Logistics, logistics, logistics
Been swamped with work again. The most prodigious consumer of my spare time lately has been graduate school applications. Its such a formidable logistical nightmare applying to 8 different schools it almost makes assembling the space shuttle look like a walk in the park.
Part of the problem lies in the fact that there is no centralized system to handle applications and each school acts as if the applicant is applying EXCLUSIVELY to their school, which needless to say is an awesomely stupid assumption. This means that since each school requires 3 letters of recommendations, I have 24 individual snail-mail letters to track and monitor.
And for heaven’s sake graduate schools should stop asking retarded questions like “Why choose Stanford?”. Now I have a problem with this kind of question on 2 levels: Firstly, it a huge time waster for the applicant. Obviously, if Stanford had nothing to offer me I wouldn’t be applying there in the first place.
Secondly, I’m convinced its meant as nothing more than an ego boost for the admission committee. i.e 90% of our applicants think that our university has a world-renowned faculty, state of the art research facilities, situated in the perfect junction between academia and industry blah blah. Therefore it must be true.
Because nobody ever bullshits on their applications. *cough*
Imagine if I had to write 8 different essays waxing lyrical about the putative attractiveness of each program. Its exhausting to keep coming up with ever-more grandiloquent fluff and gets a bit ridiculous when I start reaching my “safety schools”.
“Why choose Pineappletart State University?”, you say? Because I’m out of options, dammit.