sunpenguin

Yep, I applied to their MCB program. Did you apply there?

Brandeis University's deadline is Jan. 15.

Well said. This is what I plan to do as well if any conflicts come up.

I think the week of Jan. 6-10 is likely to be a big one in terms of news on this thread.

Thanks, biotechie and Methylmadness! I'll check out both. I have straight hips, almost boy-like, and that can make it tough to find pants that fit well. I'll check out both those places.

Does anyone have suggestions on where to look for business casual dress pants for women, especially for an athletic/non-curvy build? I would like to have something on hand besides my usual jeans for interviews.

The business-casual-ish ones I mentioned may have some leather; I'm not sure of the brand and don't have them with me on vacation. For really warm snow boots I have a Sorel brand pair that I think is leather-free. They're sort of a duck shoe style but good for snow and even very cold temps.

Microarray, not sure if you're male or female, but I am female and just did a couple of visits/informal preliminary interviews in snowy weather and wore black, calf-high boots that are waterproof but look more business casual than like snow boots. It worked well and it turned out lots of people on campus were wearing the same style of boots. Very few were wearing the outdoorsy style of snow boots. Hope that helps!

Very understandable! I feel the same way. If it helps, I did a results search for past years for all the programs I've applied to, and only one of them typically sends interview requests in December. All the rest don't normally get back to people at all until January.

I hope that's the case, because I've been wondering if I'm out of the running for UCSF BMS, too, since people have already been getting interviews. There are something like seven different research areas in BMS, so I hope they just haven't sent the ones for human genetics yet...

I think your initial instinct was right. You probably made the right decision.

Since you've already done all the work, if you can afford the $80, I say go ahead and submit it. The soft acceptance sounds great, but until you have it in writing, why not do everything you can to improve your chances of finding a good program and a good fit?

pstar, I think I love you. I'm tempted to print this out and hang it near my computer.

The big positive here is that your writing flows nicely. However, I agree with what ratlab said about the opening. I would jump right into your professional goals. In addition, almost everything in the SOP is stated twice, in different words. Try making the changes below and then see if the statement still seems segmented. I suspect it will flow better if you take out extraneous restatements of your points. I've put my additions in blue, and my comments to you within the SOP in brackets. I hope this will help a little! Good luck! Like every kid, I wanted to be everything, right from the NASCAR racer to the astronaut, but I never stopped looking for my true passion and love. It was the year that I took a gap between my high school and college that introduced me to my passion for computers. Coming from a family of mathematicians, I always had a profound interest on math and science subjects and scored well throughout my academic years. My teachers had an irrefutable influence on me and helped me to mold myself to what I’m today, responsible, explorative and compassionate. With the exponential growth of everyday technology it has become a must-do task to delve more and more into the subject area and make them software more efficient both in terms of speed and costs. To realize my career goal of a research oriented position, my first step is to obtain a Mmaster’s degree followed by a doctoral one PhD. ["One" at the end of the sentence sounded awkward.] I believe this could give me This will provide an ideal opportunity to probe and unravel the intricacies of my interested field and achieve my goals with great amount of freedom. Artificial intelligence and Ddata Mmanagement are close to my primary interests. I believe that an AI system reflects the intelligence of the programmer. Managing data and making use of already available data interests me, but I’m open to other subjects as well. I have benefited from the wide prospect range of subjects taught at our college (vidya vikas institute of technology-JNTUH). [Capitalize college name!] This has provided me with an opportunity to learn and understand various concepts of My expertise in computer science and engineering like includes the Finite Automata, Ooperating systems, Ccomputer Ggraphics, DBMS etc., [never use etc. in formal writing] and practical implementation of the same. [From this point onward, I've stopped doing a complete edit and I've just deleted some of the restated or unnecessary wording. You still need to correct grammar (especially removing the capitalization of common nouns) and rephrase awkward sentence structure in the paragraphs below. The last two paragraphs can definitely be combined. Look for other places where you can combine paragraphs as well.] During the second year of my 4 year under graduation undergraduate program, I was presented with an opportunity to be a Microsoft Student Partner. This gave me the perfect platform to showcase and improve my skills and work closely with an industry giant of my subject domain. The MSP program has a great influence on me. This opportunity also helped me to discover the leadership and management side of myself. It was in the month of March 2013, that I was called to give a demo on ethical hacking in a National conference held by C-DAC, a R&D organization of the Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology (Indian Government). This opportunity helped me to push my limits as it had me demoing the drawbacks of current profile recovery systems of social networks like facebook in front of the Industry leaders and an audience of 1100+ students, faculty and professionals. Events like these helped me to prepare myself for the next step of my career and kept me motivated. I received an institutional scholarship which covered full tuition fee in my schooling years from 5th to 12th, it was an institutional level scholarship. Principal of my school and other member of the school management believed in me and offered me the scholarship. No education is complete without practical experience, [No need to tell the adcomm sweeping generalities. Tell them about you. ] I got my experience through an internship at Edukinect as an app developer. It During was a three month paid internship as an app developer at Edukinect, from May-2013 to July-2013, where I was exposed to the designed and developedment of apps on windows phone, windows 8 platforms and windows azure as a background service. I also worked as a freelancer trainer with Edukinect, where I trained students from various colleges on app development on Microsoft platforms. Even though not generally included in the curriculum, the importance of certifications is irrefutable. I did my certifications as a Microsoft Certified Professional (MCP) and Microsoft Specialist (Programming in HTML5 with JavaScript and CSS3 Specialist) to establish myself as a professional grade developer. I seek to fulfil my goals and follow my passion in an environment that encourages and uplifts creativity and innovation. After following the UBC’s research in the fields of AI, Data management and other areas closely and proliferate reputation of the University, I believe it would be better suited to me than elsewhere. In a conclusive note, I would like to add that gGraduate study at UBC will be the most logical extension of my academic pursuits and a major step towards achieving my career objectives. I would be grateful if I get the opportunity to pursue my graduate studies at UBC.

Glad it fits! Good luck!!!

I vote you write about this experience! You might even spin it like this: Your classmates might be surprised to know that even though your long-term focus is on domestic policy, you had a fantastic opportunity to work with diverse groups in Ecuador, and that has influenced your views on the ways the needs of diverse ethnic and socioeconomic groups can best be served by education policies here in your own country.

I started mine off very simply stating why I want to pursue a PhD. I didn't try to be catchy at all, just straightforward.

It probably depends on what information the application asks for. If the only essay of any sort they want from you is a very professionally oriented SOP, then no, it doesn't make sense to mention your employment. If they ask for any sort of personal statement in addition to the SOP, or if they have a blank for any additional information that may be helpful, as many apps do, those would be good places to mention it.

I totally agree with daniele. Also, I think you can simply tell him, "I'm interested in working toward social policies that address socioeconomic inequality," and I bet it won't even occur to him to connect that statement with any disillusionment about your current job.

I think Teaching Excellence could go under Awards. Good luck with your applications!

I would avoid mentioning those when listing awards. Awards should be things like winning a contest or receiving a scholarship. Instead, the items on your list should be included on a list of your duties and accomplishments ad a TA.

I have an MA in biological anthropology, and I think your chances of getting into at least one of those program are pretty good. On the other hand, there are no guarantees, and in your place I would consider adding one or two more universities of interest to increase the chances...but that's a personal preference, and opinions on here differ vastly as to whether it's a good idea to apply to more or fewer programs. Even though work experience is a very minor consideration in the application, it can't hurt. You could turn your current job into a plus with a line or two in your SOP, because it sounds like a good position for developing leadership skills, thinking on your feet (important for fieldwork in primatology!), and teamwork.

Would be happy to read it! I've already submitted mine so can't trade, but would love to help if I can.

I first took the GRE without studying. This was a long time ago ('94), when it was paper based and the analytic section was logic problems instead of writing. Verbal: 99th percentile. Quantitative: something in the low 50s, between 52nd and 55th percentile. When I retook it in 2009, I studied for two weeks ahead of time. V: 99th. Q: 69th (a 700 on the 800 scale). If I'd known ahead of time how straightforward the Q section is (i.e. it doesn't require any super-advanced math I'd never had, just a good grasp of arithmetic, geometry, and basic probability,) I would have started earlier and could have brought it up much higher. At any rate, though, the difference between a percentile in the low 50s and a score of 700 out of 800...that's probably going to be the difference between admission and rejection for me in some of my applications. So, yes, you can definitely bring your score up in two weeks!

I would be happy to read it, if you don't mind the fact that I'm applying in a different field.