YoungOldMan

Yes you're correct. My sponsor takes university ranking into consideration, that's why I applied to UCL in the beginning. That is also why I am applying to these tough schools. Also my TOEFL is quite high, my GRE is definitely not good but its decent (but maybe not for these unis). GRE becomes very difficult when you're not native speaker. You don't read as fast and also the logic works a bit different. Now I understand that the language of instruction is english and that we are going to publish in english, however the problems we are going to solve have nothing to do with language, they belong to the physical and real world and I think their understanding is a lot more abstract. My scholarship in London was exactly 880 pounds per month. I lived in a flat from UCL housing and I paid about 530 pounds per month. I spent about 80-100 pounds per month in food, I cooked most of my food. I actually even saved about 200 pounds per month and I went on holiday at the end of the course. Visited a few countries, I am what you could call very prodigal with my spendings. I did went out, but I don't drink and basically I did not have to spend a lot of money. Probably did not go out that much, perhaps 1-3 per week and UCL has many societies so sometimes I could go to event of these and it was good. I walked to school everyday so I did not have to spend on public transport. It is possible to find rooms in Camden for like 500 pounds and if you go to zone 3,4 and 5 you can definetely find options of about the same or cheaper, or increase the quality of rooms. I think anyone can be fine as long as he/she shares flat or house. In London one has to be super careful, money disappear very quickly if you are not.

Yes I totally understand your feelings. I come from a very humble background and while everybody would think that in these circumstances my achievements are great, for many schools who only see a small aspect of yourself, they will just think I am an average person. Internationals pay 3 times the tuition fees in the UK as well. For me its a little bit easier to get in because of that, I actually have a scholarship from my country governament so I don't get to pay anything besides flight tickets, application fees and visa procedures (in case of being accepted)... this at least in the UK because Universities care so much about money. I think that in UCL people who are funded for a PhD get paid about 1,700 pounds per month. I think its quite a fair amount of money, I lived in London with less than the half of it. Afterall I am applying to the US for the very same reasons as you. If I were to do a PhD in the UK I would end the program without money, in the US I could at least save some money to defend myself when I finish. I would have to disagree with the score on the exams, from what I have heard, many universities in the US discard applicants based on a GRE/GPA threshold but I know this happens as well in the UK based only in the grades. Lets just hope for the best.

I studied at UCL. UCL is a very good University. However If your final aim is a PhD with funding, you may not have a lot of chances to apply for the PhD there as they only provide funding for british and EU citizens. However if you want to use it as a step stone, perhaps it would be a good idea. Consider as well that a dissertation done in 1 year will make it very difficult for you to get a paper published. It is possible, it all depends on how hard you work and early you do it.

The GRE is very expensive. A reduction in the cost would be an interesting factor to see if people with low incomes can improve their scores. Yea people can say that you can improve your score if you prepare, whatever. For people who are in school or just getting out of school, they have plenty of free time and most of the time support from their parents. As you grow older and have other responsabilities, work, etc... it just becomes difficult to invest money/time on such a type of test, specially for people of countries that are very poor. Internationals for example, don't get to have fee application waivers most of the time. The whole process is a real burden. I would say that having a subject test would be a lot better, but the options to take it abroad are very limited. All this universities claim to give equal of opportunity which is not really true when they ask for tests that could be very diffucult to take for certain individuals. I think that anyone with enough time, good preparation material and of course a good level of english can obtain very good scores. However I think that native english speakers or people who have learned english since an early age will always do better, because you can read a lot faster.

If I were you I would simply dress in a way that I feel comfortable. Don't stress about it now, you have already been accepted to most programs you have applied. Just be cool. Smart casual is enough.

Oh that is really good. I did a Master at UCL and I actually could have applied to stay there for the PhD, my supervisor could have taken me. I got really ill while I was in England and that kind of affected my perception how whether or not I wanted to be there, it affected my grades as well. I decided to try this and see how it works. I am international so I also thought that living in London with a small stipend was not a good idea, because I cannot obtain support since I am a foreigner. I think its very interesting that british people apply to US universities, UK unis are pretty good. For PhD they have a very nice funding as well. I held a similar belief like yours about my experience and background.... a lot of people seem to have publications and stuff like that but you know its not always easy to have such opportunities. Hopefully the universities will evaluate us according to our background and we would still be in time to apply to programs in the UK if the feedback is no good =)

I have the feeling that internationals are not usually contacted I think. Judging from the results page. I still don't have any news... I did not even got replies from faculty before submission.

Btw guys, do you think it would be useful to retake the GRE and update the results or you think its really late on the process... I had predicted that I was going to retake it on Feb 8 but I couldn't do it because I have been going to job interviews and one of the processes was already finishing. I was afraid that if I got hired I was going to be able to go take the test as there are no weekends available in my area.

Interesting. I actually applied to the Engineering Sciences Materials track, now I am terrified. The applied physics program has two acceptances in the results webpage, but it doesn't say if they're in the materials track. How the people you know found out about the decision?

No man I haven't. I actually attempted to contact 5 POI from there although I could only mention 3. I actually had like 10 people who interested me there. None of the ones I tried to contact gave me a reply. It seems based on the results page that feedback usually comes in feb/march. There is only a few entries though. I also think that people could report their results as applied physics or engineering sciences, so its hard to know. I was very interested in this program because you could take courses in different fields, very broad. I am a bit scared to e-mail or phone them to ask. Did you had an interview or anything?

Well I think its hard to say if someone is more qualified so don't get down. Did this person has any news? You know document, sometimes people have better grades or past work that maybe could make them look more attractive to their programs. However I think that in a PhD the results will be based on personal qualities, like enthusiasm and creativity. I also think that being lucky is very important in science too. It seems that decisions in the admissions committees can be quite subjective too. Lets be optimistic for now. In the worst scenario we can always improve and become better. The results page can give us an idea of how other people is doing. I think we will be ok and also your GRE its a good score. Mine is lower.

Well no news for me so far, how do you do people? Metalgirl from which uni are you?

Yea it seems it depends on the the faculty. Many people say that top universities are really rich and they don't care about it. Other say that it does because it helps them to prepare financial packages for other students. Well yea I bet it will help.

Hi man, you have given me a lot of hope. I have 66% V and 60%Q and 3.5W I actually just applied to top programs. I wanted to provide the studies with my own funding and thus I chose high ranked universities since it would be easier to get full external supports from sponsors of my country. I applied to Harvard, Caltech, Johns Hopkins and Columbia. Everything for materials. Overall I did considerable well in the undergrad. I did a very broad engineering course, which had a very low admission rate. I finished the course in 4 years instead of 5 and was in the top 5% of the class, so I was the first to finish from my cohort. While I was studying I also got 3 diplomas ( one from technical studies that I did for 1 year and 2 normal diplomas for 1 month long courses). I also did an internship at a local research center doing a robot which I used as a thesis project and got a the highest score possible. Later I had a small participation in a energy research group from my University but I didn't get any publication, just assisted with some work and read a lot of papers and summarized the information for them. I also had an entrepreneur project and got a double international certification for it, unfortunately I had to shutdown the company because its members had different plans. Later did a Master in one of the top 4 UK unis with full funding scholarship, got a bit ill during the course so some grades were just ok and the rest were merits or dinstinctions... my thesis got a dinstinction and I am very proud to have results that by far surpassed everything found in the literature. I have got no publications or patents but I am planning to speak with my previous supervisor to get the work published and patented depending on what should we start doing first. My recommendations were by one deputy from my bachelor, one researcher and from the UK the department director and my supersivor, both of these guys are pretty important in the UK. I don't have working experience, I had been working since childhood in a familiar business. I am going to be hired at General Electric but my real goal is to get a PhD position. I have a lot of research plans that I would like to try to develop but I don't have money so I depend on universities and sponsors. I actually regret a lot now that I did not try to resit the GRE but all the money I used to make the applications was lended to me by my brother. I felt very embarassed to ask him for more. I am quite worried that my applications should get just filtered just because of the scores, I have felt that I have done a lot of work to get to where I am. I could probably resit the exam soon but I don't know if I could send any result on time at this point. So far I have not heard from any program and I did not get reply from most professors I emailed. I am an international so I don't get interviews, I am a really worried and stressed right now. I am really hoping that the project is really holistic and get an acceptance, I don't want to let down all the people who have supported me.

Oh well we are all striving for something. Well I did Mechatronics engineering. I was worried the other way around, that the fact that I am not a chemist or a material engineer will affect me. I did have a very broad formation and I had around 5 related to materials science during my undergrad. I also have a master in material science in the UK. I got a reply from a program at Imperial College London and I was told that I was not a competitive student based on my qualifications, so rude. I just hope that people in other unis are not so closed on what they want.

I know there is free material but then again this isn't about my case, I only prepared myself with free material. It is really that the results for the GRE clearly shows that certain populations are favoured. Unless certain groups of human beings are more intelligent. I don't believe that, they could be more prepared though.The point is that the GRE is not a good indicator. People anywhere who want to make doctoral studies would like to go to a good university if possible. Many institutions offer scholarships besides Universities that can help people to pursue studies and if anyone can have this opportunity, why not take it. On the other hand these "Universities" that claim that their programs are orientated to people from any background, etc... they use a general exam that is not really general. Maybe I am not explaining things correctly but I hope you get what I am trying to say. About universities in my country, most of them don't require the GRE. Although some do it, specially to satisfy certain qualifications. The rest of the admissions requirements are all the same, usually universities have their own version of a GRE exam but it more descriptive in all the questions. Also I don't think these exams are any better, they're just more descriptive because of the nature of the language, these local universities don't face the situation of having international applicants as well.

You are right. However for some of us, specially students who are from developing countries its a real tough exam. It is very expensive, the material is very expensive and many of us have to work and study. Of course people on countries like the US, UK, Germany, etc.. the material can be quite cheap, but for countries in south america, africa and asia it can be really an economical burden. And of course our logic also works based on your language, the way we structure information changes a lot. While the exam may reflect work, it doesn't reflect the ability of to student to do research and academic work. I am an engineering student and I can take upon very advanced math but in the GRE seriously sometimes I can struggle to see what they want me to calculate. When I took the GRE for the first time I had been reading papers almost dialy for about a year and to be honest nobody writes like this in scientific journals.

Hi guys, I am an international student. I was wondering according to your experiences or what you have read. ¿Do external fellowships/scholarships help to get acceptances from Universities into PhD programs? I know that in the UK, having an external fellowship or being rich is the only way to get into a program when you're not from the UE, I am really asking in the context of the US. I have been told by a few people that top ranking programs/universities in the US don't take into account this for their admissions, however I looked at the webpage of SEAS Harvard and they actually mention that they rely on students bringing external fellowships to be able to offer complete support for their acceptances. ¿What do you guys think?

Being humble is a great virtue that not a lot of people seem to have today! Anyway for applying you only need to pay the application fee, it doesn't mean that we will get accepted or better in anyway (but I do hope we get accepted or at least I, just kidding). It's been really tough for everyone I guess, I had a very good research proposal but I did not want to submit it, I am a bit afraid of plagiarism I have put a lot of thought into that but then later I think, oh maybe that would have given me a real boost. At this point we can't do anything but to hope for the best, it is indeed a crucial decision for us, it may represent 5 years of our life.

Hi guys, I applied to Materials Sc. PhD in Harvard, Caltech and Columbia. I haven't had any news from any of them so far. My GRE was quite average, I don't know if that will affect. I was hoping to compensate with the other fields which in my opinion were good. Everything it's been a mystery so far for me, I am an international student so apparently I don't get to be interviewed and thus the mystery increases... I am really nervous this application process took a lot of money from me.