milestails

Follow up to my last post. Great news! I got accepted to two PhD programs, Stony Brook University (with a $28,500 stipend) and University of Florida (with a $23,008 stipend). GPA: 2.93. And Stony Brook says it has a 3.0 minimum GPA requirement. \:p I got rejected from one (Penn State) and am waiting to hear back from the last two.

I'm applying to a range of programs in terms of program rankings. The decision is based more on fit and what my advisors recommended. I know they have ties to some of these universities, so that may play out favorably. I'm interested in computational chemistry, physical chemistry, biophysics, whatever you would like to call it. (no one knows what title to call themselves in my lab. one of them was like, "I'm a scientist who is currently studying solvation models") Major in Chemistry, specialty is 'Biological,' minor in Applied Mathematics and Statistics. My GPA is 2.93, major GPA is 2.91. Last 60 hours is 3.36, though that includes a lot of general education requirements and 6 credits of research (they always give A's, I'm not sure if this bs-ing will be apparent). GRE is 158V (79th), 157Q (68th), 4.0AW (56th). I wish I had retaken it, but it was $200. I had a headache the day I took it, and I was just going through the math section too slowly. I feel like I know the stuff, I just wasn't feeling up to the pace at the time. I have two years of research experience in two labs, I can code in C and Python, and I got an A- in a graduate course at my university (which I mentioned in my SOP, and the professor of that course is writing one of my LoC's). My name is also on two publications, though admittedly my role in those was pretty minimal. Some of my data was published in the supplementary info, that is. I know none of what I just said is the most impressive, but it's something. I'm applying to Penn State (Chemistry graduate program ranking is #21), University of Minnesota (#24), University of Florida (#35), SUNY Stony Brook (#56), and Rutgers New Brunswick (#60). Does it help at all if you apply to a graduate program to the school you attended as an undergraduate? Do they favor those applicants at all, even in the slightest?