Hi everyone!

I've just finished (about one week ago) my PhD interview weekend at Utah State University, and like most people (I'm sure!), I'm going crazy over the wait. I guess I am just worried because this is one program that I really wanted to get into.

Basically, I arrived one day before the stipulated date of the interview and was received by two faculty members and their grad student who took me on a tour of their labs and around the university town. They weren't the faculty members I indicated on my application form but, as I would come to learn later during the course of the day, they hand-picked my application. However, at the end of the day, I was stumped by a question during a discussion I was having with one of them. Fortunately, he gave me one night to think over it before giving him an answer during the actual interview.

On the interview day, I met with 5 faculty members individually; two of whom are my POIs. I was given 30 minutes with each of them. The interview with one of my POIs went over by 15 minutes. During the interview, we talked (even wrote and drew hypothetical graphs) about our ideas, and he gave me a copy of his grant to comment on the protocol. At this point, I thought I was doing well.

However, when I sent emails to every one of them when I returned to my resident country (Singapore), none of them replied; not even the email with my comments on the grant. So, I'm worried that I may have messed up terribly somewhere in between. Also, competition is really tough; some of the applicants are PhD students from other colleges looking to transfer.

Although my friends concurred that it seems like I'll be admitted, I can't help but worry that I've yet to receive any news nor replies from the department.

Any thoughts on this? Thank you in advance!

Waiting to hear back after interviews is always torture, I know how you must be feeling right now!

I guess they didn't reply to your emails as they hadn't come to a decision yet, and so didn't want to put anything in an email that you could be misconstrued. They probably all agreed not to contact you until a final decision is made, so try not to read too much into that!

Best of luck, and I hope they don't keep you waiting too much longer!