Decision Dates 2016

Dishsoap · Post by **Dishsoap** » Tue Feb 16, 2016 1:40 am

*glares at Yale*

g0rteks · Post by **g0rteks** » Tue Feb 16, 2016 12:23 pm

Columbia

Cho'bal · Post by **Cho'bal** » Tue Feb 16, 2016 1:03 pm

Does anyone know if there's an open house or visiting day announced for Univ of Michigan?

Dishsoap · Post by **Dishsoap** » Tue Feb 16, 2016 1:07 pm

Cho'bal wrote:Does anyone know if there's an open house or visiting day announced for Univ of Michigan?

Yeah, it's Thursday 3/24 to Sunday 3/27.

Cho'bal · Post by **Cho'bal** » Tue Feb 16, 2016 1:09 pm

Dishsoap wrote:
Cho'bal wrote:Does anyone know if there's an open house or visiting day announced for Univ of Michigan?
Yeah, it's Thursday 3/24 to Sunday 3/27.

Thank you!

KroNoS · Post by **KroNoS** » Thu Feb 18, 2016 1:24 am

UCSC and Univ. of Michigan sent out their rejections last night.

greensfunction · Post by **greensfunction** » Thu Feb 18, 2016 2:00 am

University of Maryland, College Park has released several unofficial acceptances.

Cho'bal · Post by **Cho'bal** » Fri Feb 19, 2016 8:19 am

U Chicago has posted acceptances on the website.

From the number of offers on TGC, I'm guessing there is only one round this year.

spectral_flow · Post by **spectral_flow** » Fri Feb 19, 2016 9:46 am

Anyone has any idea about UIUC? Someone on gradcafe posted about the open house on 26 Feb. Does this mean that it would be over for international students if they don't get an acceptance by then?

Dishsoap · Post by **Dishsoap** » Fri Feb 19, 2016 2:35 pm

Yale sent out acceptances this morning

greensfunction · Post by **greensfunction** » Fri Feb 19, 2016 4:23 pm

spectral_flow wrote:Anyone has any idea about UIUC? Someone on gradcafe posted about the open house on 26 Feb. Does this mean that it would be over for international students if they don't get an acceptance by then?

I think the person on gradcafe said that the last day to sign up for the open house is Feb. 26. The open house dates are March 11-12. I'm guessing if you don't hear back before Feb. 26th, you may have not gotten in, but there's no guarantee.

thehairupthere · Post by **thehairupthere** » Fri Feb 19, 2016 7:09 pm

So.. I've not had any replies from 6 out of the 8 schools in the US that I applied to so I decided to send them all emails to enquire about the status of my apps at the end of this month (which I gather is about the time when it starts to sound not too needy). If anyone has done this before, should I email the admission head to inquire (even if Ive had no previous contact with him/her)? I've actually been finding it hard to know who's the admission head, and sometimes it's hard to find an email for the department's admissions board. Should I just email the university-wide admissions board in this case or will those be of no help?

Dishsoap · Post by **Dishsoap** » Fri Feb 19, 2016 7:17 pm

thehairupthere wrote:So.. I've not had any replies from 6 out of the 8 schools in the US that I applied to so I decided to send them all emails to enquire about the status of my apps at the end of this month (which I gather is about the time when it starts to sound not too needy). If anyone has done this before, should I email the admission head to inquire (even if Ive had no previous contact with him/her)? I've actually been finding it hard to know who's the admission head, and sometimes it's hard to find an email for the department's admissions board. Should I just email the university-wide admissions board in this case or will those be of no help?

If I were you, I'd just e-mail the physics department secretary. She might know, and if not, she would know who to e-mail.

checkcheck · Post by **checkcheck** » Sat Feb 20, 2016 11:33 am

Did anyone get any information from Caltech astronomy program? I know they have sent out some physics program acceptance..

cwr · Post by **cwr** » Sat Feb 20, 2016 4:58 pm

checkcheck wrote:Did anyone get any information from Caltech astronomy program? I know they have sent out some physics program acceptance..

I know at least one person who has gotten into Caltech, but I'm not sure whether it was part of the regular notification process or an early one. Anything showing on GradCafe?

googy · Post by **googy** » Sat Feb 20, 2016 7:31 pm

thehairupthere wrote:So.. I've not had any replies from 6 out of the 8 schools in the US that I applied to so I decided to send them all emails to enquire about the status of my apps at the end of this month (which I gather is about the time when it starts to sound not too needy). If anyone has done this before, should I email the admission head to inquire (even if Ive had no previous contact with him/her)? I've actually been finding it hard to know who's the admission head, and sometimes it's hard to find an email for the department's admissions board. Should I just email the university-wide admissions board in this case or will those be of no help?

I haven't heard from 6/9 of the schools I applied to. Not worried quite yet. Seems like we gotta let the musical chairs game play on its own.

amohobbyist · Post by **amohobbyist** » Mon Feb 22, 2016 5:06 pm

Haven't heard back from Berkeley yet but just in case, when is the open house for Berkeley?

Dishsoap · Post by **Dishsoap** » Mon Feb 22, 2016 8:29 pm

amohobbyist wrote:Haven't heard back from Berkeley yet but just in case, when is the open house for Berkeley?

April 6th and 7th.

Cho'bal · Post by **Cho'bal** » Wed Feb 24, 2016 1:28 am

Dishsoap wrote:
Cho'bal wrote:Does anyone know if there's an open house or visiting day announced for Univ of Michigan?
Yeah, it's Thursday 3/24 to Sunday 3/27.

Were these dates specified in the acceptance e-mail?

They didn't give me any info about Open House in my letter, so maybe they aren't planning to invite internationals?

TakeruK · Post by **TakeruK** » Wed Feb 24, 2016 11:29 am

Cho'bal wrote:
Dishsoap wrote:
Cho'bal wrote:Does anyone know if there's an open house or visiting day announced for Univ of Michigan?
Yeah, it's Thursday 3/24 to Sunday 3/27.
Were these dates specified in the acceptance e-mail?

They didn't give me any info about Open House in my letter, so maybe they aren't planning to invite internationals?

To Cho'bal and other international students---many departments will only invite domestic students because they cannot afford to pay for international travel. However, if you are able to travel to the US, either because you have personal funds or you are visiting multiple schools in one trip and would like to see if you can split the cost of your flight across many schools, my advice would be to let the department know this as soon as you are accepted. I would tell them that you are also visiting schools XYZ and mention that you would like to try to visit all the schools in one trip to save everyone money.

ipmsra · Post by **ipmsra** » Wed Feb 24, 2016 5:52 pm

Has anyone heard back about waitlists? It seems like the first and second rounds of admissions have gone out for most astronomy programs, but I haven't seen much here or on GradCafe about some schools.

Cho'bal · Post by **Cho'bal** » Wed Feb 24, 2016 11:24 pm

TakeruK wrote: ...
Cho'bal wrote: Were these dates specified in the acceptance e-mail?

They didn't give me any info about Open House in my letter, so maybe they aren't planning to invite internationals?
To Cho'bal and other international students---many departments will only invite domestic students because they cannot afford to pay for international travel. However, if you are able to travel to the US, either because you have personal funds or you are visiting multiple schools in one trip and would like to see if you can split the cost of your flight across many schools, my advice would be to let the department know this as soon as you are accepted. I would tell them that you are also visiting schools XYZ and mention that you would like to try to visit all the schools in one trip to save everyone money.

Thanks TakeruK, I guess I should contact the department.

KroNoS · Post by **KroNoS** » Thu Feb 25, 2016 2:49 am

checkcheck wrote:Did anyone get any information from Caltech astronomy program? I know they have sent out some physics program acceptance..

Got a rejection from their astronomy program today.

thehairupthere · Post by **thehairupthere** » Thu Feb 25, 2016 7:54 am

Just got my first offer from the Max Planck Institute for Astrophysics (IMPRS on Astrophysics in Munich). I can finally relax and stop spamming you guys about my worries of why no one is replying etc xD.

Oh and the idea of being a Dr at 25 is tempting

ipmsra · Post by **ipmsra** » Fri Feb 26, 2016 9:50 pm

ipmsra wrote:Has anyone heard back about waitlists? It seems like the first and second rounds of admissions have gone out for most astronomy programs, but I haven't seen much here or on GradCafe about some schools.

Actually, it sounds like UWashington made their waitlist. They never even interviewed me, but I haven't gotten a rejection yet. How should I interpret this?

thehairupthere · Post by **thehairupthere** » Sat Feb 27, 2016 3:56 pm

Dishsoap wrote:
thehairupthere wrote:So.. I've not had any replies from 6 out of the 8 schools in the US that I applied to so I decided to send them all emails to enquire about the status of my apps at the end of this month (which I gather is about the time when it starts to sound not too needy). If anyone has done this before, should I email the admission head to inquire (even if Ive had no previous contact with him/her)? I've actually been finding it hard to know who's the admission head, and sometimes it's hard to find an email for the department's admissions board. Should I just email the university-wide admissions board in this case or will those be of no help?
If I were you, I'd just e-mail the physics department secretary. She might know, and if not, she would know who to e-mail.

Thanks for the tip! I am finding it hard to even find who the secretary is at some of the departments. For example, is it just me or is there no such information about either a secretary or head of admissions or anyone to contact if there's something to ask for in the admissions process at Cornell's Astronomy Department? I could only find out who the Director of Graduate Studies is (who happens to be one of the professors I listed on my personal statement)... Should I contact her or is she not the correct person to ask?

TakeruK · Post by **TakeruK** » Sat Feb 27, 2016 7:12 pm

First, I want to say:

A. Generally, the correct title for the job you're discussing is administrative assistant, not secretary.
B. Let's not assume everyone in these positions are women, shall we?

Okay, here are some tips to find out the right person to contact:

1. Look at the "Admissions" or "prospective students" page of the department. A contact person for questions might be listed right there.

2. If not, then go to the "Current students" page and look for links for things like "Handbook" or a page linking to department policies. You may end up at a page like this: http://www.physics.ucsc.edu/academics/g ... ators.html which will tell you who is the administrative person in charge of graduate students.

3. You can also try to guess the right person from the Department Directory. Find the administrative person. Some places will identify one person for admissions related concerns but other places do not. I would look for people in this order:
a. someone identified as related to admissions
b. someone identified as the academic assistant or other academic affairs-like title
c. someone who appears to be the lead administrative staff member (in this email, phrase it as something like "If I have contacted the wrong person, please redirect me to the right one" etc.)

Usually doing something like this will get you to the right person!

Finally, for the person asking about Cornell Astronomy, from my own visit experience, the right person is Monica Armstrong. By the way, you can find out that she is the correct person by doing any of the above steps:

If you did (1), you will find her email address on the page that describes how to apply for the program.

If you did (2), you will end up on this page that is meant for students arriving at Cornell on their first day: http://astrosun2.astro.cornell.edu/acad ... first.html ; again, you will find the name of the right person to talk to.

If you did (3), then you will find Monica Armstrong listed very close to the top of the Directory page as "Graduate Field Assistant" (i.e. Astronomy is the "graduate field" so therefore, she is the "Graduate Assistant" for the astronomy & space sciences field.)

(I don't mean to pick on you, thehairupthere! I know it's hard to find this information. I'm just using your example as a demonstration of how to apply the strategies I wrote about. Hope it helps you with other schools and that it helps other people find the right person for their questions!).

Dishsoap · Post by **Dishsoap** » Sun Feb 28, 2016 4:42 am

TakeruK wrote:First, I want to say:

A. Generally, the correct title for the job you're discussing is administrative assistant, not secretary.
B. Let's not assume everyone in these positions are women, shall we?

A. When I asked questions about admissions/visits/offers, my e-mail was usually forwarded from the administrative assistant to the graduate secretary, so I suggested skipping a step. But maybe at some schools they're the same thing?

B. I apologize -- as a female, I wasn't aware that using "she" to describe a position whose occupants are usually female (at least this was the case in the ten departments I contacted) was demeaning at all. I apologize.

I wish we could somehow sticky that post... or that someone would have made it before I totally e-mailed the wrong person at one school. Twice

TakeruK · Post by **TakeruK** » Sun Feb 28, 2016 2:53 pm

Dishsoap wrote: A. When I asked questions about admissions/visits/offers, my e-mail was usually forwarded from the administrative assistant to the graduate secretary, so I suggested skipping a step. But maybe at some schools they're the same thing?

B. I apologize -- as a female, I wasn't aware that using "she" to describe a position whose occupants are usually female (at least this was the case in the ten departments I contacted) was demeaning at all. I apologize.

A: Yeah I think the structure varies a lot from school to school. At smaller places, they are often the same person. At my current program, there is one academic assistant for all the programs that my (large) department administers and that person takes care of all graduate student related things such as admissions, recruitment, notifying us of quals, arranging TAships, ensuring we meet requirements for candidacy, helping us file for graduation etc.

B: I just try to avoid assigning gender to positions that don't require a specific gender. Even if it's true that most people in this position are female (I would say 90% of the people I know are female), I think unnecessarily assigning gender even in casual conversation leads to weird unconscious assumptions. For example, sometimes, when random people from the public walk into our offices, they automatically assume my female friends with the desk closest to the door is a secretary because of her gender.

ipmsra · Post by **ipmsra** » Mon Feb 29, 2016 3:07 pm

I just realized that one of the programs I applied to, I expressed interest in working in observational astronomy, but my POI was in theory/computation. How on earth I overlooked that, I'll never know. Looks like I'm not going there.

EDIT: Just got the rejection. Yep.

Cho'bal · Post by **Cho'bal** » Mon Feb 29, 2016 9:10 pm

Berkeley sent out another wave of offers. They are quite late this year.

aluminumfalcon3 · Post by **aluminumfalcon3** » Mon Feb 29, 2016 9:13 pm

Cho'bal wrote:Berkeley sent out another wave of offers. They are quite late this year.

Last year there were ~25 acceptances from Berkeley on gradcafe. So far there have only been ~15, so there may be another wave. Or I should just accept the rejection and move on

thehairupthere · Post by **thehairupthere** » Mon Feb 29, 2016 9:37 pm

aluminumfalcon3 wrote:
Cho'bal wrote:Berkeley sent out another wave of offers. They are quite late this year.
Last year there were ~25 acceptances from Berkeley on gradcafe. So far there have only been ~15, so there may be another wave. Or I should just accept the rejection and move on

I haven't heard back from Berkeley yet either. They claim that they will still send out offers until 11th March so it is a reasonable time to wait and see!

Izaac · Post by **Izaac** » Tue Mar 01, 2016 6:09 am

Not a very constructive post, but: this is March the 1st, so far all I've received is rejections from 5 of the 12 universities I applied for. I'm starting thinking of all the possible ways I might have done things wrong.

thehairupthere · Post by **thehairupthere** » Tue Mar 01, 2016 12:17 pm

Just got word from UCLA that last few decisions will be made next week or so.

oscillon · Post by **oscillon** » Tue Mar 01, 2016 6:25 pm

Hello, who have got several admits and already accepted offer, please decline other offers. Students who are in wait-listed or haven't received any notification are waiting.

Dishsoap · Post by **Dishsoap** » Tue Mar 01, 2016 8:02 pm

oscillon wrote:Hello, who have got several admits and already accepted offer, please decline other offers. Students who are in wait-listed or haven't received any notification are waiting.

Unfortunately, some universities you can't decline until they send out their official offer of admission via mail.

ipmsra · Post by **ipmsra** » Wed Mar 02, 2016 3:14 am

thehairupthere wrote:Just got word from UCLA that last few decisions will be made next week or so.

For astro? Eurgh, I'm nervous.

thehairupthere · Post by **thehairupthere** » Wed Mar 02, 2016 5:14 am

ipmsra wrote:
thehairupthere wrote:Just got word from UCLA that last few decisions will be made next week or so.
For astro? Eurgh, I'm nervous.

Yes, that was for astro, not sure if it is different for physics though since it's the same department.

coffee&physics · Post by **coffee&physics** » Wed Mar 02, 2016 4:04 pm

Tufts just e-mailed me to check site, rejected.

instrument.santosh · Post by **instrument.santosh** » Wed Mar 02, 2016 11:54 pm

quick question, did anyone hear back from Upenn ? saw a CMT post in gradcafe, but that's it. I am wondering if hep-th results are already out ?

spectral_flow · Post by **spectral_flow** » Thu Mar 03, 2016 1:35 am

Are UIUC waiting to send rejection letters? I am getting insane here. I applied for CMT and haven't seen many International posters on gradcafe.

checkcheck · Post by **checkcheck** » Thu Mar 03, 2016 6:27 pm

I saw several JHU astronomy rejections on gradcafe today.....did anyone get acceptance from JHU today? does anyone know when they will send out all the results?

D3000 · Post by **D3000** » Fri Mar 04, 2016 4:26 pm

Has anyone else not heard back from Boulder (physics) yet? They've sent out a bunch of acceptances, and a bunch of rejections but I haven't heard anything yet.

oscillon · Post by **oscillon** » Sat Mar 05, 2016 4:04 pm

Hello!

I can see lot of you received admit from different Universities. Please pick the one you would love to join and decline others, so the students like me, might have an opportunity to receive an admin from a waiting list.

ashishdastro · Post by **ashishdastro** » Mon Mar 07, 2016 12:53 am

Does anybody know about Hawaii Astronomy decisions??

I am also not sure about its ranking.

oscillon · Post by **oscillon** » Mon Mar 07, 2016 8:09 am

How is the University of Tennessee compared to Wayne State University and Baylor University ?

thehairupthere · Post by **thehairupthere** » Mon Mar 07, 2016 11:33 am

ashishdastro wrote:Does anybody know about Hawaii Astronomy decisions??

I am also not sure about its ranking.

I know Hawaii IfA have already sent out (at least some) acceptances and rejections. Mind they send rejections only by snail mail so it might take a long time to arrive.

As for ranking, I believe Hawaii would be a great place to do Astronomy, and I wouldn't worry about that much.

Good luck!

ashishdastro · Post by **ashishdastro** » Mon Mar 07, 2016 12:27 pm

Thank you for the information.

I really want to do research there. But, I guess I am rejected there too.

mandark · Post by **mandark** » Mon Mar 07, 2016 8:57 pm

Any word on Columbia? I still havent been rejected or admitted. Is it worth it to contact their grad department directly or assume rejection?