Edotdl

Ruby red

Columbia? My experience as an Amgen scholar was also great, sorry that you didn't enjoy yours. A new location was a big part of it though.

Technically it's not an official transcript. However, for schools that ask for transcripts to be submitted online they are usually looking for a scan of an official transcript versus say an unofficial copy downloaded from the website.

Since you only worked in 2 labs, it's impossible to get 3 research recs; you might as well stop worrying about it. The only thing you can do now is find the best third rec and it sounds like your academic advisor fits that bill well. Good luck.

Except the worst is applications that let you edit after you submit... ><

Any reason you're using two LORs from professors you took classes with (as opposed to research advisors), since DWIC letters are generally not as helpful/weighted less. Just curious.

I also put the wrong registration number for 2 applications, so I emailed the programs. No response yet.

Just submitted all my apps today. I'm kinda more nervous now that maybe I made some mistake in my apps that will get me auto-rejected.....paranoia at it's finest.

Your scores are around the average for accepted students to top 10 programs. I'd say you'd be competive at top teir schools and a good chance at slightly lower schools. Also your undergrad school might affect how your GPA is interpreted and how much weight is put on the GRE.

How long should it be? I'm having a hard time writing more than like 400 words...

Maybe mine was just longer but 1000 words was just slightly shorter than 2 pages single spaced, but calling is probably a good choice if you're worried.

If you don't get a response I'd go with the one on the online application

I was just wondering if people knew how much the personal statement affects admission decisions for Berkeley or whether it's just used for (diversity) fellowships. Thanks.

Any idea when we'll hear back about the actual time?

I'd guess more applicants but it's impossible to know for sure.

Just heard back about first round of interviews.

I'm a bit worried about my GPA trend. I am applying to phd programs this fall for Fall 2016 admissions. I transferred to my current institution last year and obtained a 4.0 first semester and a 3.8 second semester (I had a 4.0 at my old school, if that makes a difference). I'm not sure how well I'm going to do this semester, hopefully in the 3.8-4.0 range still but I've been pretty busy juggling classes and applications. I was wondering how much these trends really matter given that they are still relatively high and that most schools will not see this semester's grade (ie they just see 4.0->3.8 and not a continued fall, in the worse case scenario). Maybe looking for some confirmation that I'll be fine or some motivation to work harder, either would be fine.

Just some general comments: 1) Some of your sentences have awkward phrasing. Are you are an international student? 2) You don't really talk about what specifically you want to do in grad school.

That GPA is probably below the average accepted GPA at top 10 programs, hence the qualifier 'low'.

Attachment doesn't seem to work, at least for me.

Assuming your papers are high quality that should outweight your relatively low gpa and gre. Without more descriptive research experience it's hard to judge. You would most likely not be automatically rejected at any schools though

Most of my programs actually asked me to report my GPA on a 4.0 scale so I converted as I explained above. If you're really worried, you could always just email the school, but generally I don't think it'll change your GPA too much (if you have a 4.3, I'm sorry for your loss). It's not like you're subtracting 0.3 or anything.

Generally to convert to a 4.0 scale from a 4.3 you just count the A+'s as A's. So if you only got A's then you'd have a 4.0/4.0. However, if you have half A+'s and half A-'s, it would then be a 3.85/4.00. Hopefully that makes sense. All other grades stay the same, so you would not scale by 4/4.3.

Thanks for sharing, I'm also interested in cognitive/computational neuro. Out of curiousity, how long have you been working there? Seems like you were able to accomplish a lot.

I'm not sure how common it it is in PolySci but I'd assume that if your institution/program is fairly well known the adcoms should know whether or not it's a 3 or 4 year program. Coming from engineering, although I'm also graduating in 3 years, it would feel strange emphasizing that my engineering degree is 4 years. In regards to whether it helps, I'd presume that given everything else equal it may tip things in your favor but would not help compared to actually having more experience.