The tricky part of Admissions….

[FNR]

I want to know what would happen when the Admission committee needs to make difficult choices.

Consider this:
A Physics department has 10 available positions in Theoretical and 4 available position in Experimental for incoming grad students. This year, over 100 prospective grad students applied for position in Theoretical and only dozens applied for position in Experimental.

Would their application be considered separately? I imagine that there must be Theoretical Admissions team and Experimental Admissions team within the Admission committee to maintain the balance of incoming grad students, but I’m not very sure….

I might be wrong, but I don’t think the committee would only choose the best-of-the-best prospective students without even considering their research interest. I mean, it is rather unwise to accept all the best if ‘the best’ only wants to do research in certain area and ‘don’t give a damn’ to the other ongoing research.

Would the committee choose to accept the not-that-good students to fill in the positions suitable with their interest over the best-of-the-best students that have no matching interest with the currently available research positions? Could anybody enlighten me here?

[admissionprof]

I want to know what would happen when the Admission committee needs to make difficult choices.

Consider this:
A Physics department has 10 available positions in Theoretical and 4 available position in Experimental for incoming grad students. This year, over 100 prospective grad students applied for position in Theoretical and only dozens applied for position in Experimental.

Would their application be considered separately? I imagine that there must be Theoretical Admissions team and Experimental Admissions team within the Admission committee to maintain the balance of incoming grad students, but I’m not very sure….

I might be wrong, but I don’t think the committee would only choose the best-of-the-best prospective students without even considering their research interest. I mean, it is rather unwise to accept all the best if ‘the best’ only wants to do research in certain area and ‘don’t give a damn’ to the other ongoing research.

Would the committee choose to accept the not-that-good students to fill in the positions suitable with their interest over the best-of-the-best students that have no matching interest with the currently available research positions? Could anybody enlighten me here?

It's not that simple. At some places, such a separation does exist. But I think that at most places, the best students are simply accepted, independent of their field (as long as it matches something in the department). For the next tier (ones that aren't obvious accepts), then one does look at the field more closely, compares with the top tier and looks at possibilities in the department (how many openings in area X are expected in the next couple of years). I don't think it's formalized as you suggest at most places. But I could be wrong--I only know about how a few places do it.

[FNR]

Guys,

I do not know how the Admissions really work, and so please consider this:

I asked the Graduate recruiter about the outcome of my application. He answered that ‘the good news you have been accepted in our program. I need graduate school to give permission to make it officially’.

Of course, I asked the Graduate school to verify this decision (since my on-line status still shows ‘pending’). To my surprise, she told me that ‘Your application is complete and we will review it before deferring it to the department.’

What the…?!? Who decides who’s in and who’s out actually?

[nathan12343]

Guys,

I do not know how the Admissions really work, and so please consider this:

I asked the Graduate recruiter about the outcome of my application. He answered that ‘the good news you have been accepted in our program. I need graduate school to give permission to make it officially’.

Of course, I asked the Graduate school to verify this decision (since my on-line status still shows ‘pending’). To my surprise, she told me that ‘Your application is complete and we will review it before deferring it to the department.’

What the…?!? Who decides who’s in and who’s out actually?

Is this your first encounter with a bureaucracy or something? The left hand may not know what the right is doing.

If the person in the department told you you got in, you're in. They told you it's only a provisional acceptance since the graduate school still needs to rubber stamp the department's decision.

[grae313]

Guys,

I do not know how the Admissions really work, and so please consider this...

Only the graduate school can officially admit you. The department picks who they admit, then "recommends" these people to the graduate school, which puts the official approval stamp on your application, as Nathan said. It means you're in, now you have to wait a bit for the official notification while your acceptance works its way through the system.