shadowclaw

Well I had my interview yesterday morning, and it seemed to go well. I was super nervous and I was a little all over the place when he asked me to tell him a bit about myself and where I come from scientifically. It started out nice and slow about my undergrad experience, but then I sort of jumped into my grad research rather abruptly and talked much too fast. But I guess he didn't mind, because he started asking questions about the details of my thesis and if I found any surprising results so far. He also asked if I planned to publish a paper from it, and seemed quite happy when I said I planned on publishing two. He also asked about what kind of research I'd like to get into (which was a bit redundant since I answered they question in e-mail), but I suppose I did go into more detail, and did ask where I got the inspiration for some of my ideas. He also asked about my background in stats, programming, and GIS. I floundered a bit on the GIS question, because my mind went blank when I tried to recall the techniques I learned in the course I took. I think I answered the stats well, because I indicated that while I had only taken some fairly introductory stats classes, I taught myself several analyses for different projects. After I answered all his questions, he told me about the different projects going on in the lab, and then gave me the opportunity to ask some questions. I honestly found this part difficult, because there was lots of info on his website and he sort of went over things I had questions about. I did manage to ask a few, though. Overall, it was a lot less nerve-wracking than I expected, and he told me to apply at the end of the interview, plus gave me some details on the timeline of things. So it went well!

Well, it's a bit too late now, but you probably shouldn't have taken on a research project that uses techniques, equipment, etc that you are unfamiliar with unless you knew that you had time to learn them before beginning the project or had someone who could mentor you. If your advisor told you that you would be trained and then didn't follow through, then that's a different story and you should talk to him/her about it. Really, you should talk to your advisor anyway and see if someone is available to sit down and actually show you how to work the equipment, or maybe someone else can work on the project with you. As for the statement, "it isn't research if I know what I'm doing," that makes no sense at all to me. I'm not an engineer and I don't know what your project is, but I can tell you that when I do research, I know what I'm doing. I know the techniques that I am using, and I know what kind of data I am collecting. Plus, I always have a research question/hypothesis when I do an experiment, so I know what I am looking for in the results. I don't do something like throw some bacteria in a Petri dish and put random chemicals on them and then look to see what happens. I have a plan and have some expectation of what the results might be. Your advisor is right that research has a higher priority than classes, but if you feel that you might fail your courses because of your research, it means that you have taken on too much. I would personally either drop one of the courses, or drop one of the research projects if it isn't tied into my thesis. You should really talk to your advisor more about your concerns and let them know that you aren't trained enough for the research and that you have too much going on with 2 classes and 2 projects. If your advisor can't understand that, you could try talking to the head of the graduate program or members of your thesis committee and find out what advice they have for you.

Hi everyone. So I haven't actually applied to any PhD programs yet (working on the materials, but nothing actually submitted or even uploaded). However, I have been contacting POIs at different schools to see if they have openings in their labs (many of the programs I am applying to require a faculty member to commit to working with me before they will accept me). I recently contacted someone at UNC who was advertising for 1-2 PhD students to join his lab and sent him the info be requested on his website. He liked what he saw and asked if we could chat via Skype or phone. So we've set up a date and time (about 2 weeks from now), and I'm wondering what exactly to expect and what I can do to be prepared. It's not exactly a formal interview, but it will certainly be a factor in this POI deciding if he is willing to work with me and giving me the ok to formally apply to UNC. From reading over some older posts (and using some common sense), I've gathered that I should definitely make sure that I am familiar with his work, be able to articulate some project ideas and how they would fit into his lab's research, and indicate why I want to work in his lab. However, beyond that, I don't know why else to expect. I provided him with my CV, GPAs, and GRE scores, as well as brief descriptions of my relevant field work and research projects, and some brief project ideas. So I'm not sure what else he might ask about. Does anyone have any experience with these informal interviews, and what kinds of questions were you asked? Was it really like an informal chat, or did you feel grilled? Does anyone have any tips? Should I treat it like a formal interview and dress really nicely, or should I be more casual? Also, I provided him with my undergrad GPA from the college that I received my degree. In the process of getting my degree, I went to several schools, majored in a diverse array of majors, and had some personal issues. My GPAs at those other schools are less than stellar. Is this a good time to mention it, or should I just let him find out during the admissions process when the adcomm reviews my application? I did mention in my e-mail that I was a former computer science major and took several CS courses, since he was looking for someone with some programming background. So that might come up when we talk. So yeah, any advice or thoughts would really be appreciated!

Grad school had made me quite fat! I was never a skinny person. At my thinnest in high school, I was 196 lbs and a size 14 jeans (and I'm 5'8"). I did have a lot of muscle because I was fairly active doing karate and my job at the time involved a lot of lifting somewhat heavy things. When I went to undergrad, I no longer could fit karate classes into my schedule and I got a job in fast food. I actually didn't gain much my first year, maybe 10 lbs, which didn't even put me up a pants size (although clothes were a little tighter). After that first year, I started working more, eating the free food more, and drinking massive quantities of Dr. Pepper while I worked 5 days a week (we're talking 100+ oz each day). I gained about 100 pounds over 3 years or so. I did yoyo a bit, and by the time I graduated, I had lost 45 lbs and was down to 250. I started to creep back up over the summer, and once grad school hit, I started gaining fast. It wasn't so much that I was eating crappy food, but I became way less active. I have a 1.25 hour drive each way to school, plus I spend a lot of time on the computer doing research or writing. I just don't have any time to be active. So I ended up gaining back all the weight I had lost and I'm trying to come up with a game plan now.

My grad courses have been more along the lines of different than anything else. There has been the element of being graded with higher expectations, and there are certainly more essay questions on exams, more papers, longer papers, more presentations, etc. However, for most of the courses, there has been more of a seminar atmosphere, with a lot of reading and discussing, as opposed to the traditional lecture. It's not about regurgitating information, it's about sharing ideas, thinking critically, finding out about the latest research in the field, things like that. Ultimately, grad courses haven't been extremely different from senior-level undergrad courses, but there has definitely been a shift away from "let's learn what's in the textbook and see a few real-world examples" to an open dialogue about what's been done and what new exciting stuff is just coming out.

Thanks for the input! I have been wondering how much POI support means in the application process. In many programs, one cannot be admitted without it, but I still didn't know how having it would play into the admissions committee's decision.

So I finally have my definitive list of schools that I am applying to: Oregon State University Utah State University University of Washington University of Connecticut University of North Carolina Indiana University Bloomington Washington University in St. Louis I'm retaking the GRE at the end of the month, hoping to bring up all of my scores into the 80th percentile or better (current scores Q 155 64%, V 160 84%, W 4.5 73%). I'm actually pretty happy with my verbal score, but I'd like to see my writing score a little higher, and my quantitative score is just abysmal, especially for someone who minored in mathematics and got all A's or A-'s, except for a nice D+ in Discrete Math, because I was a foolish freshman. I'm still wondering if my master's GPA (3.72), plus my thesis research and other research and field experiences I've had since applying 2 years ago, will be enough to offset a low undergrad GPA. I forget if I mentioned it in my original post, but while I had a 3.59 GPA at my undergrad institution (with a 3.9 major GPA), I have a significantly lower overall GPA spread between several schools and former majors (including English, Anthropology, and variety of Computer Science/IT majors), probably in the range of 2.65 to 2.70. On the positive side, I have made some good contacts with some POIs. POIs at USU and OSU have already indicated that they would like to work with me if I can procure my own funding (either though an NSF fellowship or receiving a university fellowship that they will nominate me for), because alas, they have no funding of their own for a new student. A POI at UNC has requested a phone/Skype interview in a few weeks, which is super exciting (and I don't need to bring my own funding!). I have one more e-mail to write to a POI at UConn who has PhD opening advertised, and then the e-mailing phase of the application process will be complete.

I agree that your publications and conference experiences will really help you out. I don't know how much emphasis to put on your GPA in your SOP... many people have given advice on either not mentioning it or just lightly touching upon it and instead focusing on your strengths. In my own SOP for my masters program, I wrote one sentence on it. However, I had a different mix of grades than you do... my major GPA was 3.9 while my overall was around 2.65 (had to combine my GPAs from several different schools... quite a daunting task). Since your major GPA is quite a bit lower, you may want to elaborate a bit more, but focus on how you have improved or are addressing any issues that caused those low grades. If those A's are from some of your most recent coursework, you can make a good case for how you are improving. Something the grad coordinator told me this year was that my LORs made a big impression on the admissions committee. You should probably try to get a LOR from the PI in your research lab so he/she can comment on your ability and potential for research. Anyone else who can sing your praises and highlight your good qualities would be a great choice. It would also be useful if one of your LOR writers could say something along the lines of, "the student may have received a C in Class X, but is proficient in all of the techniques taught in the class." In other words, you may have gotten a poor grade, but you learned something and can apply it to research.

Thanks for all the input! I registered in my maiden name.

That's definitely a possibility! Although the assistant manager told me that if I got into an accident while on delivery, that I should hide the delivery bags and pretend I was just driving somewhere, because most regular car insurance policies don't cover you if you are driving your car for a job like that (and thus I would get no money from my own insurance). From this, I also took it to mean that either the company's insurance wasn't good enough to cover things like collision, or they didn't want their rates to go up. Or they didn't have insurance. My friend's brother works at a local non-chain pizza place doing deliveries, and I know he doesn't get any gas money from them. So it could be on a company by company basis. This is a good point! At pizza hut, drivers didn't do much else unless it was really slow, so having a delivery charge does help pay the wages for employees that otherwise wouldn't be needed.

Hi everyone. I first took the GRE two years ago, and while I did fairly well, my quantitative score was lower than I wanted it to be (and honestly it doesn't reflect my mathematical abilities). My score was in the 64th percentile, while my other scores are much, much higher. So I want to retake the test to boost my quantitative score and maybe see if I can get my verbal and writing score into the 90th percentile, which will hopefully make me more competitive for things like fellowships. The only problem is that I got married this summer and have changed my name. So when I try to register for the test, the only option I have is to use my maiden name. I have contacted ETS, and they told me they cannot change my name on my account. That would be fine if there weren't such stringent id requirements, because it would be easy to bring my drivers license and my marriage license. However, I can't do that, so I have two potential options. First, I can create a new account and use my new name. However, I don't think I would have access to my old test scores, so if I wanted to send them as well, I would have to pay double the fee, since I can't just select "send all scores" when I go to send them. There is also the remote possibility that I won't even have an id with my married name, because I made a mistake of sorts when applying for my new license, and I had to resubmit the application (I put my full middle name on the app instead of my middle initial like my current license has, so I had to submit a notarized copy of my birth certificate). It took over a month for the DMV to tell me I made an error, so I don't really know how long it will take to get my new license. Option 2 is to just register with my maiden name and use my passport for id at the test center, since I haven't changed that yet, or use my license if by chance I don't have the new one yet. I'm not sure if there are any risks associated with this option. I will have access to my old scores under the same name, and I'm sure there's a box somewhere on the grad school apps to put my maiden name. I'm not sure if grad schools will care if a recently taken exam will have a different name on it than my current transcripts (as my name has been updated at school). Does anyone have any thoughts? I'm leaving towards option 2 since I know I will have proper id and it feels more logical to keep all of my scores associated with one account.

I delivered pizzas for a few months this past summer for pizza hut. The delivery charge was $2.25, and I got $1.15 or something close to that for every delivery to cover gas. The tips were actually quite good, too! I waited tables for 6 years, and I rarely made the same amount of money as a good night of deliveries, plus I only got $3 an hour as a waitress. I made $8 as a delivery driver. But back to the subject at hand, about half of that delivery charge went to me. Don't know where the other half went!

I've only had one professor close to my age, and that was one of my chem professors (who became my undergrad advisor and senior project mentor). He's about 3 years older than me and he was fresh out of grad school in his first full-time position when I first had him for general chem. It wasn't weird at all for me. Since I look a bit younger than I am, he didn't realize at first how close in age we were, and I suppose I was just another student (although a better student than most, which did catch his attention, as general chem destroyed a lot of students). After I requested that he be my advisor, I eventually brought up our age difference, and he was a bit shocked at first, but nothing really changed. We were pretty much good buddies, which may have been influenced by the closeness in age, but a lot of younger students treated him like a pal, too. Sadly, this also meant they showed him a bit less respect than he deserved. I never had the nerve to call him by his first name, but a lot of the young kids did! Now what was really awkward was when 18 and 19 year old guys were hitting on me in lab when I was 26 - 28. I guess I felt flattered, but it really was strange to deal with, and my non-traditional engagement ring (sapphire) didn't save me.

I wasn't accepted to any PhD programs last time around, but I was accepted to several masters programs. I have a very checkered academic background, and while I have phenomenal grades in science and math, I have a lot of cruddy grades from other majors I had pursued. So my graduate coordinator told me that the part of my application that made the biggest impact was my LORs. They were from people I worked with closely and had really good relationships with. So they wrote me some really stellar recommendations. The coordinator outright told me that those grades really hurt my application and the admissions committee wasn't sure if they wanted to admit me, but the LORs were so good they took the chance.

Thanks for the advice! I was concerned that putting the journal name might be frowned upon without an actual acceptance. Plus not mentioning the name will save some word space! Yes, I've noticed that many papers do take a long time! I'm being hopeful.

I've got a question about discussing publications. Right now, I have a paper in review and I hope to submit another one shortly. I'm not sure exactly how long the review process takes (I assume 3 - 6 months), but I imagine I won't have an acceptance by the time fellowship applications are due. So my questions is, how should I talk about my paper(s) under review when discussing my research experience? Should I say... I worked on project x, this is what it was about, and it's currently under review at Journal Y? Or should I just say it's in review but not mention the journal? Any thoughts?

Hmmm, well, when I applied two years ago, my research interests were a bit different than they are now. I'm really interested in invasion ecology, and as an undergrad, I was more focused on invasive plants than animals. So I initially went looking for programs that had faculty interested in plant invasions. I did have some ideas for a thesis/dissertation, but I wouldn't say I had a definitive plan. As it happened, I didn't get into any of the programs that involved strictly plants, and they all happened to be PhD programs. So then I decided to go shopping for a masters program. At the time, birds were more of a hobby than a serious research interest, but I did have an idea for doing some work investigating the impacts of invasive plants on birds. One of my local universities had an ornithologist who had the same project in mind, so he agreed to be my advisor and off I went. The only problem there was that the department had very limited funding, and I didn't get a grad assistantship my first year. Since it's a state university, tuition was cheap, and I just used a federal student loan to pay for it and I worked part-time as a waitress. This year I have an assistantship, so my tuition is paid for and I have a very modest stipend to live off of. So I guess to actually answer your question, yes, I had a project in mind, but it wasn't set in stone. As I've been looking at potential PhD programs this application season, I've found that I need to be very flexible in my research interests if I want to be able to go anywhere. The majority of ecology and wildlife bio programs I've been looking at require me to either get my funding though an advisor or external source or have a faculty member commit to advise me as a condition for admission. This has resulted in many people with the perfect research interests telling me that while they can advise me, they have no funding, or that their lab is full. So unless you can get an external grant to fund you (like the NSF GRFP or EPA STAR), you may have to work on a project that isn't exactly what you want, since you will need an advisor to commit to you, either for their funding or because that's how the program works. Personally, since I am running into this issue, I am applying for the NSF fellowship, and one of my POIs is nominating me for a fellowship from the grad school. I really, really, really want to go to Oregon State to work on riparian bird communities, but the only way I'm going to get there is if I get the fellowship, my POI secures funding for the project between now and next fall, or I get one of the few TA positions available. If you're looking at masters programs, there are actually several interesting positions advertised on the Texas A&M wildlife job board. I suggest you take a look. Funded PhD positions in ornithology seem to be few and far between this year, but there are some out there. A few MS positions that I know of offhand: Utah State is looking for someone to work on goose migration in Alaska and Texas Tech is looking for someone to work on Sandhill Cranes. I think the stipends for both were around $15,000 a year. They are both on the job board.

Hi there! I think I might be able to offer some words of wisdom to you. I'm not technically speaking in a wildlife bio program nor do I have any degrees in wildlife bio. My undergrad degree was in Environmental Biology, but my curriculum was pretty much identical to the school's Wildlife Biology major because several of the major electives I chose happened to be requirements for the wildlife program. So I have a background in wildlife bio, and my masters thesis is focused on wildlife (birds). Since I'm not actually in a wildlife bio program (I'm in a general biology masters program), my courses aren't all focused on wildlife. However, there are many wildlife and ecosystem-oriented courses offered that would be found in a wildlife bio program. For example, recent course offerings including Population Biology, Conservation Biology, and Ecosystem Management. Since I'm interested in ecology and wildlife biology, I've been taking all of those kinds of courses and I really enjoyed all of them. Outside of coursework, there have been ample opportunities to work in the field with different people. In my own lab, I'm the only grad student and I've been working entirely independently on my thesis. The undergrads have also been working pretty independently on their own projects, and we rarely do anything collaboratively. In contrast, one of my committee members has a much different lab (which I am unofficially a member of) and her grad and undergrad students do a lot of research working together (although her grad student is new, and will probably get more independent once her thesis is underway). I enjoy working with her lab, although sometimes I feel guilty about not spending as much time interacting with my own advisor! So I think you will find that if you pursue graduate studies, you will learn some useful information and techniques, as well as develop skills in public speaking, writing, and leadership, and generally get better at communicating scientifically. Personally, I think a graduate education is invaluable, even if you have lots of field experience. Field work is great, but I like seeing the fruits of my labor: analyzing my dataset, putting it into context, and sharing it with the world! Plus, having the education will allow you to gain a more permanent position. The people with permanent positions are usually the people that are going to be working with the data or are designing the project. To do that, you need to have more than field experience. Now moving on to a short story, one of the members of my graduate committee sort of did what you did. After graduating with her B.S., she took any seasonal job that provided her with lodging and enough money to live and traveled the country for a few years. When she finally decided that she wanted to pursue graduate school, she had a mixed experience applying. Some people thought it was great that she had such a diverse range of research experiences and saw it as a great strength to her application. Others thought she just had a problem keeping a job, and even when she explained that her goal was to see new places and gain a diverse array of experience, some people just couldn't understand it and didn't want to work with her. So keep in mind that having a lot of seasonal jobs could either help or hinder your future applications. Everything worked out great for her... she got her masters and PhD, and now she has a teaching position and grant money for projects that she's passionate about.

Hahaha that made my day. I guess you could have slipped a secret transmitter to someone on the outside in it!

I don't remember if I had to bring the confirmation e-mail or anything like that. Hopefully someone else can answer that question However, besides your ID and possibly the receipt, you can bring nothing else. You actually can't even bring your ID into the testing room with you. At least that's how the test center I went to worked. They assigned me a locker to put my ID and car keys in. They only thing I could bring in with me was the key to the locker. They wouldn't even let me bring my own pencils (which the GRE website specifically tells you to bring) or a piece of paper that had the school and department codes written on it. I had both in my pocket when I went to go into the testing room, and they noticed the bulge in my pocket and asked me what it was. When I told them, they were really, really rude to me about it. Instead of saying, "Oh sorry, we provide you pencils, please put them in the locker," they very sternly told me that nothing could come into the room with me and that my test could be cancelled for trying to bring them in. I remember them telling me that if I wanted to go to the bathroom, I had to raise my hand and someone would escort me. I'm not sure if they would let you get up to get a drink, though, and definitely don't plan on food.

During the first semester of my master's program, my advisor wanted me to meet every week in his office. What usually happened was that he'd either completely forget about the meeting, or he'd be really late (like 20 - 30 minutes) and I'd assume he just forgot again and head to the classroom and read over the material we were covering that day. I probably ended up meeting with him every other week. Sometimes the meetings were useful (I'd have questions or want to update him on something and he never reads e-mails), but other times I'd be there for 5 minutes. During my second semester, instead of meeting with him, we had weekly lab meetings for everyone in the lab. I only went every other week because I had a long drive to campus and no classes on meeting day, so he told me not to waste my gas. Our meetings usually ended up being 15 minutes of everyone giving an update on what they were working on, and then if I needed to spend extra time with him, I'd go to his office. I don't know what this semester will hold. I've done most of my data collection for my thesis, so what I need from him now is assistance with analysis and then in the spring semester commentary on the written and oral components of my thesis defense. But he'll probably have me meet with him weekly again.

I agree, I don't think it matters where you take your intro courses as far as the admissions committee is concerned. However, as GeoDUDE mentioned, you might get more out of class at a smaller school with fewer students in the class. I personally hate mass lectures. You can't really avoid having a lot of students in intro classes like that, but in my opinion, it's much better to be in a classroom with 40 students than 150. Looking at it from the professor's perspective, in a small class, if 10% of the students were having trouble grasping concepts and asked questions, it would take little time to clarify each concept and move on. In a large lecture of 150 students, that same percentage of students will amount to a lot more time being taken up to review what was just said, and ultimately, the professor would have to blow off some students in order to fit the lecture into the time slot.

I think what Vene is referring to is that like PhD programs, you can get a stipend, paid tuition, etc. as a master's student. From what I've seen, there are fewer of these available for master's students (although I've been looking at ecology and wildlife programs) and the stipends are typically lower. I've also only seen them associated with funding through a PI (as opposed to receiving a stipend through the graduate school or department). In my own program (which is at a state university), the only funding for master's students is through graduate assistantships (of which there are only 4 or 5 available), which covers tuition for 6 credits of coursework and provides a small stipend. I have one for this upcoming year. If I wasn't living in my parents' basement, I'd never actually be able to live off of it, but since I am, it works for me. However, I've seen some fellowships and TA's for masters at larger schools that do provide a sufficient stipend. As for other ways to get your prereqs out of the way, check out state schools, because they tend to have the least expensive tuition, aside from community colleges. Like TakeruK suggested, compare the cost of flat-rate tuition to per-credit tuition when considering different avenues of getting them done. In my local area, most of the schools offer discounts if you take summer courses. The school I graduated from also actually has a "weekender program" where you can earn entire degrees taking a combination of weekend and online courses (although you are also welcome to take traditional courses, too). So you may be able to find a mixture of evening or weekend courses that won't interfere with your job. TakeruK also brought up another important point - if you choose to take your prereqs while in your master's program, you may have conflicts with your work schedule. In fact, master's courses themselves might even conflict with your job. In my master's program, most courses are once a week, 5-8 pm, although occasionally there are ones that are 2 days per week. However, almost none of the undergrad courses are in the evening. So as you consider your program, if you are planning on staying at your job, make sure you check out the course schedules to get a feel of how it will work with your current schedule.

I agree with the above posters. Not only will taking some prerequisite courses be beneficial to your application, but they will also be very help to you. Most master's courses (and upper-level undergrad courses) in biology would be very difficult and require a lot more work on your part without having the learned the fundamentals in biology and chemistry. You could get away without taking physics right now. Not all programs require them, and I've seen several programs that only asked for 1 semester. Based on my own experiences in my master's program, it would also be useful if you took a course in global change and genetics. They will likely be useful for both coursework and for a candidacy exam (if you plan on entering a master's program with a thesis option... I don't know if non-thesis programs have such exams). You should also be prepared to enroll in some prerequisite courses once you're in a master's program, too. Many programs note that they will conditionally accept students missing some prerequisites, but that the student will have to enroll in those courses. In that case, you will find yourself taking longer to complete the program. You also might find yourself taking extra courses if you fail parts of a candidacy exam... in my own program, most students end up having some weakness in their background and are told to take an extra class or two. Sometimes a master's course will fulfill this requirement (which means not wasting time or money), but sometimes not.

I can't comment on any experiences in a PhD program since I am in an MS program (with no PhD program at the school). However, I do understand some of your frustrations. My school didn't have any kind of orientation for new grad students, but I did get a welcome e-mail from the graduate program coordinator who listed the e-mail addresses of other students in the program, which was helpful in that I had a contact list. However, I had no idea how anything worked and I was pretty clueless my first semester. Eventually, through visiting the graduate coordinator and meeting with my advisor on a regular basis, I learned what was expected of me. I did have to outright ask about a few things, like time tables, what paperwork needs to be filled out, etc, because my advisor didn't volunteer the information (he forgets to do things a lot). I also found that the older students were happy to answer any questions I had, and they were excited to find about my research. However, as others have mentioned, it is very unlikely any of your senior students are going to just walk up to you and offer advice. You need to ask. So some suggestions I have (which echoes the advice of others): Visit your university's writing center Take a writing class Buy a good handbook on writing research papers Find a writing workshop or webinar E-mail or approach some of your peers (both senior students and juniors like yourself) and ask if they can look over some of your work Visit your advisor on a regular basis and ask questions