excelsior

Hi everyone, I'm currently considering which universities to apply to this year for a PhD beginning Fall 2012 and someone recently told me something about Chicago's PhD programs which I'm not sure I believe, but which, if true, would certainly put me off applying. They said that Chicago take on more students in the first year than they have places for in the second, and that a number of students who don't compete well enough or satisfy the faculty in certain ways are asked not to continue with the program. Obviously all PhD programs would kick someone out if they were not keeping up with work - this is different; a system where you have to compete vigorously against one another in order to continue into the second year. The person who said this to my friend was studying some kind of science or engineering degree (sorry this is all so ambiguous!) at Chicago and claimed it happened to them. I am applying for the English PhD program and can't see anything to suggest such a scheme on the faculty website, but I wondered if people know about this happening to grad students at Chicago or perhaps can confirm that it is in fact not a feature of the English program? Best, Chris