bluejay123

^ Completely agree that HopStop is one of the handiest apps for the city. I also recommend The Infatuation, which is really useful for finding great places to eat and has the best food reviews!

The Truth Is A Cave - The Oh Hellos

Hi everyone! I'm not sure if this has been mentioned before on other Fulbright threads but I just wondered if anyone had any experience/advice with regards to the Fulbright research awards timeline? I am about to start my PhD in the fall and was hoping to spend some of my time in a lab within the US to complement my graduate studies but I can't seem to find any advice on when or how to approach my supervisor about it... I don't want to bring it up as soon as I enter the prgrogramme as they might think that I'm not committed to the school but on the otherhand I don't want to bring up the application suddenly (or after my first year) because we would then have to change my proposal/thesis plan to incorporate time spent researching within the other lab? I'm just not really sure if it's better to tell my supervisor immediately so that we can both plan for it or leave it for a year and then make some changes later on to accomodate the research trip and It's just a bit hard to get my head around planning as the whole application process takes about a year in advance. I'd be so grateful for your thoughts and would love to talk to anyone having gone through the process! Thank you guys so much.

Thank you so much for your thoughtful advice! I made the decision in the end and decided on Edinburgh Overall the research was far more interesting once I dug a little deeper, and I think I'd enjoy living in the city far more but it was such a difficult decision. I really hope I don't keep looking back and wondering if I made the right choice... wouldn't it be amazing If we could switch off the little voice at the back of our heads wondering 'what if'? Anyhow I really appreciate your help and just wanted to say thanks!

Hi everyone, First of all congrats to everyone on their upcoming PhDs and good luck to anyone still deciding what to do next! Sorry for adding to the spam but I just wondered if anyone could offer any opinions on where to start my graduate studies. I am very lucky to have been offered two PhDs in the UK, one with the University of Edinburgh and one with the University of Cambridge. Both are within affiliated institutes (molecular medicine and cancer research respectively) and both have great research projects (no teaching or taught lessons in the UK I'm afraid) so I'm basically torn as to which to choose. I've been to visit both cities and have pros and cons for both, and I realise that I should be so grateful to be in this position but can't figure out which would be better in the long term. I know that ultimately the decision is mine, and I might have to go by gut feeling, but it would be great if anyone had any opinions to share? I would like to do a post-doc or possibly industry in the US, which is where I would like to end up in the long run, so is one university easier to open doors than the other? Would they both be about the same? Anyone had any experience in either camp, either academically or socially? It would be fantastic to get a US outlook on the universities! Thanks so much everyone and sorry again for the rambly post!!

Some programmes are really nice and respond to emails immediately but for others, well...the wait continues...

For anyone waiting to hear back from Yale BBS, I emailed a couple days ago and this was their reply: "Domestic applicants have already been invited for interviews, and international students will be interviewed by phone in February and March. Once final admissions decisions have been made, you will receive an email alerting you to log into your online application to check your status." They weren't any more specific than that regarding international applicants and invitations but thought I should just let everyone know.

I saw that someone posted with an invitation for Stanford Genetics today! There's still hope Does anyone know at which point international applicants should assume that they won't be receiving an interview/skype email? It looks like from previous years that there are always a couple people that don't hear from their schools until well after January but I don't know how long I should be optimistic... I'm so nervous I can barely do anything other than pace around and refresh my emails... It'd be really great to hear from anyone with past experience with this!

Ahh sorry I took so long to reply! Thanks everyone for all the advice, it was really useful to hear differing experiences and actually kept me from generally stressing out about my applications. I decided to contact some professors and leave others if the programme had a large pool of faculty I was interested in and just mentioned them in my SOP instead. Good luck to everyone still working through applications

Hi everyone, So I've been reading and re-reading all the threads on contacting professors before applying to graduate schools...and I'm really concerned about whether it's too late to email any of them or even if I should be emailing them at all at this stage. From what I've heard, there are some great benefits to contacting professors in the departments you're interested in (are they still working on the same research project? are they taking students this year?) but I also wonder if you guys think that it's wise to email one professor when you're applying to top-tier umbrella programmes as there will be a vast number of professors that you would like to work with. It's just, I've been debating whether and which one professor I'd like to make contact with (and not just bombard about 6 people in the same area...) that I'm afraid I've missed the window and will seem like I simply want to fill out the "list the profs you've made contact with" section of the application. Sorry for the ramblings, I'm not at all familiar with the US graduate school system and any advice would be much appreciated!