Fall 2017 thread

[songofgallifrey]

Hi grad cafe,

I didn't see a thread for fall 2017 applications in the Linguistics forum yet, so I figured I'd take the initiative. 

I'm looking to study linguistic identity and language policy as they relate to social, economic, and political inequality, so I'm applying to a couple different types of programs. Relevant for this thread are the programs in Sociolinguistics at Georgetown, as well as Educational Linguistics at UPenn and Second Language Education at Minnesota. One of my former linguistics professors, who is writing an LOR for me, highly recommended that I apply to the latter two programs based on my research interests, although I'm not 100% sold on the education bent. She spoke highly of Prof Nancy Hornberger at UPenn and Prof Kendall King at Minnesota, and they're researching exactly what I'm interested in, but I don't want to pigeonhole myself as strictly an educational language policy person. I'm also applying to the joint Ph.D. programs in Sociology & Social Policy at Harvard and Princeton. Does anyone else have thoughts on schools?

I studied psychology and linguistics at a top 3 university and graduated in summer 2015 with honors. Since then, I've been working as an analyst on fair lending issues, particularly for folks with limited English proficiency, at a financial regulator in DC. My GRE (167 V, 161 Q, 5.0 W) and GPA (3.72/ 4.00) are both solid, but I'm still worried that I'm not going to be competitive. I have 2/3 professors confirmed to write me letters, and I think they'll write strong ones, but I'm still trying to nail down a third and I'm getting worried. Does anyone have thoughts on applying to PhD programs with 2 academic LORs and 1 non-academic? I'm sure my supervisor would write a strong letter about me and my work ethic, but I thought it would weaken my application.

I also have no idea if my SOP is solid. I think it looks good at this point, but I don't have anyone in my field to ask for advice. What resources are you all using to polish your materials?

Anyway, thanks for the support, even if indirect, from this thread. It's nice to have a community of people working toward a common goal!

[historicallinguist]

On October 13, 2016 at 1:25 PM, songofgallifrey said:

Hi grad cafe,

I didn't see a thread for fall 2017 applications in the Linguistics forum yet, so I figured I'd take the initiative. 

I'm looking to study linguistic identity and language policy as they relate to social, economic, and political inequality, so I'm applying to a couple different types of programs. Relevant for this thread are the programs in Sociolinguistics at Georgetown, as well as Educational Linguistics at UPenn and Second Language Education at Minnesota. One of my former linguistics professors, who is writing an LOR for me, highly recommended that I apply to the latter two programs based on my research interests, although I'm not 100% sold on the education bent. She spoke highly of Prof Nancy Hornberger at UPenn and Prof Kendall King at Minnesota, and they're researching exactly what I'm interested in, but I don't want to pigeonhole myself as strictly an educational language policy person. I'm also applying to the joint Ph.D. programs in Sociology & Social Policy at Harvard and Princeton. Does anyone else have thoughts on schools?

I studied psychology and linguistics at a top 3 university and graduated in summer 2015 with honors. Since then, I've been working as an analyst on fair lending issues, particularly for folks with limited English proficiency, at a financial regulator in DC. My GRE (167 V, 161 Q, 5.0 W) and GPA (3.72/ 4.00) are both solid, but I'm still worried that I'm not going to be competitive. I have 2/3 professors confirmed to write me letters, and I think they'll write strong ones, but I'm still trying to nail down a third and I'm getting worried. Does anyone have thoughts on applying to PhD programs with 2 academic LORs and 1 non-academic? I'm sure my supervisor would write a strong letter about me and my work ethic, but I thought it would weaken my application.

I also have no idea if my SOP is solid. I think it looks good at this point, but I don't have anyone in my field to ask for advice. What resources are you all using to polish your materials?

Anyway, thanks for the support, even if indirect, from this thread. It's nice to have a community of people working toward a common goal!

What are you planning to do after getting the PHD/Ed.D? Based on what I know about the educational linguistics program at upenn, it looks like this is particularly good for those who want to do research on/have a career in education. That is, this program is probably more about education than about linguistics. 

 

Georgetown's linguistics program is a research program, so I think it would be better for you if all LORs submitted are written by your professors.

In addition, based on your post, I also feel that you are more interested in applied sociolinguistics as relevant to L2 acquisition. Probably, some linguistics departments with strong emphases on linguistic theories cannot best serve your research interests in this regard. 

 University of Southern California has some sociolinguistic people doing research on identity issues (focus on Asian languages though). You can take a look at their website, and see whether their research foci fit with yours. 

Can you ask your professors to read your SOPs and provide comments on your SOPs? Your profs writing LORs for you can  write you better focused LORs if they read your SOPs before they write them, in addition the benefit that you can know whether you are on the right track of writing a good SOP.

 

Finally, given that your current undergrad school is a top 3, would you consider continue to do a grad degree in your current institution ?

Edited October 14, 2016 by historicallinguist

[songofgallifrey]

@historicallinguist I'm planning to work at a policy institute/think tank/intergovernmental organization where I can be a professional researcher. I haven't ruled out academia entirely, but I'm more interested in being more connected to the organizations doing the actual policymaking. Your feedback about the UPenn program is helpful, thanks.

Since I studied psychology undergrad, my thesis adviser who's one of my LOR writers is in cognitive psychology and the other LOR writer that I have confirmed focuses on contact linguistics and language shift. The third person I'm trying to get to write me an LOR is also in cogsci. Does it matter that the two cogsci LOR writers aren't in sociolinguistics or social policy? I don't have much of a choice at this point, but I'm just wondering.

I think you're right that my interests lie more in applied sociolinguistics. I'm not interested in L2 acquisition per se, more so in what happens during acquisition: code-switching, the social impact of language shift, changes in linguistic identity, and the impact of language ideology on these processes.

I subtly asked my LOR writers to give any thoughts/feedback they had on my SOP when I sent it (after they had agreed to write a letter and asked for SOP and resume), but I didn't ask outright because I didn't want to be annoying. I can follow up and ask more directly. 

I've thought about applying to my undergrad institution, and haven't 100% ruled it out, but it doesn't look like my research interests would really fit with any of the faculty members'.