ion_exchanger

Didn't mean to scare you. For me, the research fit was there. The area of the school wasn't the best, but I knew that already. For me, it came down to the personalities of the POIs there. The ones that I thought I would like ended up being cold and I don't think my supportive needs as a graduate student matched their mentoring style. I wasn't accepted, so no big deal.

Visits were the most important thing. I ended up hating a school that I thought I would turn down all my schools for (and was rejected anyway), and was accepted to and loved two schools including one reach that I decided to apply to last minute. I wish I would have visited the schools before I even paid the app fee!

I have an all in one Canon printer, and I think it's an absolute necessity. It's great to be able to scan a hard copy of something to fax/send an email to someone in a hurry. I also think it's great to be able to scan in loose papers and turn them into a document that I can store on my kindle for reading. As far as something else I recommend, I love those huge wall calendars with spaces to write. It helps to post them in a visible place, for example I have mine on the back of my door, to get a quick reference of important dates coming up so that I don't forget. I write things down in a planner, but seeing them day to day when I am working helps me stay on top of things. As someone else suggested, a large dry erase calendar works too. I like those better, but I have yet to find one that is big enough, and I am worried about taking the paint off the wall, which I did last time with double sided tape.

I spent about $800. This includes app fees and gre fees. I applied to seven programs, and one app was free. My average app fee was $75 in the sciences. My undergrad university does not charge for transcripts, but you can only request three at a time, so I had to make multiple trips. Check your program's requirements, because some of my programs just wanted a scanned transcript copy for application review, and an official copy only if you are accepted and attending that university. I would suggest getting an extra transcript for yourself for that reason. I would also suggest sending your gre scores the same day if they aren't terrible. The reason why my total is so high is that I was not confident in my gre scores, so I didn't send any scores on test day. I ended up using those scores anyway and had to pay for each score report.

I obviously need to earn a living, so I'd like for it to be in something meaningful. I want to make a contribution to the scientific community. I honestly want to continue the same type of work that I'm doing now, I just want an advanced degree and become a staff scientist. People think I'm crazy because I don't want to be a professor or a PI of a lab, but that's not for everyone. I think I would kick myself watching college graduate after graduate come through my lab and leave and pursue their dreams if I didn't give my own a chance.

I agree. I'm transitioning from an HBCU to a PWI. I honestly have not thought about the change. In my current lab, we are very mixed. At my undergrad institution, my research advisor was white, and my current advisors are three different ethnicities. I know that I will be one of few black women in my academic groups, as I was the only black woman in all of my interviews. I personally am not going to focus too much differences and celebrate the fact that we have all worked hard to get to school and will continue to work hard to support and motivate each other to finish this daunting but rewarding journey. Good luck to you.

Thanks for posting this thread! My top choice absolutely changed during the process. Before interviews, School A was my top choice. I just knew that this was my dream school and knew that I would reject all offers to go to this school. I had an unofficial visit to the school, and I hated it. It was so cold, the staff was far from warming. This turned out to be a great thing, as I was not even invited for an interview! School B, which I thought I had no shot at whatsoever, became my number one contender, and stayed that was for about 5 weeks. Even though I felt intimidated by the program, the faculty was amazing, the students seemed to genuinely love the program, university, and city, and everyone was intelligent and very relaxed. I was in love. Five weeks passed between my acceptance and interview with School C. I liked school C, but knew that they were really going to have to knock my socks off for me to accept after my amazing School B. School C was not over the top amazing, but I just felt so comfortable there. Even when I interviewed with school D (too many schools!) after interviewing with School B, I was just a bit nervous. School C was amazing. The students seemed really happy with the program. The faculty were great and cared about my grad school journey and listed ways that we could help each other. I felt like I got along very nicely with the prospective students interviewing with me. I got along with the other group of interviewees at my other interviews, but it was more of the "we're being polite to each other because 'duh' we have to be", you know? It was very easy to make small talk with everyone at School C, and I'm not really a talker. For a while I was incredbily torn with my dilemma of turning down School B, which I had loved and was very highly ranked, for School C. I have committed to school C, and I couldn't be happier with my choice. What makes it so crazy is that applying to both Schools B and C were last minute. I didn't think I could get into School B, and I thought I wouldn't like School C. I was totally wrong with both!

So sorry to hear that biohopeful. Have you contacted umass or uic? Any results on the results page?

As someone who turned down an Ivy for another institution, I definitely understand. I don't believe that you made a bad decision. I believe the most important part of a school is the fit, the research fit and the personal fit. I take rankings with a grain of salt. With that said, the difference between school #5 and #>20 is not important. What is important that you went with your gut and made the decision that you felt was best for you. There is no fun in being at a school that you only liked while continually thinking about a school that you love. The #5 school thought you were good enough for their program. You will go to the other school with the same amount of focus, drive, and determination that you would have at any other institution that you picked. Your work will speak for itself.

Congratulations! I'm so excited to think about going back to school! After going for 16 years straight and being out for 3, I hope I haven't forgotten!

Still hoping for good news for you. The good news is that April 15th is just around the corner, so you will definitely know one way or another. A lot of us have committed, but a lot of others are holding their decisions until the last minute to really weigh their options. Sincerely hoping one of your schools comes through for you. I wouldn't say they didn't like you, they just have many other candidates to accomodate.

I'm sorry to hear about your breakup. I can definitely relate, and hopefully have hope for you. I am currently dealing with a definite break-up from a 6 year on and off relationship. I'm an introvert and have very few but very close friends, so to lose one feels worse. The break-up happened right in the middle of interview season. I went to my last interview after the break-up. I was so focused on doing well and was suprisingly having fun interacting with the prospective and current students that the activities took my mind totally off of the break-up. Since being accepted, I have thrown myself into my research and future coursework and I am able to keep busy and forget about my personal life. I am moving closer to my school with my best friend, am looking forward to decorating my space and finally having a place to call my own. I am completely focused on doing well in school without any distractions. I am choosing to look at it as a positive, that I have minimal distractions and I am able to focus on my work 100%. Good luck to you and I hope that things work out for you.

As someone who has had to train people new to research, any research experience is better than no research experience. No matter where you go, there will be something new to you that you haven't done before. The key is to be a good learner. Labs like that you know how to use a pipette, they like that you can make solutions, that you can run an sds gel, that you can take a set of directions and follow them to produce. I asked one trainee to make a 1M solution of something. They miscalculated and made 2M. Instead of just diluting it, they threw the entire thing away and started over. There are simple things that having any type of research experience can teach.

@THEWB: I don't know much about living in the district of columbia, I've always lived in the suburbs of Maryland. If you look at the the post a couple up from yours, the cities that I suggested that are in Prince Georges County may be good for you. All are within an hour's commute. @ajollycossack: Craigslist seems to be the go-to for looking for sublets. If that is still too sketchy for you, luckily there are plenty of summer sublets in this area. DC is a hotspot for summer internships with all the agencies in the DC area. I would suggest going to the websites of schools in this area, i.e Georgetown, GWU, American, CUA, GMU, UMD, etc and looking to see if they are advertising summer sublets on their housing websites. I have heard that this sometimes helps people.

I was also accepted to schools that my stats would suggest that I couldn't get into. I was accepted because of the fit. I definitely did not attend a top 20 university, in fact most people at my Penn interview had never heard of my university and were pronouncing the name incorrectly, lol. I agree with LMac, my SOP and interview showed that I was a good fit and why I wanted to attend my particular schools.

Attending Georgetown University for Biomedical Sciences PhD. Already live in the metro area, so housing is not as important, even though i do plan on moving to a more comfortable commuting distance. Excited about the upcoming fall!

Now that I've officially heard from all schools, my wrap-up. Undergrad: Small state school in MD Major: Biology Minor: Chemistry Overall GPA: 3.5 Major GPA: 3.5 GRE: Middle of the road GREs, nothing too competitive, passed some initial screens, failed others. Research Exp: One year of structural biology exprience at undergrad institution, followed by 2+ years and counting at protein biochemistry & structural lab at NIH. Misc: Undergrad research fellowship. Undergrad merit scholarships. Multiple honor societies. Strong LORs from NIH faculty. Graduate courses in physical chemistry. Applied: 7 programs Rejected, no interview (4) : Sloan Kettering, JHU & GWU NIH GPP, JHU Program in Molecular Biophysics Interview (3): University of Pennsylvania Biochemistry and Molecular Biophysics, Georgetown University/NIH GPP, University of Maryland College Park Biological Sciences, concentration in molecular and cellular biology Accepted (3): Everywhere interviewed Attending: Georgetown University/NIH Graduate Partnership Program Advice for future applicants reading this forum in preparation for applications Applications: Research early and often for your perfect school. I am extremely happy with my choice of program, but there are other schools that I found out about too late on this forum that would have been good fits for me to apply. I ended up strongly disliking my first choice, however I was not invited to interview, so that's good. Be honest with yourself about the programs that you like. Listen to your professors/mentors' opinions, but make the final decision. I had no business applying to Sloan Kettering, but did so on the advice of someone else. When applying, research fit is arguably the most important component. Good research experience and fit can help other areas of deficiency in your application. Interviews: These interviews are suppposed to be fun, whether the interviews are competitive or not. When I say competitive, I mean that I went on some interviews where it was assumed that the majority of attendees would be accepted, and others where they were only going to take less than 40% of us. Relax and know your research going into the interviews. The graduate students are there to help, ask them all of your questions, because they are there to answer the questions that the faculty can't. Refrain from talking about your interviews or acceptances to other programs with faculty or students, to avoid coming across as not as interested in that program. Don't get too drunk and say anything obnoxious either. Future applicants, i would be happy to answer any questions that you have regarding the process. I'll still be on the site, just moving up to the enrolled grad school topics. 2013 applicants, it has been a great season, and it was nice to chat with everyone while going crazy over schools. Best of luck to everyone!

THIS!!!! I can't. People just don't understand.

So I'm guessing that you will be attending George Washington. Yes, the cities that I mentioned are accessible by train/bus. The cities I mentioned have many apartment buildings that are near the train station. You are fortunate in that you have multiple options. The cities that you can focus on are silver spring, rockville, shady grove, bethesda (expensive!) in montgomery county, greenbelt, hyattsville, college park, largo, capitol heights, landover, and new carrollton in prince georges county. All of these cities have very different feels, and depend on what type of environment you would like. I'd be happy to elaborate if you would like. Some students who attend schools in DC actually find that living in northern virginia is better for them. Cities such as alexandria, arlington, ballston, and clarendon are metro accessible.

It will be tiring, especially when you factor in delays on both the Marc and subway. I would suggest cities in Montgomery county, such as Rockville, silver spring, etc. You can catch the red line downtown, but also drive to Baltimore. I'm not quite understanding your question. Do you want to be able to go to Baltimore sometimes, or a city that is as easy to get around as Baltimore?

You can either take the Camden line or the penn line. The Camden line runs between the Baltimore Camden station and union station in DC. The Camden only runs during am and pm rush. The penn line runs between union station and Baltimore penn station and for certain trips all the way out to Aberdeen. This train runs frequently between 5am and 10pm. Keep in mind that both of these trains run Monday through Friday only. Hope this helps!

Congratulations! I think we were all taking bets. Best of luck to you in the future!

Committed to the Georgetown University/NIH Graduate Partnership Program this week. It feels so good to get that out. I was incredibly torn between this program and Penn, and Penn is amazing. People are surprised by my choice, but I know in my gut that I made the right decision. I love NIH! I will always look back and wonder what if. I think that Bassish101 has the biggest most promising reveal! I can't wait to see your decision!