<p>My S applied to Yale and hadn't heard anything as of yesterday.</p>
<p>We're all still waiting for some good news for all of you that haven't gotten an acceptance yet. There are still many schools that haven't even sent out their first round of acceptances.</p>
<p>"Did anyone apply to UCLA or Caltech? Evidently UCLA has begun sending out very generous offers, hopefully to their top picks with many more to come (last year they admitted ~130 students over the span of a week). And I haven't heard anything about Caltech's decisions."</p>
<p>Interesting, yes a friend of mine is considering both Berkeley and LA, and received a significantly better financial offer from LA. I think he was originally planning on coming to Berkeley, but since he could benefit from more money, he's considering LA. Wonder if anyone else is going through such thoughts.</p>
<p>The biggest difference between offers seems to be in the amount of stipend money. Some of the stipends quoted are for 9 months, and some are for the full year. The differences can be several thousand dollars, but it's really not enough to to be a tiebreaker unless the academic opportunities are equivalent.</p>
<p>Yeah I'm also a bit surprised that UCLA admits that many. I believe they get around 400-500 applicants a year, yeah 40% puts them around ~130 on the low end estimate. But they must have a very small yield because looking at their list of graduate students page, they only seem to have 100-120 graduate students. You figure that means an entering class of around 30 students, that's a 20-25% yield. I'm a bit surprised by that. I mean some schools like Harvard, MIT have probably an over 50% yield, but is 20-25% yield the norm for most top 25 schools?</p>
<p>UCLA puts all this information on their site. These are averages from 2003 - 2007.</p>
<p>Average Number of Applicants - 312
Average Number of Admits - 127
Percent of Applicants Admitted - 41%
Average Number of New Registrants - 37
Percent of Admits Registered (Yield) - 29%</p>
<p>I don't know how things might've changed over the last two years. I believe their reputation as a department is rising and they seem to be trying to poach some of the top students with huge financial packages. There were a bunch of postings on Grad Cafe on Monday and nothing since then so maybe they're doing it in rounds also.</p>
<p>Yeah I called them a few days ago, when all those admits came out and they said they will be sending out more. I should have just asked if I got rejected, instead of the vague, what is the status of my grad application. </p>
<p>Thanks for posting the stats BTW.</p>
<p>No prob. Did they give any indication of when/how many they sent out/how many more? UCLA is one of my last hopes though it probably shouldn't be. I knew someone last year who was rejected from UCLA but got into Caltech. It can be sort of random sometimes.</p>
<p>Yeah I remember they said we released 20 admits, and they will be releasing another 40 or something like that in the next few days. I emailed them asking if I got rejected, not if I got admitted. But they have not replied yet.</p>
<p>Just called and they said that there is no decision on my file yet and they are still making decisions on apps. They hope to get all admittances out by next Friday.</p>
<p>They're dropping from 130 admits/year to 60? Oh boy...</p>
<p>No no, I didn't meant that at all. Sorry, I have no clue how many admits, I think they just do them in waves.</p>
<p>I was rejected from Northwestern by phone today and my gut feeling tells me, even though UCLA is 40% admit, it is a little higher ranked than schools that have already rejected me. I'm not going to hold my breath. True there is some randomness to the whole thing and it's not an exact science but I don't see myself getting into a top 20 school, much less UCLA which is a top 25 school.</p>
<p>I'm really trying to block out the admissions thing and keep going on with my own research, but it's been a huge distraction. I think at the end of the month, I'll know where I stand.</p>
<p>Oh, I see. That is somewhat reassuring. </p>
<p>Good luck with UCLA and trying to get some work done. I personally haven't been able to do any math this month; too much anxiety. Mostly just brooding on how seriously I should take flat out rejection (which is pretty likely if UCLA falls through) as an indicator that my academic career is D.O.A. And daydreaming about how my life would turn out if I put math behind me.</p>
<p>Waitlisted at MIT for Applied Math. I assumed I was rejected when people got accepted back in January, but I guess the pure math and applied math admissions are done separately. This makes things interesting again...</p>
<p>Junkface and SBUmathgrad, we're in this together, remain strong. Man... this whole we're not even going to tell you that we've rejected you is just plain eerie. You really think by the end of the month? So I don't have money to do anything for spring break, but I just concoted a plan. 10:00am call a department, 10:05 get rejected, 10:10 go for a 10 mile run. Ok enough procrastinating, back to math...</p>
<p>Schools always wait to send out rejections, for whatever reason. Maybe some schools have rolling admissions and they don't want to reject people too early. But I got rejected from Northwestern and they do rolling admissions, I think they just wait until their class is full and then start sending out rejections. I remember last year people complained about Northwestern sending out rejection letters after April 15th. It's also about priority, a rejected student is not a priority but an admitted student is (this makes total sense).</p>
<p>But I say the end of the month because a lot of grad schools have their open houses in March, either early, middle or late March. I would think most schools want to get their admits out before then, or most of them. I think after this last week of February, I should have a clearer picture of where I stand.</p>
<p>On another note, my undergrad institution Stony Brook started sending out emails to applicants asking if they were still interested, I did not get an email. Now I'm wondering, if my home school isn't even interested in me, I severely overestimated my chances.</p>
<p>I'll wait until the first or second week of March to call and ask if I got rejected.</p>
<p>SBUMathgrad, I wouldn't worry too much about the Stony Brook e-mails. They have not sent them out all at once as I received one this morning, long after the posts on gradcafe.</p>
<p>Oh Rutgers, comeon accept me. Yeah looks like Rutgers has started sending stuff out, nothing yet for me. (fingers crossed)</p>
<p>Rutgers might just be doing their first round. Both people that posted on thegradcafe got fellowship offers.</p>
<p>I am going to try and stay upbeat until mid March and then I will start calling schools.</p>
<p>Good plan, SBU. It looks like the top programs started sending out acceptances unusually early this year. While this is agonizing for those who have not yet gotten an acceptance, it also means that the top applicants are going to be removed from the applicant pool earlier than usual. Those emails asking applicants if they're still interested is a way of eliminating some of the applicants who were using the program as a safety but already have other offers. Hopefully, this means others will get acceptances sooner. </p>
<p>I will be very disappointed if any of you don't get an acceptance this year. You're all strong applicants and this country needs more people pursuing math and science. Don't forget that you are competing internationally for these spots. If you look at the composition of students at the top programs, most of the spots go to foreign students. While this helps those programs maintain their excellence on an international scale, it also makes it tougher for American students to compete.</p>
<p>Good Luck to you all!</p>
<p>Cookiemom,
Thanks so much for your support, it's very nice of you. If I'm honest with myself I didn't expect to get into a top 25 program even though I applied to 5 in the 15-25 range. I'm not sure I even wanted to be in an environment where I'm at the bottom of my class (which would certainly be the case in experience if not in talent). Part of the reason I applied to so many top programs was to placate advisors who really believe in me and I'm glad I gave it a shot. I know that I would really enjoy attending any of the three schools I applied to outside of the top 50. I guess I've been freaking out lately because I realized my applications were incomplete at two of those three schools, but correspondence with those schools in the last week has indicated their willingness to still look at my application. I'm a little less stressed and more willing to believe the right thing will work out even if I don't hear anything through the first couple weeks of March.
Orangelights</p>