<p>Anyone else have really early application expectations? I was told by another student in my field that when he applied for a big school last August for the 2010-2011 year he was "too late." This was for a graduate assistantship. Over a full year ahead! I am considering applying to that school so I have already started my cover letter for that school and hope to send it off by the end of May!</p>
<p>You should just call the school and ask when they start accepting applications. I doubt it is this early for admission in August next year. I also don’t think an August application would be too late anywhere. Maybe he just did not get in and wants to find an excuse for it.</p>
<p>They do say on their website that their positions (5 a year I think) are filled by the end of the fall semester for the following year. So having information in super-early there doesn’t really surprise me…</p>
<p>If their assistantships are filled by the end of the fall semester (which may be likely) this would be mid-December, not in August. You can always call the training program director and ask when they begin reviewing applications for assistantships. There’s no benefit to applying in May if they don’t review applications until October or November.</p>
<p>Are you sure that your student friend was applying for a graduate assistantship for 2010-2011 and not for 2009-2010? August is rarely too early; a lot of programs haven’t even put up their applications by then. The earliest deadlines are usually December 1.</p>
<p>That said, as was stated it wouldn’t hurt to call and inquire or at the least inspect the website. Virtually all websites for graduate programs have admissions deadlines posted right their on the site; usually the deadlines don’t vary from year to year (like Columbia GSAS’s is always December 15) and so they’re static. Even if they do, a school likely would have already edited the page for the next year, or you can see when the application is likely due.</p>
<p>The deadlines aren’t in August, but they also don’t wait until a mid-December deadline to start the process. I know of several places that do this: positions are “open until filled” rather than on “this date we will accept ___ people” kind of thing.</p>
<p>In this case, it wouldn’t hurt to get your application in by mid-September. At most places, it doesn’t matter.</p>
<p>You and I had very different problems with deadlines for applying to graduate school. May I suggest that if you send in an application months before the avalanche of applications arrives, yours won’t find its way into the right filing cabinet for consideration.</p>