Grad School Applications... not much better!

Parents Forum
1

<p>Gosh, just when I thought there was an angst ridden period not much worse than the undergrad-school application process and waiting game... here we are 4 years later going through the same thing with grad school. And I have to admit, I'm out of my league on this one, I don't have a graduate degree, only an undergrad. I'm feeling a bit overwhelmed myself while trying to support my S through the process.</p>

<p>Is there a board particular to grad school parents or can I park it here for some support? I received a text last night after the dream school app was submitted, "Mom, it's submitted. I feel like I need to vomit."</p>

<p>I want to know when all this gets easier... (just kidding, I know it doesn't).</p>

2

<p>There’s a forum for grad school stuff on CC! Good luck to your son!</p>

<p>[Graduate</a> School - College Confidential](<a href=“http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/graduate-school/]Graduate”>Graduate School - College Confidential Forums)</p>

3

<p>There are additional sites by major your son and you can go to to see what other students are doing. Med school, physics etc. google his major and grad school applications and forum and see what comes up.</p>

4

<p>I hear you HurricaneMom, I am going through the very same thing with DD. I haven’t found a place for Grad parents, though I sure wish there was a place. The Grad School forum seems to be mostly students. I guess a lot of kids may be more independent at this point, but DD still likes to get support from mom :slight_smile: Interview at dream school went really well, but I think she is afraid to even hope she will get in.</p>

<p>The most frustrating thing for her has been the LOR as that is mostly out of her control. One recommender just can’t seem to get it together. Unfortunately, it is her internship supervisior so she pretty much has to get one from her.</p>

<p>Best of luck to DS!!</p>

5

<p>There’s a site called The Grad Cafe that has bulletin boards by subject matter that provide lots of granular information I haven’t seen elsewhere, plus a running tally of acceptances, rejections, and other communications, which is very helpful given that there isn’t a standard date for programs to act. No parent participation, though (nor should there be, really).</p>

<p>I lurked a lot there last year when my kid was applying to PhD programs. I wouldn’t say it was helpful – it mainly let me know when the programs my kid was targeting were making offers to other people, which gave me several weeks advance notice of when the rejections were going to come. (In general, at least in that field and many others, there can be up to 6 weeks gap between when the bulk of offers are made and when they get around to rejecting people. Some programs have formal waitlists; others have rolling offers/rejections, so applicants can be in limbo for a long time. Not fun.)</p>

<p>This is for PhD/master’s programs, not so much professional schools. There are other sites for those. I know from sitting with a cousin who was working for me at the time that law school admissions can involve the same sort of torture. He heard from some schools in a matter of weeks, and in the case of one of his top choices he never heard at all. He understood that effectively meant he was on a waitlist; he finally withdrew his application when he hadn’t heard anything by mid-June.</p>

6

<p>PhD grad apps are awful. Went thru this with S1 last year. </p>

<p>Even the safeties aren’t safeties. Some (ha ha) “safeties” are only accepting about 10-15% of apps. (I realize that a safety isn’t a safety if it only accepts 10-15%…what I mean is that some lower tier schools that you’d think would be safeties, aren’t.)</p>

<p>*I haven’t found a place for Grad parents, though I sure wish there was a place. The Grad School forum seems to be mostly students. *</p>

<p>True…only the med school parents seem to have an active place. The grad school forum didn’t even have many students posting.</p>

7

<p>I didn’t find any parents in the Grad forum. I’m not a helicopter parent, and not looking to interfere with my son, he has done all of the grad school apps on his own. Other than paying his cell phone bill every month, and providing information for his FAFSA, he is independent and self-supporting. For better or worse, he doesn’t rely on Mom for very much. I’m proud to say I can count the number of times on one hand he has called home and asked for money the four years he’s been in school. He has his father’s work ethic, thankfully. Some of my friends have far different experiences with their kids. I feel fortunate in that respect.</p>

<p>I just encourage him when he needs it and make him matzoh ball soup when comes home. His college is 900 miles away, I only see him a few days out of the year anymore. As I said, I never went to grad school so I can’t offer my experience to him, I don’t know what he is going through, the anxiety, or anything. I wasn’t expecting it to be as stressful on him as it has been, but I guess that is normal. I don’t know what he needs from me at this point, other than maybe a reminder that he can do whatever he sets his mind to, and in every disappointment there is an opportunity, he just has to not wallow in self-pity so he can find it.</p>

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<p>I will be doing this next year with my DS - how are the applications awful - are there tons of essays, etc.</p>

<p>I’ve tried to look up some apps but alot seem to be online apps. Are there any I can download so I can get an idea of what to expect next fall.</p>

<p>Also, where do you find stats of your particular PhD program. GRE and GPA required. Number applied and accepted, etc. My son is interested in Chemistry. There are the obvious players in the Chem PhD field (Harvard, MIT, Stanford, etc) - but after the top 10-20, how do you find out the top 50 or what Big U’s might have a good Chem Program.</p>

9

<p>Your son will benefit by speaking with his current undergrad advisor as well as a professor from a department related to the field he intends to study in grad school.</p>

<p>My son was mentored along the way by one of his undergrad professors. Over the years, son developed great relationships with his undergrad professors. After he narrowed his focus on wanted to study in grad school and what he hoped to do as a profession, he made arrangements to speak with multiple professors within the dept. (including the Head of the Dept.). He wanted to hear different perspectives on his plan.</p>

<p>After speaking with a few of his undergrad professors, one who had a similar subject interest as my son took him under his wing. He helped (guided) him to a list of grad school programs which would fit him well and where he could focus on his specific interest. Long story short, son ended up attending the perfect grad program for him and completed his Master’s a few weeks ago. </p>

<p>Utilizing the knowledge of his current professors should help to steer him in the right direction.</p>

10

<p>*I will be doing this next year with my DS - how are the applications awful - are there tons of essays, etc.
*</p>

<p>Some of the apps ask for odd things, like…Write the name/edition of your textbooks for each class you took within the major. Some of the books my son didn’t have anymore, so he had to search for them on textbook sites. </p>

<p>*Also, where do you find stats of your particular PhD program. GRE and GPA required. Number applied and accepted, etc. *</p>

<p>I don’t know where the acceptance rate is published. Son found out AFTER he was accepted and schools provided money for him to visit. It was during those visits, they would mention how many apps they received/accepted. That’s when we learned that some of his “safeties” had very low acceptance rates.</p>

<p>I don’t know if my son was able to find the GRE/GPA req’ts for a particular field for each school. I know I found averages for each school.</p>

<p>Also…don’t compare GRE scores to SAT scores. The math on the GRE (Quantitative) should be very high (800) for STEM majors. However, the Verbal can be rather lowish…650 or so is considered quite high. The percentiles for the GRE do not compare with the SAT. My son also had to take the Math Subject GRE…but some fields of study don’t require. </p>

<p>And…if a school asks for 3 LORs…get 4. One prof might flake. </p>

<p>*<br>
My son is interested in Chemistry. There are the obvious players in the Chem PhD field (Harvard, MIT, Stanford, etc) - but after the top 10-20, how do you find out the top 50 or what Big U’s might have a good Chem Program. *</p>

<p>USNews has a ranking. There will be strong grad programs at schools that aren’t highly ranked overall for undergrad…just as we found for math. </p>

<p>For Chemistry…</p>

<ol>
<li> tied
Cal Tech
MIT
Cal</li>
<li> tied
Harvard
Stanford
.
.
.</li>
<li> Tied
Texas A&M
UPenn
.
.</li>
<li><p>tied
Indiana
Ohio St.
UCI
UC-Boulder
UWash</p></li>
<li><p>UC- San Fran</p></li>
<li><p>tied
Rice
WashU
UCSB
.
.
.</p></li>
<li><p>tied
Emory
Iowa St.
Mich St
UAz
UCD
UM-CP
UPitt
.
.
.</p></li>
<li><p>tied
Boston College
Colorado State U
Duke
Virginia</p></li>
</ol>

<p>As you can see, some schools that aren’t highly ranked overall, have good Chem grad programs. So, a school that you might think is a safety, might only accept a small number.</p>

<p>Also…if these are fully funded programs…schools may only accept 8-20 per year per field of study.</p>

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<p>When you received your acceptances did you compare what was offered and also take into consideration of the location of the program… ie, big cities - high rent, etc.</p>

<p>Mom2 - how many schools did your son apply to? Rejected anywhere? Any surprises - higher or lower funding than expected?</p>

12

<p>I think CC could sustain a Parent Forum on Internships/Grad School. The question is, could we parents withstand the barrage of helicopter jokes and abuse that would rain down upon us. lol</p>

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<p>went thru this 2 years ago. I wrote about son flying east, and 3x getting caught in snow storms. Now he still has problem of getting outside money, from NSF or others. His g/f wants a postdoc nearby, so now that is additional concern.</p>

<p>So, I am open to a site on grad school/ $$/postdocs/academic careers.</p>

14

<p>Perhaps the Class of 2013 Parents thread will morph into a Grad parents thread…</p>

15

<p>I went through the whole internship ordeal last summer. DS went to NYC for a paid internship, man was I nervous! I never let DS see me sweat and told him to have a good time, but wow was I nervous about him being young, dumb and in the city. I’m knocking furiously on wood as I write this, but we’ve not had any problems with him.</p>

<p>I’m not looking to hover around him, but he is experiencing a level of academia that I can’t relate to. So far I’ve been enable to offer my son guidance through my own life-experience. I don’t know what emotionally prepare him for (if anything) or what to prepare myself for. </p>

<p>I’ll be honest, I don’t even know if he still needs my information for the FAFSA. I seem to recall grad school students are considered independent for FAFSA purposes regardless of their age or if they are claimed on parents taxes. I don’t even know if he fills out the FAFSA for grad school. He is hoping for an assistantship. </p>

<p>Maybe I don’t helicopter enough, I haven’t asked him how he intends to pay for grad school. Fortunately, he has worked and earned merit scholarships as well as RA’ing all semesters so he is graduating with his BS and less than $2000 in debt. If he has to borrow, I’m hoping it’s not a soul-crushing amount.</p>

<p>He is applying for MS Ed., Higher Education (student life/administration) programs. I’m not sure of every school, but I know UConn is the dream.</p>

16

<p>Maybe CC will let us have this little corner of the parents forum. None of my friends children that attended college are going beyond undergrad. I don’t have the type of relationship with my colleagues at work to talk about my kid, and most of them have children much younger than mine. </p>

<p>It’s nice to meet other parents experiencing, or who have experience, with the grad school process.</p>

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<p>I want to strongly build on what nysmile said: most of the info can and should be gleaned from the student’s faculty member that is working with them. They should have such a person and should have already been involve din research if they want a shot at grad school. That person will advise on which schools to apply to, which fit the students’ interests, whether the essay looks good etc. etc. It is <em>really hard</em> for someone outside of a particular field to provide much help. In fact, I can’t even imagine how a parent can help here (aside from providing emotional support). </p>

<p>Re: ‘safety’ schools with low acceptance rates. Keep in mind, EVERY school gets a TON of applications but trust me, you have no idea just how fast the <em>vast</em> majority can be tossed. And I’ve seen this with being at a very super top school in my field and a well known public. So ‘technically’ yes it is true and every school likes to boast about that (especially if they bring in potential grad students and feel they are a safety school and want to woo your student). But in reality I would take it with a grain of salt. So as but an example, we might get 100 apps, and choose 3…but it can be <em>HARD</em> for us to find 3 in that set (last year we could only find one we would bet on). But you gotta see what the set includes: take out the low scoring students (yes, people really do send in applications with GRE scores in the 20th percentile), students from schools we have not heard of, students from countries we don’t recognize (or the 42 students from ‘country of the year’-- usually students trying to escape their homeland and they seem to have all read about the same blog telling them to apply to X field, lol), students with the wrong undergraduate major, students who have never done any research nor seem to know what it is, or who write a letter of intent that suggests they ahve no idea what we do in our department, incomplete applications, someone with 5 GRE scores but 4 were very bad and the last one was 99th percentile…I could go on and on and on here but you get the idea.</p>

<p>Having said all of this I take it back somewhat because another very big cardinal rule about academic/PhD graduate school is so much depends upon one’s field…what will be true in one field will not necessarily be true in another. So what I write above is probably true for all fields (that is, every school gets a LOT of very weak applications), the actual number of competitive applications …well I really have no idea as it will vary a ton by one’s field.</p>

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<p>I think my son has done all the right things except hook up and and chat continually with his advisor. He goes to a top UG, has been doing research since Freshman year - currently awarded a two year fellowship. Half way decent grades - not perfect, but respectable. Loves everything and is a lab rat. Texted me last night that he spent 6.5 hours in the lab yesterday doing ())^^&% (my version of I have no idea what he’s talking about) and loved it. He’s taken a practice GRE and will take the real GRE in April. </p>

<p>I’m just not sure he realizes the importance of the contact and information from his advisor. I’m going to have to stress that to him.</p>

19

<p>My D got all of her grad school apps in right after the Thanksgiving break. My usually-last minute kid was much more organized and proactive about everything than I would have expected a year ago: she’d spoken to potential recommenders at the end of spring semester last year, and then reconfirmed with them right after Labor Day, got the GREs out of the way over the summer. Two of her recommenders were particularly helpful and worked with her through the whole process; one discussed the potential programs she was considering and helped her both expand and refine her target list and the other read and critiqued her statement of purpose and its revisions. And they all got the LORs in on time to all the schools! Now the waiting begins…</p>

20

<p>D1 has submitted all her grad school apps. I had nothing at all to do with it other than to give her loving words of encouragement. And I will do the same if she is disappointed.</p>

<p>In my D’s field, getting into grad school straight out of undergrad is apparently very difficult. She did very well at a well regarded school (graduating Phi Beta Kappa and some other honors), has almost 2 years of research under her belt, nailed her GRE, has a nationally renown mentor advising her and recommending her, and has been asked by a professor to co-write a chapter on her field of interest in a book he is writing. Given all this, she feels her chances of getting straight into grad school are slim. Mind boggling to me.</p>