UWChemE

I can't say for sure, but I didn't get in to UNC and MIT, UCSD says all acceptances are out, Columbia says all acceptances are out, Berkeley is almost certainly going to be a rejection. My hopes for Colorado are gone because I called back (see above) and I was told "My application hadn't been looked at", I just think she didn't want to tell me I was rejected over the phone. So...That's all she wrote. 7 applications, 7 rejections. I guess doing research since freshman year, and getting a double major in ChemE and Chemistry at the #5 school for both programs isn't enough. Good luck for the rest of you.

So I just spoke with the admissions administrator at UC San Diego and it sounds like they have made all of their admissions offers. According to him my application doesn't have a final decision, so there might be something there, but it probably means a rejection. Soo...I'm looking at rejections from probably 7/7 here, unless UNC and Colorado look really closely again at my application. This sucks

Guess MIT is churning out their rejections today

I was told by the man I spoke with on the phone that not all decisions have been made and he would be able to tell me better at the end of this week, if I didn't already receive notice.

I also called Columbia, they're admissions coordinator said: "I believe we have sent out all of the acceptances we will be sending. There may be a waitlist, I won't know until next week. The head of admissions is out of town this week and ultimately he decides if there will be a waitlist. I want you to know a wait list is something that we DO consider, however I believe that we have accepted all of the students that we plan to take for this year." On a brighter note, I called Colorado, and they are still reviewing applications later this week. Same for UNC. UCLA said call back in March. UCSD didn't answer the phone. Didn't call Berkeley or MIT.

I expected as much, but damn that sucks. I don't expect much from Berkeley or MIT, so now I'm down to 0/3/4 (accepted/rejected /no response) Still haven't heard a peep from the other schools though.

I don't personally have a relationship or experience with any of those professors. I imagine they are good people though. As broad of a generalization as that is, many of the professors in Madison are very down to earth and friendly. Madison as a whole is a liberal and laid back setting. Of course there will be rigor, especially in chemistry, but I feel that the PIs usually have good relationships with their students.

I have high hopes for UCLA, one of my best friends lives in LA and I really hope I can go there. Unfortunately they tend to send very late responses (at least for rejections), sooooo more waiting! Yay

That potentially explains the lack of communication as far as acceptances, but it doesn't explain rejections already going out. Don't the schools know who is already counted out, for low gpa, or GRE, or any other number of factors. As someone who hasn't heard anything, but is looking at contingency options, it's very difficult not knowing if these schools are even considering me. I graduated in the fall, so for me it's grad school or get a job ASAP. The problem being, I can't start a permanent job if in half a year I'm going to grad school. I suppose it's a personal problem, but I imagine it is relevant for others as well.

See that's what doesn't make sense to me, if they have almost all the decisions made , why would they wait until the end of February to send the rejections? Do they have a 100 person wait list. It just seems like a waste of everyone's time. I have other things in my life going on which have to wait for a response from these schools, but they can't be bothered to keep applicants informed. I can't see a reason for that

You should try to arrange for 1 big trip where you can visit more than one school. I have read of other students doing this. (If you're able to take off more than a few days of classes) The interstate travel will easily be covered by the schools, but you may have a rather large ticket cost to make it to the states. I think that seeing the school in person and actually meeting professors will play a large role in your decision. Also Madison is an awesome city! If it is cold/ grey try to look past that. It's really a beautiful city full of life and energy.

No no! No need to apologize. It's awesome that you got in, I'm envious. I'm hoping to hear from them at some point too. UCLA has some great professors I would love to work with. It's good to know they are at least telling people this early as opposed to past years when it was much later (making decisions even more difficult)

Do you have any other information? Statistics, kind of group, what the professor said? It seems REALLY early for UCLA to respond. I had a friend hear back in APRIL last year ( I would personally die waiting this long) Accidental, mobile browser. Unfortunately there is no reversal option.

https://grad.ucla.edu/asis/progprofile/result.asp?selectmajor=0153 This link for UCLA says they admit avg 140 for 348 applicants. With 600 applicants 200 admits doesn't seem too unreasonable.

Yes German keyboard made a typo. Kiessling is correct. The public trans is great, not really necessary because of bikes and bike paths. But all students get a free transport pass at the start of the semester. Don't know a whole lot about graduate housing. I do know that many grad students live on the east side of town, further from campus. This area is very young and lively. Check out the "Wiley Street" neighborhood. It's really nice. Most grad students live off campus. I believe some live in Middleton as well. They could tell you more on your visit.

I worked pretty closely with a number of the organic professors. I graded for one of Teshik's courses for example, and he's a great person and professor. The Schomaker group, though new, is really awesome! They are close knit and Jennifer is a very good mentor. Blackwell is another awesome professor, she was my intro to organic professor. Riessling will be a popular choice so keep that in mind. (Oh yeah, I really like Streiter, he's a really cool guy, started in organometallic work, and then switched to biochem. He's also pretty funny) I think some of you worried about the size of UW don't realize how small each department ends up being. They don't let in so so many people each year. Organic is by far the largest pool of people and they maybe have 20-30 people, each split up into different groups. So if you're analytical, you might be added with 8-9 other people. Physical even less, chem bio (I think) is the smallest. As is always the case people group up, you make friends, the department becomes a lot smaller than it might seem at first. Just don't worry. The size of UW is actually a giant plus! There is a lot of cross-group collaboration. So many people (undergraduate and graduate) to meet and find a place with. And to the above poster, UW is extremely well known. We get speakers from all over the world, cross departmental collaboration( e.g. engineering and chemistry) We have a ton of research funding. I believe the chemistry department has rotations for the first semester so you can make sure the group you join is a fit for you. At smaller programs you won't be able to do something like this. I hope I've quelled some fears. And if anyone has any questions about UW don't hesitate to ask, I will answer anything I have knowledge of.

Not only that, but Columbia didn't even (at least publicly) acknowledge that he did this. They mentioned it in a report that students were negatively impacted by not reproducing results, but they don't say anything about what they (Columbia) did about it. It's just a crazy story overall. Sames gets tenure off fake work, then he removes the work without approval from the first author. She lied, but he approved it. "He got the credit, but none of the punishment"

Seriously! Wow, I'm reading through this "ChemBark" series and it sounds like a Chem version of murder mystery. It's crazy how much this woman lied, cheated, and blatantly disregarded the foundation of good science. Massaging data is one thing, but she literally made it up! And I have to agree with you on this, it seems Sames had no repercussions for allowing all this to happen under his direction. I'm really sure if that makes Columbia a bad school, Sames a bad investigator, or the community at large bad at deciding who is credible. It's probably some grey area in between all this, but wow! So unexpected.

Turns out you're right (He's 78!) The reason I asked is because I made a statement about him and the work that he did at Columbia, rereading my SoP I realized it kinda sounds like I want to be in his group. Funny enough the three professors I would like to work with Leighton, Lambert, and Sames are all previous students of his! Before doing all my research I didn't consider Columbia as a top choice(just knew it was well ranked), but now it's definitely my top! I want to go there so bad! I dont care that it's in NYC. Their dates for visiting are March 6th and 27th, so hopefully I'll hear before then.

To answer your first question, I went the "other" direction because Chemical Engineering really wasn't what I expected. It's a lot of process engineering : how can you make this, how much of it, how much money, how do you control this feed back process, how much input is required for this output. There's a lot of high level math and physics implied in all of the courses. And there's way too much thermo. Many of the students are in it for money, and it's great for that. The reason I went for chemical engineering was because I loved chemistry. I thought with a more applied field I could more easily get products (specifically medicine) to people. In a sense this was true, but I really didn't enjoy the engineering. It's really far removed from the interesting science (at least what we learn in class) Organic Chem though! That's my jam, I love working in the lab, synthesizing, working up the products, analyzing NMR, planning synthetic routes. The semesters I was doing research and learning ochem in class were the best years of college. So that's why I'm applying for graduate school in that field. I really hope that the schools can look past the overall gpa, which I mentioned in my SoP. I love chemistry and actually performed better in that. I probably could /would have even had a higher Chem GPA if I wasn't taking so many chemE credits. I guess at this point I just have to wait and see. Thank you for the objective, but affirmative words, really helps ease my mind. Completely unrelated, does anyone know what is up with Danishefsky? Is he retired? Still taking students perhaps? I know he's quite old

Also wanted to ask if everyone who is getting calls also received emails? I am currently in Germany looking for a job for the intermediate time, so I can't receive calls. I never realized that Grad schools personally call to announce admissions.

OK, so I'm starting to freak out. Maybe that's not the best way to describe it, but I'm severely discouraged by how many people have heard from schools I applied to. I'm a fall graduate from UW Madison ' Chemical engineering program. I double majored in Chemistry (which was actually a significant amount of extra work) As lame of an excuse as it is, chemical engineering significantly lowered my overall gpa (graduated with a 3.05). My chemistry gpa was a 3.6. From freshman year until the end of sophomore year I worked in an organic synthesis lab. Summer of sophomore year I worked in a chemical engineering lab focused on drug delivery and bioengineering. My junior year I studied abroad and in the summer after I had an internship with a major pharmaceutical company. I got LoR from the two PIs (Assistant Prof, and Prof leader in his field) as well as my intermediate organic Chem Prof (Assistant Prof). I believe these are all strong letters. Basically, I'm worried about my gpa. I have a really great relationship with the organic lab PI and she said that this would be the biggest hurdle for me. I applied to (Reach) MIT, UC Berkeley. (Reasonable) Columbia, UCLA (Confident) Colorado State, UNC Chapel Hill, and UC San Diego. However, now I don't feel confident at all. Is there still a chance for me? Did I shoot myself I the foot and not apply to enough programs I could actually get into? I see plenty of acceptance already so I'm worried that I won't have a place to be in the next few months.