darksteam

The wait is over

@pudgySaw one acceptance posted on the GradCafe survey

It is mid of January already and I have not received any interviews requests from my applied schools. Should I consider this silent rejects? I know that 10+ years ago most applicants went into the CS PhD programs without interviews because the video call technology was not common as today's. Hence, I wonder if there were applicants accepted into the Computer Science PhD programs without interviews in the recent years?

Me too !!!

From my experience applying "top schools" CS Masters for Fall 2015 and 2016 programs, I believe that the most significant factor is the research/paper/publication you have done during in your undergraduate years. Then follow by SOP, GRE, GPA, resume and etc. What I believe personally is that most of the top schools want their Masters students to continue their research and interest areas from the undergraduate years, not counting from zero. If you change your interest or research areas from your undergraduate years, your chance of being accepted is quite low. But if you have a very high GPA and GRE score and quite good essay, that could compensate. Nevertheless, if you are not applying for top school, the research/paper/publication during the undergraduate years might not have a major effect on the decision.

I have received the email from USC Viterbi. "Statements of Intent to enroll in the fall 2016 semester, which begins August 22nd , 2016, should then be submitted as soon as possible and no later than July 1, 2016. Please note that the Viterbi School of Engineering does not require a commitment deposit." Hope this information helps some people.

I emailed USC about 3 days ago but no response yet.

I am admitted to USC master of science in computer science. Does anyone know that what is the deadline to submit the statement of intent since I'm waiting for Northwestern MS CS result but it seems to be very late.

Yeah, I applied for MS in Computer Science at UMass. I'm also nervous right now because I haven't heard back from them and it seems that some people have been accepted to this program already.

Wish there will be good news for us. Alert! SPIRE Downtime February 17, 2016 SPIRE will be down for maintenanceFriday, February 19th beginning at 5:15 p.m. and will be available again Saturday morning by 9 a.m.Please note transcripts cannot be processed during this time.

I have encountered this problem too. In the FAQ it says we should do so. However, when I submitted my application to the program, I received an email with " PLEASE DO NOT MAIL YOUR OFFICIAL TRANSCRIPTS UNLESS WE CONTACT YOU TO DO SO. " Nevertheless, before I submitted the application, I had sent the official transcript to the school already because I read from the FAQ that suggested me to do so. And, from the Stanford application portal website, my official transcript status is still "Received (Not Official)."

As far as I know, most schools do not allow the uploaded documents to be updated after the application is submitted. However, I found out that, there are a few schools that urge the students to submit their applications as fast as possible and let the students update the documents later. If I remember correctly, USC is one of that. I think if you cannot login to the application form to update your documents, you should contact the admission office and ask them case by case, depends on the school. Wish you luck.

I'm wondering that is it okay that test score sending from ETS arrives after the deadline of the application ? My credit card runs out of cash limit so I have to wait for today to send those score. But most of the deadline are Dec 9th and 15th. I'm afraid that the score will not arrive in time of the deadline Thank you.

I don't think it is a problem at all. When I asked my manager and my professor to write LoRs for me, they requested my documents such as my SOP, Resume, and Transcript. Moreover, it is their right to copy and write anything in the LoRs. You cannot stop them to not coping your sentence(s) in the SOP "unless" you are in the process of writing the LoRs.

Hi Akurniawan, First, do not take my comments seriously. I haven't been successful in applying into Graduate schools yet. I think your SOP is quite good. But I think you should add some specific details and examples such as your projects during your time at school or at work. I think those examples and details would back you up firmly that you really have knowledge in that field (Machine Learning). In addition, make sure that your essay contains no grammatical error ( that doesn’t has a brain ). Find an educated native speaker to check your essay. Good luck.

Hello Yurens, I think you should send the 2nd score report because you improved both Q and V parts.

I have seen that UIUC CS offers two different masters program. The first one is Master of Science (MS) and the second one is Professional Master's program (MCS). Anyway, both programs look nice to me since I don't want to pursue Ph.D. I have heard that the MS at UIUC CS is very competitive. Is there anyone knows about the acceptance rate of MCS at UIUC CS ? Is it a lot competitive like the MS ? and what are the cursory profiles of students who got admitted to MCS ? Thank you in advance.

Sorry serpentina02, I cannot help you either. I have taken GRE 3 times already. One in the last year and two times in the past 2 months. I would say that, if you want to improve your math score, you have to do a lot of math problems. In my opinion, the Manhattan prep's math part is quite difficult. I got only about 160 on quantitative part on Manhattan's online practice. In the real test, I got 170, 164, 168 on Quantitative part (for the 2nd time I didn't read math because I was too incautious). I would say that doing math exercise is very crucial to improve the scores. Moreover, you have to study the proper ways to solve each problems (time is important). Hope this can help.

Last year I took the GRE test on Sep 23, and I had planned to retake it again in late October. However, I did not have a chance to retake the GRE. There were still a lot of things to consider such as the SOP, Resume, LoR, and TOEFL (if you are an international student like me). Hence, I suggest that you should take the GRE first time as soon as possible, if money is not your problem, to know how the test and the test environment are. You can use this information to prepare you for the test. Also, you need to wait for three weeks to retake the GRE again. By the way, last year I submitted all of my applications quite late (almost on the deadline on mid December) and the results are not good. Since I have heard that some programs have limited seats. In my opinion, you should not submit the applications no later than November.

In my opinion, I found out that GRE Q part was just about the tricks. You just have to remember the tips from the Quantitative questions pool. Moreover, the solution of each answer will be quite simple but tricky. If you use some advance math knowledge to solve this problem, you have to be careful about the answer. Also, the answers are very tricky. Especially the A B comparison questions.

In my GRE test last year, there was a question and the answers began with different articles. So, for example, the answers will look like this. 1. an apple 2. a bear 3. a cat 4. an orange . . . . . They won't reveal the correct answer just by article. We can't outsmart ETS on the GRE.

I'm going to have a GRE Test on this Aug 4th, but I haven't finished the advanced decks yet (All of common and basic decks are done). So I have questions for anyone who used the Magoosh GRE Flashcards that should I start Advanced decks right now or just concentrate only the common and basic decks due to the limited time (2 weeks left before the test). Thank you in advance.

Dear kantrohit, I just want to share my CS Master "reject" experience with you. Hope this will help you evaluate your scores whether they need improvement or not. Last year I applied for 7 top CS schools in the US. All of them rejected me. They are Stanford, CMU, UW-Madison, UMich, Princeton, UCSD, Columbia. I got TOEFL 100: (Reading:29, Listening:23, Speaking:23, Writing 25) GRE : Q170, V150, AW3.0 My GPA: 3.5/4.0 (from top university in Thailand) However, my LoRs were sent very late (by the end of LoRs deadlines which were 1-3 months after my application deadline). Also, I submitted all my applications very late (about 1 week before the application deadlines). My SOP was moderate (I guess). So this year I will apply for Fall 2016 with better SOP and better scores on GRE and TOEFL (Fingers cross). There are a lot of factors which might or might not affect my applications. Hope this will help you.

Thank you shinigamiasuka and adamski.

Hello nadiali, Can you give more detail about your background ?