JungWild&Free

That really depends a lot on your field. I think you would need to seek out opinions from people who are really in the know about these programs. Rankings are often not a definite indication of reputation. Some schools with less prestigious reputations have well-respected programs in certain fields.

The GRE you project is quite low, I would say you need at least 200 points higher to be at all competitive (this is not the new scale though, so I'm not sure what that would translate to now). The psych GRE score is kind of eh. It's not bad but it's not a super strong showing of knowledge. If it wasn't required, I wouldn't submit it. Overall GPA isn't bad, psych GPA isn't bad, but Clinical is really competitive, so anything you can do to get your grades up will help. If you ace the rest of your psych classes that should help with both. I can't imagine schools caring about first aid certifications and you should make sure to have 3 professors able to give you a rec. The first time I applied, I didn't know a third professor that well, so I ended up getting one to write a rec that could speak to a weak point on my application which worked well. Since you are still in school, I would try to develop relationships with clinical professors now. It's good that you're starting early with your school search and that you have an idea of what you would like to study. I would say your next steps are to develop a relationship with a professor who can write you a third LOR, study for the GRE and aim as high as possible, continue to get good grades and make sure you are getting As in psych, look for programs with a good research fit and don't accept any admissions offers that you didn't apply for (or that are just posted on a grad school forum).

I agree with Sryahmay. You have no idea where you will be working in 10 years, or where the currently faculty at that school will be working in 10 years. Even if you don't work with them, you will likely continue to see each other at conferences or other professional events. You don't want to start your career off with a bad reputation. If you are being asked to make a binding decision by 4/14 according to the CGS resolution, it is absolutely frowned upon to accept and then change your mind after the deadline and you would almost definitely need permission from the school you had accepted to accept another offer. But it's also pretty lame that School 2 can't cough up a decision when they have to be aware of the deadline situation. If you really would prefer to go to School 2 and you have no funding from School 1, it may be in your best interests to wait and see what School 2's decision is. It doesn't sound like you are that excited about School 1.

There are a lot of factors that you will probably want to consider, depending on your goals. If you want to go into industry then most departments post information about past graduate student job placements. I would encourage you to look at those to see if all the schools have similar job opportunities. Ultimately, job placement probably depends on what kind of chemical engineering you want to do and where you want to do it, and how well your program is going to prepare you for that. I have no experience with the field so I really can't say. You can always get in touch with current students in the programs and ask them about how their classmates fare on the job market and how well their program prepared them for careers as engineers. I'm also not sure how closely you work with your faculty mentor in engineering so I can't say how important that is. One thing to consider is that the cost of living is going to be quite different. Auburn is going to be cheap and will be the lowest cost of living. but also the least diverse place to live. New York City is pretty much the exact opposite, it has the highest cost of living of those 3 and is the most diverse place to live, it's a very welcoming place to international transplants living in the US. Riverside is kind of in the middle. Southern California is home to people from a lot of places, it's probably slightly more expensive than the average US city but cheaper than NYC. I wouldn't normally consider location to be that important, but I can see how it might be more relevant if you are moving from abroad. Since funding isn't an issue, you should probably try to investigate more about the cost of living in these places to see where the funding will stretch the most. Other than those things, it's hard to tell what you are trying to get out of the programs. If I were you, I would sit down and spend some time looking at the websites of the schools, emailing current and/or former students and talking to fellow engineers in order to figure out what the most important factors to consider are.

I agree with the above posters that you don't want to do an unfunded degree and that a high proportion of Asian students should not be a con for that school. Chances are that regardless of race, these other students are not from your hometown. However, having a low faculty to student ratio is not usually a good thing as you want to be able to get attention from the department. I would try reaching out to current students to see how they deal with that issue to see if you can work successfully in that environment.

What do you plan on doing with the degree? In general, people say not to go into debt for a degree unless you are going to make that money back quickly once you have your degree (e.g. law degrees, MDs, MBAs, etc). If you are planning on teaching at high schools, I would say that the debt is probably not worth it.

This is often true for academics but I doubt that it really matters in Engineering if your undergrad is highly ranked in your field, but you may want to post in the Engineering sub-forum to get an opinion on that though. Other than that, I feel like it's hard to give advice based on the things you listed because a lot of them are personal and not about the programs, or are pretty vague about the program details. Can you provide more information about the resources available to you at both schools and how that fits in with you academic interests and your future career interests? In my humble opinion, I don't think it is a good idea to decide your future based on where your boyfriend or friends go. We've all heard awful stories about people that go to certain schools for their boyfriend or girlfriend and then they end up breaking up in a couple of months. This is a huge decision for your life and it should be about your goals, needs and resources. You will make friends wherever you go and if you and your boyfriend have a strong relationship you can make it work.

I would look at the average scores for the schools that you are interested in applying to to see how competitive your score will be. The stats are usually posted on the graduate school's website. The fact is, your application will get more consideration with the best combination of factors, the GRE being only one of them. But if it wasn't considered at all, they wouldn't make you take it. I know of several instances of a low GRE score keeping someone from being considered, I also know of instances where people were admitted regardless of a low GRE. Both happen. The best defense is to improve your score.

^What she said. I would study up and take it again if I were you. Also, the more research experience in clinical you can get, the better off you'll be.

If you can earn a significant amount more, it might be worth it to go with A and stick it out. But if you aren't going to get a job that will easily allow you to repay the loans, then it may not be worth it to have a tense experience at a school just because it is prestigious. How important is prestige to you? Ask people in your specific field how much utility it will have in getting you jobs. I asked several people about prestige in my field and the answer was generally that prestige helps you 5%. It will get you in the door, it will get your application read, but it isn't necessarily going to get you jobs just by virtue of your degree. I don't know your field, but if it only helped you 5%, would it be worth it? If so, go with A.

I would PM this helpful person in a heartbeat if I were you. People in your field will be the most helpful. Prestige of the department does matter more than overall prestige of the school, because the prestige of the school often comes from the undergrad reputation. However, a lot of prestigious schools also have prestigious departments and people outside of your field often don't know what the best departments are. It sounds like you have 3 great options if you don't consider funding. Obviously, 5 years of funding sounds better than 4, but I interviewed at schools with 4 years of guaranteed funding who said that they have never seen anyone denied for a 5th year, so I would check with the department about that possibility. Also, I know UCSB is pretty incredible at getting NSF funding, so maybe they are only giving you 2 years because it is standard for students to get externally funded? Either way, I would talk to all of these schools about the funding possibilities if that is keeping you from considering them all fully. I'm not sure why someone voted Paradiso's comment down, it is totally an accepted practice to tell schools you have more money elsewhere to see if they will give you more funding (in a nice, respectful way obviously). Cost of living is probably going to be pretty much the same in all 3 of those places (I live in Boston also, was recently at UCSB for an interview and have friends that live in the bay area...all seem to be fairly comparable based on COL).

That's very strange and it seems odd that your acceptance would be conditional upon you finding funding. However, it sounds like your only choice is to try to find some external funding if you want to go there. I have a friend who didn't get funding for a MA program, but found a research assistantship with one of the professors in the department. I have another friend that works at a research institution on her campus to get funding. Maybe you can email the department and ask if there are ways that students generally find funding or find out which professors have grants? Also, you can apply for grants, but if you are outside of the US, I am not really sure what foundations you should look at. There is a website called FastWeb that posts scholarships that you might want to check out but it is definitely skewed toward undergrads. If you have to take a year or two off, it's not the end of the world. Maybe you will get in somewhere fully funded next time!

Since this is the only program you applied to, I would just wait to see what happens. You can look at the results search to see if anyone has heard from the University of Toledo to get an idea if they have accepted anyone yet. If they wait until after the 15th that can mean either waitlisting or rejection. It would be very unusual for them to make the first round offers after April 15th because many students will have already had to decide on other offers at that point. If you are on a waitlist, you may be offered a spot after April 15th, but there is no way to know for sure if the department won't give more details.

I agree with the posters above. Even if School A is more prestigious, the fact that current students wouldn't talk to you is really sad and makes me think they don't have good things to say about the program. It also sounds like School B is still a good school, so it's not like you're talking about a sub-par education. Unless you think that the opportunities you would have at School A would be worth giving up the experience at School B, it seems like School B might be the way to go

I work at an institution which is full of EU PhDs and educated professors, and when I circulated this story among the colleagues in my department, every reaction was the same regardless of the origin of their degree (complete shock and disbelief that you are considering this). You seem to read that everyone's disapproval comes from some puritanical American sensibility but, in reality, you are talking about taking money to do something, saying you are going to do it without ever intending to and then dropping out after you have served enough time to get off scot-free with the money. I'm pretty sure in any country, that would be both dishonest and obviously wrong. If you don't like the word morality, choose a different one: honesty, integrity, honor.

This is so true. My mother has an MSW and the prestige doesn't really seem to factor in (she went to a well-respected program). If you are going to be a social worker, you will have a hard time repaying loans since it's not a very lucrative career.

Does anyone know how those cuts will affect NSF graduate research fellowships?

In my field it is crucial to email because some POIs are not taking students so you would basically be wasting your time and money. 11 out of 13 professors responded to my emails and I did not build a Death Star. This is not the case for all fields but people should definitely determine if it is the case in theirs.

Don't skip through this one. Make the choice. You are basically talking about theft, and I don't think it's unreasonable to assume that you would be making yourself vulnerable to having to reimburse the school for your funding, or even possibly a lawsuit once they realize that you were fraudulently enrolled and accepting funding. This financial "shortcut" could end up costing you a lot of money.

Some advice I was given about places (a lot of these are VERY expensive but both people are double Dukers so they definitely know the area): 1. Station 9, off east campus. Modern style, concrete floors etc, there is an age limit so that restricts you to mostly grad students. Nearly all the fuqua kids live there. Super social 2. Trinity commons-- off west, basically walking distance. A lot of residents and medical people bc it's just down the street from the hospital on Erwin road. Brand new, verrrryy nice inside 3. The lofts-- these are also off west, right next to trinity commons. Very modern, very nice, a few more undergrads than the other two but also a lot of medical professionals. 4. Alexan-- these are about 15 min away from campus but another choice for grad students. Very nice on the inside and end up being a lot cheaper than the lofts and trinity commons that are right on Erwin rd. And from a different friend: "I lived at Station Nine (which has a bus to main campus) and loved it (just don't get an apartment on the pool because it can get loud). I've also heard good things about the Lofts, but neither of these are that cheap. If you are on more of a budget, I live at Claremont at Hillandale and its great- A little farther away and so it's cheaper. Other grad students I know live off apartments near Garrett road around 10 minutes from campus, such as Alexan at Garret road, Addington Farms, or Alden Place. A lot of undergrads live at the Belmont, so steer clear of that." Hope that helps! I basically made a big list of places and am going to run them by these people to see if I should eliminate any. I did hear that LaSalle St. in East Durham is specifically a dangerous area.

I applied before and didn't get into any of the 12 schools I applied to. 12. I was pretty discouraged about it, but I got a job as a lab manager and worked on my CV. This year I got 2 offers with full-funding, and interest from a lot of programs. One thing that I didn't consider until I had been rejected from all my schools the first time, is that a lot of the reasons I didn't get in were probably my fault. I didn't contact professors to see if they were taking anyone, I didn't do good enough research about school fit and I focused my SOP too much on past accomplishments. Looking at my applications with a critical eye helped me improve my chances a lot and also helped me put my "failure" in perspective. I realized that I had put myself at a disadvantage, not that I was "sub-par" compared to others. Being overly self-aware makes me less tense, not sure if it works for everyone Just know that it's not the end of the world, or really a reflection of your potential, if you don't get in this time. You'll make it happen eventually!

I have no idea because I am not in your field, but I think posting this in the Engineering forum might get you some information. http://forum.thegradcafe.com/forum/32-engineering/

I didn't get a chance to look around the campus either since I was only there for the visit. I am going to visit mid-May and I'd be happy to contribute more info then. I have asked several people and they have pretty much said that East Durham is the place to avoid (and that is only on a block-by-block basis). So OWD sounds like it could work. I would definitely consult people who live in the area though.

In my experience, all of the flowery and interesting to read things I wrote in my SOP were the first to go when I was met with word limits. Basically, you want to make your SOP interesting to read, especially the opening so they keep reading, but you mostly want to communicate why you are a good fit and what you plan to study. Spending a lot of time talking about other things like your uniqueness, or just writing things to make it interesting to read, will likely just take word count away from the things you should be emphasizing. Didn't you say that you were a server in another thread about this? I think that has the potential for an interesting and thoughtful opening about your interest in (and real-life application of) HF psych, while also communicating the fact that you worked during undergrad in a subtle way. I would approach it from the aspect that interacting with people in that setting made the vast application of the HF field apparent to you and stoked your passion for the field. But don't dwell on these interesting parts. You want to dedicate your word count to emphasizing why you are a great candidate.

I don't mean to be a downer, but I figured you wanted multiple opinions. I think prestige, in general, is not always worth the money. However, I think Ivy League degrees are sort of the gamechanger for that rule. There's really no question that people outside of your field will be more impressed with a degree from Harvard than a degree from a school that people are less familiar with. Since you want to go into political advocacy, you will probably be talking to people on a regular basis who are not familiar with the programs in your field, or academia at all. It's silly, but people give a lot of automatic credibility to people who attend Ivies, especially Harvard. They will know the Harvard name, everyone does. You will also have the opportunity to network with their ridiculous list of alumni, in every field and tax bracket ($$$ for your causes). I have heard that things are expensive in the Netherlands from several friends who lived there for a year or two, and you could definitely live in or near Boston/Cambridge reasonably if you try (many do it with roommates or live slightly outside of the city). I am not starving and I live alone in Boston (and used to in Cambridge). Incurring debt is not good, but with a 75% tuition waiver, it doesn't sound like it will be insane debt. BUT! It sounds like you really would rather go to the program in the Netherlands, and it could be a more enriching life experience, and it's your life so you shouldn't have to justify that choice to anyone. You should choose what feels right to you and where you think you'll be happiest. I think you could get to wherever you wanted to go based on your reputation alone if you are highly motivated. I would just consider all of the factors before making your final choice to avoid regrets later.