Boorishness of some schools.

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soluyanov
Posts: 51
Joined: Fri Dec 15, 2006 1:06 pm

Boorishness of some schools.

Post by soluyanov » Fri Mar 16, 2007 8:51 pm

In this topic, I would like to express my amazement about the boorishness of some schools. When you apply, you pay the fee. What for? To wait for 100 days for a piece of response? To email them and to get no reply? Is that supposed to be "the university" - it looks more like a bad grocery...

Here is my black list:
1. NYU
They are on top. Definitely. The fee is 80 usd - one of the largest among the schools. I haven't met any international responses on the gradcafe, but still it's the 15th of March already... I have emailed GSAS, I have emailed graduate assistant twice (being really polite) and got nothing at all. I haven't heard a word! Taking into account a really "backup" reputation of this schools it could be even funny if not those 80 bucks. I'm not greedy (at least I hope so), but what really bothers me is that my application turned out to be a simple donation to NYU. I already have acceptances which are much better than NYU, but still. Did I just "donate them"?
2. Berkeley
At least, this school has a reputation. From what my mom told me when I was a kid, your reputation doesn't matter - you should always respect the others. First, I had a problem with one of my recommendation letters and emailed Ms. Sakima twice - got nothing. OK, I understand she could be unwilling to answering all the 6 hundred of applicants. But what about informing me of the decision? "..most likely would not be recommended for admission..." Very nice letter, makes you feel like ***.
3 Northwestern
Got an email (after two inqueries) that their decisions will be rendered by mid April. I think, they don't have more than 400 applications. 105 days from their deadline. 4 applications per day))) This is the speed of light....

mathlete
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Joined: Tue Dec 05, 2006 12:22 am

Post by mathlete » Sat Mar 17, 2007 12:43 am

Rest assured that NYU is also shitty with regards to law school admissions. Expensive, lack of communication, and a very slow process.

ebgphy
Posts: 10
Joined: Wed Mar 07, 2007 5:55 pm

Post by ebgphy » Sat Mar 17, 2007 7:45 am

I think perhaps there is noone Ms. Sakima, I sent an e-mail 5 months ago and still waiting for her repply :lol: Perhaps we should send e-mail to the profs and other people at Berkeley to talk about this problem, because everywhere in their web site they say: for further inf. please e-mail to Sakima, damn...

lorenzbutterfly
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Joined: Tue May 16, 2006 8:21 pm

Post by lorenzbutterfly » Sat Mar 17, 2007 9:28 am

I dunno...

I heard back from NYU first among all the school I applied to, which included Maryland and Chicago. On a few emails they were a bit slow in getting back, but when I was applying, I inquired about the program and was quickly invited to visit (I live in NYC, so this was a day trip for me).

The grad students and professors I spoke to were very friendly and helpful. I know it's not a lot of people's first choice of schools, but depending on your area of interest, they can be a fine institution - that's what I've heard, at least.

Just my $0.02

braindrain
Posts: 158
Joined: Sat Dec 30, 2006 12:23 am

Post by braindrain » Sat Mar 17, 2007 4:54 pm

@soluyanov: phone calls usually help, although when I was having my ETS problems, the schools never answered there phones either, but you can always leave a message. If they do answer, they may be friendly or not. Only
one person was very rude on the phone and he asked me why I thought he
would know more than I do. Duh, 'cause he works there.

The whole things feels like donations to me too - even the acceptances. After all, they should be paying us, why do we have to pay to apply for a job? My calculations were wrong before regarding coming up with $54000 for the
total they make in an applicant pool. Multiply that by the number of departments and a school is well in the millions from this. Students collectively pay millions of dollars for the chance to be allowed on their campuses. It is a rip off. Yes, you do deserve more for your money than being ignored. It again raises suspicions that they don't all look at the applications.

We need some students at each school to put up surveillance equipment in each admissions committee room and broadcast it on the internet :). Younger people are still more computer saavy than them and they will never figure it out. It would be so easy to do and the students could sit it a white van out in the parking lot filled with electronic equipment. I watch too many movies. :)

soluyanov
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Joined: Fri Dec 15, 2006 1:06 pm

Post by soluyanov » Sat Mar 17, 2007 5:30 pm

NYU really has some good people. That's why I have applied there. But...
From my point of view this the school with one of the best locations among all schools. Not for students only, but for researches too. Imagine, you have invitations from UIUC and NYU. Although UIUC is much more prestigious, you'll think twice before preferring the middle of nowhere to NYC. So, in my opinion, they have all the opportunities to become one of the top schools. In all disciplines. I know, they are good in math, but there are lots of other programs they are really shitty at.

kdub
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Joined: Mon Aug 28, 2006 5:53 pm

Post by kdub » Sat Mar 17, 2007 6:28 pm

I think the application fee is to prevent people from applying absolutely everywhere. I know that departments are frequently swamped with hundreds, sometimes even thousands of applications. In a perfect world where the admissions committees have infinite time and resources, they would be able to look through them all and spend as much time as they need to decide on an applicant. But the reality is, these people have their own research, teaching obligations, etc. to work on in addition to serving on the admissions committee. It is a huge time commitment for a professor to serve on the admissions committee, and their job is certainly not easy. If there were no application fee, I think the number of applications received would skyrocket. This is also the reason why some schools use a GPA or GRE score filter as a first cut. Yes, they risk rejecting a potentially good student, but they need to reduce the number of applicants so that they have enough time to fairly consider the ones that make the cut.

I suspect, though I'm not sure, that the cost of applying at a given school is proportional to the time the admissions committee has to review and decide on students. If a school is getting so many applications that they can't possibly spend a fair amount of time reviewing them all, they ramp up the application fee to cut down on applicants the following year. Again, this is just speculation on my part, but it's certainly possible.

braindrain, I don't agree that the application fees are at all intended just to get more money for the school or department. Even after taking $54000 or whatever in fees, they still have to do things like host visiting days, pay for students to move out to the school, etc. $54000 is nothing in relation to the costs a typical department incurs over the course of a year. Plus, the amount of time spent reading applications and making decisions in the first place is a far greater cost when you consider the amount of research that could have been done in that time. It may not seem fair all the time, but I think the fee is really necessary so that departments aren't forced to base their decisions on a rushed analysis of your application.

JWC
Posts: 7
Joined: Thu Mar 15, 2007 1:44 pm

Post by JWC » Sun Mar 18, 2007 5:56 pm

Well well well, I have no TROUBLE at all when I contact with BERKELEY (both secretary and faculty, even chair department) they are replying me very fast (some hours or a day long).

However, STANFORD is a piece of ***, I wrote some letter for some professors, it took for 3 months then one replied as a polite brush-off, even they took the application fee nearly twice Berkeley.

This is a list of friendly place:

Berkeley
UCSB
UIUC
UChicago
MIT
UCSC
USCD

This is a list of *** place:

Stanford
USC
JHU
BU
UMich

User avatar
Helio
Posts: 809
Joined: Thu Mar 15, 2007 7:11 pm

Post by Helio » Sun Mar 18, 2007 6:09 pm

@ JWC:

Who did you contact at USC (I am assuming Southern California)?

If you contact the office directly (95% of the secretaries are complete junk) you will get no where. And the info on the website is wrong as well. I should know, since I am an undergrad. here..

Edit:

On a second thought: It is very odd to hear that as well, since the professor in charge of graduate admission is a really nice guy. He usually calls the people he is very interested in. I know him since he is one of the two German professors in the department and most of the grad students love him...
Last edited by Helio on Sun Mar 18, 2007 6:17 pm, edited 1 time in total.

tnoviell
Posts: 235
Joined: Sun Nov 05, 2006 10:31 am

Post by tnoviell » Sun Mar 18, 2007 6:12 pm

JHU's biophysics department is awesome. I've never met a group of more helpful people in my life.

JWC
Posts: 7
Joined: Thu Mar 15, 2007 1:44 pm

Post by JWC » Sun Mar 18, 2007 7:11 pm

@Helio:

USC = University of South Carolina, I did not realize, it is exist USC as U of Southern Califonia.

@tnvoiell: I am talking about Physics Department, I am not talking about biophysics.

User avatar
Helio
Posts: 809
Joined: Thu Mar 15, 2007 7:11 pm

Post by Helio » Sun Mar 18, 2007 7:14 pm

Yeah there is a USC = Uni. of Southern California

Just click here

Or just watch the NCAA Basketball Tournament

rjharris
Posts: 101
Joined: Wed May 10, 2006 6:48 pm

Post by rjharris » Sun Mar 18, 2007 8:25 pm

yeah... uk is out due to kansas. f*cking kansas.

/ oh well.

Richter
Posts: 36
Joined: Tue Dec 19, 2006 3:45 am

Post by Richter » Tue Mar 20, 2007 4:26 am

Well well well, I have no TROUBLE at all when I contact with BERKELEY (both secretary and faculty, even chair department) they are replying me very fast (some hours or a day long).

However, STANFORD is a piece of ***, I wrote some letter for some professors, it took for 3 months then one replied as a polite brush-off, even they took the application fee nearly twice Berkeley.

This is a list of friendly place:

Berkeley
UCSB
UIUC
UChicago
MIT
UCSC
USCD

This is a list of *** place:

Stanford
USC
JHU
BU
UMich

JWC:

Who were you contacting with MIT and Berkeley? Because I only have these two schools not giving any reply....

JWC
Posts: 7
Joined: Thu Mar 15, 2007 1:44 pm

Post by JWC » Tue Mar 20, 2007 7:30 am

Well, I am contacting with both: secretary, professors, chair department, and Nobel laureates :lol: . If you want to know whom, just go to school directory, then you will find out.

braindrain
Posts: 158
Joined: Sat Dec 30, 2006 12:23 am

Post by braindrain » Tue Mar 20, 2007 1:26 pm

Well, you can laugh at me. I naively thought, ok, application time, they must bring in extra staff for this big job, but noooooooooo.

JWC
Posts: 7
Joined: Thu Mar 15, 2007 1:44 pm

Post by JWC » Tue Mar 20, 2007 9:32 pm

:lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol:

When you got acceptance and you do not want to work as TA but you want to work as RA, then you need to connect to whoever you want to work with. :lol: :lol: :lol:



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