The Odd Couple Deadline

Like Oscar and Felix of The Odd Couple, the two programs with a deadline today are an unlikely pairing.  Our youngest applicants — those who apply to the MALD or MIB programs through the Map Your Future pathway — and our academically most advanced applicants — those aiming for the PhD program — are in the final stages of application preparation, if they haven’t submitted their materials already.  And just as the two programs are different, our reasons for assigning them this December 20 deadline have little in common.

PhD applications face a particularly long review process, involving not only the PhD Admissions Committee, but also potential faculty advisors.  Every admitted PhD student needs to be assigned an advisor at the point of admission and it’s meant to be a relationship that continues throughout the student’s time at Fletcher.  All this review takes time and we realized years ago that the process would go more smoothly if we started the clock ticking earlier, though PhD applicants are notified of the decision on their application at the same time as everyone else.

For Map Your Future applicants, our thinking was simply that we wanted to be able to offer a little extra time for pre-application communication/counseling and that’s easier to do in December than it is in January.

A quick check this morning showed me that we already have quite a few PhD and MYF applications ready to be reviewed, and many more in another phase of preparation.  For those still adding the finishing flourishes to their applications, you have until 11:59 p.m. EST (UTC -5) tonight.