Pure Mathematics PhD admission results

[MWG]

NYU sent out fellowship offers..so what is the situation
of non funded and waitlist, anyone got waiting for these?

[openthought42]

Fuwing2007, No I am a prospective grad student like yourself. Although I will most likely be attending UPenn for grad school .

Yes, I also had my heart set on many places like Berkeley, Chicago, et al, and have been similarly disappointed. Take as comfort that there are tons of overqualified applicants for very few spots at each of these schools, but at the end of the day all you need is one "yes." Choice is nice, but very few elite applicants have their pick of the cream of the crop.

The 52 admits for Columbia (I am also waiting to hear back), could be misleading. Although there is some independence in the admissions process, very many of the same people who are accepted at Berkeley, Chicago, MIT, and so on are admitted (and apply!) to Columbia. Accordingly, grad chairs there know that they need to admit 50 in order to get a class of 10. For Harvard and Princeton, their yield is so much higher that they know that they need only admit 15-20 to get a class of 10-15.

Also, if you don't get into the grad school of your dreams it is possible to take a year off and apply again. I've had advisors also tell me that if you get into at least one "serious" or "good" PhD program you should go and you can always transfer if the research really isn't ideally suited to your interests. Best of luck!

[fuwing2007]

openthought42, thank you for your msg.

Actually I am a rookie in applying graduate school. I mean I don't know much about the selection process, I don't know the importance of the tests to the application. And I even don't know this forum and thegradcafe.com until recently.

After I sent emails to the universities I applied, I think no reply is always better than an immediate rejection.

BTW, what is your field of interest? If yours is the same as mine, we may be competitors.

[zw849]

Again, for Columbia the graduate admissions director said there were only 10 admitted. Maybe the rest is in the wait list.

[kralgon]

Some info on Berkeley:

"The size of our graduate program has been quite significantly reduced;four of our last five entering classes have averaged 26 students,and the class entering Fall 2008 is expected to number 20 or fewer.In recent years, we have consistently had more teaching assistantpositions than graduate students to fill them, yet we have continuedto admit only as many students as we are able to fully fund and train."

Also, Stanford has been sending out decisions. A classmate of mine was accepted fairly early in February, and I received an acceptance e-mail this past Sunday. I'm not sure if they expect to admit any more students, but there may still be some decisions to come.

I've been admitted to Berkeley, Chicago, Stanford, Michigan, Brown, Rutgers, and UCSB, so I plan to release my spots at Brown and UCSB by the end of the week. I'm giving it a little time so that I'm 100% sure before declining. Rutgers is offering a lot of money, so I'm thinking about it, but I may be declining soon since it's unlikely that I'll go anywhere besides Berkeley, Chicago, Stanford, or Michigan.

[mathgrad]

Hey Kraglon,
Congrats for getting selected in such top-level places!And thanks in advance for declining Brown(quickly)!Can I ask you what your field of interest is?

[mathgrad]

Kraglon,are you an American applicant?

[mathgrad]

Anybody here who has got in Caltech but not planning to join there?

[mathgrad]

Assuming that people holding responsible positions give responsible statements,I will give you some news.
The gradchair of UPenn has given somebody some statistical data also:the average Math GRE score of the selected applicants is 860(i.e,97%)!That's almost unbelievable,isn't it,considering that in last few years,it was 731?I don't why so many people with such great GRE scores are applying to UPenn!
The vice-gradchair of Chicago has told somebody that this year had the strongest applicant pool in 40 years.[He is about 70,so it's not an impossibility]

[happyentropy]

Yeah, I've finally got all of my decisions and I did MUCH better than expected.
Accepted: UChicago, Berkeley, NYU, Columbia, Michigan, UCLA, UCSD, Wisconsin, UPenn
Rejected: Princeton, MIT
Waitlisted: Stanford
So considering Stanford's decision isn't likely to come out before April 15...
would it be inconsiderate to agree to go somewhere before April 15 and then decline if a positive decision is reached by Stanford? (I'm sure many people have dealt with this situation...)