fernandes

Hi @Microbio, 
I am not in the Biosciences field, but I believe that this should apply to any field. Having publications, in general, is a really good thing if you are applying to a Ph.D. program at any university since it shows that you have had concrete research experience in the past. I don't think that changing your research focus for your Ph.D. would be a problem, but you should provide the university with an explanation of why you want to change your focus area. This can be done when writing your statement of purpose. I believe that all of the skills that you have learned in the other field within biology are somehow transferable to this new field, so it should still have a positive impact in your application.
Hope this helps.

Well, I promised myself if I ever got into grad school I would post on gradcafe to help others out there that are trying to as well. Hopefully this information inspires you to pursue your dream of becoming an SLP.  
Back story: When I was younger, I was diagnosed with a learning disability (auditory and visual processing). I always had to try harder in school than the average student. I went to community college after high school because I wasn't sure what I wanted to do. I always had a liking working with kids. In the back of my mind, I always knew I wanted to be a teacher, but I hated subjects so I wasn't sure how that was going to work out lol. After researching Speech Pathology, I realized I wanted to be an SLP. I observed a few SLPs before I made the decision to transfer to a University and pursue a Bachelors degree in Speech Pathology. I was only accepted into one school in California because my cumulative GPA was a 2.6 (did I mention I HATE subject courses). After two grueling years pursuing a Bachelors degree in Speech, I managed to graduate with a 3.7 CDS GPA and 3.2 cumulative GPA. During the two year program, I had the WORST faculty. They were not supportive at all and had their favorites. It was terrible and I am so glad I am not going there for grad school. 
Ok, so this is how I got into grad school: 
I worked my ass off during my two year undergrad program by volunteering at a school (classroom and SLP), hospital (child life department), NSSLHA events, reading program, and an aphasia support group. I applied to three grad school programs my senior year, scored extremely low on the GRE and didn't get accepted. I even applied to my undergrad summer SLPA program and didn't get accepted. I knew I had to take a gap year and work in a related field. After I graduated, I worked as a behavioral therapist. It has almost been a year now since I started, and honestly, it was the best idea. It reassured me that I was meant to work with kids and become a therapist. I don't necessarily love ABA, since I have long in-home therapy sessions, but I believe this experience helped me get into grad school. I applied to 12 schools this time. I retook the GRE and scored a little higher, but still low. V:140, Q:145, A: 3.5.  I researched literally every single program on ASHA edfind with low GPA and GRE scores. Also, I rewrote my letter of intent and had it proof read from sooo many people. I was determined to get in. I ended up being accepted into one school, waitlisted for 3 schools and rejected from the rest. The school that I was accepted to is literally my number 1 choice. I was in shock. I finally did it. 
So what I am trying to say here is that, YOU CAN DO IT. Don't give up. If you really want it, you will make it happen. If you have any other questions, please feel free to ask me! Grad cafe really helped me research my schools and kept me up to date on the grad school process. I am so thankful for all the support on here. 
 

Hi @Howyoung, 
I am just sending you this message because I don't want you to be waiting forever for people to respond to your question. 
I believe that the best you can do right now is:
Check the universities' websites and see what faculty members are working on, and if you see yourself doing anything similar; Once you find a faculty member that you might be interested in working with, shoot an email to their current/previous graduate students and ask about their experience working with that professor. Finding a good adviser is one of the most important things in graduate school; About the schools' reputation, I am not capable of helping you, but you can certainly find online rankings that will help you make a more educated decision. Hope this helps.

Hey @CivilTwilight, welcome to the forum.
I will try to answer some of your questions, since I have just gone through grad school admission processes. Before applying, I tried to get as much information as I could and I ended up coming to the conclusion that MS students are hardly funded during their programs, except if you get admitted to top-tier ivy league schools. I have not applied to top 5 schools in my field because I tried to be realistic about my application and I was not willing to just throw away my application fee into a school that I would probably not be accepted.
2) I think that my first paragraph almost says enough about this question, but there are a few more things. While I was looking up schools and programs I have come to the conclusion that only a few schools will allow their MS students to work as a TA/RA for the school. And usually the schools which offer that are much harder to get in, since they are really well ranked and receive tons of applications per term. So I would say that, unless the school's website explicitly say that MS students are eligible to RA/TAships, you should not count on that option.
3) It really depends on the school you've applied to. Two examples: I have been admitted to a PhD program in February - that's when I got the admittance letter - and only received funding information in April. I had to email professors and RA/TA coordinators to check if they would have any funding for me. I was also admitted to a PhD program in April and I received funding information along with the offer letter. So, again, it really depends on the school/program you're applying to.
I hope I could help. I couldn't help more, since I have applied to 8 PhD programs and 1 MS program, but let me know if you need anything else.

Finally graduated from college!! Now I'm excited about starting grad school in August!

Finally graduated from college!! Now I'm excited about starting grad school in August!

Finally graduated from college!! Now I'm excited about starting grad school in August!

Our research group had a PhD student in the middle of a project, and my advisor brought back all of these rocks from Australia. Cost thousands of dollars to go collect them and ship them back. He told the PhD student to run some geochemical tests on the rocks... which requires the rocks to be crushed into a fine powder. 
In the middle of a large research meeting, it came out that he had crushed the entire rock. Now anyone im science knows that you don't use the entirety of your sample to run one test, when you have lots more tests to run. (lol) He didn't do this for one rock... he did this for all of the rocks. Every single one. Gone. Forever. Thousands upon thousands of dollars ground up into dusty powder... No billets, no thin sections, no nothing. So it became a running joke throughout our research group that you couldn't really be doing too bad so long as you hadn't crushed all the rocks.
So Fuzzy, just try not to crush all the rocks. 

@hippyscientist I successfully got my visa last week. How did yours go?

I have no experience on this topic and really can't help you out, but I wanted to send you a message to wish you the best. I hope other users can give you some advice.

Hi Virtua!
1. I found universities with funded graduate positions by looking at the university webpages. Usually, the department webpage will have some information about funding. If it's not on the department webpage, you might be able to find it from the Graduate Office webpage. If there is no information available at all, then I would contact the appropriate person from the department contact list. You should always check but generally Masters programs are not funded in the US and PhD programs are funded. But this is just a generalization.
2. This is a good question---sometimes the department commits to funding students but you can only work with professors that have funding because the professor needs to provide a part of this funding. The best way to find out is to email the professor and ask them if they have funding for a student in Fall 2017 (or whatever year you will be applying). In this email, you should be very brief, but basically indicate that you are interested in applying to their school and working with them on topic X, and you would like to know if they have spots for students.
3. Yes, it takes a lot of time to research schools and email professors. But you should not be emailing every professor. The goal is to identify a few professors with matching research interests and apply to those professors specifically. 
When I applied, I also applied to 8 universities and I probably spent over $1000 in total for applications---my transcripts (from 3 schools) cost money, the GREs (both subject and general) cost money, the GRE score reports cost money and the application fee itself was about $100 per school! This is a lot of money so I put a lot of hours in researching and emailing professors ahead of time to ensure that this is money well spent. In the end, I would estimate that I spent a total of 150-200 hours in the months** leading up to applications thinking about which schools to apply to, including things like carefully researching schools to make a shortlist of 15-20 schools, then consulting with various professors I knew to narrow that down to 8, then reading up on each professor to make sure our research interests overlapped and then finally emailing them to make sure that if I am spending $100+ to apply there, if I get accepted, there would be something interesting for me to work on.
(** I was in a MSc program while applying to PhD schools, so I basically put aside the equivalent of one work day (8-10 hours) per week starting in July to think about where to apply. In the fall, there was a short period where I basically got very little work done on my MSc projects because I was basically full-time working on applications. My MSc advisor was okay with this and even encouraged me because my advisor is a good person and great mentor who wanted me to get the best opportunity possible after my MSc with them.)
In addition to not wasting money to get an offer you're not interested in, spending the time to do the research to make sure you have a great fit will make your application a lot stronger and greatly improve your chances of getting a good offer!

That's great to hear! It's exciting when everything becomes more official. 

i had a professor in religious studies once. he told me that there are three types of people... those who can count, and those who can't.

I know a few international people that have successfully found jobs in the US both in industry and academia.
In academia, you don't really have to worry too much if you have a PhD because that makes you eligible for various skilled worker visas as well as temporary academic visas. Almost all universities will be willing to help you get the right immigration status---getting a job is probably harder than the immigration hassles (although I can imagine that citizens of some places might have a harder time than others).
Outside of academia, I think H1-B is the best shot and most of my friends have gone this route. The challenge is that you have to find a company that is willing to sponsor you on H1-B status. This costs them money, time and mostly importantly, there is a quota on H1-B. I think this means that companies might want to make sure you're a proven good worker before they are willing to sponsor you (since if they choose you, they can't choose someone else). Also, there is a nationwide cap on H1-B applications they will process. I think it's 65,000 per year plus an extra 20,000 for those with US masters degrees or higher. It's first come first served so you have to apply really early. I think the US Immigration fiscal year is October to October, and they open applications for the upcoming fiscal year on April 1. So, April 1 2016 was the start of the applications for the fiscal year beginning October 2017. I did a google search and found that they reached the cap of applications by April 9 2016, so there are no more H1B applications available until next year.
So, because of the very tight timeline, you generally need to be able to work in the US and convince your employer to support your H1-B petition the upcoming April. Most of my friends who go this route do so by working on F-1 OPT after graduation and use this time to find a place that will sponsor their H1-B and also to prove themselves. I remember that in another thread you were considering withdrawing early from your program---if you want to work/stay in the US, it might be better to finish your program so you can use your OPT.
All of the above is assuming you meant a post-graduation job. If you are looking for work while you are a student, then you could qualify for CPT or OPT while studying too. There are limits on how many hours you can work (20 hours per week during school year, no limit when school is not in session). Talk to your international student office to find out how to use these benefits. OPT and CPT is managed by your school, not the employer.

OK, this topic has been going on for a while now. I remember I used it before starting grad school! After three years, I thought I might give my two cents. 
Note taking: I have always been a pen-and-paper person. Yet, I decided to go laptop for grad school. Two main reasons:
You can search you notes faster. For writing papers and/or sitting for your Comps, it is always better to make your notes word-searchable. Easy to edit. If the discussion involved a reference to a book that I didn't know, it is easy to add hyperlinks/side notes to that book. Also, I would go home and add historical background (if needed), or other information I saw pertinent. A good resource was adding keywords and their definitions.  For notetaking, I use OneNote. Free and websync so you don't lose your stuff. 
Laptop: I brought to grad school a 2010 Dell mini 10''. Light, easy to use but very old and very slow. It took it half an hour to start running (even if it wasn't shut down). For my third semester I invested in a MacBook Pro and it was the best decision  I have made. First, because I have VERY GOOD campus support for Mac. Second, it is as light as my previous computer but the screen is bigger so I can actually work here (13''). Third, because Mac is SO much better for viruses. I travel a lot for research so it is nice not to worry about one thing. Pay attention to your campus offers as regards software. Most of the software I can download through my school is both for Windows and Mac, which is great. 
Software:
Bibliography– I use Zotero but because I only made a choice when I started three years ago. It was either Zotero or Endnote. Choose one and stick to it. I would suggest doing some digging -again- about support on campus. For example, when I work on campus computers, I make sure I choose one where Zotero is installed for using with a word processor. Endnote is everywhere, Zotero not so much. Like OneNote, it syncs online which is great. Writing– I recently started using Scrievener. It is a great resource for extensive writing. It has many features that you sort of discover as you use it: brianstorming, corkwall, keywords, etc. The only problem that I have with it is that there is not a good extension for bibliographic managers. But I will definitely write my dissertation here. SO MUCH BETTER than word. You can try it out for free for 30 days (30 days that you actually use it which can extend over a longer period). Scanning– If you need to scan books/documents, I suggest CamScanner. It scans and turns your scans into PDFs documents, and then you can send them to your e-mail. I also use traditional scanners if I am on campus, and traditional cameras if I am in the archive. But this is an awesome resource because, let's face it, your phone has a good camera.  Organizing files– For knowing what documents I have from which archive, which one has been OCRed, etc, I use online AirTable. It's a database software but SO MUCH easier to use than access. And it looks nice. And it's free. And online.  Organizing research– A Gantt Chart. Always. How to make a good Gantt chart? Look up GanttTeam.com or something like that. I have planned my research plus the tasks for each time.  Misc: I always have a copybook, pens, and color markers on my desk, including highlighters. I often make graphic notes for prepping for lectures and I need color for that. Also, writing by hand makes your mind process your thoughts differently than typing so I always resort to hand and paper when stuck. My "drafts" notebook is full of postits, bubbles, highlights that look like a mess, but made sense to me at some point! Finally, I have page markers all over the place: my desk at home, my bag, my office in school, my pencilcase... You cannot have enough of these! 
Furniture: My first year I lived in a furnished apartment and bought a bookcase like many suggested here. On my second year, I bought this bookcase-desk combo on craiglist. Actually, the "little" bookcase on one end of the desk was the one I had before and I put it next to the big one as a bed-side table (my room is pretty small). The desk + big bookcase + office chair were like $100. Oh yeah, invest on a good chair. The guy also gave me his desk lamp . So never underestimate Craiglist for a good buy! On this topic: many schools have an office that manage furniture and many sell their old furniture really cheap, look for those. Also, ask your department to contact you with people that are leaving/graduating to see what they do with their furniture (we "inherited" a lot form older students: bedframes, side tables, washer/dryer). 
Finally, I am happy to answer any questions! All the best to new students!!!!!!  
AP
 

Well , that's great to hear about R. 
And I also don't know much about map and reduce, and I also don't know how useful it could be in my research area. I think I'd better wait and see if I will need to use those tools before I actually start learning them. 
I'll keep learning Python then. And I'll let you know if I have any other suggestions for your Web app. 

The search parameters are pretty much the same as grad cafe's.
https://grad-cafe-visualizations.herokuapp.com/

There's some good info in the Lubbock thread!

I am Kingsley Onuzurike, a recent mathematics/physics graduate of the University of Nigeria, Nsukka. I am in need of $205 to register for GRE, and will be very grateful if anyone can help. I will be applying for grad school in the US and is confident of being admitted considering my grades and possible recs. I need the GRE to complement my application. I hope someone is kind hearted enough to see me through this. I will happily answer any questions you might have. Thank you.

I was going to make a snide remark about the "Nigerian Prince" scammers changing tactics given the economic downturn, thought better of it because this seems like a reasonably earnest young man trying to go to graduate school in the US, and then checked his Reddit post history and realized he's also seeking investors in an effort to open a casino in Nigeria. 
So, it's totally a scam. Hopefully the mods will lock/delete this thread.
Link to his Reddit post history: https://www.reddit.com/user/hulega. His posts in /r/education and /r/GradSchool exactly coincide (within an hour) with the time of this post.
And, in case he deletes the Reddit account, screenshots to tell the story: http://imgur.com/a/sfwEp. I would have just attached them here, but they exceed the size limit. 

http://www.nytimes.com/interactive/business/buy-rent-calculator.html
 
Be sure to use the advanced settings to take into account things like security deposits, local taxes, etc. I also think their default assumptions for increasing property value are too high for most parts of the country, and the assumed rent increase too low.
 
We bought a year after starting grad school, and it looks like we'll save 30-60k over renting in just those four years (depends on whether the unit gains value or not, and even greater savings than that if rents continue to rise at 7-10% in our area as they have been). But we live in a very expensive rental market where condos, and our unit was bought far under market value so we are very confident of selling it, so the math was more in our favor than it might be for you. Origination fees should be fairly minimal compared to the unit cost, but if your margin is only 15k it probably isn't worth the hassle and lack of flexibility that come with home ownership--for example you can't move quickly if your neighbors are shitty or circumstances change. I honestly don't think it is worth it unless the savings are something you will really notice (eg more than a few thousand a year) or it is your dream unit. Better to save your money for a home wherever you settle for the long term after grad school, in my opinion.
 
Mortgage apps and house hunting were also essentially a full time job for a few months. Also, unless you can pay full asking price in cash, you will probably need to find a "non-conforming" loan (exceedingly hard to get post 2012 finacial reforms)--this is because most of us were previously in the work force (got W-2s), and when we switch to getting fellowships (1099-MISC) it is considered changing job type to "self-employed," and you are expected to have a 2-5 year work history proving sufficient income on the 1099s. Rediculous, I know, but try convincing the bank that your income is gauranteed despite the 1099 and you'll see how difficult this is. I had better luck with local credit unions that offered "portfolio loans," Fannie/Freddie and the big banks won't touch you.

I just accepted my offer to go to Rice University as a PhD student! Exciting!

I just accepted my offer to go to Rice University as a PhD student! Exciting!

I just accepted my offer to go to Rice University as a PhD student! Exciting!

I just accepted my offer to go to Rice University as a PhD student! Exciting!