₦airaland Forum

iCool:
Thank hirschfelder, Topiipii, Ladunal, Okusi, Shayhune and andradaeze. Your decisions will be sweet too.

@Topiipii. Any new update concerning funding?

Graduate coordinator for Colostate mailed me, I'd have to apply for TA or email individual faculty for RA. Any update from your end?

drhopeful:
And it's Penn State breaking the ice!!!!! Acceptance with full funding for first year. Subsequent funding dependent on 3.0gpa blah blah and availability of funding..... Now I am relieved!!!! Thank you guys for all the encouragement!!!

At last! This is wonderful news. At least your hair can grow in peace now

iCool:
Decision 3/5

University of Houston, An ACCEPTANCE.


Accepted in the 3 decisions received so far - I am humbled...


Got a $1k scholarship and in-state tuition.

Congrats iCool!

hirschfelder:
Hello house, I hope we are all doing great. So, I was accepted at KSU for PhD in Chemical Engineering and I would like to share my experience with you all, since we started this journey together and will hopefully all get into great programs at the end!
This is my second application cycle, I was rejected from all the schools I applied to for Fall, 2016. I was disconsolate as you'd imagine. Luckily, I stumbled upon this thread and gained so much information from it. I contacted a very active and helpful member, SirRiddy-he gave me some tips and suggested I re-write the GRE (my previous score was 310), IELTS-8/9.
So, I did and got a better score (332), applied to a wider range of schools and got accepted into one of them. I would like to say, happening upon this thread made all the difference. If one makes use of the information posted here judiciously, great improvements in one's profile would be made.
Soo, thanks to everyone that has contributed to this thread in one way or the other! And special thanks to SirRiddy of course!!!

Congrats hirschfelder!

Scholastica16:
Regret mail from LSU. They say they hope the regret will not discourage me from pursuing graduate program in other schools. Congrats to those who got it.

Sorry to hear about this, I'm sure you'll receive great news soon.

Scholastica16:
Intimidators.

Intimidate us.

Where is Hirschfelder?

But na you say make we dey update the house na

andradaeze:
Some schools make funding decisions later. Congratulations dear.

Thanks!

fredoricko:
Thanks boss. Amen to that

Congrats.

Ndawe:
Congrats!!! Funding will come. Are you going for an MSc or a PhD program?

Thanks, they're all MS programs.

drhopeful:
With all the decisions on here, I guess I can now intensify ripping off my hair....

No need for that now, I think you still have till the end of March; in fact, I was surprised to see the first mail as I had hoped decisions will start coming in around March.

towbaynah:
Got a rejection from the University of Tennessee today. 1 of 5. My chest is heavy.

Sorry about the rejection, I hope the others turn out better.

iCool:
@Seeker88. Congratulations!!!

Admission is in.... Funding is next!

Congrats to you both.

I have received four decisions from my applications, they all admitted me without funding yet.

Colorado State University - Jan. 24
Kansas State University - Feb. 7
University of Wyoming - Feb. 10
Tennessee Tech. - Feb. 14

K-State is asking me to send a bank statement though before an admittance can be processed.

I still have two more decisions to go (U of Utah and Vanderbilt)

tescoman90:
but aw can i pay for GRE dat is $205 and will d exchange rate be at 320 wen payin?

Using B. Y. MAFIT at 50,000NGN is cheaper than your card at 320NGN/$

I saw a closing date of December 31st on the first one, is it still open?

Silva79:
seconded

seXytOhbAd:
Rubbish fake news. Where did she refer to blacks as niggers Nairaland is losing value from all these bullcrap

khalids:
Am I the only one seeing Neferunenaji, is that an asian name...............Fake news everywhere in Nairaland.
We go soon rename am Trashland

What will it cost you lot to google the twitter handle @neferurenaji instead of trying to be all knowing on nairaland?

SilaV:
A beautiful evening to this lovely e-family. I will be making some application payments using my debit cards and I don't know how secured the web page of these schools are. I will be glad to hear from veterans in the know,here,whether my concern about this is well- founded.

I think it is quite safe, I did with mine and also with a friend's who also applied for Fall '17; No one here has complained of any issue either.

OluDare01:
Oh my bad,UTK is a well funded school.
Wish you all the best

I don't know the devil that pushed me against applying to UTK in 2014 after sending my GRE scores and filling the application, I suppose that's one of the cons of having inadequate preparation.

Scholastica16:
Igbosere in Lagos. N200 per page but it is all about bargaining. There are alot of Notary Publics there so it helped. I am saying this because some guy in VI wanted to charge me 5k for 2 documents and I thought he was doing me a favor till someone recommended Igbosere to me

That's quite cheap, may be I should come and learn some bargaining skills from you. I called a friend and he told me he spent about 10k to have his notarized at Ikeja in 2014, I promptly called it off; I always thought it shouldn't be that expensive.

Scholastica16:
Mississippi State Uni wanted official documents of everything but I sent them an email asking for concession to use notarized copies and they accepted. You are right though, that some will not evaluate the application without the official documents sent. I am even happy you said this because I was starting to feel bad that I spent all that money sending the documents, for what I thought was nothing.

How much did you pay to have your documents notarized and where? I wanted to do this last month, but later decided to forgo the idea.

Scholastica16:
I did for K-state but not for Utah. PhD too?

If you don't get both let me know why!

MS, I no get liver

Scholastica16:
I was just thinking about something as I got home today: Did I really need to send all my official documents until the admission decision was out? Musing on it, maybe I didn't.

What I am trying to say is, don't you think just uploading transcript, GRE and IELTS would have sufficed till the admission decision was out? Then if you consider going to the school you only pay for the official copy to be sent to the school.

Most of them will require you to send official test scores no matter what, some will even insist on official transcript and will not process your application until you provide it; some of them might allow soft copies though after you mail them. I saw about two or three schools that allow soft copies of test scores during my search, UWyoming is the only school that accepts soft copies of all documents as at the last check.

Aig84:
Hello, please can you help me with this issue, I have an undergrad CGPA of 3.0/5, I know it isn't competitive but I expect to write the GRE and hopefully get a very competitive score, I do not have a masters yet also but how realistic is it for me with a competitive GRE score and this undergrad CGPA to qualify for a PhD program. Also note that I have no research experience save for the undergraduate project

You can use the link below to have a close estimate if you have a copy of your transcript with you.

http://www.wes.org/students/igpacalc.asp

Scholastica16:
Sorry, just seeing this.

Except a school wants to be finicky, I don't see how they can ignore a composite of 108 and zero in on the fact that the speaking was rated "fair" to a candidate ETS treats as non-native.

Nice @ EE. I expect big testimonies from your end mate. Cheers.

I'm hoping so too and I expect same from your end and others here. I see that we both applied to U of Utah And K-State, I think I made the deadline though, the last item was submitted on Dec. 29 but my status wasn't updated till the new year because of the holidays.

Scholastica16:
Wash me small but not with detergent baba. Even your GRE repeat wey you say you no too dey happy with still pass my improvement. LOL. Na me suppose dey envy you. The importance of AWA and Speaking score are exaggerated when one compares how large the composites are to them.

BTW what's your major and did you reapply to the same schools?

I can live with the AW score, but that 20 in speaking is too low; I'm hoping the other sections count in my favour.
Major is EE applied to different schools this time around.

Scholastica16:
Thanks to everyone who kept asking and showing concern. My TOEFL was released today.

(R 29 L 29 S 26 W 28) composite: 112

Nothing earth-shattering. The highlight of my score is my speaking of 26 (which I didn't expect as I had informed the house earlier that I barely ever finished explaining myself when the time elapsed. One other time I meant to say 'dilemma' (someone was stuck between choices) and I ended up saying 'debacle'. Quickly changed it to predicament which is a good synonym for dilemma. I felt it would come-out imprecise to whoever was scoring me sha but it is whatever. Lowlight will be the writing joor. I expected a full 30 as I constantly compared myself to the Indians and Russians online that got 115-118 with perfect Writing scores.

I want to accuse ETS of malfeasance and demographic bias in scoring but I don't have empirical evidence.

I know this is a GRE thread but if anyone is preparing for TOEFL especially the speaking aspect do not panic if you are talking and you see the seconds ticking away. The evidence shows that one's overall score is not affected by this. Do not also panic if you finish talking way before the time. I don't think it hurts one's overall score as well. Try to pronounce your words slowly (many don't know this but Nigerians are accused of talking too fast).

Cheers.

Congrats on the wonderful scores, I dey envy you right now.

OGreene:
Please read my other posts, my test experience is there. I have no issue with that all. I have said this again and again.

My issue is i dont have to be called out because i didnt include my test scores. Not whether its right or wrong, Overtime i havent seen people updating scores constantly. Even when i wrote the first test, i posted that day and hola'd others that wrote. I cant remember any of them responding. So i just left it there, and i thought it seem people weren't really taking it serious.

That was my thinking when i posted that mine is in a comfort zone without intending to offend anybody. Only for me to see that response which i didnt take lightly. Some people have said they dont agree with me about leaving out the scores, or that its right to include it; thats even better than just calling me out at first.

My response isnt different because i have taken the exam, if it were before, i will still have responded.

To be honest, the abrupt nature of that first post makes it impossible for anyone to assume any other meaning than what most of the commenters have said, I am sure you'll also agree that it did not properly convey your intentions which you later made known in other posts as well as this one. I am glad you have no issues with sharing your experience, it seems the matter has died a natural death and quickly too. I wish you all the best in your applications.

Dagrin fan, what's this even about?

He used to refer to himself as Barak 'OGrin' which is a variant of your moniker.

OGreene:
Hi Time2Smile, congrats again. You have really been doing well.

My issue wasn't even talking about the test experience. I knew you tried for me, it was so disappointing that I didn't have a good report to tell you. So I just announced the score is just there, a comfortable zone. Who is happy talking about a low score? If my test prep didn't work for me, is it going to help others? For real, if people yet to take feel they will learn from it, I will explain asap.

Imagine my shock when I saw the epistle of how selfish I am withholding the scores. I couldn't condone this. Has reporting the score here now compulsory, that it has to be put out that way! Because if it were so, I would gladly play along. Its been a choice matter. Some people never talked about their scores, and no one called them out. So why me? What I wanted to do later is if some people (that had been with me on this insisted), i will pm the score. Am very shy about it.

I didn't even know they were referring to the test experience most of the time the argument lasted. I didn't intentionally hold that back. I have added that straight away.

Hi OGreene,

I saw your post yesterday, but I never thought it would descend to this. The fact that others did not give a report does not make it right if you don't, it is a rule of the thread sort of, so should have tried to respond as expected rather than take the antagonistic route by referring to those who did not give a report.

You were right when you mentioned that some people did not share their test experience, but it could also be said that you asked more questions than the majority of the people in question and if you noticed, those that asked for your experience have been helpful to you in the past either directly or indirectly, I am sure they asked out of concern. Imagine a scenario where you've been assisting a student in one way or the other for an exam only for him/her to return after the exam and tell you that his/her performance is 'OK' without being specific. Your initial post after the test

Hello people, my appreciation to all that helped, with materials, steps to take, answering questions and that Maggosh account.

My scores are okay, in comfortable zone smiley I can now hope for the best with admission.

appears to suggest that you've obtained what you're after and would rather keep it private which is against the spirit of the thread anyway. Scholastica16 did not do anything wrong when he mentioned you, the only thing I think you may find offensive in his post is the fact that he said he is disappointed; that is in no way an insult to you.

You may think that your score is not good enough (although you did mention that it's in the comfortable zone), but have you thought about the fact that sharing your experience might also be of benefit to you as the ensuing discussion might reveal something that may be of importance? Seeing/reading reports of only high scores is not good for the thread in my opinion, it gives the impression that the test is easy which may make an intending test taker lax in his/her preparation(s).

On a different note, are you a fan of Dagrin?

Sirriddy, don't you think your language to OGreene in your last response was harsh? I hope those yankee people have not infected you with their F-word syndrome.

Kelvdimeji:
He really said that?

Abeg help me ask am well well o! And he calls himself Mr Physics.

Time2Smile:
I just finished my GRE, all I can say is Whao, Full report loading.

Congrats on your scores, I kept thinking of your moniker and how apt it is to the occasion while reading through your test experience. It is indeed your time to smile.

sirRiddy:
Scholastica16 your response is very insightful.
Emailing grad coordinators would help eliminate schools that you
should not waste time and money on.
So applicants should go to LinkedIn and find current students in their prospective programs.
One can type "GTA Chemical Engineering Harvard" if you are applying to the Chemical
Engineering program at Harvard for instance.

sirRiddy, please your assistance is required; I sent you a mail.

P0intBlank:
You say it like it's her fault. When the portal didn't make provision for Computer science.

I was trying to explain the spreadsheet to the first person I quoted. The last part of my post is in response to a question asked by the other person.

duni04:
If this is your contribution to the topic at hand or you're just another "provost praiser" angry at seeing someone question your demigod provost, please visit other threads and leave this one.
I'm very concerned and angry that a brilliant young woman has been robbed in broad day light. What is more annoying is that the robbers are here pretending to be her saviours and brandishing all kinds of twisted logic to justify their robbery.
Mr provost, please publish the entire list of 100 level Medicine and surgery students that have been registered for the new session with the breakdown of their UTME and O level grades.

Did you go through the Nigerian educational system at all? Someone insisting as you're doing right now would have gone through the old thread and the provost's profile before embarking on such quest. 45 students were picked from that list, the others would be for pre degree, catchment area and ELDS with the odd 'man know man' which would be extremely few because it is of course Med Surg. In the USA for instance, admission is quite subjective, you can have a very high SAT score and still not get admitted while someone with a lower score will. They use race/minority status in the same way we use catchment/ELDS. Apart from that your SAT score alone no matter how high is not enough as they use other criteria as well, yet I don't see people accusing them of not being transparent instead they say they're highly selective. I'm talking about some of the best schools in the world like Harvard, Yale Stanford etc.

You might want to read this:

<span class="quora-content-embed" data-name="Does-Malia-Obama-deserve-to-go-to-Harvard/answer/Loretta-B-DeLoggio">Read <a class="quora-content-link" data-width="559" load-full-answer="False" data-key="93cb25710d1604e1d072974267a8907d" data-id="23918039" data-embed="lmxjwrc" href="https://www.quora.com/Does-Malia-Obama-deserve-to-go-to-Harvard/answer/Loretta-B-DeLoggio" data-type="answer" data-height="250"><a href="https://www.quora.com/Loretta-B-DeLoggio">Loretta B DeLoggio</a>&#039;s <a href="/Does-Malia-Obama-deserve-to-go-to-Harvard#ans23918039">answer</a> to <a href="/Does-Malia-Obama-deserve-to-go-to-Harvard" ref="canonical"><span class="rendered_qtext">Does Malia Obama deserve to go to Harvard?</span></a></a> on <a href="https://www.__nousername__.main.quora.com">Quora</a><script type="text/javascript" src="https://www.quora.com/widgets/content"></script></span>

That handler is good, he's always on point with his replies.

duni04:
What rubbish is this? Are you the PA to the provost? Or is this an alternate moniker the provost has created to defend himself?

You don't have to be offensive, the prof opened an account yesterday (https://www.nairaland.com/adesegunfat) because of this issue when he was contacted by past students who saw the lady's post. One can fairly deduce from the spreadsheet that the process was automated, so the issue occurred when the lady entered 7 subjects instead of 8 and the school won't know since they will just go with the final column; she even clarified the issue today from a screen shot I saw here on Nairaland. sanchez01 is an old member here.

OBAGADAFFI:
Where did the girl err here.

She erred when she entered 7 subjects as against the 8 demanded on the web portal.