Your favourite application contact

[papercuts]

Okay let's move away from our own stories and conflicts and do something else to pass the time: announce here the application or faculty that has been most helpful. This might seem exceedingly unnecessary as they probably aren't going to be reading these forums (which might be a good or bad thing I don't know), but in an area which is not always as personalized or polite they do deserve some attention for being very nice and helpful.

I would like to mention Susan Kandel from Harvard Graduate School of Education. After I sent her an email about my two typos in the statement I thought that was it. She would be like "You're not only a big idiot for doing that kind of thing in the first place, but now you're sending me a pathetic email to whine about it ? What are you applying to here, kindergarden?"... She was instead very nice and offered a possible solution to my problem too.

If only other admission or faculty contacts were as nice, or are they? Tell us your stories.

[ColorlessGreen]

I think this is a great idea for a topic.

I was really lucky in contacting the faculty at one particular school - I wrote to two professors who were both really helpful in answering my questions about their recent research and publications. One of them directed me to a former student of his, who answered about fifty questions I had about the program via e-mail. I am really incredibly grateful to her for her patience and friendliness. Contacted out of nowhere by someone she didn't even know, she nevertheless took the time to write me several long, informative, engaging e-mails about her former program and the people there. Getting that kind of helpful response from her and the two professors I'd contacted made me think that this particular program, which had previously been last on my list of possibilities, would actually be a real joy to attend.

[NEPA]

1. My potential adviser at my top choice school could not have been more friendly or welcoming, both when I spoke to him on the phone and when I visited the school in the fall.

2. The graduate contact person in one department where I applied was exceptionally nice when I forgot to submit my writing sample on the main application - she responded to my e-mail in literally one minute (!) and let me e-mail the 12-page writing sample to her so she could forward it to the Grad Admissions office. If she does that for everybody she must do a ton of printing out papers.

[NeuroNerd86]

Hands down, the recruitment officer from the University of Minnesota - Twin cities. Even if I don't get an interview there, I will still send him "a thank you" email for being so nice and supportive (and helping me with the application fee waiver, so it didn't cost me anything)

[digits2006]

Dr. Harmon Hosch at the University of Texas at El Paso, Legal psychology program. He has been very helpful. I would ask him questions and besides just giving me another person to email, he would find that person and find out the answer for me. I hope he fights for me in the adcom,they started today and I only had 2 LOR.

[LateAntique]

Honestly, I've encountered nothing but friendly people in this process. A professor at FSU gave me his cell number so we could chat about whatever. When I was having transcript issues with a school I attended, one program's administrative assistant asked me if I wanted her to "go to bat" for me and make some tough calls (to the school that was withholding my transcripts). Likewise, an admissions person at Duke helped me solve the transcript issue for Duke. With as many issues as I've had in my educational career, this experience has shown me a bunch of people who are genuinely caring.

[gildedProgressive]

I was accepted in early December to a conference for this April. Having submitted all my applications before I was notified of this, I was advised by two of my LOR writers to try to get this included for consideration on my app. All the schools were beyond helpful, but the CGS at my top choice was absolutely amazing. One of my LOR writers contacted this same guy about me (they are old friends) in late April last year, and both he (CGS) and the dept. chair told my LOR writer that they were excited about my application. Back to this season--the CGS, in his email back, recognized my name, acknowledging that he had received my application materials earlier that week, saying what a great honor my paper acceptance was. This email was sent at around 9pm on a Sunday, so I'm assuming he wasn't in the office, where he could see my packet. Anyway, this guy was the greatest. I didn't mean to get sidetracked into boosting my own confidence.

[jacib]

I was accepted in early December to a conference for this April. Having submitted all my applications before I was notified of this, I was advised by two of my LOR writers to try to get this included for consideration on my app. All the schools were beyond helpful, but the CGS at my top choice was absolutely amazing. One of my LOR writers contacted this same guy about me (they are old friends) in late April last year, and both he (CGS) and the dept. chair told my LOR writer that they were excited about my application. Back to this season--the CGS, in his email back, recognized my name, acknowledging that he had received my application materials earlier that week, saying what a great honor my paper acceptance was. This email was sent at around 9pm on a Sunday, so I'm assuming he wasn't in the office, where he could see my packet. Anyway, this guy was the greatest. I didn't mean to get sidetracked into boosting my own confidence.

Since I'm looking at a pretty specific topic, I had to email a lot of people to see if it "fit" with their department. It often didn't, but even then most professors tried to be helpful and suggest other programs (often in vain... but they tried!). I had a lot more emails with professors who didn't want me than did, but even in those cases, they often were still very encouraging ("you have an important, interesting topic but unfortunately it falls outside of my area of expertise"). My top shout outs have to go to the professors who I emailed when I knew I WASN'T going to apply there.

One of my dad's colleagues gave me the skinny on all the sociology of religion departments, and offered to put me in touch with tons of people (which she did) and told me to freely drop her name even though we've never met in person. I also emailed another random professor or two out of the blue who teach at liberal arts colleges when I was completely desperate for information ("I like the work you do and actually find it interesting... tell me how you got there. Are you happy with the path you took? How do people react to your degree? If you could do it all over again would you choose the same schools?") just because I had no one else to give me advice.

Finally, I emailed one of three or four biggest names in my subfield (he teaches at Georgetown which doesn't have a program for me) and was like "I'd really like to study with you.... but Georrgetown's Religion program is so Christian and there's no sociology or anthropology graduate program. If I can't work with you, where should I apply?" He wrote me back a few weeks later "Sorry I was out of the country. It's easier for me to talk than email, call me at one of these times." And I did and then he just talked to me for more than 30 minutes telling me literally everyone in the subfield who was training people.... and when I say everyone in my subfield, I mean everyone who studies this subject in religion, sociology, anthropology, and political science departments... I think he might have even mentioned one historian. He's told me this is a rising program, this program is looking for people, people are leaving this program, this program tried to recruit me. It also just made me think about how this topic can and should be studied within the departmental structure. This conversation was also one of my big turning points away from Religion programs and towards Sociology programs. Anyway, he spent a long time explaining a lot to a student whom he had no obligation to.

[LadyL]

I have had great experiences with several schools:

-University of Vermont, where a potential mentor immediately suggested a phone interview after my initial email contact, and then spent an hour telling me all about the program. Also, to their graduate coordinator, for seeming genuinely excited for me to come interview there and making me feel welcome before I've even arrived.

- University of Massachusetts Amherst, where another potential adviser wrote me a detailed email explaining why I should apply to not just the psychology program but also neuroscience to increase my chances at admission - "insider info" that she had no obligation to mention.

- The folks at CUNY who helped me decide between two different programs. Between my five contacts there I spoke to one on the phone, two by email, and two in person. The first in-person meeting went well over the allotted hour and included an hour chatting with students in the lab, a complementary lunch at an awesome greek diner, and a general hospitality that went way above and beyond what could be expected considering I hadn't even applied to the program at that point.

- A potential adviser at Tufts University who took the time to speak to me on the phone, answer my questions when I attended a conference there, and then when funding didn't come through for her to take me as a student last application season, actually apologized and asked me not to take it personally. Because of her friendliness towards me Tufts is still one of my top choice schools.

[digits2006]

I have had great experiences with several schools:

-University of Vermont, where a potential mentor immediately suggested a phone interview after my initial email contact, and then spent an hour telling me all about the program. Also, to their graduate coordinator, for seeming genuinely excited for me to come interview there and making me feel welcome before I've even arrived.

- University of Massachusetts Amherst, where another potential adviser wrote me a detailed email explaining why I should apply to not just the psychology program but also neuroscience to increase my chances at admission - "insider info" that she had no obligation to mention.

- The folks at CUNY who helped me decide between two different programs. Between my five contacts there I spoke to one on the phone, two by email, and two in person. The first in-person meeting went well over the allotted hour and included an hour chatting with students in the lab, a complementary lunch at an awesome greek diner, and a general hospitality that went way above and beyond what could be expected considering I hadn't even applied to the program at that point.

- A potential adviser at Tufts University who took the time to speak to me on the phone, answer my questions when I attended a conference there, and then when funding didn't come through for her to take me as a student last application season, actually apologized and asked me not to take it personally. Because of her friendliness towards me Tufts is still one of my top choice schools.

Who do you want to work with at Tufts? I am applying there for psychology as well.

[BlueSwedeShoes]

Tim at the international office of UCF. Friendliest point of contact so far, great help and solved many of my problems right away! Thanks Tim

[Victorianna]

I will not give any specific names because I am a bit paranoid, but I contacted one of the stars in my field to ask if he was accepting students and briefly described my research. He responded asking for a phone interview and was more helpful than I could have imagined! At the end of the interview he confirmed that he would be fighting for my application.