muons wrote:Hi everybody, this may sound like a ridiculous question but... hear me out:
I'm a top notch undergraduate (domestic male, not minority) interested in high energy theory. I love my gf but our grad school plans kind of failed. I was hoping she would apply to CA schools but she refused.. in turns, I only applied to the top notch schools:
Princeton, Harvard, MIT, UChicago, Stanford, Berkeley.
I got into all of them, and got a fellowship offer from Stanford. However, my gf didn't get into any. She's into high energy experiment, and she got into:
JHU, Cornell, Rutgers, Rochester, Boston U
Now she seems pretty set on Cornell. However as stupid as I was, I did not apply to Cornell. She does not seem to want to compromise. It'll be 4 hours away from Princeton (my top choice), however, I seriously hate long distance relationship and even 4 hours sound ridiculous to me... my only regret now is that I did not !@#%# apply to Cornell...
Now, what if (I know it sounds crazy...) I send the admission committee people an email, stating my situation... would there be a slight chance that I'll get admitted?
I have a very strong record:
- 990 PGRE, 800 Math GRE, 520 Verbal GRE, 4.5 Writing GRE, gpa=3.97
- 3 summer of experimental research, 1 summer at CERN
- I just got the new DOE fellowship 35k per year (that means no funding needed from the department)
- grad courses: 3 semester QFT, 2 QM, GR, applied group theory (in physics), 2 EM, Stat Mech (right now)..
- My recommendations are from well known hep experimentalist and one theorist but it would almost be impossible to
get their recommendations at this point... They would totally KILL me for even considering this... and my parents, advisors and recommenders will surely be disappointed...
So my question is:
1. How likely can I pull this off seeing how admission decision deadline is April 15th?
2. How stupid am I? I'm blowing off Princeton, MIT, Harvard... just to go to Cornell and be with my gf... am I making sense? How much of a sacrifice would it be?
3. Am I insane for considering this?
muons wrote:Hi everybody, this may sound like a ridiculous question but... hear me out:
I'm a top notch undergraduate (domestic male, not minority) interested in high energy theory. I love my gf but our grad school plans kind of failed. I was hoping she would apply to CA schools but she refused.. in turns, I only applied to the top notch schools:
Princeton, Harvard, MIT, UChicago, Stanford, Berkeley.
I got into all of them, and got a fellowship offer from Stanford. However, my gf didn't get into any. She's into high energy experiment, and she got into:
JHU, Cornell, Rutgers, Rochester, Boston U
Now she seems pretty set on Cornell. However as stupid as I was, I did not apply to Cornell. She does not seem to want to compromise. It'll be 4 hours away from Princeton (my top choice), however, I seriously hate long distance relationship and even 4 hours sound ridiculous to me... my only regret now is that I did not !@#%# apply to Cornell...
Now, what if (I know it sounds crazy...) I send the admission committee people an email, stating my situation... would there be a slight chance that I'll get admitted?
I have a very strong record:
- 990 PGRE, 800 Math GRE, 520 Verbal GRE, 4.5 Writing GRE, gpa=3.97
- 3 summer of experimental research, 1 out of 3 summer at CERN
- I just got the new DOE fellowship 35k per year (that means no funding needed from the department)
- grad courses: 3 semester QFT, 2 QM, GR, applied group theory (in physics), 2 EM, Stat Mech (right now)..
- My recommendations are from well known hep experimentalist and one theorist but it would almost be impossible to
get their recommendations at this point... They would totally KILL me for even considering this... and my parents, advisors and recommenders will surely be disappointed...
So my question is:
1. How likely can I pull this off seeing how admission decision deadline is April 15th?
2. How stupid am I? I'm blowing off Princeton, MIT, Harvard... just to go to Cornell and be with my gf... am I making sense? How much of a sacrifice would it be?
3. Am I insane for considering this?
quizivex wrote:@ muons, hmm, grad school is 6 years of your life and sets the stage for your career. Why would you be willing to give up your dream school(s) to be with your gf....?
muons wrote:Thanks for all the advices... I'm still battling whether I should try it out or not...
But on another note, she'll be off to CERN eventually (probably in the third year or so and this stunt will only score me two years with her)... also to answer volcano's comment, she dislikes both Boston U and Rutgers U as they seem to be wayy more subpar than Cornell (and yes I agree that they are wayyyy less prestigious than Cornell). To her, the long distance isn't that big of a deal, but to me, driving drives (no pun intended) me nutssss!!! and public transportation will take 7+ hours. In the busy semester that's coming up, I can probably only visit her one weekend per month and over major holidays....
I guess I might just have to suck it up...
(and don't worry, I'll decline some offers after checking out MIT and Harvard.. I just need to check the out).
meggo wrote:If you're going to do a long distance relationship at a 4 hour distance, it can work if you make sure you see each other as often as you can (given that you will be extremely busy, especially during the first two years).
matonski wrote:meggo wrote:If you're going to do a long distance relationship at a 4 hour distance, it can work if you make sure you see each other as often as you can (given that you will be extremely busy, especially during the first two years).
How often did you see each other?
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