Tall Chai Latte

Hey Ghanada, congratz on deciding to come to Ann Arbor, first of all! I think you can look into some apartments along Plymouth road. The AATA #2 bus runs up and down of this route and can take to you central campus in about 10-15 minutes. I live in a one-bedroom and paying about 800 a month (including heat/utility) with lots of space. I can tell you more about the area in PM if you are interested.

Choosing which school to attend was hard for me too. It came down to one really high-ranked, well-reputed program and my own alma mater, with a group of people I totally loved and saw myself working with for the PhD. But I chose to go with the high-ranked program. Just like the OP, I didn't officially decide until April 14th and send out my decision on the 15th.After that, I felt sick to my stomach for until one month before school started. To be honest, even til the present day (I'm at the end of my second year), deep down I'm still not sure if I made the right choice two years ago, and my first year was so tough that I was mad at myself for making that decision. But I guess this is something we have to live with, we can't foresee the future! Try to see the positives in the choice you made, you will be just fine. Good luck to you, OP!

I think it depends on what kind of full-time job you have before you are off to grad school. I did some research in a lab before grad school started, everyone was asking when my last day is and if they could take my reagents/pipettes/consumables, lol. It was more like crunch time for me, because I needed to wrap up the projects. Sure it was good ol' happy undergrad days...

Hey Grad cafe, My prelim is just around the corner for me. Based on our program requirement, all prelimers should propose a topic of their own choice outside of their own field of interest and past experience. This will become a 10-page writeup, and we defend it in front of a standing committee. Our own PIs are only allowed to give very limited assistance, given that this is an exam. So I'm doing my best here, proposing a topic entirely outside of my comfort zone. It ain't easy as I have to learn lots of biology in 3 months' time (I was not a biology major during undergrad), at the same time I'm expected to do bench work and take classes, totally unrelated to my writeup. The bench work is even not a part of my thesis -- it's an on-going paper that's been dragging for 4 months already (at its final stretch to completion). On the one hand, I'm in the midst of preparing for the prelim and don't really want to spread myself too thin over all these other tasks that the PI wants me to do, but I realize that whether I pass or not depends directly on the PI, implying maybe I should probably get things done the way he likes. On top of the stress induced by prelimania, and all these different things on the side, it really wears me down mentally. Lately I've been having the thought of quitting altogether for some reason, maybe it's just the stress speaking. So what is your experience when you take your prelim/quals/comps? It feels like a lot of work, but being able to produce research simultaneously is a normal expectation?

I'm in the life sciences, and I have rotated with a famous prof with a large-ish group of 20 people, and small groups with only 7~8 people. From my experience, I do see that staying with the famous prof certainly has its advantages, i.e. the fame, the cutting-edge research, financial stability etc, but since the prof is famous, he also has a lot of things going on on the side (he owns a company) and doesn't have a lot of time to mentor his students. The situation is similar to what you described for the first group -- if you like working independently, and people you work with are friendly and willing to help you out when you have questions, there is no problem with staying with the famous prof. On the other hand, profs with smaller groups have fewer personnels to manage, and you can potentially get more input and guidance from the prof himself (and if he's also a well-known expert in the field, you are lucky!). Either way is great and can be rewarding, you need to find out which style fits you the most.

Not feeling connected to the people is probably less of an issue, in my opinion. As long as they don't annoy you or doing anything out of line to you, it should be okay. Can't really predict these people things! Maybe next year there will be someone you like joining the lab.

Stay optimistic and stick it out! You'll be just fine. I know how hard rotations are -- I did 4+ rotations before I landed in my current thesis lab, and being told "I have to think about taking you on, because [insert reasons]" again and again really wore me down a lot mentally. Remember, your program recruited you there, they are responsible for finding you a lab home even all of your rotations failed (of course, if you remain in good academic standing). Asking for feedbacks on your rotation performance is a good idea, it shows that your attitude. If it comes to the worst -- that you cannot join the lab you love after N rotations -- be ready to open up to new research areas that you've never considered before. You'll never know what you will find. Good luck, you will be just fine!

Congratulations to you all with an acceptance in hand! I did my housing search from 500 miles away, what I did was sending out mass email to my cohort/current students if they need a roommate. I thought that once I've become familiar with where I go to school, I can fish out another place to live in the next leasing cycle. It might or might not work out for all of you (i.e. roommate issues), but at least you are not going into an inhabitable place. It worked well for me.

I also bought them a small, consumable gift (like dried tea leaves, one of my recommenders likes drinking tea) when I visit them for Christmas break.

Handwritten cards for all

Yeah it happened to me, one of my recommenders did not turn in her letter to any of the schools I applied to, so I had to salvage that with a LOR from my coworker (a post doc). I applied to a total of 7 schools, and I think 4 out of 7 schools tossed out my app/simply skim through my app without any serious judging. But do let them know that you switched out one recommender via phone (it was more efficient than emails).

I have a 22" monitor, bluetooth Apple keyboard, a USB mouse and a desk. Pretty standard... I carry with me: - Phone - Car/House keys - Lunch and some snacks - Macbook and charger - Jansport backpack - Pens - Running shoes/gym clothing if it's gym day

I'll join the crowd too! For me, I hate how my program doesn't communicate all the details in an open, honest way, and students have to find out what you are supposed or not supposed to do on their own, and sometimes in a hard way. I hate how some professors here are passive aggressive, making things overly complicated -- it drives me nuts and paranoid.

It's nice to read all these good advice. Similar to Cosmos, when I first came to my current grad program for interview, I felt an instant dislike, to both people and surroundings. Eventually I chose to attend the program because, after some rational thinking, I decided experiencing new environment will be good for me. The "instant dislike" lasted about a year or so after I started my program, and all the issues I had with not able to find a thesis lab, endless rotations, having only acquaintances in the program all added to the "dislike". After some time, although I can't say I like everything here 100%, it has become much better, and I start to feel like perhaps I do belong here after all (going to the gym and run also helps). Just give these people things some time, and take good care of yourself by doing some exercise regularly.

You can also ask other grad students in your lab for some advice on how they popped the big question when they were rotating. And occasionally, you would hear what your PI thinks of you from them... This is also a way to get a feeling if your fellow labmates welcome you or not. And then you can go "Hi, I would like to talk about the rotation with you, would you have time?", your PI will know what you are implying.

For what my lab is interested in -- the research draws knowledge from pathology, biochemistry, small molecule synthesis, and ever since I joined, biophysics/structural biology has been added to the list. To me, interdisciplinary research is to answer a scientific question with many different techniques/tools. I may be responsible for a small part of the bigger picture, and the project will utilize my background as well as providing opportunities to pick up new things. One thing I find challenging in interdisciplinary work is communication: not everyone knows what you know, and not to the same extent. Sometimes communication becomes a problem here because people are not "speaking the same scientific language". How I overcome this was by reading up on what I don't know, also strive to keep the explanations simple when telling others (who are not in your field) about your part. Of course, get help when you have questions. Does the outcome match my expectation? I think so. I just got on this project, we'll see.

Hello GradCafe, 'Tis the season to be preparing for prelims... Our prelim format is coming up with a research topic that interest you, write a proposal, and defend it in front of a committee. Although, the rule is that the topic cannot be something you are or have worked on. Current projects, current projects your lab has, past rotation projects, even your past undergraduate research projects are not allowed. Looks like stepping out of the comfort zone is what's asked of us... I'm totally new to defining a research project from a field that I have limited knowledge on. I do have one or two areas that interest me (that's outside of my past experience, expertise, and current interest), how does one even begin approaching defining a research topic after reading lots of background info? Any advice is great.

I think both options have pros and cons. If you stay in one lab (for instance, like me sticking with one lab for 3-4 years), you will gain technical knowledge towards the subject you are working on, develop meaningful relationship with your mentor (assuming you two get along), and potential co-author opportunities. Now these things will help you towards grad school acceptance. However, the downside is that, you are not exposed to wider variety of research, as well as different types of mentoring and lab environment. Switching labs once every so often can broaden your horizon, build your network (comes in handy when asking for LORs), and experience different types of coworkers/mentors. These things are the soft skills that can help you adapt better in grad school. Sometimes you gotta put yourself in different situations to know your preference! But you might or might not get some of the pros of staying at one lab. But do choose what's the best for you

One thing I do to motivate myself to work out is signing myself up for races. Before starting grad school, you would never see me running on a treadmill... But after a while, when the stress of grad school hits, running becomes my stress reliever. Participating in 5K/10K race events really motivates me to get my butt out the door and run.. Though my fitness level is not that good yet... Let's start from 1 mile race, baby steps..

Are you a domestic applicant or an international applicant? I think the standard is lower for domestic applicants, as long as you have a combined score of 1200 with quantitative higher than 600 (under the old scoring system) and AW not lower than 4, it's not going to keep you from being accepted unless you aim for the prestigious schools... Your stats are better than mine, and I accepted to a science program. I'm not sure how much research experience you need to have, but students in my cohort have at least 3 years of research on average before matriculation. This varies between programs.

I failed a class last semester and am placed on academic probation this semester. I also studied very hard and talked to the professor for suggestions, but in the end I still failed... Now I need to repeat this class to in order take the candidacy exam next year. I have to say that grades are still important because you need them to apply for external funding and moving along in your program. However, while a C on the transcript seems bad, it's really not the end of the world. Grad school is just a process, don't stress yourself out over a printed letter.