Schools reducing grad admissions, rescinding some acceptances amid fed funding cuts

Graduate School
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Any updates/positive progress on 2025 grad school admissions?

D is applying for phd engineering and related cross-curricular research programs. She turned one early offer down based on logistics of actual program and fear of program not having funding in the coming years based on fed cuts.

She has one verbal offer with diversified funding. She is excited about that, but was hoping to hear something else from the others.

And then several that were very interested and positive, but have gone silent and no changes in the admissions portals. Professors she was talking to have reached out a few times but nothing from admissions.

I hate that these are the same kids who had a weird/MIA senior year of HS due to Covid, did not go on full college tours, started college with Covid parameters…

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44

Mine applied to 4 programs. He ended up with 3 offers for PhD for earth sciences, and one that turned him down but not without first making sure that he and his undergrad advisor knew they really wanted him but had to turn him down this cycle. One of the offers felt a little soft in terms of funding, so he really had 2 fully-funded options to choose between from top schools in his field. He is excited about the choice he made and is ready to move on next year.

He did receive only an Honorable Mention on the GRFP fellowship front. It appears that the National Science Foundation only awarded about 40% of the fellowships as compared to the number offered the past couple years.

Now we get to wait and see if the school he selected ends up losing federal research funding. I keep telling him that he needs to live in university housing next year and not sign a lease with a private landlord. He is far less concerned about the funding situation than I am.

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45

Thanks for sharing! Congrats.

The grad campus housing is not a bad call with the unknown. We will keep that in mind as we figure this out.

46

I assume that if the worst case scenario hits where any students lose their funding, that the university would be willing to release them from their housing obligations.

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