MikKar

Day Dream

I think it's pretty hard to come up with a solid research plan straight in your SOP. It's definitely not a bad thing, but being too specific might make the potential supervisors a bit uncomfortable as they'd judge whether the research plan is something that fits with their own interests, thinking and ideas. So I guess the point is to strike the right balance ?

SOP is the deal maker for me. Along with Letters of Recommendation. A SOP is a personal piece of writing. I wrote mine based on what people said worked for them and in the end the morale is that the SOP should be the fairest reflection on what you are, how you came to be interested in your field and why a particular is the perfect one for you. Last winter I had a sort of trial application season. I was roundly rejected and made all the possible mistakes I could make. For the Spring 2014 season, I put a lot more effort in my SOP and LORs. My qualifications were otherwise unchanged and I got an offer of admission this time. So I can tell that this is what made a real difference. My best advice is to really spend time on your SOP and make it clear for the admission committee that your decision to pursue graduate studies was informed and the result of mature thinking.

Basically : they didn't have any money to support you.

Ice Heart

Hello all, I didn't see any threads for University of British Columbia, which was kind of surprising, so I created this one. Is anyone going there ? I applied for a MASc in ECE and received an offer of admission to start in January 2014. I think I will be accepting it as I'm not getting any signs from the others yet. Looking forward to discovering UBC and Vancouver

The most vocal folks posting things on the Internet are never the ones who are at peace with what they are doing. Unfortunately.

Your academic qualifications are good, dxvforte, but it's your SOP and LORs that will be crucial I think. Do you have years of experience in your field ?

Thunder Storm

How about not studying in schools that cost a ****load of money ? Are there cheaper schools but still reasonably competitive schools that match your research interests ? You could even choose to go to schools in Europe or countries other than the USA where the Rupee is not taking such a heavy beating. If that's a viable option, of course.

Sweet Home

Going Berserk

144 in Verbal is low yeah, be somewhere between 152 and upwards, 4.5 and 5.0 for Analytical Writing should be just about enough as well.

I don't think the University will even bother looking at your translated transcripts since you aren't a certified English-translator. Don't give adcoms even a hint of a reason to eject your file before it gets a proper look. Go to a certified translator and let him do the job, then the University won't bother you with regards to the officialness of your translated transcripts. You're free to do what you want though, but all Universities I have seen had strict requirements with regards to what THEY see as an official translation, and the only thing that will be official in their eyes is a translation done by a certified translator, and the translations have to be in a sealed, signed, stamped envelope. Anything other than that and they will just discard your application, 100% guaranteed. I didn't mean to deflate you, but the reality is that adcoms receives hundreds, if not thousands of applications and they will use any method available to reduce the volume of work they have to do.

Seven Stars

Hello TakeruK, Thanks for the answer. Yes it's what I have read on this forum in other places as well. I personally look for weather that is stable as I'm very sensitive to sudden changes in temperatures (which give me stupid symptoms like running nose and the like). I don't mind a few cold/hot weeks in the year, that much is to be expected but as long as the changes are gradual, that's what I would like. I personally don't mind the rain much, as long as it's not torrential downpour, but given the ocean is just in front, it should not be the case. Really, there aren't a lot of reasons for me to turn down UBC or Vancouver lol.

Following the official acceptance offer I have received from UBC, I am gradually leaning towards going there. Plus, Vancouver is said to be a pretty scenic place and UBC is a pretty good university too. I'm French, born of Indian parents (have grown up and done all my education in France, I'm currently working here too), I want to further my career towards research as that's what really drives my professional goal and UBC has a pretty strong program in my field of research, hence my applying there. For those of you fortunate enough to have lived there, I just want to have your impressions on the weather : I personally like places where the temperatures are fairly stable throughout the year. I'm hoping Vancouver is good in that respect.

Clean cut

Nice way to start the weekend : UBC's FGS just emailed me that I was accepted in the MASc program in ECE (to start in January). Chuffed to bits The wait was absolutely mind-killing though. Still pretty painful but at least it showed that the time I spent on my SOP and selecting the right people for my LORs wasn't in vain.

Blood river

No it's pretty strong actually. The point is : you're above potential cut-off scores that schools use to remove applications (as Arcanen mentioned earlier). I think that the only potential weakness is the AW score, as generally the really top schools use 5.0 as the cut-off. Again : a better score doesn't mean you're actually better at AW, it just means you're a better GRE taker. But the higher scores will reduce your chances of having your application turned down because of cut-offs.

I'm assuming that you're score is V/Q/AW Maybe you can push your Analytical Writing score to 4.5/5.0, but your scores are otherwise fine.

The units are cyclical after a power of 3, so that's all you need to know to figure out the remainder. n = 0 -> Unit is 1 (3^0 = 1) n = 1 -> Unit is 3 (3^1 = 3) n = 2 -> Unit is 9 (3^2 = 9) n = 3 -> Unit is 7 (3^3 = 27) n = 4 -> Unit is 1 (3^4 = 81) etc... For a power of 82, you just need to know that 3^2 and 3^82 will have the same unit in the end, which is 9. A division by 5 will result in a remainder of 4. Edit : Ah, DerpTastic beat me to it, haha

Top Notch

Family life