ion_exchanger

Congrats aryelh! Penn is an amazing school. @biohopeful, I am remaining optimistic for you. I interviewed at that school on feb 7th. Unfortunately some schools are insanely slow. I guess I'm spoiled because everyone else got back to me within a week.

My acceptance to a program was through email. It was pretty informal. They won't be expecting anything profound. To sum it up I just said that I appreciate the consideration and offer of admission, I'm excited to accept, I look forward participating in the program. Did your acceptance come in the form of an email? If so, this format is ok.

Acceptance to the University of Maryland College Park Biological Sciences Program, concentration molecular and cellular biology, five weeks after the interview. I have made a decision and will post my committment tomorrow after I turn down the other offers. Feels great to have everything in and be finished. What a wild ride!

One of my interview days ended at a faculty member's house for dinner. Since we had interviews the same day, we were already dressed up. The grad students that showed up dressed casually. The invite specifically said that dinner would be served, so there was no need for us to bring anything. Does it say what type of get together it is? If it says dinner or happy hour, then most likely there will already be food and alcohol provided. I have never heard of any of these interviews where there wasn't wine or beer.

Have you tried the Georgetown website for off campus housing? I've browsed it and there are a few apartment listings there. I don't remember if there is a roommate finder feature on there.

I believe so. My unofficial acceptance was from a program administrator. The official acceptance was sent by the school and was on the official application website, which showed the amount of my stipend and health insurance, etc. For my other program, the total acceptance was just the email, and it had most of the information, and said that additional information would be received after you accept the offer. Not much more is listed in an official acceptance, usually that comes after you accept the offer.

If it's truly your first choice, I suggest that you wait a year and apply. I had so much fun on the interview, with everyone clowning around. The research is a hoot and the faculty and students are a riot.

Congratulations mrmolecularbiology! Good luck to you! Biohopeful, I really hope you hear something soon. Trickster31, I am extremely confident in my decision to attend clown college. Thanks!

There are some stipends in the sciences that are impossible to stretch in the areas that the school is located. Stipend and POI are most important for me. I realized during this process that the TA requirement is just something that I don't want to deal with, so I liked programs that did not require TA'ing for the stipend.

I applied to 7 schools, which I felt was a good amount in my field. I see that others applied to more than I did. If I were to do it again, I would still only apply to 7 schools, but I may apply to ones that I discovered were a better fit too late.

I have made a decision, but I will commit tomorrow. I keep putting it off because I have to make sure I have made the right decision. Right now, I have chosen clown college.

Looks like interview season is coming to a close! I hope everyone remembers to come back and tell us where you are attending!

I applied to schools based on research fit. It just so happens that these schools have either the largest amount of faculty for specific research interests, or the largest amount of known/famous faculty. The most popular schools here tend to have the largest amount of faculty and be well funded. That's just for me personally. I viewed rankings on US news, but I also take these with a grain of salt. As far as where you will get in, I attended an undergrad school that no one out of my state knows much about, definitely ranked lower, and I graduated with a 3.5 GPA, and was accepted into an Ivy, and I was rejected from lower ranked schools. Don't let that sway you. Research experience and fit is most important.

@Annieca, have you looked at Silver Spring in Montgomery County? There aren't many apartments close to $800, but there are some under $1200. They might not be luxurious, but that all depends on what you want. Many buses run between the two cities.

Makes me think of that saying, "be careful what you wish for, because you just might get it.". I wanted to get into my dream program, and I did. So accept already! The same thing with your POI happened to me! My POI at one school earned their PhD from one of my top choices, and he couldn't look at me and ask me to turn down the offer from the school that he felt was the perfect choice for him! Sad twist of fate!

I wish I would have been confident enough in my score to send it out on test day. I was so flustered and unsure if I scored high enough, that I walked away. I wish that GRE would still have the 4 free score option available even if you don't send your scores the same day. I went back and forth as to whether I should retake it, and ended up not retaking it. To send my score reports out cost just under the price for a retest.

@bassish101: That's true. I'm just surprised that my mentor has felt so strongly about one school, and all of a sudden is lobbying for the other. I still like my first choice for all the reasons we initially agreed on. This should be interesting.

I understand. I know where I'm going. I'm just being a chicken about committing. I'm still waiting on one more decision, but ironically enough, I have no problem telling them no. I have to get guts to do this. As a graduate student, I'm going to have to make more difficult decision. Might as well start practicing now!

I would wait a bit for Cornell before you jump off the ledge. I know it's hard, but I would try to keep high spirits until the decisions are in. Sometimes the interviews go worse in our mind than they actually are. Hoping for the best for you! Congratulations! Good luck on your Hopkins interview! A lot of my Penn interview group is interviewing there.

Yes! I feel so bad saying no to people. I have to remind myself that they know that it could happen, and that people have said no before, and will say no again. Everyone knows that we don't just apply to one program, well most of us anyway. While they will be disappointed, on some level they will know that we are doing what we think is best for ourselves, just as they do for themselves. I tell myself this to gather up the courage to actually do it.

I told my mentors that I had made a decision and decided to commit. They want to sit down, look things over and discuss. What do they think I have been doing? Going to commit anyway.

@bamafan, I have heard about that article. I need to try to find it. I definitely understand. It would have been nice to only be accepted to one good school so I wouldn't have to make the choice and wonder what if. @aryelh and @bassish101, thanks guys. My gut is definitely telling me which to choose. @flat_rhino I'll send you a direct message. @cleverfool a last minute application has thrown me for a loop. I wasn't going to apply at first, but decided to just go ahead anyway. I ended up loving it even more than I thought I would.