kcat

Hi all,I am an graduate from Taiwan who got admitted in UCLA EE, UMD Physics for the PhD program (although I received like 15 rejections...). UCLA gave me fellowships for the first academic year of entry while UMD offered me TA or RA with Dean's fellowship through the end of second academic year. Both offers cover almost all of the tuition and give me stipend every month. For the research part, for UCLA EE, my advisor is doing applied physics research, the research topics covers Graphene Photonics / nonlinear dynamics in semiconductor lasers, which I am interested in. As for the UMD physics, as you know, they got many different research areas, I am also very interested in topics such as quantum information / mesoscopic physics.I know that LA has far nicer weather, although it is more expensive and traffic can be a pain. UCLA EE is more highly regarded in EE than UMD Physics is in Physics. In addition UCLA degrees have better brand value in general, EE degrees are normally more marketable than physics degrees, because they are more specialized. And the professor in UCLA EE also interviewed me before the admission, he did help me for getting the fellowship offer.As for UMD, UMD physics is very good at quantum information, they have the joint quantum institute in addition to lots of connections to the NSA, NIST, and military/defense funding. That's important for lots of quantum research. Also UMD I know produces at least some faculty.My future goal is to become professor in physics/applied physics, but I also heard that it is possible to teach physics with EE PHD degrees if you have firm basis, besides, I know it is not easy at all to find jobs in academia, I also looking forward to work in some companies.I am not really sure which would be a good fit. I am very hesitate between choosing these two universities, and as the decision deadline is approaching, the more info I got, the more I hesitated. Could you guys tell me about the factors which I should take into account for a great graduate life? Any help would be appreciated, thanks in advance.

Hi all, I am an graduate from Taiwan who got admitted in UCLA EE, UMD Physics for the PhD program (although I received like 15 rejections...). UCLA gave me fellowships for the first academic year of entry while UMD offered me TA or RA with Dean's fellowship through the end of second academic year. Both offers cover almost all of the tuition and give me stipend every month. For the research part, for UCLA EE, my advisor is doing applied physics research, the research topics covers Graphene Photonics / nonlinear dynamics in semiconductor lasers, which I am interested in. As for the UMD physics, as you know, they got many different research areas, I am also very interested in topics such as quantum information / mesoscopic physics. I know that LA has far nicer weather, although it is more expensive and traffic can be a pain. UCLA EE is more highly regarded in EE than UMD Physics is in Physics. In addition UCLA degrees have better brand value in general, EE degrees are normally more marketable than physics degrees, because they are more specialized. And the professor in UCLA EE also interviewed me before the admission, he did help me for getting the fellowship offer. As for UMD, UMD physics is very good at quantum information, they have the joint quantum institute in addition to lots of connections to the NSA, NIST, and military/defense funding. That's important for lots of quantum research. Also UMD I know produces at least some faculty. My future goal is to become professor in physics/applied physics, but I also heard that it is possible to teach physics with EE PHD degrees if you have firm basis, besides, I know it is not easy at all to find jobs in academia, I also looking forward to work in some companies. I am not really sure which would be a good fit. I am very hesitate between choosing these two universities, and as the decision deadline is approaching, the more info I got, the more I hesitated. Could you guys tell me about the factors which I should take into account for a great graduate life? Any help would be appreciated, thanks in advance.

Thanks for the responding, friend. For me, since I will finish my M.S degree and then go for PHD, I only need to take 4 courses for UCLA EE, and as you said, I can take some physics course such as photonics or laser physics. I am also interested in academia (although it's not easy at all in U.S), but I think both of them have many chances, that's part of reason why it is hard to decide. For your cases, first, congrats for getting admission for Caltech physics, I just got rejected half a month ago, it said although my record was very good, and they did not doubt my ability for getting PHD, it made me feels complex haha. Caltech physics have very complete research teams for quantum information, you can do experimental / theory / material part for QI, I think they have a little more teams / faculty that you can choose from. I don't know too much about Princeton EE unfortunately.

Hi all, I am an graduate from Taiwan who got admitted in UCLA EE, UMD Physics for the PhD program. UCLA gave me fellowships for the first academic year of entry while UMD offered me TA or RA with Dean's fellowship through the end of second academic year. Both offers cover almost all of the tuition and give me stipend every month. For the research part, since my background is physics / electrophysics, I am apply for physics and electronic wave research for UCLA EE, my advisor is also Taiwanese, in fact, he interviewed me with skype in January 6. His research covers fibers/ plasmonic waveguides / nonlinear dynamics in semiconductor lasers, which I am very interested in. As for the UMD, as you know, they got many different research areas, I am also very interested in topics such as quantum information / mesoscopic physics. I am not really sure which would be a good fit. Could you guys tell me about the factors which I should take into account (other than research) for a great graduate life? Any help would be appreciated, thanks in advance.