I had to narrow my schools down from 12 to 9. One of my recommenders said he couldn't do as many letters, so I had to cut a few schools out. That really hurt because I've had these schools picked out for at least a year. But at least he's doing letters for me at all! I'm applying to PhD programs in counseling and school psych, but one clinical program.
*Where I am in this process...well I just had a mishap with registering for the subject test. ETS claimed they didn't receive my payment, so now I'm set back and had to dig up another $130 that I don't really have to send to them today. I don't think I'll be able to take the Nov 4th test since that makes me late to register now, but I signed up for it anyway. One of my two schools that requires the subject test has a December 15th deadline, so if I have to take the December test, I might not be able to apply to that school because the scores won't be sent in time. I hope not, because it is one of my top 3 choices. Regular GREs were taken. I have not begun prepping for the subject test and probably won't until this mishap is figured out.
*I am in the process of collecting LOR from my recommenders. I have them back from 3 (out of 6) of them. A fourth recommender neglected to sign her name across the envelope flap, so I had to mail the letters back to her (and waste more postage and time) so hopefully I will get those letters back early next week.
*SOP are done. They just need to be tweaked before I apply so I can add some new things I'm doing this semester that I want to include.
*Contacting professors at the schools are done, although I did not hear from all the schools, most of them though.
*Hoping to get transcripts sent to the three schools I plan to apply to this month, within the next week. One of them has a November 15th deadline! So that's definitely the earliest deadline. I have began on the that school's application (it's online).
if your program doesn't specifiy how they need to be sent do you just send it in a white envelope with their signature across the seal?
I had several that didn't have specific forms, so I just called the schools up. Just about all of them wanted a general letter written on official letterhead, signed and sealed across the envelope flap. Standard white envelope unless your recommender has an official envelope. I would call to be 100% sure.