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mikef522

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    2015 Fall

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  1. Congrats! You made the right choice, I have a friend who goes there for Immunology and he loves it. Hopefully I can join you. Currently stuck in waitlist limbo there. They interviewed only 12 people out of 400 applicants for SCBRM and wanted to take 5 or 6 from those 12. ~1.5% acceptance rate! Crazy competitive, everyone was outstanding. Hoping that I can get an NSF GRFP to get me off the waitlist.
  2. True. It may be that you weren't up to speed with the literature and that showed in the interviews? After describing my previous research in my interviews, I would say what I would do differently and brought up relevant current research. I also used the current research to explain what types of projects I was interested in. Basically, they could tell I had read a lot of articles. Also, talking about techniques in detail would show that you really understand that technique and show that you're knowledgeable. Definitely talk about having to work the jobs. That's extremely relevant. The freshman definitely are not expected to have lab experience, and they usually don't. They usually have good grades. In my case, I failed my 1st semester and was put on academic probation for a year (basically, kicked out), so I had a 0 GPA. I got a job prepping intro bio labs my freshman year (just cleaning dishes, making media, etc... [not research]) after being denied for several research positions (that means restocking and doing dishes for 1-2 semesters if you're a freshman). Then I joined a student org where undergrads do a summer research project and got a lot of independent experience that way. Then I emailed dozens of PI's my sophomore year and finally got a research position midway through my sophomore year. I spent a semester proving myself doing genotyping and finally got an independent project the summer before junior year. I definitely didn't go the standard route and I think I learned a lot more than I would of if I had. I don't think any class, even graduate classes, teach you any skills in sufficient detail. The upper level cell and molecular biology lab class at umich was a complete joke. I really think they should abolish them and just make theory based lab classes. The in depth knowledge of techniques and troubleshooting skills of those techniques is really only learned by doing that technique a lot in a real lab.
  3. 3 semesters is definitely not a lot. If it wasn't full time, especially if you're already 26, that's definitely a red flag. Even if it was full time work, that's still very odd and won't be very competitive against the 21-22 year olds who have 1-3+ years experience. You're also competing against 26 year old technicians and master's students who have significantly more experience. You need to prove to them that you can work full-time on research, for say 1-2 years minimum AND get publications. Doesn't need to be 1st author, but get your name on pubs. Help out with other people's projects in the lab. This should be relatively easily if you work 2 years full-time in any average lab. The harder you work, the better. You should be working your ass off anyways. To put it in perspective, I was a very competitive applicant with a decent GPA (3.5 w/o 1st semester), but about 5 years of combined research experience (2 years in 2 labs simultaneously). I'm age 22. I worked my ass off way more than full time while taking classes and it undoubtedly showed in my letters of rec, publications, etc... For someone who is 26, they are expecting a lot more research experience barring extenuating circumstances. Since I don't know what those are in your case, I can't guess how that would affect your chances. I have circumstances that affected my school performance, so it's certainly possible to overcome those with a strong research/work performance. I did come from the university of michigan as well, which will definitely make a difference when comparing someone's grades from that school to some from a rank 250 school. I don't know exactly what a rank 250 school is like, but Umich is about rank 20 and I've taken classes at a community college (unranked). The difference in course difficulty was phenomenal. What you learn in Calc I at a community college is not equivalent to what you learn at Umich. My advice, if you still want to pursue research, would be to directly email any professors at any institution that are doing research that interests you. Ask them if they have need of a tech and if you could tech in their lab for 1-2 years. You should get paid for this work. Include your CV and tell them that you can have your recommenders send them letters of rec on your behalf if they are interested in considering you for the job. You will probably have to apply widely and won't hear from most or get rejected outright. Alternatively, you could pursue a MS if you have the money. I can only imagine your frustration. Whatever you do, get in a lab or keep working in the one you are in. If you don't do that, I can't see your situation improving, even in Europe. Best of luck with everything. If this is something you really love, keep at it.
  4. My GPA closed a lot of great doors for me during my undergrad right at the very start, so I can relate when you say it's "still hurting me". It's a shitty feeling, if not downright depressing. The good news though is that, for a PhD program, grades mean next to nothing if you can demonstrate your outstanding research abilities in other ways. For future applications, if your GPA was great after your rough start (which was hopefully not very long; perhaps ideally only a semester), you could try to emphasize your GPA when calculated to not include the rough start. My overall GPA is 3.072 and I was recently accepted to UPenn, with upcoming interviews to UCSD and Stanford. I completely failed my first semester of undergrad due to a severe illness. My GPA without my first semester was 3.51 and I explicitly stated this in my application. I did have a lot more than 1 year of research experience though, which from what I've heard is FAR more important than grades. I spent 3 years working in an iGEM lab (I worked a good amount throughout classes as well) and 2 years in an unrelated lab (2 years of which I worked in the two labs simultaneously). Throughout this work, I gave presentations, co-authored 2 papers, and I earned 3 stellar letters of recommendation. I also submitted 1 extra letter that talked about my classroom abilities (probably not stellar, but good). In my Stanford application, they had extra questions asking about computer/programming and mathematics experience (which I had a lot of, especially for a biology major). I explained how these extra skills will help me in my research. They also asked what diversity I would bring to the school. As a white male, I said that I would be able to share my experience with overcoming obstacles (my illness, failing, bad GPA/closed doors) and said that my advice would help others overcome their obstacles. I think this extra information was key to getting me the invite. I didn't include this extra information in my applications to UCSF and Harvard and I was rejected from those places (the other schools are a better fit anyways though). I guess my advice is to emphasize the good stuff so much that your grades become insignificant. Just make sure between now and the next time you apply (if you do), you add a lot of extra good stuff: research experience (do more than asked of you), superior grades, and whatever else is relevant to conducting research you're interested in or your career. Also, persistence counts for something! There's a professor at Harvard named George Church. He repeated 9th grade, failed out of his graduate studies at Duke, and nearly failed out of graduate school at Harvard. He became a huge biology pioneer (DNA sequencing/synthesis, human genome project, genome engineering tech[including CRISPR], founded multiple companies). A friend of mine talked to Dr. Church recently and he asked him about his experience failing. One of the things he said at the end was that he really likes the people who apply to the PhD programs a 2nd time because it shows they are determined. You're going to fail so much in science. If you can't handle failure, you'll never succeed. That was more than I was planning on writing. Anyways, hope that helps signalmytransduction. Best of luck! Don't give up!
  5. Applied to Stanford Stem Cell Biology and Regenerative Medicine. Received the same email from them today and followed up to confirm I was invited. Sounds like they will send another email and a packet by mail. Unbelievably excited!! Especially after not hearing back from Harvard BBS or UCSF BMS.
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