hamster09

most of the people who agree to be your recommenders know that its electronic. i guess if you had spoken with them prior to your application they would have expected it.

ok im sorry maybe i exaggerated a bit. lets say 1000 limit and 100 words off. i really understand the importance of brevity. i am just reluctant that if I do not use proper designations they might think i do not know my stuff. anyways im going to call them tomorrow. thank you all.

So i suppose that discussing your research in depth is not a good idea? my plan was to briefly state the hypothesis and how we tested it. also when applying to the sciences and there are jargons that we use like tumor necrosis factor alpha (Tnf-a) do i go and type Tnf-a and assume that they just know it? if i type the entire thing it makes my SOP over the word limit. I know this sounds dumb. but i just want to know your thoughts. thanks everyone.

does it matter a lot if the word count is 1000 and urs is 1300 words on SOPs?

do they do rolling applications for every program including the sciences? I just called U Mass Med the other day they said they dont have a lot of applications in yet. so i guess theirs is not rolling.

Is the GRE the only thing you can consider weak in your application? how's the other number your GPA? and your research experience? some say that if you have other points in your application like your experience and the recommendation then those maybe able to offset your GRE. I had the same problem as you. I was doing well on the practice but lost time on the actual thing. im still pretty angry about that. because now it was too late for me to retake it. 1190 was my score.

thanks you guys maybe that was just me. i shall go ahead and reply to him.

So I have tried to email a professor at U Mass. He works primarily on apoptosis. I introduced, myself gave lil bit of background on the research that I have done and have told him that I am interested in training in his lab. He replied and said that he was delighted about my email and that my background suits the research in his lab. He also mentioned that there is a central admissions process and that there are other labs at U Mass that may suit my interest. He also said that if I go on one of the interviews he would be pleased to meet me. well actually i told him i am interested in cellular signaling in cancer and inflammation and specifically that i wanted to study the mechanisms of regulation of apoptosis. I also offered to send him my CV but i suppose he is not interested. Is it a bad sign? Does it end there? Do I write back and tell him more about my interest in apoptosis?

cheesethunder don't despair. i also scored lower on the test because of the time constraints. and because of that i felt rather stupid. but the GRE is not measure of success in my opinion. if the rest of your application looks good especially letters from your recommenders then it should off set the GRE. assuming that that is the only low point of the application. yes i agree with all of you that the GRE is really a waste of money.

ok i feel rather embarassed after seeing all of ur stats.... but here is mine =( Major: Biology at a UC GRE: 670Q 520V 4AW (ran out of time on quant..fml) Cum GPA: 3.94 Science GPA: 3.96 Research Experience: 1 year in a telomere lab with a publication at a undergrad journal Summer Research in cancerbio lab as an Amgen Scholar got co authored 2 abstracts presented at 2 cancer research conference, 1 manuscript to be published in 2010 2 years in a immunology/cell signaling lab. got 2 grants for the project from an honors society and from my univ. applying to Biomed programs/ pharmacology at: UNC yale columbia u mass medical mount sinai UCSF NYU UCI SUNY Buffalo Univ. of Rochester or USC.

hello everyone i'm in a bit of an odd situation my quant scores are low 670Q and verbal is 530 (ran out of timee grrrr). im applying to cancerbio programs and pharmacology programs. the rest of my application looks like this bio major with 3.9 cgpa at a UC. 1 publication at an undergrad journal, co author of 2 abstracts, 1 manuscript and won 2 undergrad grants from my uni. and an honors society. i know that my score will hurt alot. =( im applying to yale unc ucsf ucla u mass med sloan columbia appreciate ur thoughts!

for most of the programs they do not post the average GRE scores...i heard from an advisor from UCLA that the weight of the recs and previous research experience are what counts the most. she also said that applying to graduate school is a matter of connection...if recommenders have connections in a particular campus they can pretty much influence your acceptance to the program and such. not sure if that's true but she's a pretty reliable source since she used to be in the admissions committee at UCSD before coming to UCLA. i'll cross my fingers. and just concentrate on my SOPs and graduating. =)

howdy everyone... once in awhile life gives u a little slippage to make things a bit challenging...so it decided to throw me some curve ball on my GRE when i took last Sat. hence i scored a 670Q 530V and still waiting on AW. the rest of me well...is this... i am senior at a UC. majoring in bio. hoping to get into a cancerbio/pharmacology program. my gpa is 3.9 cumulative. i have 4 years of research experience starting from my freshman year. got a publication to undergrad journal my freshman year. Amgen scholar my second year with co authorships on 2 abstract and 1 manuscript. for the last 2 years i've been working on my own project (no grad students by my side) and have won 2 grants for that project, one from my university and another from an honors society. i'm applying to yale, unc, ucsf, ucla, u mass med, mount sinai, columbia, weill cornell. my concern is that my GRE is just simply bad and wont let me get into these schools. =( i feel rather hopeless since i've worked so hard for the last 4 years and it seems like i've been shooting at the moon all along. thank you for opinions and thank you for reading.