#College Admission 2020

[raigarhopju]

Best Private Universities in Raigarh

Are you looking for the best private universities in Raigarh? OP Jindal University is one of the best private universities in Chhattisgarh. This university provides world-class education to its students and offers a range of academic and professional programs in engineering, science, technology, management and humanities. The university offers some of the best engineering colleges in Raigarh, the best engineering universities in Raigarh, and M.Tech Colleges in Raigarh. With its highly qualified faculty, top-notch infrastructure and excellent academic environment, OP Jindal University is the leading choice for students looking for a top-tier private university in Raigarh.

[readytoescalate]

"EMORY IS EVERYWHERE": AN OPEN INVITATION FROM PROTESTORS OCCUPYING EMORY UNIVERSITY

As the Palestine Solidarity movement rips across college campuses, college administrators and government bureaucrats are rushing to denounce anyone taking action as an “outside agitator”. Those who grease the gears of the war machine think that this rhetoric will erode public support for bold actions at Emory. They are wrong. 45 years after the Camp David Accords - an infamously botched, imperialist plan for peace between Israel and Egypt with no input from Palestinians - was orchestrated by an Emory faculty alum President Carter, we observe that there is nowhere on Earth “outside” of Emory University. We want to say as clearly as possible - we welcome “outside agitators” to our struggle against the ruthless genocide of Palestinians. Emory University has the highest tuition, the lowest acceptance rate, and by far the highest endowment of any institution in Georgia. Economic barriers, infamously racist standardized testing, and nepotism have barred many from studying at Emory. To students in Atlanta and beyond - we invite you to struggle with us. Local high school students dream of attending Emory, and many teachers encourage them to study hard and take up extracurriculars to increase their chance acceptance, knowing their chance of admission is slim. To local high school students and teachers, we invite you to struggle with us. Just down the street from Emory Hospital Midtown is the site of the former Peachtree-Pine homeless shelter. In a bid to gentrify the city and evict its houseless population, the City closed the shelter and did not replace it, displacing hundreds and cutting off a last line of support for thousands of poor people in the city. Emory University purchased this building, just one example of Emory’s contribution to gentrification in Atlanta. To those without homes, or those displaced by gentrification, we invite you to struggle with us. Emory’s $11 billion endowment, the 11th highest in the country, is an outsized influence in Atlanta’s economy. While economic inequality widens in the city, Emory remains a bastion of the rich. To the restaurant workers, house cleaners, gig workers, and all proletarians - we invite you to struggle with us. In 2020, Emory University laied off or furloughed over 1500 employees. To those who are no longer affiliated with the university - we invite you to struggle with us. 4 out of 5 students at Emory are not from Georgia. While the Freedom Riders were heading down to Georgia in the 1960’s to fight for Black people’s right to vote, segregationist governors cast them as “outside agitators”. To those from outside Atlanta and Georgia, we invite you to struggle with us. 1 in 5 students at Emory are from outside of the United States. The Palestinian students murdered by American weapons under Biden will never be one of those students. To those from outside of the country, we invite you to struggle with us. In April 2023, Emory admin called the police to break up a protest led by students against Cop City on the quad. None of the pigs were Emory students. To all of those who struggle against police brutality, we invite you to struggle with us. EMORY IS EVERYWHERE. THE PLACE FOR DIVISION IS NOWHERE. WE INVITE YOU TO STRUGGLE WITH US.

[covid-safer-hotties]

Also preserved in our archive (Daily updates!)

Under 1s account for 64 per cent of all childhood hospital admissions with Covid, study finds

By Tom Bawden

Under 1s account for 64 per cent of all childhood hospital admissions with Covid, study finds

Covid is almost as bad for babies now as it was in the early days of the pandemic, while the risk of serious illness among all other age groups has sharply reduced over time, a study has found.

Researchers found that 6,300 babies less than a year old were admitted to hospital, either wholly or partially because of Covid, in the year to August 2023.

As such, infants accounted for 64 per cent of all child admissions for Covid for that year, according to the new study, published in the Journal of Pediatrics.

The study shows the rate of hospital admissions among infants has hardly changed as the pandemic has progressed, with a total of 19,790 under-ones admitted between August 2020 and August 2023 (an average of 6,596 a year) – representing 43 per cent of all child admissions over that time.

Meanwhile, during the period when Delta was the dominant variant, from May to December 2021, infants made up less than 30 per cent of children’s admissions.

Taken together, these figures show that while serious cases fell sharply among children aged one and older, they are little changed among the under-ones.

The continuing high rate of hospitalisations among babies is largely because babies are born with no immunity to Covid and weak immune systems more generally.

This is in contrast to many older children, who have built some immunity from Covid infections and vaccines.

Most infants are only in hospital for a short time – about two days – but about 5 per cent needed intensive care.

“The pandemic is as bad as it ever was for babies. Under-ones are the only age group where admissions have not gone down over time,” said Professor Christina Pagel, of University College London.

“As children over one year old gained some immunity from infection or were vaccinated (with vaccination mostly in teens), their risk of needing hospital fell. But this doesn’t help infants in their first encounter with the virus.”

She expects the picture among infants to have been “about the same” in the year to August 2024 as they were the previous year, “as we’ve continued to see waves of Covid and immunity in newborns remains low”.

This is the first study to show that UK Covid hospitalisations among babies have hardly fallen during the pandemic.

Although a vaccine has been developed for children aged six months to four years, these are only given to those who are clinically vulnerable.

As such, the best protection a baby can get is if the mother is vaccinated during pregnancy – ideally in the third trimester, scientists say.

The baby builds up some protection from the mother’s vaccination “in utero” and boosts this further after birth from breastfeeding, when antibodies are passed on through breast milk. The vaccine also reduces the risk of the mother catching Covid and passing it to her baby.

Professor Pagel points out that vaccine uptake in pregnancy is quite low, at about 40 per cent, and urges more pregnant women to get vaccinated.

“Not enough infants are being offering the protection of a vaccine – from six months – and the benefits of maternal vaccinations aren’t be promoted enough,” she said.

A study in the New England Journal of Medicine found that a vaccination during pregnancy reduced risk of hospitalisation for Covid among infants under the age of six by 61 per cent.

Analysis by the US Centre for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) has shown that Covid hospitalisations in babies under 6 months old are higher than any other age group apart from over-75s – although the difference is that hospital admissions among that age group have fallen sharply over the course of the pandemic, even if they are still higher than for babies.

Dr Simon Williams, lecturer at Swansea University, who was not involved in the research, said: “The findings of this new study are very concerning and help to debunk the myth that Covid is harmless in children. Although a majority of children will not be seriously ill from Covid, this study shows that in some cases it can be serious, and particularly in babies, who are vulnerable and with low immunity.”

Sheena Cruickshank, professor of public engagement and biomedical science at the University of Manchester, who was also not involved in the study, said: “Young babies are exceptionally vulnerable to Covid as their immune systems are still developing.

“This paper shows that even while older children are being hospitalised less, this is not the case for younger children. If mothers are able to breastfeed and have been vaccinated during their later pregnancy, then their maternal antibodies can protect the baby.”

“However, takeup of these vaccines has not been quite as good as it could be leaving a lot of mums and their babies vulnerable,” she said.

Dr Mary Ramsay, director of immunisation at UK Health Security Agency, said: “The Covid vaccine for pregnant women is offered during a relatively short window during Autumn [October to December], so we advise them to take it up when it’s offered this year and not delay.

“This way the vaccine can protect more pregnant women and newborn babies, whatever stage of pregnancy they might be in and if they were to deliver prematurely.

“The Covid-19 vaccine is already offered to ‘babies over 6 months of age and children who have certain long-term conditions’, who are among those most at risk of severe illness.

“For other babies and children, Covid-19 will generally be a mild illness. Our surveillance shows that whilst infants under 6 months of age currently have the highest rates of hospitalisations, the number requiring intensive treatment remains relatively low.”

“As with all vaccination programmes, the JCVI keeps the Covid-19 vaccination programme under review and informed by best available evidence.”

Study: www.jpeds.com/article/S0022-3476(24)00473-6/fulltext

[beardedmrbean]

Do they ever give up? Those looking to divvy up Americans by race, that is.

In California they tried to get race preferences approved in a 2020 referendum, but voters rejected it 57.2% to 42.8%. This was a stunning rebuke, not only because the rejection came from residents of a blue state but because the losing side had outspent opponents something like 14 to 1.

In 2023 the Supreme Court weighed in with a landmark ruling that barred colleges from treating people as members of a racial group instead of as individuals—and cast constitutional doubt on all race-based preferences. “Eliminating racial discrimination means eliminating all of it,” Chief Justice John Roberts wrote. Couldn’t be clearer, right?

Not in California. Undaunted state Assemblyman Corey Jackson is pushing a bill called ACA7. It takes aim at the state ban on race preferences that voters put in the constitution in 1996 when they passed Proposition 209. Californians reaffirmed Proposition 209 three years ago at the ballot box.

The language the voters agreed to and the activists hate reads as follows: “The state shall not discriminate against, or grant preferential treatment to, any individual or group on the basis of race, sex, color, ethnicity, or national origin in the operation of public employment, public education, or public contracting.” Unlike the 2020 effort, the new bill would leave that language intact. Instead, it would add a provision allowing the governor to create “exceptions.” Effectively that would gut the ban.

Apparently, the lesson the advocates of state-sponsored discrimination have taken from their defeat is that if at first you don’t succeed, try something sneakier.

Here is Mr. Jackson’s press release summarizing the bill: “ACA7 will allow . . . the Governor to issue waivers to public agencies that wish to use state funds for research-based, or research-informed and culturally specific interventions to increase life expectancy, improve educational outcomes, and lift people out of poverty for specific ethnic groups and marginalized genders.”

Gail Heriot is a University of San Diego law professor who sits on the U.S. Commission on Civil Rights and was a leader of both Proposition 209 and the “no” effort on the 2020 referendum. She has launched a petition with Extremely Concerned Californians at change.org opposing the measure.

“ACA7’s proponents are hoping that voters will be fooled into thinking that it is just a small exception,” Ms. Heriot says. “In fact, it gives the governor enormous power to nullify Proposition 209.”

Edward Blum agrees. As the founder of Students for Fair Admissions, he spearheaded the lawsuits against Harvard and the University of North Carolina that killed race preferences in college admissions.

“Racial preferences are never legally justified because some specious ‘research’ report concludes it would be beneficial to a certain race,” says Mr. Blum. “This exemption will trigger endless litigation that will polarize California citizens by race.”

But sowing discord is a feature, not a bug. As the bill was making its way through the Assembly, Mr. Jackson got in a spat with Bill Essayli—a Republican who is also the first Muslim elected to the Assembly. Mr. Essayli pointed out that the majority of Californian voters disagree with state-sanctioned discrimination. “I fundamentally disagree with this backwards policy,” he later tweeted.

Mr. Jackson responded in his own tweet: “This is a perfect example how a minority can become a white supremacist by doing everything possible to win white supremacist and fascist affection.”

ACA7 passed the state Assembly in September. If it passes the Senate, it will be on the ballot in November. If Californians vote yea, it will become part of the constitution.

But all is not lost. The 2020 referendum awakened a sleeping giant: the Asian-American community. Asian-Americans quickly realized (as the Harvard case drove home) that they and their children are the primary victims whenever race is substituted for merit. Asian-Americans are more aware and organized than they were in 2020. They aren’t likely to be fooled by talk of “exceptions” based on “research.”

It also isn’t a given that ACA7 will make it through the state Senate. Though Democrats enjoy a 32-8 majority, polls consistently show race preferences are unpopular. Gov. Gavin Newsom’s support will be crucial.

Though he has no formal role in the constitutional process, some think the bill will go nowhere if Mr. Newsom doesn’t want it to. If it does make it to the ballot this November, he’ll be under immense pressure to endorse it. That’s another reason the Senate should kill ACA7 now, Ms. Heriot says.

“California voters need to make sure their state senators know where they stand—through emails, phone calls, letters, and petitions,” Ms. Heriot says. “Once the senators understand that, they will realize putting ACA7 on the ballot is not in their interest.”

[xanadontit]

College Chronicles

Since the deadline to make a decision is nigh, my brother is finally actually touring of some of the schools he's been accepted to.

San Jose State (SJSU) is the current front runner. He needs to get a 3 on the AP Calculus exam to be officially in, although the admissions counselor said there was a work-around there if he didn't. I think it's a test they administer through the university? One of his best friends has also committed to SJSU and said if my brother goes he'd like to room with him. My dad is being a total jackass about this. "It's too close to home." OK? Then you shouldn't have allowed him to apply there! And seriously? We're going to punish the kid because he happened to grow up in an area where there are a ton of great opportunities because you've decided he "needs" to go far away? Shut up.

Chico State (CSCU) is out but my brother said if you could move the campus slightly closer to a city he'd definitely consider it seriously. Totally fair. It's a cute, affordable college town but Sacramento is 1.5 hours away on a good day. I'm glad he's weighing the schools and considering he has to live there.

Long Beach is old and rundown and felt depressing, according to him lol. Fullerton had a nice campus and people were smiling and seemed happy but he finds the 97% commuter aspect off-putting. He also liked the campus at Cal Poly Pomona and said the chemical engineering program sounds fantastic but it's basically Chico but further south (remote, not much going on in the area). But, he hasn't officially eliminated it.

SF State is also an option but is even closer to my parents' house than SJSU (my stepmom drives past it on her way to work most days) and so again, my dad is being a pill about it. My brother doesn't seem terribly excited about it, anyway, other than he knows the area and spends time in the city anyway so it's comfortable.

He hasn't visited Sonoma or Northridge. He turned down UC Santa Cruz's waitlist spot. At one point UC Davis was also in the mix (waitlisted) but he didn't love it when he visited and told me he had it at the top of his list because it's a UC and "everyone told me to be into it."

I told him if he wants to talk through his thoughts/concerns I'd be happy to help him make some pro/con lists or figure out his non-negotiables or just listen to him vent and he said he knows and loves me (omg) and he's going to sleep on it and talk to his girlfriend (who also got into SJSU and liked it, FYI) and he may call me to talk later. At this point I may offer to be there when he tells his parents his decision if for no other reason than to whip something at my dad's head if he expresses anything other than enthusiastic support.

@pelicanhypeman and I are pretty sure it's going to be SJSU. My dad thinks I support this because it's 10 minutes from my house and uhhhh... if the kid wanted to go to school in Japan I'd support him! What is there to be gained by shitting on his decision, especially if it's not an inherently harmful one? He'll pull away from us out of hurt, not out of finding independence. I don't want that kind of relationship with him.

Now I need to figure out what to get him as a graduation present (I still owe him a trip from 8ther grade graduation in 2020) and order the bullhorn for the ceremony.

[religion-is-a-mental-illness]

By: Aaron Sibarium

Published: May 23, 2024

Up to half of UCLA medical students now fail basic tests of medical competence. Whistleblowers say affirmative action, illegal in California since 1996, is to blame.

Long considered one of the best medical schools in the world, the University of California, Los Angeles's David Geffen School of Medicine receives as many as 14,000 applications a year. Of those, it accepted just 173 students in the 2023 admissions cycle, a record-low acceptance rate of 1.3 percent. The median matriculant took difficult science courses in college, earned a 3.8 GPA, and scored in the 88th percentile on the Medical College Admissions Test (MCAT).

Without those stellar stats, some doctors at the school say, students can struggle to keep pace with the demanding curriculum.

So when it came time for the admissions committee to consider one such student in November 2021—a black applicant with grades and test scores far below the UCLA average—some members of the committee felt that this particular candidate, based on the available evidence, was not the best fit for the top-tier medical school, according to two people present for the committee's meeting.

Their reservations were not well-received.

When an admissions officer voiced concern about the candidate, the two people said, the dean of admissions, Jennifer Lucero, exploded in anger.

"Did you not know African-American women are dying at a higher rate than everybody else?" Lucero asked the admissions officer, these people said. The candidate's scores shouldn't matter, she continued,  because "we need people like this in the medical school."

Even before the Supreme Court's landmark affirmative action ban last year, public schools in California were barred by state law from considering race in admissions. The outburst from Lucero, who discussed race explicitly despite that ban, unsettled some admissions officers, one of whom reached out to other committee members in the wake of the incident. "We are not consistent in the way we apply the metrics to these applicants," the official wrote in an email obtained by the Washington Free Beacon. "This is troubling."

"I wondered," the official added, "if this applicant had been [a] white male, or [an] Asian female for that matter, [whether] we would have had that much discussion."

Since Lucero took over medical school admissions in June 2020, several of her colleagues have asked the same question. In interviews with the Free Beacon and complaints to UCLA officials, including investigators in the university's Discrimination Prevention Office, faculty members with firsthand knowledge of the admissions process say it has prioritized diversity over merit, resulting in progressively less qualified classes that are now struggling to succeed.

Race-based admissions have turned UCLA into a "failed medical school," said one former member of the admissions staff. "We want racial diversity so badly, we're willing to cut corners to get it."

This story is based on written correspondence between UCLA officials, internal data on student performance, and interviews with eight professors at the medical school—six of whom have worked with or under Lucero on medical student and residency admissions.

Together, they provide an unprecedented account of how racial preferences, outlawed in California since 1996, have nonetheless continued, upending academic standards at one of the top medical schools in the country. The school has consequently taken a hit in the rankings and seen a sharp rise in the number of students failing basic standardized tests, raising concerns about their clinical competence.

"I have students on their rotation who don't know anything," a member of the admissions committee told the Free Beacon. "People get in and they struggle."

It is almost unheard of for admissions officials to go public, even anonymously, and provide a window into confidential deliberations, much less to accuse their colleagues of breaking the law or lowering standards. They've agreed to come forward anyway, several officials told the Free Beacon, because the results of Lucero's push for diversity have been so alarming.

"I wouldn't normally talk to a reporter," a UCLA faculty member said. "But there's no way to stop this without embarrassing the medical school."

Within three years of Lucero's hiring in 2020, UCLA dropped from 6th to 18th place in U.S. News & World Report's rankings for medical research. And in some of the cohorts she admitted, more than 50 percent of students failed standardized tests on emergency medicine, family medicine, internal medicine, and pediatrics.

Those tests, known as shelf exams, which are typically taken at the end of each clinical rotation, measure basic medical knowledge and play a pivotal role in residency applications. Though only 5 percent of students fail each test nationally, the rates are much higher at UCLA, having increased tenfold in some subjects since 2020, according to internal data obtained by the Free Beacon.

That uptick coincided with a steep drop in the number of Asian matriculants and tracks the subjective impressions of faculty who say that students have never been more poorly prepared.

One professor said that a student in the operating room could not identify a major artery when asked, then berated the professor for putting her on the spot. Another said that students at the end of their clinical rotations don't know basic lab tests and, in some cases, are unable to present patients.

"I don't know how some of these students are going to be junior doctors," the professor said. "Faculty are seeing a shocking decline in knowledge of medical students."

And for those who've seen the competency crisis up close, double standards in admissions are a big part of the problem. "All the normal criteria for getting into medical school only apply to people of certain races," an admissions officer said. "For other people, those criteria are completely disregarded."

Led by Lucero, who also serves as the vice chair for equity, diversity, and inclusion of UCLA's anesthesiology department, the admissions committee routinely gives black and Latino applicants a pass for subpar metrics, four people who served on it said, while whites and Asians need near perfect scores to even be considered.

The bar for underrepresented minorities is "as low as you could possibly imagine," one committee member told the Free Beacon. "It completely disregards grades and achievements."

Lucero did not respond to a request for comment.

Several officials said that they support holistic admissions and don't believe test scores should be judged in isolation. The problem, as they see it, is that the committee is not just weighing academic merit against community service or considering how much time a given student had to study for the MCAT. For certain applicants, they say, hardship and community service seem to be the only things that matter to the majority of the committee's 20-30 members, many of whom were handpicked by Lucero, according to people familiar with the selection process.

"We were always outnumbered," an admissions officer told the Free Beacon, referring to committee members who expressed concern about low grades. "Other people would get upset when we brought up GPA."

Lucero hasn't been kind to dissenters. Speaking on the condition of anonymity, six people who've worked with her described a pattern of racially charged incidents that has dispirited officials and pushed some of them to resign from the committee.

She has lashed out at officials who question the qualifications of minority candidates, five sources said, suggesting naysayers are "privileged," implying that they are racist, and subjecting them to diversity training sessions.

After a Native American applicant was rejected in 2021, for example, Lucero chewed out the committee and made members sit through a two-hour lecture on Native history delivered by her own sister, according to three people familiar with the incident. No applications were reviewed that day, an official present for the lecture said.

In the anesthesiology department, where Lucero helps rank applicants to the department's residency program, she has rebuffed calls to blind the race of candidates, telling colleagues in a January 2023 email that, despite California's ban on racial preferences, "we are not required to blind any information."

That alone could get UCLA in legal trouble, according to Adam Mortara, the lead trial lawyer for the plaintiffs in Students for Fair Admissions v. Harvard, the Supreme Court case that outlawed affirmative action nationwide.

Asking for information about an applicant's race when "no lawful use can be made of it" is "presumptively illegal," Mortara said. "You can't have evidence of overt discrimination like this and not have someone come forward" as a plaintiff.

Lucero has even advocated moving candidates up or down the residency rank list based on race. At a meeting in February 2022, according to two people present, Lucero demanded that a highly qualified white male be knocked down several spots because, as she put it, "we have too many of his kind" already. She also told doctors who voiced concern that they had no right to an opinion because they were "not BIPOC," sources said, and insisted that a Hispanic applicant who had performed poorly on her anesthesiology rotation in medical school should be bumped up. Neither candidate was ultimately moved.

Lucero's comments from the meeting were flagged in an email to UCLA's Discrimination Prevention Office, which has received several complaints about her since 2023, emails show. The office has declined to act on those complaints on the grounds that they aren't "serious enough" to merit an investigation, according to a source with direct knowledge of the situation. The Discrimination Prevention Office did not respond to a request for comment.

The focus on racial diversity has coincided with a dramatic shift in the racial and ethnic composition of the medical school, where the number of Asian matriculants fell by almost a third between 2019 and 2022, according to publicly available data. No other elite medical school in California saw a similar decline.

As the demographics of UCLA have changed, the number of students failing their shelf exams has soared, trends professors at the medical school say are connected.

Between 2020, the year Lucero assumed her post, and 2023, when the first classes she admitted were taking their shelf exams, the failure rate rose dramatically across all subjects, in some cases increasing tenfold relative to the 2020 baseline, per internal data obtained by the Free Beacon.

"UCLA still produces some very good graduates," one professor said. "But a third to a half of the medical school is incredibly unqualified."

The collapse in qualifications has been compounded by UCLA's decision, in 2020, to condense its preclinical curriculum from two years to one in order to add more time for research and community service. That means students arrive at their clinical rotations with just a year of courses under their belt—some of which focus less on science than social justice.

First-year students spend three to four hours every other week in "Structural Racism and Health Equity," a required class that covers topics like "fatphobia," has featured anti-Semitic speakers, and is now the subject of an internal review. They spend an additional seven hours a week in "Foundations of Practice," which includes units on "interpersonal communication skills" and, according to one medical student, basically "tells us how to be a good person." The two courses eat up time that could be spent on physiology or anatomy, professors say, and leave struggling students with fewer hours to learn the basics.

"This has been a colossal failure," one professor posted in April on a forum for medical school applicants. "The new curriculum is not working and the students are grossly unprepared for clinical rotations."

Nearly a fourth of UCLA medical students in the class of 2025 have failed three or more shelf exams, data from the school show, forcing some students to repeat classes and persuading others to postpone a different test, the Step 2 licensing exam, that is typically taken in the third year of medical school and is a prerequisite for most residency programs.

Around 20 percent of UCLA students have not taken Step 2 by January of their fourth year, according to the data. Ten percent have not even taken the more basic Step 1—an "extremely high number," one professor said, that will force many students to extend medical school.

"It's a combination of a bad curriculum and bad selection," another professor said, referring to the admissions process. Some students are accepted with GPAs so low "they shouldn't even be applying."

UCLA did not respond to a request for comment.

As medical schools around the country adjust to the Supreme Court's affirmative action ban, the experience of UCLA offers a preview of how administrators may skirt the law and devise public-spirited excuses for violating it.

Lucero has told the admissions committee that each class should "represent" the "diversity" of California, including its remote and rural areas, so that graduating students will return to their hometowns and beef up the medical infrastructure there, officials say.

Race is rarely mentioned outright, and unlike the committee for anesthesiology residents, the committee for students does not see the race or ethnicity of applicants.

Instead, officials say, Lucero uses proxies like zip codes and euphemisms like "disadvantaged" to shut down criticism of unqualified candidates, citing a finding from the Association of American Medical Colleges that, technically, most students with below-average MCATs make it to their second year of medical school. How well they do after that point goes undiscussed and undisclosed.

"We have asked for metrics on how these folks actually do," one committee member said. "None of that is ever divulged to us."

==

Hope your next doctor isn't from UCLA.

Wokeness has a body count.

[justforbooks]

Phil Baines, who has died aged 65 of multiple system atrophy, was one of the most distinctive voices in contemporary British graphic design. His work included books, posters, art catalogues and lettering for three important London monuments – the memorial to the Indian Ocean tsunami in the grounds of the Natural History Museum and the 7 July memorials in Hyde Park and Tavistock Square, commemorating the victims of the 2005 London bombings. These projects point to Baines’s defining attributes: a scholarly appreciation of letterforms, a deep-rooted respect for materials and a love of collaboration.

Such attributes can also be seen in Baines’s cover designs for the Penguin Great Ideas series (2004-20), works by “great thinkers, pioneers, radicals and visionaries” that gave him a canvas on which to display his typographic philosophy. The Saint Augustine – Confessions of a Sinner cover, for instance, uses ancient ecclesiastical letterforms and yet looks superbly modern. For Chuang Tzu — The Tao of Nature, Baines arranged letters to suggest a butterfly in flight. David Pearson, one of two art directors for the series, described how his “often-oblique approach gave the series a crucial added dimension”.

Born in Kendal, Cumbria, Phil was one of the three children of Martin Baines, a construction contract manager, and Joan (nee Quarmby), a horticulturalist. Growing up in a Roman Catholic household, he began studies for the priesthood at Ushaw College, County Durham. During the holidays from Ushaw he worked at the Guild of Lakeland Craftsmen, Windermere, and from there his interest and confidence in art grew.

At the start of his fourth year, he quit Ushaw, and in 1980 began a year’s study on the foundation course at Cumbria College of Art and Design. In 1982 he moved to London and enrolled on the graphic design course at St Martin’s School of Art (now Central Saint Martins), where he met Jackie Warner, whom he married in 1989, and where he was among a talented cohort, many of whom went on to study, as he did, at the Royal College of Art.

Richard Doust, then leader of the first-year course at St Martins, recalled the portfolio Baines submitted for admission: “I was so excited … I was sure he was going to be someone very special. He quickly established his individuality. He made typography and particularly letterpress his own territory.”

Baines was fiercely individual – he did not join schools of thought or align himself with fashionable camps. Instead, he built a creative practice based on his belief in the “humanist” qualities of the English typographic tradition.

His contemporaries were using the computer to bring a new complexity to graphic communication. Smart software allowed for the overlapping and interweaving of text in ways that echoed the ecclesiastical manuscripts that Baines admired so much. He was no Luddite, and used the computer himself, yet his work invariably retained an element of the handmade.

Paradoxically, his work was greatly admired by the new generation of digital designers. Neville Brody, for instance, included Baines’s work in his experimental typography publication FUSE, produced to demonstrate the malleability of the new digital typography. Baines’s work does not look out of place among the other contributors, many of them American typography radicals whose multi-layered layouts were driven by modish theories of deconstruction and poststructuralism.

In 1988 he returned to Central Saint Martins (CSM), as part of the faculty. In staff meetings his willingness to say the unsayable was a frequent cause for consternation among colleagues. To his students he preached a doctrine of “object-based learning”, a typically contrarian notion in the age of screen-based and virtual graphic design. He was appointed a professor in 2006 and retired in 2020 as emeritus professor.

Despite his commitment to teaching, Baines did not give up his work for clients. As well as designing books for leading publishers, he worked for the Crafts Council and the Ditchling Museum of Art + Craft, and designed the signage for CSM’s King’s Cross campus. He designed exhibition catalogues for Matt’s Gallery, south-west London, relishing the creative three-way collaboration that existed between the gallery’s director, Robin Klassnik, exhibiting artists and himself.

He wrote books that contributed to the understanding of visual communication: Type & Typography (with Andrew Haslam, 2002), Signs: Lettering in the Environment (with Catherine Dixon, 2003) and Penguin by Design: A Cover Story 1935-2005 (2005), the last of which helped establish Penguin cover art as one of the most important bodies of graphic art in British design history.

With Dixon, he co-curated the Central Lettering Record, an archive of typographic history housed at CSM, and in November 2023 his work was celebrated in an exhibition, Extol: Phil Baines Celebrating Letters, at the Lethaby gallery, CSM. He was appointed as the Royal Mint advisory committee’s lettering expert in 2016, and reappointed in 2021 to advise on the integration of lettering on new coins and medals, with consideration given to special issues and the accession of King Charles to the throne. For this work, in 2023 he was awarded the Coronation medal.

Baines was an enthusiastic runner and cyclist, and loved music, especially the Manchester post-punk band the Fall. He was a collector of signs, lettering, and railwayana, and built his own studios at his home in Willesden Green, north-west London. A few years before his retirement he moved to Great Paxton, Cambridgeshire, where he took up bellringing.

He is survived by Jackie and their two daughters, Beth and Felicity, and by his father.

🔔 Philip Andrew Baines, graphic designer, born 8 December 1958; died 19 December 2023

Daily inspiration. Discover more photos at Just for Books…?

[mytearsrricochet]

listening to right where you left me while horrifically drunk after my college football team lost the most important game of the season just added my 2020 ex on Snapchat again and I would probably meet criteria for some kind of admission rn

[gerifran]

A Love Letter to Formula 1

F1 feels like home, and I love it like no other.

In particular, I find that Formula 1 has a unique ability to produce captivating stories about heartbreak, redemption, and glory—sometimes even all at once.

I’m not sure where my admiration for George came from. Perhaps it was our shared initials or a strict affinity for multiples of three. What I do know, though, is that his Formula 1 journey became one of my favorite stories in sports. I wrote my Common App essay about George because it was that serious. I forced college admissions officers to read about how I cried watching car 63 fall down the timing tower at 9 a.m. on a Sunday because that race changed my perspective on sports forever.

The 2020 Sahkir Grand Prix is nothing short of a captivating tale. I watched a man get the opportunity of a lifetime and lose it swiftly through no fault of his own. His misfortune would bring a victory that would change the trajectory of another man's career.

Everything in this sport is consequential and all of it is connected.

I’d never considered myself a competitive person, but in that moment I understood how people can put so much of themselves into a sport. I felt that team's loss like it was my own. I wanted the victory, I wanted the feeling, I wanted the story.

Of course, I don’t believe that this love is simple. There are many times when Formula 1 has angered me beyond belief—times when I’ve had to reconcile that maybe the sport I love is not one that can love me back.

What do you do with a sport that discourages—and actively censors—athlete activism? One that often fails to hold its most successful athlete in high regard?

I grieved the loss of Lewis Hamilton's eighth world title like it was me who had been cheated. I could not fathom losing something that was so certainly yours, much less to lose it through the admitted fault and negligence of an authority. Two years on, I still think of this as a moment that fiercely challenged my love for the sport.

I often joke that F1 is a billionaire’s playground, and frankly that is entirely true. You don’t have to be wealthy to become an F1 driver, but you sure as hell better know someone who is. I can't help but wonder how much more wonderful this sport could be if it wasn't so inaccessible. I wonder if we'd have full-time female drivers or more people of color. I wonder if I'd be able to see somebody who looks like me and grew up like me.

Yet despite all its faults, I’ve attached so much of my being to this sport. At a time when my world stood still, I turned to F1; not just as a source of entertainment, but rather a motive and a purpose. It became a reason to get through the week. I know I can survive this week because on Saturday and Sunday I'm going to watch F1. For about 20 weekends out of the year, I get to watch a new story and then I get to tell people about it.

I am intensely passionate about F1, and I could talk about it to anyone willing to listen and especially those who are not; I know its stories and I want everyone else to know them too. At their core, stories born from sports are about human persistence and man’s ability to pour heart and soul into a craft. Etched into Michael Schumacher’s final race helmet are the words, “Life is about passions. Thank you for sharing mine.” And Michael is never wrong.

What I love so much about Formula 1 is that it’s mine.

Nothing else ever has been.

[dhaaruni]

so, thoughts on today's supreme court decision that has struck down affirmative action?

Elite colleges walked right into this decision by being too loud about discriminating against Asian Americans and it's no wonder there was so much backlash. You aren't going to get away with requiring one ethnic group to score at minimum 100 points higher than other ethnic groups on standardized tests for the same entrance to an elite space, that's just profoundly unamerican (and yes we should also ban legacy admissions). Also, if elite college admissions officers didn't want affirmative action to be killed, they shouldn't have gone on record giving Asian Americans "lower personal ratings!!"

Plus like, killing race based admissions polls about as well as preserving Roe v. Wade so if you want the Supreme Court to take public opinion into account, this is exactly the decision you should support. These surveys are both from Pew.

California, one of the most liberal states in the country, banned affirmative action technically so UC schools, especially Berkeley which is the top public college in the country, are resorting to other methods to keep Asian-Americans out as much as they can and it shows. This was the affirmative action prop in 2020 that failed resoundingly compared to support for Joe Biden among the respective demographic groups.

[eliteprepsat]

Think about how well you and your college counselor know each other. How often do you voluntarily talk to him or her? Counselors can be a tremendous resource of information and support beyond just enrolling you in classes, so if you don’t already, try regularly setting up times to meet with them.

To make the most of your time together, go in with strategic questions based on your curiosities and needs. Here are 6 questions to get you thinking:

1. HOW DO I FIND THE COLLEGES OR UNIVERSITIES THAT ARE BEST FOR ME? 🔍

The college or university that is right for you might not be the same one you’ve heard about from your friends, parents, or favorite TV show. Each school has a unique set of characteristics, and finding the one that best fits your preferences will set you up for future success. Imagine a place you would thrive in. Consider factors such as size, location, academic programs, extracurriculars, and overall campus culture. Your counselor can provide guidance for how to assess which schools best meet your criteria and are most likely to admit you.

If you already have a list of colleges that interest you, you can ask your counselor if your list looks balanced or if you could benefit from modifying it. He or she can also inform you of any upcoming college fairs where you can consult with individual college representatives.

2. WHAT SHOULD I BE DOING THIS YEAR TO PREPARE FOR COLLEGE?

Depending on what grade you are in, your counselor will have different recommendations for how you can best prepare for college. It’s helpful to devise a road map of sorts so you know you’re not missing any key steps. You can discuss topics such as choosing between the SAT or ACT, taking SAT Subject Tests, planning testing dates, stepping up your involvement in extracurricular activities, and making the most out of college visits.

3. AM I TAKING THE RIGHT COURSES? 📚

The requirements for which high school classes you must take vary by college and they may differ from your high school’s graduation criteria. For example, UC and CSU schools have what are called “a-g” class requirements, which stipulate the minimum type and number of courses you must take to be eligible to apply to these schools. Navigating these details with an expert can give you peace of mind as you piece together your schedule.

Not only can your counselor help you plan your class schedule so that you time everything appropriately, but he or she can help you choose the classes that will increase your competitiveness for college admissions. For example, if you’re thinking of applying with a major like engineering, you’ll want to take as many rigorous STEM classes as you can to demonstrate your interest and ability in that field.

4. HOW DOES MY SUMMER PLAN LOOK?

As part of getting to know you, colleges like to see how you spend your free time. Summers are a great opportunity to explore and develop interests and further your academic career. Your counselor can help you decide what to do this coming summer–whether it be an internship, enrichment course, paid or volunteer job, or academic summer program–and provide resources for finding such opportunities.

5. HOW DO I APPLY FOR FINANCIAL AID? 💰

College, as you may have heard, can be surprisingly pricey. Harvey Mudd, for instance, estimates the cost of attendance for the 2019-2020 year at about $79,539 per year. Fortunately, you can find plenty of financial assistance in the form of grants, loans, scholarships, and work study programs. Filling out the Free Application for Federal Student Aid (FAFSA) application is the best way to ensure you qualify for as much of this aid as possible. The form can be a little confusing, so you might ask your counselor if your school offers any events that walk students and parents through filling it out.

Your counselor will also likely know about additional local or national scholarships that you may qualify for. Each independent scholarship has its own application requirements, so finding out early can help you budget your time and not allow any deadlines–aka free money–to pass you by.

6. IS THERE ANYTHING ELSE I SHOULD BE DOING TO IMPROVE MY CHANCE?

Especially if your counselor knows you well, he or she may have some additional tips for helping you get into your target colleges or universities. Perhaps you will be applying to schools that offer interviews and could benefit from interview pointers, or maybe your priority should be fine-tuning your college essays, increasing your GPA, or taking the SAT again to reach a target score. A great thing about talking with your counselor, rather than exploring the sea of online information alone, is that you get access to an interactive expert who knows you as an individual, able to tailor specific answers to your specific situation.

Hopefully you’ll use these six questions to get thinking about what topics you want to bring up with your counselor. Think about what areas you’re most unsure of, keeping in mind that the quality of the information you get depends on the quality of the questions you ask.

[commiepinkofag]

EMORY IS EVERYWHERE

As the Palestine Solidarity movement rips across college campuses, college administrators and government bureaucrats are rushing to denounce anyone taking action as an "outside agitator". Those who grease the gears of the war machine think that this rhetoric will erode public support for bold actions at Emory. They are wrong.

45 years after the Camp David Accords - an infamously botched, imperialist plan for peace between Israel and Egypt with no input from Palestinians - was orchestrated by an Emory faculty alum President Carter, we observe that there is nowhere on Earth "outside" of Emory University. We want to say as clearly as possible - we welcome "outside agitators to our struggle against the ruthless genocide of Palestinians.

Emory University has the highest tuition, the lowest acceptance rate, and by far the highest endowment of any institution in Georgia. Economic barriers, infamously racist standardized testing, and nepotism have barred many from studying at Emory. To students in Atlanta and beyond - we invite you to struggle with us.

Local high school students dream of attending Emory, and many teachers encourage them to study hard and take up extracurriculars to increase their chance acceptance, knowing their chance of admission is slim. To local high school students and teachers, we invite you to struggle with us.

Just down the street from Emory Hospital Midtown is the site of the former Peachtree-Pine homeless shelter. In a bid to gentrify the city and evict its houseless population, the City closed the shelter and did not replace it, displacing hundreds and cutting off a last line of support for thousands of poor people in the city.

Emory University purchased this building, just one example of Emory's contribution to gentrification in Atlanta. To those without homes, or those displaced by gentrification, we invite you to struggle with us.

Emory's $11 billion endowment, the 11th highest in the country, is an outsized influence in Atlanta's economy. While economic inequality widens in the city, Emory remains a bastion of the rich. To the restaurant workers, house cleaners, gig workers, and all proletarians - we invite you to struggle with us.

In 2020, Emory University layed off or furloughed over 1500 employees. To those who are no longer affiliated with the university - we invite you to struggle with us.

4 out of 5 students at Emory are not from Georgia. While the Freedom Riders were heading down to Georgia in the 1960's to fight for Black people's right to vote, segregationist governors cast them as "outside agitators". To those from outside Atlanta and Georgia, we invite you to struggle with us.

1 in 5 students at Emory are from outside of the United States. The Palestinian students murdered by American weapons under Biden will never be one of those students. To those from outside of the country, we invite you to struggle with us.

In April 2023, Emory admin called the police to break up a protest led by students against Cop City on the quad. None of the pigs were Emory students. To all of those who struggle against police brutality, we invite you to struggle with us.

EMORY IS EVERYWHERE. THE PLACE FOR DIVISION IS NOWHERE. WE INVITE YOU TO STRUGGLE WITH US.

[meetmeatthewhaleskull]

hey! how trans friendly do students and faculty tend to be at COA? im a high schooler hoping to go to COA in a few years and slightly nervous about my college experience as a trans person. how welcoming are OOPs, classes, housing for trans students?

Hi, thanks for your question!

The Princeton Review has repeatedly ranked us among the top LGBTQ+-friendly campuses in the country. In 2020 we conducted a campus climate survey where the majority of student respondents identified as LGBTQ+ and said that they found COA to be a very positive environment for students identifying as trans or queer. So not only do trans and queer students make up a large portion of our student body, they also tend to feel supported in expressing their gender identities.

A large part of this has to do with how the COA community is small and built on values of inclusivity and compassion. While no institution is perfect, we hear again and again from students and alums that they've never felt so supported with their gender identity as they have at COA. Some students come here after negative experiences in their high school, previous colleges, or a lack of support at home. Being surrounded by peers, faculty, and staff who start from a place of kindness and support can be a powerfully affirming experience.

Some of the ways we support trans students as an institution include: having 100% gender-neutral bathrooms, gender-inclusive housing practices (you indicate which genders you feel comfortable rooming with), counseling and other wellness supports, and providing a streamlined, transparent processes for changing your chosen name in school records like your email and your student ID.

If you'd like to be connected with a current student who shares a similar gender identity, to hear directly about their experiences, please reach out to any of us in the admission office (or email inquiry@coa.edu) and we can connect you with someone!

[beardedmrbean]

Anthony Fauci has sparked a backlash from politicians and commentators after saying that wearing face masks protects individuals from spreading coronavirus, but that there was inconclusive evidence to suggest it prevented a pandemic spiraling at a whole population level.

The former chief medical adviser to the president, who was regularly the face of the government's response to the pandemic, told CNN on Saturday that "an individual protecting themselves or protecting them from spreading it, there is no doubt that masks work," amid a spike in infections of the virus and speculation that fresh COVID restrictions could be on the horizon.

"Fauci admits that masks don't work for the public at large but still absurdly claims masks work on an individual basis," Rand Paul, a Republican senator for Kentucky who was suspended from YouTube in 2021 for questioning mask wearing, wrote on Sunday in one of many critical responses to the interview. "More subterfuge."

Some private institutions, hospital operators and colleges have reintroduced the requirements for staff or visitors to wear masks while at their sites to limit the spread of the new variants—EG.5 and BA.2.86—which have recently emerged. The moves sparked concerns that nationwide restrictions could be set to return.

In the week to August 19, there were more than 15,000 hospitalizations due to COVID-19 infections across the U.S., the most recent monitoring figures from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) show—a rise of nearly 19 percent on the week prior.

Admissions have been steadily rising since July, but are far below the highest peaks of the pandemic and appear to be localized into hotspots. The highest number of hospitalizations due to COVID-19 in any week since the virus first emerged was over 150,000 in January 2022, and the highest weekly total this year was over 44,000 in the first week of January.

"We're starting to see a surge of cases...about an 18 percent or 19 percent increase in hospitalizations, certainly going in the wrong direction," Fauci told CNN host Michael Smerconish on Saturday.

While he noted that "we're not talking about mandates or forcing anybody," he said he hoped that if cases were to grow to a "reasonably high level" that the CDC recommended mask wearing again, that individuals "abide by the recommendation and take into account the risk to themselves and to their families."

A CDC spokesperson told Newsweek on Thursday it currently has no intention to call for a return of mandated mask-wearing, but didn't deny that this might change if cases of the new variants were to rise significantly. Fauci previously said he thought there was "not going to be the tsunami of cases that we've seen" before.

Despite his advocacy of mask wearing, Fauci was questioned about the diverging views on the effectiveness of face masks at limiting the spread of COVID-19.

There are differing opinions among the scientific community as to the efficacy of mask wearing, though many agree that when used in tandem with other measures—such as washing hands, social distancing and vaccination—they help stop the virus spreading.

"When you're talking about at the population level, ... the data are less strong than knowing that if you look on a situation as an individual protecting themselves or protecting them from spreading it, there is no doubt that masks work," the leading immunologist said.

"Different studies give different percentages of advantage of wearing it," he added. "But there's no doubt that the weight of the studies, and there have been many studies, indicate the benefit of wearing masks."

However, he was probed on one particular study, first published by the Cochrane Library in 2020 and updated this year, which found that wearing even medical-grade face masks "makes little or no difference" to infection rates. Smerconish cited an interview with The New York Times in which the study's lead author, Tom Jefferson, an epidemiologist at the University of Oxford, said: "There is just no evidence that they make any difference."

Fauci responded that "there's no doubt that there are many studies that show that there is an advantage" at the level of individual infections, but "when you're talking about the effect on the epidemic or the pandemic as a whole, the data are less strong."

He added: "But we're not talking about that, we're talking about an individual's effect on their own safety."

"Even the [mainstream media] (CNN) are rowing back on the effectiveness of mask wearing mandates," Andrew Bridgen, a British member of parliament who was suspended in January for spreading coronavirus misinformation, wrote on X, formerly Twitter. "Unscientific and harmful."

"We know he lied back in 2020," Chad Prather, a host on right-wing outlet Blaze TV, alleged. "Guess what. He's lying NOW. Anything to stay relevant." Meanwhile, doctors who had previously opposed mask mandates expressed vindication at Fauci's concession.

Fauci told Newsweek that he was "not interested" in responding to the critics, but noted: "Even Cochrane itself put out a statement that the study referred to by Smerconish on CNN that masks do not work was 'widely misinterpreted.'" _______________________

[classicslesbianopinions]

how do you even go to grad school, i have two years of undergrad left and i'm already so scared. i have this fear that they will see that i passed all my exams not because i know stuff but because my writing is good enough and they will all laugh at my poor little collection of credits i got from my poor little college lmaoo

well my college closed and a global pandemic hit partway through my degree and my final transcript is from a college that straight-up does not offer latin or greek and i've been recommended for admission at a phd program so. anything's possible really.

anyway first of all if your writing is good enough to pass your exams, 1. that's a sign that you do know stuff, because it's really hard to write well without knowledge to back it up and also 2. writing is a huge part of academia and good writing is something programs will be looking for. like good writing is a selling point in its own right, completely separate from your knowledge.

secondly like... i had a lot of the same worries when i was applying, i graduated in december 2020 and it took until december 2022 for me to actually get any applications in. because i went to a tiny liberal arts college that closed, and because i spent my last semester working almost entirely independently at a school that did not offer anything in my field, i was worried my degree and coursework wouldn't be enough, and that i didn't know enough to get through. i applied to one masters and two phd programs and have been rejected from one phd program and recommended to the dean for admission (but not officially offered admission yet, i'm still waiting to hear) at the other (the masters had a later deadline and i haven't heard officially but i did have an interview). i thought basically if i didn't get into the phd program i could do the masters for a stronger foundation, which is still my plan, but i was also told by my current greek instructor that my language background looked strong enough without it (i have four years of high school and two years of university-level latin, and four-ish years of greek) and i would be a competitive candidate. i still don't necessarily feel like a competitive candidate, but honestly this field just breeds so much impostor syndrome that at a certain point you've just got to assume you're underestimating yourself.

but like... no one has laughed at the poor collection of credits i got from my now-defunct college, both programs i interviewed with took me seriously as a candidate and an academic, and also like... if it doesn't work out for me this year for whatever reason, i'll probably just work on my application and apply again next year 🤷‍♂️ there's no shame in applying multiple times, it can be a bit random where and when you actually get accepted.

also to answer the practical question of "how does this work": you pick out programs you would like to apply to-- i just went through this list of graduate programs in north america from the society for classical studies, although if you don't want programs in north america you will have to look elsewhere (and probably ask someone else. i live in the us and applied solely to schools in the us, and i know it works differently elsewhere). decide if you're applying to masters or phd programs or both. a phd program will include a masters as part of the program. masters programs are shorter and might prepare you to get into a phd program or to do other work in the field, and phd programs of course take a long time and qualify you to be a college professor and also let you put "doctor" in front of your name, which kind of rules. i picked programs by size and location (i do best in small communities), and i also was told to make sure that when applying to phds i could see faculty in the program that i could see myself working with, and to mention a faculty member's work in my statement of purpose for the school. so i actually might've applied to more phd programs if i had found more faculty whose work interested me, but honestly i pretty much knew where i wanted to go from the start and it's very likely that that's where i'll be next year.

check to see if the programs you want require the gre, mine were gre optional but i sent the scores anyway because i'm really good at standardized tests. but also taking the gre was a very dehumanizing experience, so like if it's not required and you don't test well, just skip it. and make sure to ask faculty for letters of recommendation a few months in advance. (they might also want to look at drafts of your application material, so i would recommend having that pretty far in advance.) every program i applied to asked for a statement of purpose to say "this is what i want to do and why i want to go to your school" and a recent writing sample (which was hard for me to find because of the haphazard nature of my last two semesters). i also attached my cv because i've done a lot of stuff outside of school in the last two years, and i held a lot of leadership positions when i was in college. also purdue owl has a page about applying to graduate programs, which was really helpful to me and might be to you!

if you're still in undergrad, also, you probably have faculty you can ask for advice etc-- part of my problem was that i was a year out of college when i tried to apply the first time, and the second time it was two years after i graduated. and i didn't have any way to contact any of my past classics professors. so if you have an advisor or just any professors you like and get along with, you should talk to them about this as you start researching programs and planning out your applications! you'll need their recommendation letters anyway, but also a lot of the time people are really glad to help. anytime i've asked for help i've been met with support. (and remember that it's pretty normal for professors to be asked to help with this sort of thing! it's something you're doing for the first time but they've almost definitely helped tons of people with it, in addition to doing it themselves.)

anyway i don't know how much help this is, but just know that you are almost definitely way more qualified and competent than you think you are, and grad school applications are super intimidating but incredibly possible.