newms

geological era

paid survey

dead end

summer vacation

This is where you need to do a little research to see what exactly that program is doing right now. You could email profs(as long as the don't say you shouldn't on their website) or grad students if the program's website is not up to date. You should then point out how your research interests, past research, skills, methods meshes with what they're doing. Try to convince them that you'd be an asset to the research that they are doing.

Winter Olympics

I don't know of any place that lists that information. What may be useful for you is an 'admissions estimator' from UTEP. It's a rough estimate and you shouldn't take it too seriously, but it will give you a list of schools that your GRE scores fit what they say they accept. It is here: http://www.cs.utep.edu/admissions/

If you really want to apply this year, you can still do so. Unless you're going to be in a remote place, you may still be able to do the paper based GRE at the end of October - there are testing centers in many countries. Plus I'm not sure that you're scores will keep you out. If the rest of your application is pretty good then you may be ok.

It's the second go-around for me too. A few things I'm doing differently this year: 1) I'm reworking my SOP entirely to be more focused on my research interests. 2) I've identify schools and profs I'm interested in from early on. 3) I'm contacting profs to make sure they have space in their groups for new students. I've been able to meet with one and had a good talk. 4) I'm reading as many papers in my research interests as much as I can, and undertaking an independent research project. 5) I'm taking the subject GRE in my area. 6) I'm going to be working closer with my LOR writers this year, giving them a better idea of what I want to do. 7) I'm applying to roughly twice as many schools as I applied to last time. 8) I'm putting up a website for myself. And I want to be done with all of this by the end of November. I've got my work cut out for me!

I'm not in your field so I can't really give you advice on whether you need to retake to apply to top schools. Why don't you ask in the Anthropology forum: http://forum.thegrad...5-anthropology/

I'm a firm believer in visualizing yourself having success. Once I know that I have prepared myself, I just picture myself doing what I'd done in practice and imagine myself doing well. It's when I know that I haven't prepared well that I have problems.

fur coat

dead bolt

time keeper

I've also heard that Maryland-College Park (a top 15 school) has a good CV group.

human being

bgk, do you know when this years blogging season will be open?

Congrats Eigen!

sociocultural evolution

I would just put the school you got the degree from. You could probably briefly explain why you went to 3 schools in your SOP so they don't get the wrong idea.

I hope to be able to use this advice next year. Thanks for it

Sports Studies

I really am not sure about sending a SOP unsolicited. I personally wouldn't do this as it might look rude to some profs.

Hi Sunny, To answer your questions: 1) GRE scores are usually valid for 5 years. As to how much you will gain from the work experience depends on what program you want to pursue. If you want to pursue a research based program that leads to a PhD, then the work experience might not value much unless you actually do some research as part of your job. If you want a terminal Master's for an industry job, then your work experience may be of some help (depending on if it's in the field you want to study and what exactly you do) 2) The verbal score isn't so important for CS applicants, so your verbal score should be ok. Your quantitative score of 760 isn't bad, but consider that many CS applicants will have a higher quantitative score than 760. Again though, it will depend on which program you pursue - GRE scores aren't that important for research based programs. In short, if you have the funds to sit the test again and believe you can get a higher score, there may be some limited value in doing so, but if not, your scores should be ok. 3) The choice of what universities to apply to really should be made by looking at the CS programs and seeing which ones are strong in the area that you are interested in. You should also consider how strong an applicant you would be, and use how strong your application would be to determine a range of schools that would be at your 'level'. You could apply to a couple 'dream' schools that you really want to get into, and also a couple that you think you definitely should be able to get into. Ultimately though, it really depends on which schools are good fits for what you want to do. There is a list of CS grad schools and their 'ranking' (for whatever its worth) at this link: You can look through the schools to see which ones match what you want to do.

I don't feel like I'm in a position to give you advice, being a wannabe grad student and not having been through a Master's program like you. Having said that, it really depends on you. I've read that it's natural to have up and downs in considering spending years of your life pursuing a PhD and that's when its funded - you would have to take on debt to pursue the PhD. The way I see it there are 2 ways to analyse the situation: 1) Do a financial cost/benefit analysis. Would the debt you incur in 4 years be worth the extra salary of having a PhD? 2) At the end of the day, how much do you really want a PhD? Would the PhD lead to a career that you want to pursue? Could you see yourself happy without going down the route of getting the PhD? Is it important to what you want to do with your life? I hope this helps you make your decision.