eddotman

I did a fair amount of research in Saskatoon while I was an undergrad, so I can provide a few comments here (though based on relatively brief visits to the city): It's beautiful in the summer, and the area near the river is fantastic for walking. You'll see many joggers on the bridges. The campus is quite nice, with a quiet atmosphere. It does get very cold in the winter (think downwards of -20C). Having a synchrotron on campus is very useful for anyone in the sciences. Amazing steak. It's not really near many other cities of interest - be prepared for flights. Hope that helps!

Your profile sounds fine. In my experience, if you went to a Canadian undergrad school, then Canadian grad school isn't so hard to get into. Just email some UofT profs and see if any are interested in being your supervisor. As long as someone wants to take you in to their group, then you should be fine.

The housing site says that we should get emails some time in June.

Just got confirmed for an Ashdown efficiency apt! Anyone else living on campus? Also, anyone else decided their research group yet? I just joined a group a couple weeks ago.

Hey all, I'm planning to live on campus at MIT this fall -- any comments on whether a single/double room is better?

Yeah, I've also heard that Tang is bad. I'm hoping for SidPac or Ashdown.

I just signed MIT the other day. I'll be looking for on-campus housing this fall -- but I think it's guaranteed for first year grads anyway, right?

I'll likely be going there for DMSE, though I haven't signed anything yet.

That's rough dude. I also got the initial MIT error message, although I was later admitted in late January. Stanford also sent out admission in late January. I didn't apply to UPenn, so no clue on that. Good luck though!

This is more common than you think. I know plenty of people (well, "plenty" is a relative word here) who did many (or all) the things you did + more while maintaining a higher GPA. Don't sit on too high of a horse. All that said, remember that admissions committees are simply made of people, and people are subject to all kinds of biases. Not getting in somewhere doesn't reflect anything on you. As an example, I got into the top 1 and 2 ranked programs in my field, but was rejected from another school that was top 20 or so. Sometimes, there are variables that are out of your control.

I'm thinking that campus living is a smart choice, given how much cheaper it is. I've visited Stanford once before, and the campus is beautiful - so I suppose it's really not much of an issue to live on such a nice campus.

I heard from Stanford around late January

Yeah, I'm thinking I might go for the PhD Materials Science program. Tough choice between here and MIT...

Hey guys, Adding my results (so far) here: Accepted w/ full funding: Stanford, MIT Rejected: Cornell Waiting on: Harvard, McGill I'm not too concerned with my rejected/waiting on list at the moment, since I'm pretty content with the offers I've received. Uhh, stats are: GRE: 165 Q, 159 W, 4.5 AW GPA: 3.9/4.0 Publications: two conf. papers, two undergrad journal papers, a couple others in the submission process Research: About 6 years of experience (started in high school) Scholarships: Large full-tuition undergrad scholarship, two NSERC grants

I recently got admitted to PhD programs for Materials Science at MIT and Stanford. However, I'm also running a very early stage VC-backed software startup company. If we made any big funding rounds, do you think that would be a decent reason for deferring? And are universities usually open to that sort of reasoning?