MOVING TO FRONT, SINCE RELEVANT AGAIN (originally posted 2011)
============================================
Keith DeRose (Yale) writes:
Since prospective graduate students read your blog for information and advice on applying to graduate programs, I was wondering whether it might be a good idea for you to run a short post on an important way that applicants can help one another.
Every year, many applicants get into better programs than they otherwise would have by eventually being accepted by a program that initially put them on a waiting list. (I myself got into the program I attended off their waiting list. In fact, I think I was quite a ways down UCLA's waiting list.) Often, though, the management of waiting lists gets extremely messy, especially right before and on April 15, and the consequences of this messiness are often results that are far from optimal for the students involved.
I don't think there's any feasible way to completely solve these problems, but the applicants themselves can make things much better for one another by declining offers as soon as they're in a position to, so the programs involved can then go to their waiting lists.
Sometimes this can be done simply by making one's decision earlier. Once they have all the relevant information, given it a little chance to sink in, mulled it over a bit, and talked things over with their advisers, students can often do everyone -- including themselves!-- a favor by making a decision significantly in advance of April 15.
However, I realize that for various reasons, some will delay making their decision until the bitter end. In addition to reasons of personal psychology, sometimes this is done because students are hoping themselves to get into a better program than they've so far been accepted at off of a waiting list.
Recent Comments