Monochrome Spring

I haven't been accepted. But in my recent phone interview with my top choice POI, I was told that having the experience for independent research is what he finds to be the most important aspect of the application. He said that students who have done work specifically related to their graduate level research stand out, because they can jump right into their own research and don't need as much training.
 
He also made a very big point to talk about how I should start my SOP early on, and that I should make it very clear how my previous experience will benefit the program. He also talked about having a clear goal in mind for what kind of research I want to do, even if it's not a specific project.
 
I think for STEM fields that are very field-work centric, having a strong background stands out. It shows a previous focus in that area, as well as an ability to learn the required processes. He also noted that a demonstrated ability to work on independent projects in the field showed a lot of potential.

Got an off from UCLA EEB (Ecology and Evolution of Medicine track). For those applying next season- don't lose hope!

I don't think that there is any advantage or disadvantage to applying as a second year applicant. It is simply another cycle. I'm sure someone can find a way to over-analyze it and find strengths and weaknesses, but I would just focus on getting work done instead.
Even if you don't have a lot of time and you are finding it difficult, I would advise you to still apply this cycle. It's great experience/practice and you have nothing to lose but a bit of time. Use it as an opportunity; ask a professor in your department if you can write a proposal with them and get to know their research. Best case, you get a major fellowship. Worst case, you got great experience and have a starting block for future funding applications.

I love all three of those!

great thread!
JRP's probably my favorite. He's a great interviewer. I thought howard stern was able to get people to get people talking, but Rogan is WAY better.
I'm also subscribed to a few other ones that only really curb to my interests, like star talk, bigger pockets, jocko willink (that dude's intense..) or something like that. 
friend told me about jordan peterson's podcast. if I ever listen to him, I'd have to not be doing something else, because it takes me some more processing to really absorb what he's talking about. but damn he speaks some good truths.

Hey everyone! Just thought I'd pop in and say good luck with this year's application season. My experience is in the ecology/plant biology/forestry side of applications, so I can provide a lot of detailed feedback for anyone applying to those kinds of programs. I also have general knowledge about applications, like transcripts, GRE's, interviews, etc., after watching several application cycles through this site. If you don't feel comfortable putting your information in the general forums for whatever reason, feel free to PM me with questions. I try to respond to all messages within 48 hours.

If it's relevant to your research and could help in your career, I would include it. Make a section for it, like "Non-academic awards and honors". No harm in including them if they are relevant to your field of study in some way.

I would like to remind everyone that you can filter through the Results tab at the top of this web page to view information like when interviews were released, the stats for users who were accepted into specific programs, etc. You can filter by school, program, year, etc. Several members of the Grad Cafe lurk in the forums and don't post in large threads like this, but will post in the Results section.

If it's relevant to your research and could help in your career, I would include it. Make a section for it, like "Non-academic awards and honors". No harm in including them if they are relevant to your field of study in some way.

Any pub from a reputable (as in, non-predatory) peer-reviewed journal looks good, but a high impact, prestigious journal like Nature or Science might make the adcomms look at your application more closely.  Subfields also have their own high-impact, well-regarded journals.  If someone is really interested in the work you've done, then they might look at your actual publications and read them more closely, but overall the committee will just look at publications as a measure of your research accomplishments. 
During my interviews, I've had a couple PIs request to meet/interview with me because they read through one of my publications and wanted to discuss the work.
Having a publication or not won't make or break your application, and for undergrads, it's actually not as common as you may think for them to have publications--especially not first-author pubs.

Hey everyone! Just thought I'd pop in and say good luck with this year's application season. My experience is in the ecology/plant biology/forestry side of applications, so I can provide a lot of detailed feedback for anyone applying to those kinds of programs. I also have general knowledge about applications, like transcripts, GRE's, interviews, etc., after watching several application cycles through this site. If you don't feel comfortable putting your information in the general forums for whatever reason, feel free to PM me with questions. I try to respond to all messages within 48 hours.

Hey everyone! Just thought I'd pop in and say good luck with this year's application season. My experience is in the ecology/plant biology/forestry side of applications, so I can provide a lot of detailed feedback for anyone applying to those kinds of programs. I also have general knowledge about applications, like transcripts, GRE's, interviews, etc., after watching several application cycles through this site. If you don't feel comfortable putting your information in the general forums for whatever reason, feel free to PM me with questions. I try to respond to all messages within 48 hours.

I miss my boyfriend so so much.

Is it possible to hook it up to the back of a UHaul truck when you move the rest of your stuff?

I just use a basic planner from bluesky.com. It has a monthly and weekly view, and I really like that it has tabs and a thicker plastic cover to protect against liquid spills. I had a moleskine, but I like that the bluesky one is wirebound, so it can lay flat in half.

Well thanks for the honesty I suppose. I'm going to be blunt with you, so try to not take offense, but you seem awfully arrogant. Some of your points are valid and I agree with; there are currently too many PhDs being trained. At this rate it's not sustainable, it's simply not. But to say a PhD is not worthwhile unless you stay in academia is silly and myopic, and should someone choose industry over academia that does not make them any less of a scientist. Many PhDs are choosing industry and alternative careers simply because they find academia is not an attractive option. Being on an entirely soft money salary fighting tooth and nail for grants in order to feed your family isn't exactly everyone's idea of a stable career, and if you can't see that then perhaps you should reflect on the current climate of academia a bit more. You know what percentage of PhD graduates end up in tenure track positions? It's low. While academia was once the default path, it's quickly becoming just the opposite and schools are changing to reflect that. 
You are exactly the the type of person I am looking to avoid for rotations. I hope during the course of your training you take off your blinders, because your narrow mindedness is something that is not a great character trait. 

Does it bother anyone else that schools like to start out the career path options presentations without mentioning going for a career in academia?
Why the heck would you go to grad school for your PhD if that is not your goal. I'm sick and tired of that shit, you don't need a PhD for consulting, you don't need a PhD to become a science writer, you don't need a PhD for an industry job..
Schools are letting in too many people, at every interview I've been to, I've met tons of smart people, alternatively, I've also met people that make me think "Why are you here?". I hear stuff like: "I'll be picking a mentor and doing rotations with people whose personalities mesh with mine" are you kidding me? -- I'll be doing rotations with people who are going to challenge me and push me to the edge - I'll be going with my gut feelings on who I choose to work with and it will purely be based off of their science. 
There are TOO many PhD's awarded, have you seen the statistics on PhDs on welfare (not just Biology PhDs to be fair but all in the USA) something like 30 percent on welfare. 50 years ago there were about 600,000 Bio researchers, now there are 6-7 million, it's not sustainable.
Schools need to clean up their acts, Masters degrees need to be funded not paid for by students - that can solve two problems: replicability as MS degrees can be focused on reproducing data and not novel data generation; it can also give an avenue for all the people who want to do what I would call "soft" stuff with their degrees. PhDs should only be given and encouraged for those who have raw talent and can become peers with professors not every person who applies.
If science does not keep you awake a night and doesn't wake you up in the morning... good luck.
When I'm a PI one day, I will not even let a student who does not want to become a SCIENTIST anywhere near my lab, not even for a rotation. Some of the people on this website and IRL just make me cringe, somebody needs to scientifically slap them with the truth.
What are your thoughts? Are you getting your PhD without the intent of at least trying to become a PI or Lecturer? Why? 

My SO and I have been together for 3.5 years, 2.5 of which have been long distance, and it works for us. He has two more years of undergraduate work (we are the same age, just different programs and paces), so he's going to move in with me some time after completing that. He doesn't know if he wants to live with his parents to pay off his loan debt first, or move in with me first, and I respect his decision either way. He'll be in California and I'll (probably) be in Michigan, so he can fly in to see my a couple times each year. My PhD work is going to be very abroad field-work heavy, so we wouldn't see each other much anyway, but we understand that. If it really matters to you, you can have the relationship and the career.

I haven't been accepted. But in my recent phone interview with my top choice POI, I was told that having the experience for independent research is what he finds to be the most important aspect of the application. He said that students who have done work specifically related to their graduate level research stand out, because they can jump right into their own research and don't need as much training.
 
He also made a very big point to talk about how I should start my SOP early on, and that I should make it very clear how my previous experience will benefit the program. He also talked about having a clear goal in mind for what kind of research I want to do, even if it's not a specific project.
 
I think for STEM fields that are very field-work centric, having a strong background stands out. It shows a previous focus in that area, as well as an ability to learn the required processes. He also noted that a demonstrated ability to work on independent projects in the field showed a lot of potential.

Is it possible to hook it up to the back of a UHaul truck when you move the rest of your stuff?

Don't feed the trolls. You have the option to block all content from users who you find annoying.
 
Remember that the outcome of the GRF does not determine your value as a scientist or as a person. It means that 3 people who most likely don't know you, who happen to be in a broadly related field, did not like your application as much as others. There is a lot of bias and luck, but it is also something to be proud of if you do get it. Just keep it positive.

I just wanted to share my recent school supply purchase. I'm doing a big overhaul on my paper notetaking system.
 
Muji 0.38mm black gel pens
Muji 0.38 multi-color gel pens
Zebra mildliners in various colors
Muji A5 notebooks
Obligatory post-its and post-its
 
This haul (other than refills on the black gel pens and notebooks) should easily last me the rest of my doctoral program.
 
I don't take a lot of paper notes as a graduate student, so this is really just for brainstorming and reference books. I got tired of carrying around my filing system with lots of loose leaf paper.

I would strongly second rising_star's advice against annotating everything. This is how I started reading in my first year of grad school too and it didn't help me at all. Summarizing in your own words and maybe even presenting a 5 minute summary of it to a colleague is what really helps me understand material.
There are still maybe a handful (less than 5 papers) that I've read every single word, annotated the margins, and can recite full equations from. These papers are the ones that form the foundation of the methods and ideas behind my main research questions so I think it's important to know that at this level. But you should not be doing this for every paper. Also, for the papers that I did annotate everything, I did the quick thing rising_star and telkanuru's PhD comic said first, I just "went through" them and after going through a lot of papers, I was able to identify the key foundational works and then read them more deeply.

The quick answer is not to fully read and annotate everything. Read for what you need, rather than just reading in general. For example, if you're trying to understand different methods used to study a topic, then you'll want to focus and take notes on the methods sections. If you're concerned with results, then focus on that, making sure to pay attention to any figures and tables included.
Also, stop trying to annotate everything. You're better off writing a brief (1-2 paragraphs, 300-400 word max) summary of the article and its key points in your own words, so you can easily do a search to find the relevant stuff later. No one really reads every single article carefully from first page to last page. 

I'm actually doing both. Found a great systems biology program where I have co-advisers. One is strictly theoretical modelling while the other is strictly experimental. Collaboration with both is allowing me to experimentally test/back-up my models!
However, if you want an opinion on one or the other....
Modeling has an advantage in that you can publish papers much much faster. There is no experimental work. However, this leads me to the disadvantage that you have no experimental work to back-up your claims. Therefore, a lot of your criticism from reviewers will be about it being theoretical. Also, because you have no experimental work, your papers most likely will be lower impact which isn't good.
On the experimental side, you will probably have higher impact but reviewers will be much more critical of your techniques. Also, experiments take forever and you need a lot more funding for them.