Edotdl

Official MIT BCS interview invite!

Official MIT BCS interview invite!

I wouldn't lose all hope. As I posted before, my friend told me his former UCSF PI said BMS invites would come out Dec 18th. The PI is in immuno so maybe, immuno invites are coming out a bit later?

I don't know how common it is for UChicago, but I got several fee waivers from various places this semester. I ended up not using any of them, but if you're somewhat interested in the program and have professors you want to work with I don't see why you wouldn't apply.

True, if you're really worried you can always ask, but I don't think it'll really affect the decision.

I feel like it depends on the school, I'm sure there are at least some that do and it might depend on how many applications they get. However, I feel like if they did have hard cutoffs they would not be that high, maybe like a 2.5.

I feel like it depends on the school, I'm sure there are at least some that do and it might depend on how many applications they get. However, I feel like if they did have hard cutoffs they would not be that high, maybe like a 2.5.

Thank you for that reminder.
One of my friends who sat on the Michigan committee literally told me the same thing - to ignore people that have so far posted they have interviews. It apparently happens every year. It's this website's version of trolling. 
Hence, why I'd like people to consider not posting that they received interviews on this thread, and rather make a new topic like INTERVIEW RESULTS or INVITES or something.
Because the spam that occurs when someone posts "I GOT AN INTERVIEW FROM X" followed by 2 pages of "CONGRATS!" and "WHAT, THEY ALREADY SENT OUT INVITES, I DIDN'T GET ONE! AM I REJECTED!?" is really annoying when this whole post is about people's stats and where they finally got into, as an easier method of searching the survey results. I'm not about reading 130 pages of posts like I had to last year, that was filled with off-topic discussion. 
I, for one, will probably just post all my interview invites in batches, starting in January. I'd hope people can consider doing the same thing, and not plaguing the rest with anxiety attacks. 

Although I don't necessarily agree with some of the other things you wrote, I feel like there is some essence of truth here. It is difficult to compare GPAs from two different schools let alone infer what they say about their respective students. However, I believe most people would believe that getting a perfect GPA at MIT is likely harder than at <insert large state school>. That being said, it really bothers me when people claim that they're getting a 3.2 because they go to an elite school and there's grade deflation and they could go to a state school and get a 4.0. Besides the problem of generalizing all state schools, I believe most people magnify the difference in grading. Additionally, instead of thinking about how much your GPA would rise if you went to an easier school, we can think about the converse. Do you think it's likely that your GPA will drop by 0.8 if you transfer from a state school to a top school? Well I was in that position and I thought about it a lot, since as you mention it is a big deal to grad school applications. Result? It dropped by 0.06. This may be a bit unique but the other people I know who transferred from state schools and even community colleges only dropped by around 0.5. Also worth mentioning is the law of diminishing returns with grades. In my opinion a drop from 4.0->3.5 is very different than a 3.5->3.0 since the work required to get from one to the other is not the same in the two cases, generally.

Although I don't necessarily agree with some of the other things you wrote, I feel like there is some essence of truth here. It is difficult to compare GPAs from two different schools let alone infer what they say about their respective students. However, I believe most people would believe that getting a perfect GPA at MIT is likely harder than at <insert large state school>. That being said, it really bothers me when people claim that they're getting a 3.2 because they go to an elite school and there's grade deflation and they could go to a state school and get a 4.0. Besides the problem of generalizing all state schools, I believe most people magnify the difference in grading. Additionally, instead of thinking about how much your GPA would rise if you went to an easier school, we can think about the converse. Do you think it's likely that your GPA will drop by 0.8 if you transfer from a state school to a top school? Well I was in that position and I thought about it a lot, since as you mention it is a big deal to grad school applications. Result? It dropped by 0.06. This may be a bit unique but the other people I know who transferred from state schools and even community colleges only dropped by around 0.5. Also worth mentioning is the law of diminishing returns with grades. In my opinion a drop from 4.0->3.5 is very different than a 3.5->3.0 since the work required to get from one to the other is not the same in the two cases, generally.

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

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.

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.

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.

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.