username1824
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Posts posted by username1824
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Do you have a link or anything to this program?
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I wish I lived on the west coast. I could stay up until midnight, but not 3am. I'll be dead tomorrow by lunch time.
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Ugh, I hate this so much
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Every grad student you met at Yale was miserable? In MCGD? I'm sorry you got that impression but I'm pretty surprised by it. I'm a first year in Yale's MCGD and I can't think of a single other person there who is miserable. I know people who are shy and quiet and that's the only thing I can think of that might be mistaken for someone being miserable. But you gotta go with your gut, and if you're not happy with Yale, there's nothing you can do.
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Well I can give my perspective as a first-year grad student. I just finished hosting for the interview weekends. All of the students, or I should say first-years and second-years, were out on all of the extracurricular activities, and the major reason was because all our friends were gonna be there. I don't know about other programs, but my department has 30+ first years and we're all really close with each other and genuinely enjoy spending time together. So if I hear another school only half the students show up to extracurricular stuff, based solely on my experiences which may or may not be representative (I can only attend one graduate school after all), I would think that the department is not extremely close. This may or may not be true, I really can't say and I think you'd have a better idea based on the interactions you saw. If you're a person like me who enjoys interacting with your peers and fellow students, this may not be the perfect environment for you. Again it's hard to say because I'm basing my answer solely on my experiences.
On the matter of high postdoc/grad ratio, I feel that your PhD is all about preparation and training. I rotated in one lab that was all graduate students and the mentor would constantly pop into lab to say hi and see if anyone needed any help or anything. I also rotated in a lab with 30 post docs and 1 graduate student. A week or two ago, I told the PI with the 30+ lab that I wanted to join, so that's where I'm doing my thesis. Originally I went into grad school thinking that PI mentorship was irreplaceable, but I realized in my rotation that postdocs can make excellent mentors too. I should mention that the lab atmosphere in the lab I'm in is extraordinarily generous, full of collaborations between members, and overall very friendly, so I know that if I have questions, there will be a postdoc. Additionally, my PI paired me up with a postdoc who's fairly new also, so that we can each help each other and grow together in our time. I'm positive there are many postdoc heavy labs where the postdocs are very self-driven and are looking to publish and don't want to use their time offering training to a grad student. I guess the point I'm trying to make is that postdoc-heavy labs can be great if the postdocs themselves are generous and friendly. Postdocs can be great allies and mentors in your training. But overall, despite how much I love the lab I'm in, I would not have joined it if I didn't think I can get some kind of mentorship and training from the postdocs. If you don't feel grad-mentoring (either from the PI or postdocs) at this school is up to your expectations, I wouldn't go there. Your mentorship and training are the entire reason you're in grad school.
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I attend my final interview weekend tomorrow but already know I want to go elsewhere...I have already written the acceptance email for the program and am itching to hit send. I should wait until after this interview...right? It would be rude to accept my top choice before then?
Well, what if you accept your school that you wanna go to, then you go to the interview, are BLOWN AWAY at the interview, and can't accept their offer. Your offer at the school you wanna go to will still be there after the weekend, so it's safe to wait.
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General question:
When I make my choice about where I want to go, should I accept and then wait until after I hear from the school again to decline my other offers? Or is it safe to accept and decline all at once? I am just afraid of something weird happening, like I accept a program and they are full or something (which I don't think will happen, but I'm just wondering here) and that I have declined all my other offers. Any advice would be helpful, I'm planning on making my decision this week...
If they rescind their offer for any reason, academic or bureaucratic, they would let you know.
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WashU is very well respected in biology. In my (perhaps naive) opinion, I feel that WashU and Columbia are equals in biological research. I don't think you would get a huge advantage from name recognition by going to Columbia
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Glad I got one acceptance for one of my two back up programs. My other (and unfortunately due to research fit my higher choice) back up school just sent this out. Hopefully, no one has NC State as a top choice.
Dear Applicant
Due to increasing budget and funding cuts scheduled for the next academic year, we will not be able to accept PhD students for fall 2015. This is an unfortunate situation for both the students and professors, but a reality of the times.
Since you already applied to the Graduate School at NC State, your application can be directed to another program at no cost to you. To redirect your application, you need to contact the admissions office in the Graduate School
Woah! To accept ZERO grad students for the year! That's really unfortunate for NC State, and I guarantee it's very frustrating and concerning for everyone involved.
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If it didn't work with the professor at Northwestern, would there really be no other professors you would be excited about rotating with there?
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If you're not checking a bag, most airlines let you print your airline ticket from home, so you can go straight to the security checkpoints when you arrive. Pretty good time saver, and it just makes one less thing to do.
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I don't know anyone who gave their interviewers CVs or anything. The person interviewing you has your entire application in front of them usually and the point of the interview is to get to know you beyond your stats and numbers. So I don't know if it would be helpful to bring copies of your CV or anything like that. But that's just my opinion, maybe others strongly disagree
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Admissions committee met today and no interview invite...I see a couple people got one from the program on the results page. When do I start to worry?
Not necessarily. Usually when they decide on who to offer interviews to, they assign certain professors to contact you. Some professors may contact you that same day, others might way a few days.
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Send an email to Iowa asking when they would like your response by. That's what I did to all the early interview requests I got, and every single school was cool with it.
- gliaful and username1824
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I think the most selective schools offer acceptance to about 50% of the people they interview. That's not bad at all compared. I have a friend applying to med school and she tells me that she has to pay for all her travel to interviews and the programs accept about 25% of the people they interview. I totally totally get why people ask about the stats on how many interviewers get offered admission (I always asked that question at all my interviews), but it seriously doesn't help you to worry about it. It's not in your best intentions to treat an interview any differently based on how many people they accept.
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either that or it's a general email and they get a little extra $$$ for convincing you to apply.
Nah, they would probably convince an extra 50 applicants to apply, and even if the app fee was $100, that's only an extra $5K for them. Not significant at all. They're probably genuinely interested in reading your application.
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@FuzzyWuzzy you're going to be expected to calculate your major GPA. There is no single definition of a "major GPA" however, most schools just ask that you report one. You can choose to include all the classes that your major requires (so if you're a bio major, you'd include chemistry and math and physics courses if your major required those courses), or you can choose all the classes that are in the subject of your major (so you'd be excluding chem and math courses, just the bio courses if you're a bio major) and I've even seen some people just take the last two years of their undergrad and call that their major GPA. Any one of these three choices is justifiable, I think, so just go with whichever one is highest.
And if you have any questions about Yale let me know. I'm a first year here and I interviewed at Harvard and Stanford so if you have any questions I'm always willing to talk about grad school
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I was just talking with my first year friends, and we were talking about how we really really wish we could interview again because they were all so fun haha. Enjoy the dinners, they're usually in some decently fancy restaurants. Always a highlight.
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Got an email from UMass inviting me to their recruitment weekends...that's their interview right??
Yes! Congrats!
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Hey guys, so I got my Biochemistry, Cell and Molecular Biology subject test back. My Biochem subscores were pretty decent (80%+) but everything else was pretty abysmal (below 50% for the cell bio subscore and a little better for molecular bio). Should I even bother even submitting my scores? I am applying to Biochemistry/Chemical Biology programs anyway. I guess I'm worried that they'll look at my overall score before my subscore.
I looked at the stats you posted, and they look really really solid, so I think these scores would hurt more than they could help. We had similar stats and I didn't do well on my subject test, didn't submit it to any school, and it didn't hurt me at all.
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So.. I'm looking at my completed application to make sure everything is in and I see that one of my LOR writers has misspelled my last name. It might give the wrong vibe to admissions to see that a writer has misspelled an applicants name. On the other hand, the writer is getting near retirement and the misspelling is a small, common mistake. e.g. change of vowel 'a' to 'e'.
Besides feeling slightly offended, I'm not sure what to think. I'm so toasted from going through this application process it hardly phased me. Do I do anything at all?
It definitely won't impact you negatively. It's a misspelling. If your LOR got your name completely wrong, that's another thing, but your readers probably won't even notice this.
And also don't be offended that someone misspelled your name..... that's an honest mistake.
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I had that same problem and I would just send them an email saying something along the lines of, "Is there a deadline for accepting your interview offer?" I think it's very smart to wait as long as you can, rather than accept and then change your mind later. It's just courtesy really, no one's going to hold it against you if you cancel before they make travel plans.
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I can't speak to the female-specific fashion questions because I'm a male and pretty fashion clueless myself. In general, interviews you don't wear a suit, but you wear something nice. I'm sure you'll get better advice from the women on this board than from me.
-Either a grad student will pick you up, or a shuttle will pick you up, or they'll ask you to get a taxi and reimburse you.
-I had 8 or 9 interviews and I was always put up in a hotel with another person. It's weird the first time, but literally every single one of my roommates was an extremely nice and generous person. Don't worry about your roommate, they'll be great, they're just like you.
-I wouldn't mention it unless it happens during an interview. Just say you get migraines and it makes you say funny things IF you say something funny. They won't hold that against you.
-A lot of people I met on the interviews were quiet. There's nothing wrong with that.
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when am i allowed to check my email incessantly? because i already am every morning bcuz im nutz.
I got my first invite via email like a week before Thanksgiving, BUT I also submitted my app in like the middle of October. Most of the invites will be coming out in December/January. Huge waves usually the week before Christmas and after New Years. I'm really jealous of you applicants, it was SUCH an exciting/stressful time when interviews were coming out. Lots of rumors about what schools are sending out what when. Lots of restless nights. I made a rule for myself that between the hours of noon-5pm, I can only check my email once per hour. That was really helpful.
What should I spend my fellowship stipend on?
in The Bank
Posted
A fellowship I'm on gives me some money every year to buy supplies or whatever you need. I have $400 left to spend by May 15, but I'm not totally sure what I should buy. I'm thinking maybe a textbook, and an external hard drive, but that still leaves me with $150 left over. Any thoughts?