vnatch

Well in any case, do you think it would be appropriate to email the programs I am considering to ask them how necessary P Chem is? The truth is that I am just too bored by physics to take it (and I'd much rather fill up that time slot with a more applicable or interesting bio class), but I'm not sure if I should state that in the email lol. I may just say something like my schedule conflicting with the time slot for that course. Either way, it is acceptable to email programs to ask about this, right?

Hello, I'm currently a junior, and I'm trying to organize my grad school list (i'm trying to get into a decent PhD program) and the coursework I need to complete before graduating. My main question is: since I'll be turning in all of my applications during the fall of my senior year, do grad schools somehow check on my grades for these last two semesters? I'm not sure how they would do this, unless they ask for copies of my transcript after fall semester is over. The reason why I'm asking is that I'm basically done with my biology major, and I'm now thinking about picking up a second major in Statistics. It would only require 5 additional classes, which I could definitely knock out during my fourth year. My concern is that, while I do enjoy stats, I'm inherently much better at bio than stat. I'm not saying my grades will be awful, but they might drop my GPA a bit. I like stat, but if my worse grades in those classes could compromise my chances of getting into a good PhD program then I'd rather not risk it. Does anyone have any thoughts on this?

Hello, I was wondering about the importance of undergrad classes that may be considered as "prereqs" for many molecular/cell bio grad school programs. I'm currently a third year student, and as most of my undergrad degree requirements are complete, I can focus on lots of fun bio electives to take. However, after browsing through the websites of some grad programs I'm interested in applying to, most of them casually list areas of coursework that are recommended for me to have taken before starting their program. I was wondering, is this list just some suggestive coursework or is it more mandatory? In my case, I was very surprised when I saw that most programs I'm applying to list Physical Chemistry as suggested coursework. I absolutely hate physics and I only really like chemistry because of the applications it has for bio, so naturally the thought of taking a chemistry course through the lens of a physicist is terrifying. It also seems rather unhelpful in terms of strengthening the knowledge I will need for bio grad programs. I guess my question is, will my chances of getting into programs be reduced if I opt out of P Chem? Or is their coursework merely a suggestion that doesn't actually hold much importance in the admissions process?

Hello, I've been researching lots of grad schools to find good cell/dev bio programs, and there were a few instances where I came across professors whose lab pages/directories said "School of Medicine". I'm not too sure what the difference is between this and the school's generic cell/molecular biology department, could someone explain this? I have heard of some people applying to PhD programs in medical schools, but I always assumed this was more for people geared towards research that had a pretty direct relationship with medicine and/or clinical work. For example, if I apply to a school's Biology graduate program, would I be able to work under a professor if he/she is doing work in the School of Medicine? I would like to know this ahead of time, both so I know who I can work with and who I can't, and also so I don't sound uninformed in my SOP for these schools. Thanks

I am trying to put together a finalized list of the schools whose PhD programs I want to apply to, and I had a question pertaining to LORs. I already know two professors who I think will write me a decent one, but for my third rec letter I have a choice between two old professors. In terms of the quality of the letter and how well they know me, I would say that they are about equal, so I'm having some trouble deciding who I want to write it. I've been looking into their backgrounds and how well they are known in their fields, and it led me to ask this question: how much weight would it carry if the professor writing my letter got his degree from a school I am applying to? In my case, one of the professors got his PhD from U Kansas while the other got his degree from MIT (where I will be applying). Would MIT look more favorably on a letter by an alum and possibly increase my chances of getting in? I would be really interested in hearing some other opinions on this!

Thanks for all the input. Since posting this, I decided to just try and look at some programs/articles online to see what I would find. I quickly realized that I was very wrong with the "i'm interested in everything" mentality. I've been reading tons of papers, and I seem to be most interested in the ones concerning the molecular genetics and cell biology of development. I will obviously continue reading and honing my interests, but do you think this level of specificity is enough for me to write my applications? I've been noticing that, within the field of "development", I can easily pinpoint which areas I DON'T like, but its harder for me to get really excited about one specific issue (I usually find a variety of articles interesting). For example, after my research I can definitively say that I am NOT interested in: plant development, microbiology, Chromatin/maintenance of DNA, and development of the nervous system. However, the things I was most interested in seem to be diverse (e.g. stem cell differentiation, signal transduction, circadian rhythms, protein regulation and expression, etc.). I suppose my difficulty now is in writing an SOP that can tie all of these things in together. My goal for the SOP is to be able to say "My general interest is in post-fertilization development, and specifically my interests are over a range of different research areas". Ideally, I want to be broad enough to raise my chances of any lab accepting me, but specific enough so that I sound like I've done my research and would be a good fit for the school.

Thanks for the input. I see what both of you mean, but I suppose my followup question would be: do people really have goals and interests that are that specific? It may sound corny, but when I said that I love all molecular bio, what I meant was that I think I would be able to pick many different projects and be equally happy with all of them. What really draws me to research in general is the problem-solving aspect of it, it fascinates me that people can find out so much that they can't see or directly observe just by using standard molecular tools and putting pieces of a puzzle together. So no matter what it is (with certain limits), I feel like I would love anything if I delve deep enough into it. With this mentality in mind, it confuses me that some people actually think "The one thing that truly interests me more than anything else is apple genetics (or whatever)". If its true that everyone else applying is this specific in their interests, it worries me slightly that my interests are much broader. As peachypie said, it might make for a weak SOP. Do you or anyone else have any pointers on how I could combat this? I suppose the most accurate thing for me to portray in my SOP is that I am passionate enough in general biology that I will love almost any specific research topic once I delve in. Obviously, when applying to schools I will first pick a lab that strikes me as the most interesting, but it would be wrong of me to write as if my sole purpose in applying is to studying that one topic. Again, I'd love some feedback.

Hello, I am a junior undergrad (majoring in biology) and I am very interested in pursuing a PhD program once I graduate. I have already done quite a bit of research on which schools to apply to, but I am a bit overwhelmed and not sure how to properly choose schools. My plan was to follow the same strategy as for undergrad, choosing a few "reach" schools, a few matches and a few safeties. However, I'm realizing that it won't be as easy to do the same for grad programs. No PhD programs show mean GRE scores or undergraduate GPAs, or even what percentage of students are accepted, so I have no idea where I stand in applications. All of the sites I read advise me to just apply to programs which are a good fit, but I'm not quite sure what that means. All that I know for sure is that I want to live in/near a major city (I've narrowed my options to San Francisco, New York, Philadelphia, or Boston). In terms of program requirements, I honestly love all aspects of molecular/cell bio, so after researching a bunch of schools, I could see myself getting excited about being a part of any molecular bio program. Since I'm not so picky about the program or the place where I end up, the only thing that has been attracting me to certain programs and not others is the prestige/rank of the school. So I already have a pretty huge list of top-tier schools I want to apply to, but the lower-ranked schools don't get me as excited, and frankly they all start to look the same to me after a while. Of course, I'm not even sure when to draw the line for "top-tier" or "safety", since no schools provide that info. So my main question is: how do people tell which schools are safety and which are a reach? It'd be great if I could get some feedback on schools that would be a pretty good match in terms of competitiveness, and to see which of my schools may be too much of a reach, so here's some info about my academics: By next year I will have graduated from the University of Virginia with a BS in Biology (as part of the Distinguished Majors Program) and possibly with a second degree in Biostatistics. My GPA is around a 3.85, and almost all of my classes have been math or science related. By the time I graduate, I will have been involved with Independent Research in molecular biology for 5 semesters (as well as some time spent over the summer). I just started undertaking my own project in my lab, and my professor says it may be good enough for publication if it works--so I may or may not have a publication under my belt by the time I'm applying to grad schools. I haven't taken my GREs yet so I'm not sure exactly where i stand in that aspect. With this in mind, some of the schools I'm very interested in are: Stanford, UC Berkeley, UC San Francisco, U Penn, Columbia, U Chicago, NYU, Boston U. Like I said before, any opinions or advice would be greatly appreciated!