back into the Spire program to resend it to them, and there's no way I can do it. I called the Graduate Admissions Office, and the very nice woman asked for my ID number and said she would resend them for me. But wouldn't it just be easier to develop the system so that I could resend it myself rather than wasting their time?

It's not just you - one of my recommenders had the same problem of not receiving an e-mail from UMass. On the bright side, I think I talked to that same incredibly nice woman - she got the link sent in under a minute. Of course, this was after I spent an hour or two fiddling around with the SPIRE website trying to figure out if I could send it myself.

[BonAppetit]

My annoyance is with the pull-down menus for degrees, too. All three schools I applied to only let me choose ONE degree, and had no additional space to list a double major. Well, I doubled in journalism and I.R., and both are equally relevant to my graduate studies, so I had to basically just "pick one" and hope they notice the other one in my C.V./SOP. With so many people double-majoring in undergrad, why on earth would they not provide applicants the space to explain that????

[tskinner]

My annoyance is with the pull-down menus for degrees, too. All three schools I applied to only let me choose ONE degree, and had no additional space to list a double major. Well, I doubled in journalism and I.R., and both are equally relevant to my graduate studies, so I had to basically just "pick one" and hope they notice the other one in my C.V./SOP. With so many people double-majoring in undergrad, why on earth would they not provide applicants the space to explain that????

I had this same problem! I am earning both a BA and BS concurrently in I.R. and Economics, and only one of my applications had this as a choice. For those that let my type in the degree, it usually only allowed four characters, so I couldn't even abbreviate to BA&BS. For on of the applications I remember listing my university twice under attended universities with the same dates of attendance to put in both degrees! >.<

[RedPotato]

One of the schools I applied to listed about 25 types of degrees EXCEPT b.f.a. which is what I have. I had to put "other" which made me nervous. I hope this doesn't count against me, because a bfa is a pretty common degree.