Wren, nice to hear an update, and especially that she is where she should be.
We have one in a very well-funded STEM PhD program as well, and even there the funding cuts impacted many students in the program. Fortunately, the PI in DC's case had wisely diversified funding, so they were able to maintain all of their students and post-docs by spreading the belt-tightening around a little.
I would agree that admissions is tough. DC had already presented twice at the top national conference in this field as an undergraduate, including an actual oral presentation (not just poster), in addition to presenting at smaller conferences, and had been mentored by a pretty well-connected professor in the undergraduate institution (which otherwise is basically an average regional state uni). TA'd as an undergrad and actually developed some curricula for those classes. Earned dual bachelor's. But out of the top 3 programs applied to, #2 and #3 said no, and #1 was an acceptance, which probably reflects both the competitiveness of applications and maybe some vibe that may have come across in DC's application essays (one of the programs had some question marks regarding cultural fit, based on conversations with current and past graduate students there, and the other was not as well-matched on research interests).
I do think the undergraduate research projects were key, as were the recommendations from faculty with reputations and relationships in their niche fields. Sadly, not everyone has access to these kinds of undergraduate research opportunities, for various reasons, but I think that your DC's pathway has some generailizability, in terms of gaining that research cred through a master's program first. A fair number of unis have plus-one 5th-year master's programs, which I think is likely going to become a more frequent pathway to doctoral programs. It's also a good way to test the waters before committing to a lengthy and intense graduate research experience.
