What you think the adcoms are saying about your application

[sputnik]

Mine are thinking: These letters of rec are way better than this kid's records deserve. Must have paid them off.

[aradia]

"Meh"

I have nightmares about this one! :,(

[emmm]

next . . .

[natsteel]

"He forgot to use 2 hyphens in his SOP. What a jack ass."

I still can't believe I didn't catch this after reading this damn thing hundreds of times. My advisor didn't either so maybe I don't need to worry!

Don't feel bad... I'm in a kind of ancillary program at my school, which actually grants my degree but which just recently changed a word in its long name (adcoms will have no idea of this though). So, of course, like a tool, I used the old name and somehow didn't catch it until it was too late. Inevitably, I imagine a bunch of "This idiot doesn't even know the name of his program" reactions from adcoms.

[Emerson]

Professor X: "Let's see what we have here. Applicant 'A.' Decent grades, a long publication list, two foreign languages, fair GRE scores, demonstrates familiarity with key issues in the field..."

Professor Y: "Wait, wait, wait. Let's give this a closer look. Sure his grades are good, but he has bounced around different programs like he has no sense of purpose. Since he graduated with his BA, he has gone through two graduate programs, each with a different school and in a different field. I see no reason to believe he has the disciplined rigor to succeed in history. He has no vision: he is just wandering around intellectually--an academic prostitute, if you will."

Professor Z: "Yeah, and a majority of his publications are on obscure topics published in non-elite journals. I mean, The Journal of Mormon History? Pshaww!"

Professor X [finally seeing the light]: "You're right. Now that I think of it, his languages are somewhat lacking as well. One was mostly honed while doing church service in Washington DC--no academic rigor involved! The other was, besides one semester of a 'readings' course--we all know how effective those are--developed in personal study. Sure, Applicant A, we can believe that...." [snickering commences]

Professor Y: "And while his GRE scores are now presentable, he had to take the test three damn times in order to get over the 600 hump! Three times!" [Laughing becomes more noticeable.]

Professor Z: "And if that wasn't enough [struggling to contain laughter], his personal statement tries to show how all of this background has helped prepare him for life in academia!" [Restraint is no longer achieved--loud laughter fills the room as all three professors squeal in delight.]

Professor X: "You're right, you're right. I'm sorry--I should have seen this from the beginning. OFF WITH HIS HEAD! Err, to the trash with his application!"

[The three professors perform a mock funeral ceremony as the application is shredded, burned, and tossed out the window. "At least this gave us a fun respite from the tedious work of admissions," they all thought.]

[Across the Atlantic ocean, Applicant A shudders for no apparent reason.]

Or something like that.

[beanbagchairs]

he is just wandering around intellectually--an academic prostitute, if you will."

HAHAHAHAHAH.. you really made my day!.. thank you!

[waddle]

University of Big Shots: Prof. Applicants R. Hilarious squints at waddle's transcript. "Teh Suck ... State University at ... Nowhere? Pshaw! He thinks that's a real school? Hawhawhawhawhaw! Teeheeheehee! Oh man, that's the best laugh I've had in days."

Leading Science Institution: Placing katerific's oh-so-awesome application in the 'admit' pile, Prof. Y-Do I. Bother picks up waddle's, expecting something just as amazing. Flips quickly through it, and thinks, "SON. I AM DISAPPOINT." This one goes on the pile marked 'document disposal'.

Nobel Factory University: After reading through waddle's statement, Prof. I. M. Amazing gets up to grab a beer to wash out the bad aftertaste. She feels just a modicum of pity for the hapless chap who had the audacity to actually submit such a non-amazing application.

University of Badass Research: Before sitting down, Prof. Reject N. Repeat decides to automatically reject every third application that comes his way, and only review the rest. This will save him time, allowing for him to pack a few extra rounds of foosball into his busy schedule (his defense has gotten a bit rusty over the holiday break). After disposing of 1/3 of the applications on his desk, he picks up the first remaining application. It's waddle's. Midway through reading it, Prof. Repeat starts screams, "WHATISTHISIDON'TEVEN!", tears the application into shreds, and out of anger, shreds all the other applications, too. Thereafter, he calmly gets up and walk towards the break room, planning to pwn some n00bs (grad students).

Lotsa Money University: Prof. Should B. Retired sits down and starts working through his inbox. "Oh hey, an applicant. I guess we'll accept her." Then goes on to accept every other applicant, thinking it'd be fun to see how many clueless new grad students he could pack into an office before they figured out what had happened. Heck, maybe he could strike up a collaboration with the psychology faculty and get the experiment published too. And apply for a grant. Of course, the money would go toward getting a sedan chair. With all that extra grad student labor, he wouldn't even need a car! (Oooh, this is an interesting train of thought!) Heheheheh ... zzzzzz.

I would put down more scenarios, but alas, I ran out of applications.

P.S. To the other applicants at UBR: Oops, sorry, guys.

Edited January 4, 2011 by waddle

[katerific]

waddle:

....although my application probably isn't that oh-so-awesome and we only have like, what, maybe two overlapping schools?

[Count de Monet]

Certain professors:

"hmm...GPA in UG and Grad school are great. Well written letters are from respectable and known professors. SoP presents a 'sexy' topic in political philosophy. GRE scores are not bad, but could be better. So far I think I like what I see here; now for that writing sample. Ooooo, a paper on a relevant debate in political theory maybe we've got a winner here....

......

......

........

.............

....................

BURN IT!!!!!! BURN IT!!!! How dare any student dare to attack the conclusions by Leo Strauss on Hobbes! BANISH HIM TO THE REJECTION PILE!!!!!!"

[eklavya]

'lets make paper boats out of their applications and see how long it takes to reach their home town'

nauseated by the new, huge application pile, one adcomm member looks to others, and says cartman style 'screw you guys, i'm going home!'.

[EricaMarie]

University of Big Shots: Prof. Applicants R. Hilarious squints at waddle's transcript. "Teh Suck ... State University at ... Nowhere? Pshaw! He thinks that's a real school? Hawhawhawhawhaw! Teeheeheehee! Oh man, that's the best laugh I've had in days."

Leading Science Institution: Placing katerific's oh-so-awesome application in the 'admit' pile, Prof. Y-Do I. Bother picks up waddle's, expecting something just as amazing. Flips quickly through it, and thinks, "SON. I AM DISAPPOINT." This one goes on the pile marked 'document disposal'.

Nobel Factory University: After reading through waddle's statement, Prof. I. M. Amazing gets up to grab a beer to wash out the bad aftertaste. She feels just a modicum of pity for the hapless chap who had the audacity to actually submit such a non-amazing application.

University of Badass Research: Before sitting down, Prof. Reject N. Repeat decides to automatically reject every third application that comes his way, and only review the rest. This will save him time, allowing for him to pack a few extra rounds of foosball into his busy schedule (his defense has gotten a bit rusty over the holiday break). After disposing of 1/3 of the applications on his desk, he picks up the first remaining application. It's waddle's. Midway through reading it, Prof. Repeat starts screams, "WHATISTHISIDON'TEVEN!", tears the application into shreds, and out of anger, shreds all the other applications, too. Thereafter, he calmly gets up and walk towards the break room, planning to pwn some n00bs (grad students).

Lotsa Money University: Prof. Should B. Retired sits down and starts working through his inbox. "Oh hey, an applicant. I guess we'll accept her." Then goes on to accept every other applicant, thinking it'd be fun to see how many clueless new grad students he could pack into an office before they figured out what had happened. Heck, maybe he could strike up a collaboration with the psychology faculty and get the experiment published too. And apply for a grant. Of course, the money would go toward getting a sedan chair. With all that extra grad student labor, he wouldn't even need a car! (Oooh, this is an interesting train of thought!) Heheheheh ... zzzzzz.

I would put down more scenarios, but alas, I ran out of applications.

P.S. To the other applicants at UBR: Oops, sorry, guys.

LOL. This is awesome, and gave me the first real LOL I've had in days....Thank you.

[MoJingly]

She doesn't need a PhD. She needs medication.

[katerific]

MoJingly, I wish I could give a gold star sticker to each and every one of your posts.

[MoJingly]

MoJingly, I wish I could give a gold star sticker to each and every one of your posts.

haha, : ) thanks!

[awvish]

Very Prestigious Schools:

Ha. Wait, no. She's serious. She thinks that crappy grades in the field and no formal background, no GRE subject test, and a couple of mismatched majors--even from an Ivy League school...and what's this...letters from her past PIs who are totally irrelevant to her proposed field...she thinks all this makes an application?! I'd cry, if this weren't so...funny. Oh no! She's doing development work in Africa...and she took time out from doing that to apply? Wait, is she ever competent? This is just sad. Okay, okay. Focus. *Puts in the pile labeled "Waste of paper"*. Next.

Not Quite As Prestigious Schools:

What, does she think that just because we're not a VPS she thinks she can gatecrash us with little credentials and less evidence of competence? Puh-leeeeeeze. *Adds to the "Puh-leeze" pile*. Next.

[apieceofroastbeef]

I often think that my application is going to be sent to a certain professor at my #1 choice school (probably the only one who will understand the technical parts of my WS) who will then find HUGE mistakes/naivete in it and personally send scathing emails to the poor professors I got to write me letters of recommendation-- mocking them-- and then these LOR writers will contact me asking why I would "embarrass them like this?". And then, after being rejected all-round, I couldn't apply to graduate school again, even if I wanted to, because I've been blacklisted at my UG.

Then again, when thinking about my reply to this post, I've figured that the worst thing would be no response at all. Just nothing. As in "you're not even worthy of our consideration and you'll never even know what it would take to become one of us" type of thing.

[MoJingly]

Then again, when thinking about my reply to this post, I've figured that the worst thing would be no response at all. Just nothing. As in "you're not even worthy of our consideration and you'll never even know what it would take to become one of us" type of thing.

That's intense!

[NadaJ]

Then again, when thinking about my reply to this post, I've figured that the worst thing would be no response at all. Just nothing. As in "you're not even worthy of our consideration and you'll never even know what it would take to become one of us" type of thing.

Exactly. The opposite of heaven is not hell--it's nothingness. This is intense!

[agatheringrose]

My general thought for any of the schools I've applied to is:

Why is someone with a Library Science masters applying here? Does she think we put on puppet shows?

[lab ratta-tat-tat]

I am pretty sure they glanced at my transcript- saw I got a 3.0 and threw my entire application packet out.

Too bad I have 2 publications, 5 years total research experience 2 years molecular biology lab experience and I have presented a poster at several meetings and I am still pretty young.

Back to the drawing board.

[pawqara]

With mine:

She doesn't even know english!

WTF is this 20-scale gpa thing? what? a 12.5? (in my school, only true geniuses get more than 13.0, of course, they are not aware of that)

She thinks THAT can be considered as science? she is only running around campaigning for endangered species! (most of my work is on conservation biology)

Those are her GRE scores? Puhleeeeeese! she can't even count!

Oh, an she only applied to us because she is so over confident! (actually, majorly broke)

REJECTED!

And then, I will have to find a real job in the real world, and forget about research. *runs around hyperventilating!*

I am sooo stressed!

[Bison_PhD]

"A 3.4 at Blah Blah State University is ridiculous.

I haven't ever heard of it but I'm sure that it is a very poor/easy institution.

Hah, if I had gone to such an easy school I'd have gotten a 4.0

They think that they are going to make up for it with only 1 year as an RA at a research institution, Puhleese.

Grad Student #4378, throw this in the trash for me, I can't be bothered by this 'Bison' any more."

[TheOtherJake]

"Hey, check out this thread on Grad Cafe where people guess what we are saying about their applications."

"Haha, as if we sit around and talk about these peeps as if they were a focus of our lives or something."

"LOL! Pass the Chinese food please."

"Did you just say 'LOL'?"

[NadaJ]

"Maybe next year."

[Jbird41]

Probably...."Oh honey, we're very happy that you're trying so hard but you don't have a drop of diversity, you're 23, and you definately didn't buy nice enough stationary paper to put your personal statement on..."