sjoh197

I get rather concerned when I see people refer to themselves as "screw ups" or "unlikely to get in" or "I did so horribly" and then I look at their credentials and...... They're better than mine.

Why are you going into Oceanography?

I don't know about the interviews.... but I was at UCSB doing research in November.... and everybody there was sooooo incredibly nice, it was astonishing. It may ease your anxiety to know that.

I keep dreaming about getting rejected from schools.... And then I had a dream that I got accepted, and it was soooo much worse to wake up from. It just makes me analyze so much more.

Bwahahaha

When I was emailing professors earlier last year... I talked with my advisor, and he told me that a good subject line was "Inquiry from a Potential/Prospective Graduate Student" I used this for every email that I sent, and received a response from every (I really do mean every) single one. It seemed to work pretty well.

Yeah, the O&G downturn is making it far more difficult for the students like myself and others here that planned from the start to go to grad school and are now competing with people who are applying as a somewhat second thought.

That sounds awesome. I will be happy just to hear from any of them... I think if I could land an interview, I would make a much better impression than my numbers. Good luck with your interview

GeoMex... you have pretty much the same gpa and pretty close gre scores to me.... you also have years in industry (big plus) and funding from you company (BIG plus). Not only that, but you obviously have proficiency of the English Language, which is not always the case for foreign students ( I don't know your background, but you went to school in Mexico?) Also, seeing as how you went to school in Mexico, I assume you are also proficient in Spanish? Another plus that many of us "locals" don't have. Being a non-traditional student... your stats are kind of hard to compare.

I keep dreaming that I am being rejected. Unlike a lot of people though.... I remember at least a portion of my dreams almost every night, and typically extremely vivid. Sometimes, that is really kind of cool and other times, I can't actually discern if I was actually rejected from graduate school. LOL

Yeah... I was told to shoot for what I really wanted, who I wanted to work with, and what research I truly wanted to do. Now I am realizing that what "I wanted" might be well outside the realm of possibilities. Not only that, but I am dealing with the two person problem as well... making it even more stressful. I feel like I should have shot a lot lower. My numbers aren't really all that impressive, although I have really strong letters and decent undergrad research. I feel like if they could meet me in person, they would have a much, much better impression. I feel like I have set myself up for failure.

You are very correct, I apologize. He was a researcher there. It doesn't really matter though, as I likely wouldn't get accepted. I am feeling awfully depressed now about my decisions.

I wasn't going to apply to UH, just because of the high application pool, and difficulty getting in, but I talked with a new professor there that had just transferred from being a professor at MIT, and was trying to recruit new students, as he doesn't have any now. My thoughts are still on the slim side though.

Yeah, I went back and looked through all of my application details. I didn't have any glaring mistakes but I didn't have the strongest SOP, as I didn't go into enough detail as to what I really want to do. I was sooooo stressed at that point in time, with 17 semester hours, research, travel blah blah blah

My POI is on the admissions committee for UT Austin... I hope I didn't sound like a complete idiot in my application.

GeoMex Although I am not necessarily the person to ask.... You might do well to contact them later about your rejection... as you are much less likely to get a response during this particularly busy time.

The POI I emailed at UT Austin responded to me in less than 24 hours. The next morning I already had an email.... but I don't think that is typical of that institution. Same with Rice. I don't know about the others though. Some professors will tell you in a response to let them know if/when you apply. If this is the case for any of your POI's, then I would just send a short message letting them know just that. Otherwise, I myself wouldn't contact them.

What things have you overheard other students say that made you completely facepalm, or wonder how they got into college? I'll start... While sitting in our communal food/theater/postal/everything else area on campus... also known as "The Union", I overheard a girl ask her friend how to spell "onion." The irony of the situation arose when her friend responded that she thought it started with a "u".... "union". Because its not like we're sitting in a building that is spelled like Onion with a U. They were dead serious.

Second version is much better. Be careful with doing the last part of your sop, in explaining your grades. The adcomm knows that shit happens, and that grades plunge for many reasons. Just make sure to make your reason sound just like that, a reason, not an excuse. It can be very difficult.

I know of a few universities that choose their Master's candidates before their PhD candidates... which leads me to believe that at least some universities create their slot numbers ahead of time.

Also... Paragraphs should be 5 sentences long at least. You'rs are much too short, and should either be combined or expanded upon. Also, what research have you done in your current degree?

I read an article about the nascency of the field of operations research (OR). During WWII the allies were losing bombers and accompanying crew at an alarming rate. Early OR professionals arrived at the counter-intuitive decision to reinforce undamaged areas of bombers that returned to their bases instead of damaged areas. Their rationale was bombers that sustained damage at areas returning bombers did not experienced catastrophic failure and were lost. This type of unorthodox practical thinking intrigued me. OR’s coupling of the two subjects I enjoy the most—computer programming and mathematics—is why I want to obtain a graduate degree (specify) in OR. My undergraduate degree in mathematics and (perhaps say "along with") numerous computer programming courses are ideal (perhaps say "provided ideal") preparation for a career in OR. Once I complete the MEng in Industrial Engineering: Operations Research concentration, I hope to apply my degree improving efficiency and business processes within the federal government. I appreciate the practicality of OR. No area of OR better exemplifies this utility than linear programming (LP). (I appreciate the practicality of OR, and no area better exemplifies this utility than linear programming (LP).)After conducting independent study to refine my grasp of the simplex method, I hope to continue on to integer programming. The application of linear programming to the allocation of military assets is an area I would also like to study further. Linear programming’s application to finance and insurance are also of interest to me. I’ve seen LP used to discover arbitrage opportunities in the currency exchange market. I would like to study ways OR can be used to exploit opportunities for financial gain in other segments of finance. Actuarial science is also of interest to me; LP’s application to investment vehicle selection and desired returns in the context of pensions is an area I would like to explore. ISU is the ideal place for me to study OR. The presence of a large statistics department will allow me to tailor my degree to my desired career path. Data mining and reliability are two subjects I am interested in and hope to incorporate into my degree. The course offerings within the industrial engineering and statistics departments will allow me to graduate prepared to solve real world problems. I look forward to taking course work in data mining, integer programming, and scheduling. My 2.86 ISU GPA may be a point of concern when making your admission decision. (not in good form to tell the admissions committee what their own concerns are. It is best to rephrase) This blemish is mainly due to academic fatigue and a reluctance to abandon a field of study due to prior investment of time and money. Having taken the spring 2014 semester off to reevaluate and reenergize, I am prepared to continue my studies and graduate as soon as possible. My military college benefits will not pay for me to audit a class. If I want to take a class for familiarity and have my veterans benefits pay for it, I must take it P/NP. This approach allows for exploratory learning without the burdens of time and effort. This is my way of auditing and the NP is expected and not cause for concern. Unlike most of the applicants for your MEng program, I am not an unknown quantity. I have taken two industrial engineering graduate courses—linear programming and stochastic processes—and received a B+ and a B respectively. After I excel in the graduate courses I am taking this semester, I will have only three courses remaining to complete my MEng; all of which I plan on taking during the fall 2015 semester. I would love to end my formal education and complete my MEng at ISU. If given the opportunity, I will avail myself of it and not disappoint.

We are dealing with the same situation.... One thing to keep in mind is whether you factored in a significant others job potential into your applications? I found one or two programs that I thought I would like, but the job market potential for my SO was zero. So I counted them a loss.Just a thought

I didn't think that my application was really that bad. My GRE was supposed to be Q: 159 and V: 164. Not sure how that got messed up. My research is a bit more in depth than what I posted. I worked on the Illite Crystallinity of multiple samples from a transect in the Ladakh-Chamba region of the Himalayas, in order to determine thermochronological data. I worked on size and mica separations for samples from the same transect, to prepare them for Ar testing, to test extrusion models of the Greater Himalayan Crystalline Sequence in the South Tibetan Detachment. I have done zircon separations and laser ablation split stream analysis for U-Th-Pb on these zircons at the LA-ICP-MS facility at UCSB. Awesome place, I must say. It wasn't nerve wracking at all to operate a 2 million dollar machine at 2am alone... said no one ever. I will be second author on a major paper (my advisor will be first obviously) that we will be submitting to a USGS bulletin. That obviously won't have any real effect on my application, as it won't be finished. lol. My gpa is well explained in my LOR's, as my daughter passed away in the middle of one of my semesters and I failed everything the next semester before moving to geology. All of my conversations with POI's went really well, I thought. Everyone was very encouraging and seemed enthusiastic. Much better than the static silence I've heard about from other posters.

Wait.... Is that quote your transfer SOP?