<p>Another application submitted and another screw-up on my part. This time I forgot to fill out the list of other schools I'm applying to, in the optional section. Doh!</p>
<p>The school I applied to was a mid-tier school. Do you think they'll care that I didn't fill any information out? How much weight is it given? (It can't be a lot since it's optional, but it also is a very important question I think to determine how an offer might be received). </p>
<p>I was really planning to do this but it just slipped past me. Probably not a good idea to do apps at 12am.</p>
<p>Probably not a good idea to finish up your applications when you are not thinking as clearly, however, I wouldn’t worry too much about it. It was optional. Filling it out or not filling it out really shouldn’t help or hinder the other areas of your application. It might make a difference in financial aid, for example, if they see that you’ve only applied to other schools that were likely out of your reach vs. applying to other schools that you will also likely be admitted to. But if you do get other acceptances with better offers, let this school know and see if they’re willing to work with you if it’s your number one choice. If it’s not your number one, then don’t worry at all.</p>
<p>Relax. I didn’t give that information to any school I applied to, and I got several acceptances. (Frankly, it’s none of their damn business. Evaluate me as an individual!)</p>
<p>Thanks guys. I think I’ll reserve this thread as a place to fret over my semi-neurotic concerns during this application process. Im afraid there’ll be more to come.</p>
<p>Others can do the same. The title is open-ended enough.</p>
<p>You will have enough stress just waiting for the results of your applications. Don’t fret over something that was optional. It’s tricky knowing when putting down other schools will help or hurt you. Again, I really think it has more to do with what kind of aid they would give you, and not the actual admitted/rejected decision. Good luck!</p>
<p>I just realized I also misspelled one of the professors names who I mentioned in the statement. I can’t resubmit it or change it. I have already communicated with him. Should I email him or call him and apologize? I want him to know I’m sorry and that I REALLY want to go to that school. I don’t want that to be the reason they don’t accept me. ANYTHING?!?</p>
<p>**** I thought my statement was perfect too, until I just caught that. What should I do???</p>
<p>FYI: I only misspelled his name once. It was spelled correctly elsewhere in the essay. How bad is this?</p>
<p>Few people will notice the typo, and if they do they won’t care. We accepted someone last year who addressed their cover letter to the wrong school. All that matters is your record and the fit between your research interests and ours.</p>
<p>Thanks but this is a professor’s name we’re talking about! The saddest part is that I proofread it over and over. The professors last name is Garty, but I wrote Gardy on the last time. I must not have caught it b/c it sounds the same when I read it aloud. </p>
<p>Ugh! I’m thinking of calling the grad office tomorrow to see if they can delete my application, maybe I can start over…? Or should I not even mention it to anybody? I’m so worried now, my stomach is sick. Thanks.</p>
<p>I would not worry about it at this point - 9/10 professors won’t care, and the ones that do care are going to find out about it probably no matter what you do. Try to proofread the rest of your apps with special attention to names.</p>
<p>^Part of me thinks this too, since they’re scientists not English profs. But the department faculty is small there (from what I gather) and so the admissions committee should be able to recognize it pretty easily.</p>
<p>I was thinking of emailing the prof anyway to tell him I submitted my app, thank him, etc… Should I mention my blunder and apologize profusely?</p>
<p>I also have to call the admissions office tomorrow to ask about transcripts and such. Should I ask them too?</p>
<p>I had a typo that was part of 6 of my 11 statement of purposes (my background/experience part that was standard form for just about everyone) and I still got admitted to a good amount of them.</p>
<p>Regarding the optional list of programs you applied to, I submitted that to every application and not one single professor I spoke to during admissions memorized my answers: if they were at all interested, they asked me on the flyout as if they had never read my application (just my CV and personal statement).</p>
<p>If anything, I think the app is only seen by the graduate school and/or some committee under the DGS before administrative cutoffs.</p>
<p>Thanks for the votes of assurance. You guys are better than a bottle of pepto bismol. </p>
<p>Vitiatethis, to me that doesn’t sound like a “deliberate” typo. Just something you didn’t think mattered. In my case, they could argue that I don’t care and I didn’t proofread mine, since it was careless. Yours was just a matter of misunderstanding and misinterpretation, but you were consistent.</p>
<p>I have written papers that I proofread about 100+ times (my senior honors thesis was one of them) and I still managed to overlook a minor typo. One typo in the whole paper isn’t such a bad thing. Plus it was a name, and names are much hard to ensure proper spelling for. My prof that I did a bunch of research will still on occasion would spell my name wrong. I don’t think people will take it too personally. And if they do, then you probably don’t want to work with someone so uptight.</p>
<p>How bad is it if you didn’t exactly follow all of the instructions for the Statement of Purpose? For example, if the directions said “Indicate where and when you had your research experience…” but you didn’t explicitly say like “March 2009…” or the city. This especially goes for when there was a section elsewhere in the application that asked for that information. </p>
<p>How bad is that? (This is all theoretical, of course… )</p>
<p>On a related note, how much do you have to follow the directions “to a T?” Do you have to answer the questions in the order they are asked in the directions? Particularly when its asked like this, "Give us your research experience. What attracted you to apply to University X? How did you decide to pursue your degree? "</p>
<p>Ok, I’ll confess that I did not, partly because I didn’t think it was important and mostly because it broke the flow of my essay, which everyone thinks is really good.</p>
<p>As long as you answered the prompt then you will be fine. If you didn’t explain why you chose University X, for example, then I think you are in trouble.</p>
<p>Any of your worries are probably nothing. These are the minutest details; content and message are what matters–if you get that across, then faculty will stop caring about whether or not you got your point across or if you used their prompt as a template or not.</p>
I’m thinking of calling the grad office tomorrow to see if they can delete my application, maybe I can start over…? Or should I not even mention it to anybody? I’m so worried now, my stomach is sick. Thanks.</p>
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