cstheory13

I would suggest to consider rankings once you have thought upon factors like - your area of interest, potential collaborator(s) etc. Checkout the web-pages of faculties/students if you want. CS is surely good at Gatech but it may be possible that for your area of interest - your other options are even better. Rankings can be hard to believe sometimes simply because we do not know what factors do they take in consideration. Also, rankings may not be customized to your area of interest. Only you them in case of tie.

we may not agree with lots of people - could be our boss, friend, family or even graduate adm committee. I think its important to understand their stand - their thought process, limitations etc. This might help us evolve in a better way. Sometimes, ofcourse it is hard.

I would have preferred doing research with your friend if I have no other collaborators to work with. If you choose to stay in India and work with him then it's going to be difficult. However I have seen some people collaborating over video chats and email discussions. It would be better if you could stay with him at least for some initial period (could be internship). Another option - you can consider joining PhD, and then reapply next year. Since there are chances of repeating coursework, I would prefer the coursework to be less or if it can be carried over to new univ. But importantly , I should have time for research since that is my primary requirement. You have time so evaluate all your options. Best wishes.

same here..

I had applied to GaTech ACO program, seems like they are done with their acceptance

which college n dept. Angua? I expect univ to not to reject atleast 3 times their requirement.

@ssk2 congrats for the accept by Cornell!! which area?

are you sure? m from theory

btw, has anyone mailed institutes which are apparently done with their first round? like UIUC,UCB,UT-Austin? If yes, then please share the any relevant details.

If there are no serious problems with top 20 program, I would personally go for it. This way it is likely that you will end up doing PhD from top 20 or even top 10 institute. For PhD, I would like to join a institute which has 2-4 potential advisors and strong group/association in my area of interest. This is unlikely to be in a institute ranked 110 (assuming ranking is sensible).

this thread is struggling..

Top prof will prefer research exposure. If you are applying to top institutes then it is likely that your competitors will have good amount of research exposure. @sudarshan (last post) - prof have already too much work to attend along with their personal stuff. They can still agree to work with other guys if those guys have done something substantial to attract prof's attention. I think you should try some research area in which you can start alone. Once you fix and start working on a particular problem, try discussing it with the authors of papers which address that problem. Personally I think that it would be gr8 if one of the author is a grad student. Then once you do all hard work say 4-8 months, either you will be having some results or almost towards it. If nothing happens, then write a survey paper and if relevant then your ideas which failed, e.g. This problem does not have a greedy solution or the problem is at least in EXP. At the end of all this, you have research exposure. Upload your survey paper at arxiv and link it in your cv/resume.

Many students who have multiple acceptances like dat_nerd will be refusing offers. So if someone is lucky then (s)he might hear in March. After April -15, it is too late and I doubt if universities continue to send acceptance in that period.

@warbrain.. r u a theory student? mine list is almost a copy of yours. haven't heard though.

how much time is given to confirm once any institute send acceptance mail to a candidate?