Waitlisted for top-choice - can I change it?

[avidphlegmatic]

Hi all!
This community has been so helpful to me in the past, so I was wondering if any of you could shed some light on my issue.

First some background: I'm applying for a PhD in English. I already have a BA in English and studying towards an MA in Creative Writing and English.

Comments

[nzraya]

I read that as saying "We are only accepting one person with an outside MA directly into our PhD program this year, and it's not you, so if we do take you off the waitlist it means you will be starting from scratch with us (completing requirements for the MA before being advanced to candidacy for the PhD)."

At most US PhD programs you earn an MA (and often, also an M.Phil.) on the way to the PhD. In some programs they grant advanced standing to students who already hold an MA from somewhere else. In others, they don't; if you want into the PhD program you have to fulfill their MA requirements first regardless of whether you already hold an MA degree. It sounds like this program that waitlisted you has two tracks: one for those with MAs seeking to enter the PhD program directly, and one for everyone else (i.e. those who will have to complete the MA requirements before being formally advanced to the PhD program). You didn't get in on the first track, but you still might get in on the second. It doesn't make any difference whether you go ahead and finish your current studies or not (and the prof who contacted you certainly did not mean to imply that it would).