ShogunT

How was it going?

I agree on this. MIT EECS stopped requiring GRE when I applied years ago (because all applicants had maximized GRE scores I guess) lol

You can call them (Payroll in your school) in work days if you are currently on vacation. They are CPAs/professionals who get paid to consult or answer your questions on tax matters. I know tax return can be daunting at times. Good luck!

If you are in CSE or ECE, you may be interested in this linear algebra book: "Coding the Matrix: Linear Algebra through Applications to Computer Science," by Philip N. Klein.

They roamed the engineering buildings as they were the driving forces of the universe. They ate all the free foods, i.e. pizza, drinks, cookies etc., and took all the free yet limited T-shirts at the events in September and November. :-|

Visit your Payroll Services ASAP. They are responsible for handling tax in your school. Why did you apply for a SSN already?

My advice for you would be to wait until the orientation in your new school. Many public schools (I don't know the private ones) work with banks to provide students with student bank account. This kind of account, you don't need to maintain a thousand or so dollars in the bank. The enrolled information will be handed out to new students in the orientation or similar events.

Publications are the materialized evidence that illustrates one's capability of doing meaningful research. Unless the conference/journal acceptance rate is 100%, why not publish? If you are worrying your research being considered as immature, one way to test it is to publish the top/high-tier conferences; and it is also recommended to do so as soon as you can. If the submitted research is deemed immature, the paper would be rejected in the rigorous peer-reviewing process in those conferences. At least you would get some feedback on improving your manuscript. Yes, in my field there is a rule similar to that, but the other way around.

I think we agree to disagree. There are outliers as I already said in my original post; a friend of mine went to Cornell with a mediocre GRE. And I never said there were interview by-passing. Are there any reliable sources for no-longer use of GRE cutoffs in the top 10 programs?

Just want to share my understanding of the ad process (some of the top 20 schools in my field) to you: - Screening: Standardized tests, i.e. GRE, and TOEFL for students international, are used to cut the majority of thousand of applicants off the list. GPA may also be involved in this screening process. - Reviewing: GPA, publication, awards, recognitions (e.g. highest honor for thesis, graduating with a summa/magna cum laude) --> SOP, LoR. The order of which criteria being checked first varies among schools. Then the minority of candidates are offered interviewed, site visits while the rest goes to the waiting list. Exceptional candidates may by-pass some reviewing rounds. They are those who earn the high place in international competitions, e.g. IMO(Maths) for Maths/ECE/CSE programs, ACM programming for CSE/ECE programs. That being said, unless you have a paper published in Nature or Cell, your chance getting into interviewing, in a top program, with a low GRE is not good. Similar logic applies to low GPA. Some outliers with great publication credential may also be offered admission with mediocre GRE, which is known but not common. However, the more years of relevant industry work or experience in a research lab you have, the less important your GPA contributes to the Ph.D. application process. GPA is more crucial to screen students applying straight from college. In addition, publication in prestige journals can possibly offset low GPA. Hope it helps.

Then I would recommend that you focus on improving your GRE, do your volunteering work with your undergrad PI. Hopefully, you can get your name in the co-author list of a decent paper by the time you interview for admission next year. I don't think that 1-year MA at Columbia benefits you that much. Good luck!

Do you think this 65K one-year investment is gonna get you into any top programs? When it comes to Ph.D. applications, the things ad com people look for are your research capability materialized by publication or scientist potential illustrated through course works / interesting projects you have done. Connections are important, but without the required credentials you are not getting in any top programs, I am sorry. I think you have to reconsider your priorities and make different questions. Have you explored other leverage such as doing voluntary work in a research lab, becoming a lab technician, getting few years industry experience under your belt, etc.?

That's a good thing to do. Wish you all the best!

Are you the first author of that manuscript or co-author? If you are the first author, then yes, it is not the obligation but academic etiquette that you revise your paper based on the revision unless you transfer the first-authorship to one the other co-authors. Otherwise, I personally think you should still lend a hand if the first author needs your support that he/she cannot do your part. It is a proof of your professional customer service although it is not mandatory. Disclaimer: I am a Ph.D. student who has worked with many Master's students as their thesis mentor. Most of them stopped working with me once they landed full-time jobs. This is reasonable and I am completely good with that. However, there were few already-graduated students who had continued doing the incomplete research with me on weekends until it was done (just about one or at most two months after they graduated). I really appreciated such act. All in all, I think that once you start something, you should finish it.

I store my MSWord/LaTeX in a synchronized folder managed by Dropbox (there is a desktop app for it). The edition I make to the documents automatically get updated into the data server. I can easily retrieve the most updated version literally anywhere.