Planning for Round 2 PhD applications

[poseidon14]

Hello!

I just got rejected by Baylor College of Medicine (Biochem). It joins a list of 7 other schools that have done the same: UW-Madison, UMich, NYU, BostonU, UCSF, McGill and UT-Southwestern, all for Biomedical Science programs.

While UBC and UToronto have accepted my application, admission is dependent purely on finding a supervisor. However, I haven't been able to do so, mainly due to my grades or a lack of funding from these faculty. My grades aren't ideal (to say the least) but I can't do anything about them at this point. So...as horrible as it feels to do this, I have to plan for Round 2.

In hindsight, perhaps I was aiming way too high for my stats. I was hoping my research experience would carry through, but perhaps not. My Stats:

UBC - Undergrad GPA: 3.0 (3.6 core and upper level courses) - Cell Biology Major, Psych Minor

UMich - Master's GPA: 3.6 - Cell Biology

Research Experience: 3 years cumulative (3.5+ by the time I apply for 2017 cycle). 1 year at a genetics lab in UBC. 1 year at an immunology lab in UMich. 1 year and counting as a research assistant in a pharma company. Gearing towards cancer research, cancer immunology specifically. No publications, sadly.

GRE: Verbal - 161 (87%) Quantitative - 157 (68%)

I'm going to improve on my GRE score (or try) as the scores are close to being invalid for a lot of schools. Grades are something I can't do something about so maybe I should target other schools. Any advice on where to look for solid cancer biology programs? Any thoughts overall on my profile and what to do for Round 2?

[Verloren]

Hey, 

So I'm not applying to a phD program, but thought I would stop by and give some input anyway.

In my experience, many professors like to see that beyond just working in a lab, you have started a project of your own. Even if you haven't published, maybe you did a senior thesis or something? My lab coordinators are both planning to apply to phD programs next cycle, and were told by the professor that if possible, you should have lab management experience. You have a lot of experience as a research assistant, maybe you can apply to head one of these labs for a semester? This will also give you some nice connections with staff and graduate students who are working on their doctorate in the lab. 

[poseidon14]

2 hours ago, Verloren said:

Hey, 

So I'm not applying to a phD program, but thought I would stop by and give some input anyway.

In my experience, many professors like to see that beyond just working in a lab, you have started a project of your own. Even if you haven't published, maybe you did a senior thesis or something? My lab coordinators are both planning to apply to phD programs next cycle, and were told by the professor that if possible, you should have lab management experience. You have a lot of experience as a research assistant, maybe you can apply to head one of these labs for a semester? This will also give you some nice connections with staff and graduate students who are working on their doctorate in the lab. 

Great input, thanks! I did do a senior thesis but chose to focus more on my research experience in totality instead of talking about projects that I started (in my SoP/essay). This is something I can try to emphasize in the next cycle. 

I'm not sure about being able to head a lab but I'm currently heading a project in our company. While it won't lead to a publication, the results will be significant internally. Again, another thing to emphasize on my CV/Resume and my essay. 

[Bioenchilada]

I don't think your GRE invalidates an application, per se. Of course, with a lower GPA, the GRE becomes more important, but I don't think yours was bad. Also, what's your major GPA? Who wrote you rec letters? And, did a lot of people look at your SOP?

[aberrant]

OP, I can think of three possible reasons that your profile looks not quite competitive.

1. Your GPA hurts you, whether that be the overall GPA or major GPA. For the programs that you are applying, which are the most competitive schools, I'm afraid you can barely passed by the first/preliminary GPA screen (3.0 is minimum requirement, but most students who are accepted by these school have at least a 3.2 GPA, probably 3.6 or above major GPA). The GPA requirement is stricter for international applicants. (I don't know if you are since you said you went to UBC and I assumed that is University of British Columbia)

2. Your quantitative GRE percentile definitely needs an improvement. For most science programs, you should aim for 80%. The GRE requirement in subject test is also stricter for international applicants, but for general test, 80% in quant is basically universal.

3. The real red flag of all is you research experience. Yes, you do have cumulative +3 years of research experience, problem is you switch your research (presumably lab as well) after just 1 year. Since you did research during your school year, I would assume that was considered a part-time research experience. For those programs, typical successful applicants would have worked in the same lab for at least 2 years during their undergraduate / master studies. Unless you are able to achieved a lot during 1 year of research in each lab (e.g. poster / seminar presentation of your work), otherwise, this particular section of your application is not particularly attractive.

What @Bioenchilada pointed out regarding letters are also important. You need to have 3 strong recommendation letters from someone who can provide insightful comments on whether you can be a successful researcher in grad school / PhD. These letters are preferable from some "three" who are PIs that do basic research in academic settings.

These are just a few things to think about. On the other hand, however, if you apply and award a national predoctoral fellowship before starting grad school, then you are guaranteed end up at somewhere.

[Bioenchilada]

43 minutes ago, aberrant said:

OP, I can think of three possible reasons that your profile looks not quite competitive.

1. Your GPA hurts you, whether that be the overall GPA or major GPA. For the programs that you are applying, which are the most competitive schools, I'm afraid you can barely passed by the first/preliminary GPA screen (3.0 is minimum requirement, but most students who are accepted by these school have at least a 3.2 GPA, probably 3.6 or above major GPA). The GPA requirement is stricter for international applicants. (I don't know if you are since you said you went to UBC and I assumed that is University of British Columbia)

2. Your quantitative GRE percentile definitely needs an improvement. For most science programs, you should aim for 80%. The GRE requirement in subject test is also stricter for international applicants, but for general test, 80% in quant is basically universal.

3. The real red flag of all is you research experience. Yes, you do have cumulative +3 years of research experience, problem is you switch your research (presumably lab as well) after just 1 year. Since you did research during your school year, I would assume that was considered a part-time research experience. For those programs, typical successful applicants would have worked in the same lab for at least 2 years during their undergraduate / master studies. Unless you are able to achieved a lot during 1 year of research in each lab (e.g. poster / seminar presentation of your work), otherwise, this particular section of your application is not particularly attractive.

What @Bioenchilada pointed out regarding letters are also important. You need to have 3 strong recommendation letters from someone who can provide insightful comments on whether you can be a successful researcher in grad school / PhD. These letters are preferable from some "three" who are PIs that do basic research in academic settings.

These are just a few things to think about. On the other hand, however, if you apply and award a national predoctoral fellowship before starting grad school, then you are guaranteed end up at somewhere.

Though I agree with most of your post, I strongly disagree with your statement that being in a lab for less than a year and moving around will hurt you. Adcoms LOVE diversity in your CV, it was brought up in all of my interviews. I worked in 4 different labs. Two of those were for 3 semesters, and the others were from internships. I only got rec letters from the latter two. The third one was from a professor that I also did research with, but it was not "wet-lab" stuff. 

[aberrant]

1 hour ago, Bioenchilada said:

Though I agree with most of your post, I strongly disagree with your statement that being in a lab for less than a year and moving around will hurt you. Adcoms LOVE diversity in your CV, it was brought up in all of my interviews. I worked in 4 different labs. Two of those were for 3 semesters, and the others were from internships. I only got rec letters from the latter two. The third one was from a professor that I also did research with, but it was not "wet-lab" stuff. 

From what I gathered, "what had a particular applicant accomplished during that 1 year" is an important question. Since the time is relatively short compare to most applicants, it easily raised concerns by adcom that I know of (both inside and outside of the US). While admission for an umbrella program could be looking at things differently than a department-specific programs, being able show what a specific applicant have learned and done during that short period of time is extremely important. Obviously, whatever the applicant said in SOP / PS / research statement will be validated with/by his/her recommendation letter when appropriate (assuming one passed the first round of screening).

This is actually important for the most competitive (in terms of numbers of applicants to acceptances ratio) programs when you cannot show your research-related accomplishment(s). OP probably has his/her reasons (e.g. exploring/discovering research interest), but at the end of the day, no PI that I know (+10 professors, if that means anything) would take risk by admitting a student who does have extensive experience/skills in previous research ("knows what research is"), or doesn't know what he/she wants to do ("coming into graduate school without knowing what specifically he/she wants to do"), or doesn't seem to be able to work in the environment for a long period of time. After all, PhD programs are typically 4-6 years (6-8 years for UCSF, last time I checked). When a student is accepted, it costs a PI's resource (i.e. time and money). Selecting and accepting students should be a "certain" thing, not a gamble.

That being said, I think OP can 1) improve GRE quant scores, 2) consider taking subject GRE test to overcome the GPA concern, 3) continue to do research in current location until OP gets into grad school, 4) secure 3 strong recommendation letters, and 5) looking into labs around the country that do cancer biology-related research, who are also accepting students from other programs (e.g. cell biology / biochemistry programs instead of biomedical science / umbrella programs) that do not necessarily in the absolute top schools

Good luck, OP. Hope that helps.

[poseidon14]

On ‎4‎/‎22‎/‎2016 at 6:43 PM, Bioenchilada said:

I don't think your GRE invalidates an application, per se. Of course, with a lower GPA, the GRE becomes more important, but I don't think yours was bad. Also, what's your major GPA? Who wrote you rec letters? And, did a lot of people look at your SOP?

That's the 3.6 core that I mentioned, it's my GPA for major upper-level courses. My recommendations were written by both my research supervisors at the labs I worked at and a professor with whom I took 2, year-round courses. All 3 of them looked at my SoP, dunno if that counts as "a lot".

22 hours ago, aberrant said:

OP, I can think of three possible reasons that your profile looks not quite competitive.

1. Your GPA hurts you, whether that be the overall GPA or major GPA. For the programs that you are applying, which are the most competitive schools, I'm afraid you can barely passed by the first/preliminary GPA screen (3.0 is minimum requirement, but most students who are accepted by these school have at least a 3.2 GPA, probably 3.6 or above major GPA). The GPA requirement is stricter for international applicants. (I don't know if you are since you said you went to UBC and I assumed that is University of British Columbia)

2. Your quantitative GRE percentile definitely needs an improvement. For most science programs, you should aim for 80%. The GRE requirement in subject test is also stricter for international applicants, but for general test, 80% in quant is basically universal.

3. The real red flag of all is you research experience. Yes, you do have cumulative +3 years of research experience, problem is you switch your research (presumably lab as well) after just 1 year. Since you did research during your school year, I would assume that was considered a part-time research experience. For those programs, typical successful applicants would have worked in the same lab for at least 2 years during their undergraduate / master studies. Unless you are able to achieved a lot during 1 year of research in each lab (e.g. poster / seminar presentation of your work), otherwise, this particular section of your application is not particularly attractive.

What @Bioenchilada pointed out regarding letters are also important. You need to have 3 strong recommendation letters from someone who can provide insightful comments on whether you can be a successful researcher in grad school / PhD. These letters are preferable from some "three" who are PIs that do basic research in academic settings.

These are just a few things to think about. On the other hand, however, if you apply and award a national predoctoral fellowship before starting grad school, then you are guaranteed end up at somewhere.

21 hours ago, Bioenchilada said:

Though I agree with most of your post, I strongly disagree with your statement that being in a lab for less than a year and moving around will hurt you. Adcoms LOVE diversity in your CV, it was brought up in all of my interviews. I worked in 4 different labs. Two of those were for 3 semesters, and the others were from internships. I only got rec letters from the latter two. The third one was from a professor that I also did research with, but it was not "wet-lab" stuff. 

Yep. I am an international applicant. Yea, I knew my GPA would be the major hurdle as an international but for the next round I figure a much improved GRE score could help in some way at least (along with a subject test, as you said).

I never thought about my research experience that way and I can definitely see the Adcoms point of view regarding my moving around a lot. On the other hand, diversity was in fact brought up in my interview with BCM (only interview I got). Either way, I will probably get a poster out of my current project at work so I may have something to show for my time here and have the diversity.

Thank you!

21 hours ago, PlanB said:

If I am reading this correctly, you are an international student and, as you probably know, admissions for international students is pretty competitive. Your admissions profile is better than most applicants that I have seen getting admitted to the schools you have listed, so I am kinda of disturbed that you got rejected from so many places. So I would speak with the PIs writing your rec letters. They might not be saying flattering things about you. If you want to go for a PhD in the US, you may also consider applying to lower ranked schools like U of Kentucky, IU-Bloomington, Purdue, U of Mass-Amherst, U of Cincinnati, or U of Miami   I think you have a better shot at gaining admissions to a top ranked Canadian institution like UToronto or maybe McGill. You could even stay at UBC for your PhD. Many of these schools are highly regarded in the United States and would make it  easy for you to find a lab in the US to a post-doc in after you graduate.  Just my thoughts.

I did talk to them before asking for the recommendation and they seemed pretty positive about my prospects. So I'm assuming they spoke well about me? Dunno, judging from my conversations with them, I can't think otherwise. I will speak with them again, though.

Thank you for the suggestions! I will look into those schools.

[poseidon14]

19 hours ago, aberrant said:

That being said, I think OP can 1) improve GRE quant scores, 2) consider taking subject GRE test to overcome the GPA concern, 3) continue to do research in current location until OP gets into grad school, 4) secure 3 strong recommendation letters, and 5) looking into labs around the country that do cancer biology-related research, who are also accepting students from other programs (e.g. cell biology / biochemistry programs instead of biomedical science / umbrella programs) that do not necessarily in the absolute top schools

Good luck, OP. Hope that helps.

That does help, thank you!