NWFreeheel11

Dartmouth sent me an invite on Christmas Eve about 10 minutes ago. Its my first invite and I am stoked!

Dartmouth sent me an invite on Christmas Eve!!! Best present by far.

Yes she was. They had not been in contact and he had no idea that she went there. They were in the same department as undergrads and both heading to grad school eventually, but still...he was floored.

This happened to a friend of mine last year: Due to a lack of same sex graduate student hosting options, my friend (he) was placed with a female host during interview weekend. Turns out, the girl was an ex-girlfriend that he had a traumatic break-up with 4 years prior and they had not spoken since.

I think learning to take rejection gracefully is a good goal before graduate school. If you can't handle being turned down, you are in for a rough ride in academia. It happens to all of us at times. No need to hold grudges.

PhD programs are a huge part of reputation. Even if you did get in, do you really want to be the person in the department that bullied their way back in? People get rejected, its a fact of life. Move on and find something/somewhere else fun. An appeal will only leave a stain on your reputation because you were a sore loser. It could even spread to other academic institutions because the world of academia is small and you don't want to shoot yourself in the foot before you even start.

Haha, I would definitely do that, but I have already bugged the coordinator a bit about another topic and I don't want my name to be associated with annoyance Its a thin line and a slippery slope. I guess nail bitting and waiting is the way to go.

For Neuroscience?

Does anyone know if Michigan has sent out all their invites? I haven't seen nearly as many as I expected so far.

Apartment style with options. You can have an efficiency apartment (Bath, BR, and kitchen) or regular style apartments. Agreed. Its all about priorities in spending. My point was that while it is more expensive, it is doable while still having a great time.

Its expensive, but doable. I lived in Palo Alto for a year and have a friend who is a 4th year PhD students at UCSF and one at Stanford. Rent is expensive but LOTS of grad students do it and love it. University housing in those areas are the best option. Stanford has so much grad housing you wouldn't believe, and the grad housing at UCSF is pretty nice. I managed to find a place to live and enjoy life initially on a salary that was equivalent to about $18,000/year. I eventually got a real job and made money, but had fun the whole time.

I have a really close friend who is a 4th year PhD in the neuro department at CU Denver AMC and she is working with a faculty in the pharmacology area. She has already published a first author paper and patent based on her work. I know the faculty there are stellar and Denver is awesome. I will be there for that weekend too, but I will be interviewing for bioengineering. All the AMC programs interview on the same weekend.

I posted this in another section, but I was hoping to get some life science specific opinions. Yesterday, I had a professor from a school I applied for send me an email and ask me for the contact information for my manager at my last industry job. It wasn't a research job, but I worked at a company that creates a product that is very useful in a research setting. I have already submitted my three academic LOR and apparently my application is being reviewed at some level right now. Questions: 1) Is it strange for someone reviewing your application to ask for a professional letter of reference? I haven't heard of that before, but I guess it kind of makes sense because you are applying for a job in the department. Thoughts? 2) I am not sure if this prof is interested in me personally or assigned to review my application as part of the adcom. Does it make more sense that someone is doing their due diligence for their own sake? Or just for the sake of knowing if my work ethic would fit in the department? Which do you think is more likely?

12/14 of my schools are not done with invites yet. A couple have sent early invites, but are not finished. The rest of them, probably 9 of them wont send anything until January. So I am in the same boat and am jealous of all the good news going on in here.

Was it Michigan Neuro or PIBS?

I figured as much, but it was just surprising because I have never heard of this happening from a PhD adcom before.

Yesterday, I had a professor from a school I applied for send me an email and ask me for the contact information for my manager at my last industry job. It wasn't a research job, but I worked at a company that creates a product that is very useful in a research setting. I have already submitted my three academic LOR and apparently my application is being reviewed at some level right now. Questions: 1) Is it strange for someone reviewing your application to ask for a professional letter of reference? I haven't heard of that before, but I guess it kind of makes sense because you are applying for a job in the department. Thoughts? 2) I am not sure if this prof is interested in me personally or assigned to review my application as part of the adcom. Does it make more sense that someone is doing their due diligence for their own sake? Or just for the sake of knowing if my work ethic would fit in the department? Which do you think is more likely?

Are you working with Cynthia Chestek? I am. I am looking to work in neural signal processing and neural prosthetics. Some pretty cool stuff out there if you ask me. I spoke with a prof at Brown via skype interview about some cool stuff they are doing. I am excited to see how things shake out. UIUC and UMN have IGERT NSF fellowships in Neural engineering. Extra money and an NSF fellowship to study prosthetics, yes please!

Does anyone know if all the Michigan invites have been sent yet? I know a few people here have received them.

I can see how you are frustrated, but I would caution you before writing a rant and rave to the dean. Your professors are in no obligation to write you LORs so just be careful. It may be unprofessional yes, but not something they will be reprimanded for or even spoken to. It may be much more detrimental to your professional image than it would be productive. Also, they did not screw up your entire future. You can reapply with different letters next year after using the unfortunate opportunity to build your application for a year.

Animal behavior field research is an easy hop fro psych and could be tied into the who plan easily and seamlessly. That would be an awesome way to mix things up while still being productive.

You should read my response to the post in the "Waiting it out" thread. The gist: Relax, not a worry. They understand.

Life's too short to worry about the SMALL stuff you CAN'T change. Relax. The personal statement is not even the important part of your application. Its about what you've done; Unless you are applying to programs in english ;-)

I graduated in 2011 and am so glad that I have taken some time away from academia. After graduating, I moved to silicon valley and worked for a start-up and volunteered to work with a research group at Stanford. I made good money, ended up getting two years of research experience and a LOR from my PI, and had a blast. After two years in the Bay, I moved to Seattle and worked at another tech company for a year. In June of this year, my girlfriend and I started a bicycle ride that will last until August 2015, right before grad school starts. We are riding from northern Alaska to South America and are having the time of our lives. We made it to San Francisco (~3000mi) and have taken a break so I can interview. In March, we are going to get back on our bikes and keep riding until August. My point in all this is that I think everyone should consider taking a little time off before grad school. Perspective makes life a little different. People say that if you don't go straight to school, you will get comfortable and never go to grad school. I think that if you are passionate about it, you will go back no matter what and a little time away helps build a bit of excitement to get back into the swing of things. A creative story in your personal statement helps bring everything together and you can find a compelling story line between any points. I think, and have spoken with many people about this deciding to take time off myself, that having life experience helps a person understand the limitations of the real world outside of a resource dense academic laboratory. I whole heartedly think that if grad school doesn't pan out this time, you should take some time to do something a little different. If you really want to go, you will get there eventually. You can still do something productive and useful for building your application, such as research abroad, but I think you should mix it up and enjoy life. Grad school is tough, leads straight to postdocs and then into careers. Do something epic.

Every school in the US has the ability to ignore people below a certain bar (GRE, GPA, experience, etc.) and every year that standard can shift. If the bar one year is exceptionally high from the profiles of the cheap students (aka domestic and permanent residents) then no one else will be considered. It is exactly the same as having a GPA cutoff. They are in no way obligated to do anything and when they have everyone they need, they stop wasting time looking for more. There is only X amount of funding, once its gone, then there is NO MORE money to give. Why bother reviewing applications when you can't offer any more admissions?